The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman (1974)

          Three years before the miniseries Roots (1977) became an unexpected ratings blockbuster and opened many Americans’ eyes to the breadth of suffering that Africans and their U.S.-born children endured during a century of American slavery, The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman explored similar subject matter and earned a reputation as one of the best TV movies ever made. (Accolades showered upon the film included nine Emmy awards.) Based on a novel by Ernest J. Gaines, The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman is purely fictional, depicting a 110-year-old woman as she recalls her life from the Civil War in the 1860s to the Civil Rights era in the 1960s. Gaines’ clever structure, which involves a journalist asking Miss Jane Pittman for her memories, allows the film to present vignettes that illustrate myriad forms of abuse, oppression, and prejudice. Through each harrowing episode, themes of dignity and perseverance dominate, so the movie offers both an indictment of racist social structures and a tribute to the people who survived life within those structures.

          At the beginning of the picture, Jane (Cicely Tyson) is physically frail but mentally sharp, so she’s able to oblige a request from New York reporter Quentin Lerner (Michael Murphy) for a description of her life. Most of the film unfolds in flashbacks, with Valerie Odell playing the title character as a child in a few scenes and Tyson handling most of the performance. Some of the experiences that Jane describes are historic, as when a plantation owner grants young Jane her freedom, and some are horrific, as when racist vigilantes attack a group of ex-slaves, leaving Jane to fend for herself in unfriendly territory. Each time Jane finds joy, tragedy follows. Her happy marriage to Joe Pittman (Rod Perry) ends prematurely, and her guardianship of an orphan named Ned (played by three different actors) takes a dark turn. Jane recalls the tribulations of Reconstruction, during which northern carpetbaggers plundered the demolished American south, and she describes how working as a sharecropper following emancipation was simply another form of slavery. Yet the filmmakers never take the easy path of suggesting that Jane was some pivotal historical figure--excepting her incredible strength of character, she is an everywoman representing the African-American experience. Only at the very end of the story do the filmmakers gift Jane with “importance,” thanks to a climactic scene that encapsulates Jane’s mode of quiet defiance.

          Finding fault with The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman is not an impossible task, but only the most hard-hearted would try. The film’s politics are humane, and the story’s engagement with history is meaningful and unflinching. If no one real person actually had all of Jane’s experiences, so what? The stories of thousands who lived through the nightmare of slavery and its aftermath remain untold, so this fictional character speaks for them. Tyson does fine work, even when slathered in award-winning old-age makeup created by Dick Smith and Stan Winston. She plays every scene with emotion and sincerity, resisting many opportunities for cheap sentimentality and instead sketching a portrait infused with pride and resilience. The supporting cast is fine, the script by Tracy Keenan Wynn is efficient, and the direction by John Korty is unobtrusive, but the experience of The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman is all about watching Tyson channel decades of suffering through a prism of embattled self-respect.

The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman: RIGHT ON

Tribes (1970)

          Simultaneously disciplined and impassioned, the TV movie Tribes—which also received a small theatrical release—examines how the Generation Gap complicated America’s experience of the Vietnam War. Creating a simple conflict between characters who represent opposing ends of the political spectrum, the picture pits hard-driving drill instructor Drake (Darren McGavin) against hippie recruit Adrian (Jan-Michael Vincent). Initially determined to break down Adrian’s resistance in order to instill other recruits with respect for military duty, Drake slowly peels back his opponent’s layers and, as a result of that process, grows to respect the younger man’s pacifist attitude.

          On the surface, this storyline may sound absurdly contrived—peacenik softens warmonger—but Tribes works because it approaches Drake’s transformation with patience and respect. Instead of portraying the drill instructor as a bloodthirsty monster who unquestionably feeds the military machine with fresh meat, the filmmakers—director Joseph Sargent and writers Marvin Schwartz and Tracy Keenan Wynn—paint Drake as a complex man confronted with changing times. Adrian, meanwhile, is a compendium of counterculture signifiers (enigmatic silences, long hair, yoga meditation postures, etc.), so it’s natural that Drake would find Adrian distasteful at first glance. Yet as the men wage their battle of wills—which Drake eventually learns is one-sided, since Adrian is, metaphorically speaking, making love not war—both characters develop empathy. Make no mistake, the filmmakers align themselves with Adrian’s antiwar stance. Yet in avoiding the obvious play of making Drake a monster, the filmmakers open the door to a touching statement about the human capacity for change. In the world of Tribes, compassion is the most valuable commodity.
          Even within the boundaries of a tight TV-movie budget, Sargent integrates feature-style flourishes that give Tribes a hint of poetry. The twee theme song succinctly articulates how America divided into antiwar and pro-war factions (key lyric: “tribes are gathering”), and crisp flashbacks are used to illustrate the gentle romantic vignettes that Adrian summons when centering himself during yoga. Better still, the flourishes complement otherwise straightforward storytelling, so the cinematic style echoes the initial gulf between Drake’s rigid existence and Adrian’s transcendent journey. The very different energies of the leading actors contribute to the effect, with McGavin incarnating man’s-man irascibility and Vincent channeling mellow Age of Aquarius vibes. Everything good about Tribes converges in the ending, which appropriately—and somewhat movingly—encapsulates the way the principal characters alter each other’s destinies.

