LeonLouisRicci A Haunting Story of a Middle-Aged Spinster (read virgin) Trapped into Living with Her Mother. While Obsessing with Death and Contemplating a Worthless Life, She Discovers Sex and a Possible, Positive Change in Her Completely Unsatisfying Life.Joanne Woodward Gives a Powerful Performance and the Movie is Directed with Restraint by Paul Newman. The Third Act is the Weakest but Getting there is Strong Cinema. Rachel's Mind Games that She Plays with Herself (not the flashbacks) are Quickly, Neatly, and Effectively Cut into the Drama and these Little Bits of Business go almost Unnoticed but do Reside in the Sub Conscious.This Stylistic Flourish is all but Abandon in the Second Half, Probably because of Rachel Finally Discovering Something that allowed Her to be Released from Her "Cage". Her New Found Carnal Knowledge was Wonderful for Her Emotional Maturity but the Film doesn't Hold the Grip it Once Held After that.But Overall it is quite a Strong Story with a Fine Cast and one of those "Ground Breaking" Experiments that were Unleashed on the Movie Going Public as the Studio System Collapsed and the Rules of the Game began to Change.

Bill Slocum A film that draws its greatest power from its most subtle, fragile moments, "Rachel, Rachel" is a sweet coming-of-age drama where the subject is a woman neither in her teens or early twenties, but of an age where she has begun giving up on anything special ever happening to her.Joanne Woodward embodies the title role with disarming ease, a frumpy small-town teacher who lives with her mother above a funeral parlor. Rachel's life consists largely on flashing back on her childhood and her relationship with her dead father. As summer sets in, new opportunities to experience life emerge in Rachel's life, just as she develops an appetite for change."Nothing is real," she says, echoing John Lennon from about this same time. "Nothing is now."The film can be divided in two parts. The first part establishes Rachel and her surroundings in a quiet, almost eventless way. The director, Paul Newman, obviously knew actors, especially Woodward, and gives his cast ample space to find their voices. Woodward and Estelle Parsons as Rachel's teacher friend Calla were both nominated for Oscars, and Woodward and Newman both won Golden Globes, but the standout for me is Kate Harrington as Rachel's needling, passive-aggressive mother."I'm not criticizing, dear," she tells Rachel gleefully after discovering her daughter forgot to bring her the candy bar she asked for. "We all forget sometimes. Anyhow I got it myself. I took a nice long walk in the heat." She emphasizes that final consonant wonderfully.The second part revolves around Nick, the guy with the key to releasing the woman inside the overgrown girl Rachel has become. James Olson gets all he can out of playing Nick, smug, coy, self-loathing. He's a fellow teacher home from the big city who Rachel knew as a boy, not all bad but prone to saying even complimentary things in a caustic way. "How polite and well brought-up you are," he tells Rachel in one of many uncomfortable moments Olson delivers well.Terry Kiser, best known today as the title walking-dead guy from the "Weekend At Bernie's" series, shines as a charismatic preacher, while Donald Moffat plays Rachel's father in a series of enigmatic, effective flashbacks with Woodward and Newman's real-life daughter Nell Potts as Rachel. It's a real family affair; Newman himself can be heard if not seen as a character in a scary movie Rachel and Nick go see.On the whole, this is a solid and worthwhile film, very much a product of its times yet ahead of them, too. The surreal peeks we get of Rachel's active imagination point toward the less-tethered but more scattershot mind-flipping of films to come like "Midnight Cowboy" and "Catch-22."Newman also gets a lot of value from the more rural enclaves of Fairfield County, Connecticut, looking very beautiful but a bit oppressive. A visit to the cemetery reveals Rachel has her own grave laid out already, with a tombstone bearing both her and her mother's name!There are things that seem under-realized. Kiser's church service is an overacted mash which feels like a shrill send-up rather than the transforming experience presented in Margaret Laurence's source novel, "A Jest Of God." Also left without resolution are some early bits of business involving the principal at Rachel's school and a little boy Rachel dreams of adopting. By the way, the boy wears a holster with toy guns to class. This really was shot 45 years ago!Today, "Rachel, Rachel" is best known as a tour de force for Woodward, as it should be. She commands our attention even as her character seems desperate to escape our notice. Can Rachel survive in the big, bad world? You may not know for certain in the end, but Woodward, with Newman's able support, makes sure you care.

Nazi_Fighter_David In a variation on her "Long Hot Summer" role, Woodward plays a sexually repressed schoolteacher in a small New England town who realizes that life is passing her by… She is thirty-five, a virgin, and dominated by her mother… During the summer, she has an affair with an old schoolmate… It proves disappointing, but she now knows that she can be loving, and determines to leave town and do something about her life—a move that seems only tentatively hopeful… Woodward gives her finest performance as the confused, frequently beaten but ultimately indestructible woman… She has an extraordinary ability to look natural or simple and still reveal an inner radiance…There are many touching moments: her timidness at the religious meeting; her awkward experiences with men; her late-night discussion with a likable male friend; and, most unforgettable, her face causing change from joyous expectancy to merely suppressed hysteria to a painful outburst of tears when she discovers that, contrary to her hopes, she is not pregnant... Newman shows a natural cinematic sense in his perceptive depictions of small town life, the frenzied activity of a revival meeting and the anxieties of a first sexual experience; and in his clever, rarely impressive juxtaposition of Rachel's present with her fantasies and childhood memories… He gets excellent performances from Estelle Parsons as another lonely teacher and James Olson as the cynical big-city man who lets Rachel down…Both Newman and Woodward won Golden Globe Awards… Woodward won the coveted New York Film Critics' Award, and was nominated for an Oscar

kevintinsley I was surprised to find this movie on HBO Signature channel early this morning, and just as surprised to love it, and to never before have heard of it. With this being Paul Newman's directorial debut, and starring Joanne Woodward, you would think it would be better known than it is. This is a wonderfully moving illustration of small town life before the onset of the modern world, with all of the good and bad that went along with it. It reminded me of growing up in a small town with all of the petty gossip as well as all of the wonderful friendships. Rachel is repressed in many ways by her past relationship with her late father as well as dealing with her not-so-invalid mother, who she serves as a sort of girl Friday. When she finally gets a chance to come out of her shell, she passes it up once before finally reaching out to find all she has missed in her life. Joanne Woodward gives one of the finest performances of her career, with her understated beauty contrasting so much with the intense repression of her character. All in all, this is one movie that deserves far more acclaim than it has received as a study of that small town life we all have left behind, and all that we have learned since.