The money men at MGM let the kids act out in this shrill protest film against the establishment (themselves)in this sloppy and incoherent tract made fresh on the heels of the Kent State Massacre. It is one bad temper tantrum.
It is the dawning of the Age of Aquarious (Tune in, turn on, drop out.) and the kids have had it with the hypocrisy of their square and out of touch elders who lack their social conscious and righteous dude ethos. Simon (Bruce Davison) a jock on a crew team is at first bemused by the social action of a student group that takes over the dean's office but soon sees the light and is radicalized and ready to stand against the big bad oppressive monolith known as the system. Along the way he hooks up with an innocent and out of touch co-ed (Kim Darby's fashion statement says it all) who soon finds herself dragged into the maelstrom. Things ratchet up and we soon have the fascist pigs gassing and pummeling the beautiful people while an indifferent public at large looks on and in one case wonders if her laundry is done.
Made during a period (Easy Rider) when moguls thought youth was on to something and bank rolled their ideas The Strawberry Statement's let it all hang out style of patchy editing and bad acid camera-work is one visual downer as it clumsily jostles you along with leap cuts from one tantrum to the next. Prolific scribbler Israel Horovitz's scenario is filled with all the requisite cliché blather that puts the students into realpolitik mode but he seems at a loss to flesh out his characters beyond their smug sarcasm and hip attitude.
There's an excellent soundtrack of Neil Young tunes along with CS&N and a warbly rendition of Circle Game by Buffy Saint Marie that supplies some energy to this torpid and hackneyed lecture that the US has lost its moral compass but unfortunately the overheated passions get lost in the fog of tear gas and self righteous tedium all haphazardly put together by a director (Stuart Haggman) and cinematographer (John Woolsey) who look like they cut one too many film studies classes.
It is the dawning of the Age of Aquarious (Tune in, turn on, drop out.) and the kids have had it with the hypocrisy of their square and out of touch elders who lack their social conscious and righteous dude ethos. Simon (Bruce Davison) a jock on a crew team is at first bemused by the social action of a student group that takes over the dean's office but soon sees the light and is radicalized and ready to stand against the big bad oppressive monolith known as the system. Along the way he hooks up with an innocent and out of touch co-ed (Kim Darby's fashion statement says it all) who soon finds herself dragged into the maelstrom. Things ratchet up and we soon have the fascist pigs gassing and pummeling the beautiful people while an indifferent public at large looks on and in one case wonders if her laundry is done.
Made during a period (Easy Rider) when moguls thought youth was on to something and bank rolled their ideas The Strawberry Statement's let it all hang out style of patchy editing and bad acid camera-work is one visual downer as it clumsily jostles you along with leap cuts from one tantrum to the next. Prolific scribbler Israel Horovitz's scenario is filled with all the requisite cliché blather that puts the students into realpolitik mode but he seems at a loss to flesh out his characters beyond their smug sarcasm and hip attitude.
There's an excellent soundtrack of Neil Young tunes along with CS&N and a warbly rendition of Circle Game by Buffy Saint Marie that supplies some energy to this torpid and hackneyed lecture that the US has lost its moral compass but unfortunately the overheated passions get lost in the fog of tear gas and self righteous tedium all haphazardly put together by a director (Stuart Haggman) and cinematographer (John Woolsey) who look like they cut one too many film studies classes.