Go Ask Alice (1973)

Simply Perfect

As Good As It Gets

It's easily one of the freshest, sharpest and most enjoyable films of this year.

Although I seem to have had higher expectations than I thought, the movie is super entertaining.

I can see the charm in propaganda films that are well made or fun to poke fun at. This was just dreadfully boring. Things just happen. The characters have no real motivations. The acting is just bad enough to be annoying. The camera work is all flat shots. I would prefer to be waterboarded than to watch this dull film again.

Before watching this made-for-TV movie, I had learned that the supposedly true best-selling book the movie is based on was a work of fiction. So this movie instantly had one strike against it when I sat down to watch it. And it didn't take long while watching the movie for it to rack up a number of more strikes. As I said in the subject heading, the main problem with the movie is that the controversial subject matter the movie concerns itself with - drugs - is too tamely handled. Drugs don't come across as very dangerous or deadly here, and there's the suggestion that quitting drugs is easier that what you've heard in the news. I am sure that even audiences in 1973 found this attitude quite hard to swallow. And lousy covers of classic rock songs are the icing on the cake.

I saw Go Ask Alice as a high school student, shortly after it was made. Admittedly I was a relatively sophisticated film viewer, but my reaction to it was that it was a weak effort. I found the acting wooden and the script heavy-handed. One of the scenes where the girls discover something that shocks them completely failed to shock me, perhaps because I wasn't either young enough or narrow-minded enough to find it more than mildly surprising.I would call it a period piece -- not as over-the-top as some of the more hysterical what's-wrong-with-our-kids efforts generally classified as Exploitation Films, but unfortunately not far short of that. It has the same sort of "one little slip from the straight and narrow and you're sliding toward hell" assumptions as many other morality plays, and that actually weakens it as a propaganda/educational (take your pick) effort.Maybe the book was better. Or maybe you needed to be younger (and/or female?) and see it before "the 60's" (which actually ran partly into the 70's) started fading. Or maybe you needed to be predisposed toward the lesson it was trying to teach. But as a film (never mind as a message) it just didn't work for me. If I'd had any interest in drugs (which I never have), I don't think this would have changed my mind... and it didn't succeed in convincing me that it was even a good composite picture, never mind a portrait of an individual.I will admit I have not viewed it since then. But since part of what others have discussed has been how it affected them, I felt a comment on how it failed to affect me was appropriate.Just one ex-kid's reaction. "This is the kind of movie that is liked by the kind of people who like this kind of movie. I'm not one of them."

I was 13 when I saw this movie and today at 45 it is still my favorite movie of all time. The story was so realistic in it's approach to drugs and hanging out with the bad crowd. The choices that we make and how it can affect us. I loved the music also! I think that the networks consider bringing this back on TV. The story is still relevant today as it was back than.This is one movie that you can't get out of your mind! Parent's should also see this with their children and discuss the movie afterwords. The movie didn't seem to scream in your face about drugs, it kept you interested and involved in what was going to happen next. Please get this movie on DVD if anyone can.