Tribes: GROOVY

The Longest Yard (1974)

          A great sports movie, a memorable comedy, and one of leading man Burt Reynolds’ best films, The Longest Yard is also a potent expression of anti-Establishment rage, channeling the tenor of its time through the unlikely prism of a gridiron saga set behind bars. Directed by action master Robert Aldrich at his sharpest, the movie blends brutal football violence with intense prison clashes to create a pervasive vibe of us-vs.-them tension. The film’s humor emerges organically from character and circumstance, and the script (by Albert S. Ruddy and Tracy Keenan Wynn) is filled with characters who are strangely believable even though many of them should seem absurd. The prison angle justifies the presence of extreme personalities, and the cast—which mostly comprises character actors and real-life athletes—seizes the story’s ample opportunities for super-sized moments.

          Reynolds stars as Paul “Wrecking” Crewe, a former pro quarterback whose career was tarnished by a point-shaving scandal. After a fight with his girlfriend, Paul gets drunk and instigates a police chase. Then he’s thrown into a prison run by sports nut Warden Rudolph Hazen (Eddie Albert). Hazen has organized his guards into a football squad, and he expects Paul to coach the team while incarcerated. Paul refuses, so he’s put on backbreaking labor duty. Eventually, Paul accepts the even less enticing offer of quarterbacking a team of inmates during an exhibition game against the guards. Although it’s understood that Hazen expects the guards to win, Paul inspires his fellow convicts by saying the game is a chance to pummel their oppressors. The plot goes through several twists past this point, and interesting relationships develop between Paul, the guards, and the inmates. For some participants, the athletic competition is about demonstrating power and superiority, and for others, it’s an unlikely means of reclaiming human dignity. And if none of this sounds particularly funny, rest assured The Longest Yard is filled with wicked humor, even as the storyline deftly integrates dramatic (and even tragic) elements.

          The centerpiece of the movie is, of course, the big game, which stands alongside the football match in M*A*S*H (1970) as one of the funniest gridiron sequences in movie history. Real-life college football hero Reynolds thrives here, infusing his role with the sardonic attitude that distinguishes his best performances, and Hollywood veteran Albert makes a terrific villain by portraying a man whose greatest weakness is his arrogant reliance on power. Among the large supporting cast, standouts include Michael Conrad as a disgraced NFL player, James Hampton as Paul’s amiable sidekick, and Ed Lauter as the cruel QB of the guards’ team. (Bernadette Peters has a small but amusing role as the warden’s va-va-voom secretary.) The Longest Yard was loosely remade in 2001 as the Vinnie Jones movie Mean Machine, and directly remade in 2005, with Adam Sandler taking over the Reynolds role. Stick with the original.

The Longest Yard: RIGHT ON

The Glass House (1972)

          For an early-’70s social-issue telefilm, The Glass House has an impressive pedigree: Truman Capote co-wrote the story, and ace scribe Tracy Keenan Wynn (The Longest Yard) wrote the teleplay. Alan Alda stars as Jonathan Paige, a college professor convicted of manslaughter for inadvertently killing the man who injured Paige’s wife in a car accident. He’s sent to prison on the same day that an idealistic guard, Brian Courtland (Clu Gulager), starts work at the institution, and as these unsuspecting men fall into the web of corruption and violence spun by prison overlord Hugo Slocum (Vic Morrow), a brutal killer incarcerated for life, the heroes come to realize the hopelessness of escaping, much less changing, the merciless status quo inside the big house.

          Paige’s descent is tied to the abuse visited upon a sweet-faced young man (Kristoffer Tabori) whom Paige fails to protect, and Courtland’s disillusionment stems from his realization that the aged warden (Dean Jagger) is content to let inmates kill each other. Unobtrusively directed by journeyman helmer Tom Gries, the picture moves at a strong pace from the bleak opening sequence to the horrific finale, making a simple statement about the seeming impossibility of retaining humanity inside a maximum-security lockup.

          Abetted tremendously by Alda’s characteristically sensitive performance, the script does a strong job of depicting Paige as a man who can’t win: Keeping to himself doesn’t steer the professor clear of danger, and neither does taking a principled stand. What’s more, the script expertly weaves together various strong personalities, with Morrow commanding the screen as a predatory monster, and Tabori giving a poignant turn as innocent doomed by circumstance. Billy Dee Williams shows up in an important featured role, and the film slyly employs his super-cool swagger to present a complex character who’s part peacenik, part revolutionary, and part straight-up badass. Depressing but focused and purposeful, The Glass House is solid stuff.

The Glass House: GROOVY