Charly

Charly (Ralph Nelson, 1968) - C+

So there I was, admiring the movie's straightforward, unadorned feel -- which, oddly enough, makes Cliff Robertson in "full retard" mode a less grating presence by not drawing attention to it -- when it went off the deep end on me. I suppose the stylistic fireworks that ultimately dominate were necessary to obfuscate the fact that the movie doesn't really have time to tell this story properly. The last 40 minutes are a mad dash to the finish, with the central romance essentially confined to a brief abstract montage, the big diatribe against modernity coming out of nowhere, and the nightmarish (and frankly ridiculous) fantasy "chase" sequence evaporating as abruptly as it begins. The ending does work, and the whole thing can be read as a metaphor for humanity in general (the human species emerges from the ooze and gets to the point where it can consider its own consciousness and intelligence, only its technological progress threatens to send it back to the stone age), but this called for a more patient, less emphatic approach.