Al Pacino's first role in a feature film. He has a very brief scene as a cocky/sleazy Fonz-like character in a Brooklyn dance hall, reinforcing lead Patty Duke's lack of self esteem as she comes of age. She moves to "the Village" (apparently Greenwich Village) to get away from her stodgy parents and their vintage fashion. There she encounters and gets involved with a man, an architect down from Connecticut who is also trying to rediscover or reinvent himself through painting female nudes. She undergoes some of the requisite personal development but of course hasn't thought most of it through. The ending was a bust.
The majority of the runtime is colour and as such it sort-of works as an NYC time capsule, at least of making movies in that city. Could you really ride a Honda scooter in the pedestrian lanes in those days? And rent that enormous apartment on 10 USD an hour? A. Martin Zweiback's screenplay cleaves overly closely to the source material (due to him and Stanley Shapiro). Fred Coe directed. It reminded me of Adrienne Shelly's work with Hal Hartley (The Unbelievable Truth (1989), Trust (1990)) but without (enough of) the artifice.
Roger Ebert: three stars. His art is terrible. Vincent Canby. Knives out and fair enough.
