It's been fifty years since I last saw this oddity in its original release and by now the controversies it created have been crowded into irrelevance by every similar movie about the "sexual revolution" made since. In the intervening years I lived a life: raised a family more or less successfully, served in the US Navy, struggled in a variety of jobs, earned a Master of Social Work in my Forties and became a Clinical Social Worker and psychotherapist; not a particularly remarkable life story but I mention it because ME 2023 has a few more filters through which to view this movie than did ME 1973. I also have strong memories of growing up during those times and participating in "encounter groups" and "t-groups" in which half dressed, hyper-hormonal college underclasspersons rolled around on the Student Center floor and ecstatically rubbed each other in the belief that such sexy antics would transform the world. I used to call these extracurricular activities "Group Grope" and admit that I was less interested in saving the world than I was in seeing naked classmates. I was 18-21, after all.
So. Seeing this movie again after all that living and growing, I have a question. Why? Why did so many elite intellectuals make their life mission the dismantling of millennia of social norms, many of which have practical foundations. In the movie, the elites represented by the Tenhousens are never questioned about the goal of their mandated habitation and intimacy. No empirical evidence is referenced, no meta analysis of peer reviewed studies and/or journal articles is mentioned, and there does not appear to be any attempt at assessment and reassessment during "the Experiment" with an eye to publishing their findings in service of the Greater Good of the World. In fact, early on we see a conversation between the married Tenhousens in which they have taken steps through their selection process to eliminate any applicant who they believe may cause them legal problems or even charges of rape. So this means that their sample is already skewed away from study participants who may challenge their views. They also utilized an ally on the college board to assure their funding in the face of mounting questions about the "Experiment". Another point is that there was no control group. Everyone was in the same group instead of being put into either A. The mandated habitation/intimacy group B. A mandated non-habitation/non-intimacy group or C. A group of participants given solitary lodging and advised that they could choose to accept or opt-out of intimacy as they wished. It would still be a flawed study, but closer to a scientific model. I'll leave the lack of LGB characters to other reviewers to skewer.
Yeah, it's only a movie based on a novel and did not actually happen but it calls to mind some of the real world "experiments" from those days, like those of Stanley Milgram and John Money, most of which were found to be highly unethical and would never be repeated today. It's been said that Politics is downstream from Culture, so intellectually bankrupt movies and even documentaries based on spurious assumptions and historical inaccuracy are still being made and still influencing beliefs and public policies.
Back in those days, we used to wear a button that said "Question Authority". It was a good idea then and a better idea today.
I gave this 2 stars instead of 1 or none because it was fun to see all the naked coeds. Maybe fifty years haven't changed me that much in some areas LOL.
So. Seeing this movie again after all that living and growing, I have a question. Why? Why did so many elite intellectuals make their life mission the dismantling of millennia of social norms, many of which have practical foundations. In the movie, the elites represented by the Tenhousens are never questioned about the goal of their mandated habitation and intimacy. No empirical evidence is referenced, no meta analysis of peer reviewed studies and/or journal articles is mentioned, and there does not appear to be any attempt at assessment and reassessment during "the Experiment" with an eye to publishing their findings in service of the Greater Good of the World. In fact, early on we see a conversation between the married Tenhousens in which they have taken steps through their selection process to eliminate any applicant who they believe may cause them legal problems or even charges of rape. So this means that their sample is already skewed away from study participants who may challenge their views. They also utilized an ally on the college board to assure their funding in the face of mounting questions about the "Experiment". Another point is that there was no control group. Everyone was in the same group instead of being put into either A. The mandated habitation/intimacy group B. A mandated non-habitation/non-intimacy group or C. A group of participants given solitary lodging and advised that they could choose to accept or opt-out of intimacy as they wished. It would still be a flawed study, but closer to a scientific model. I'll leave the lack of LGB characters to other reviewers to skewer.
Yeah, it's only a movie based on a novel and did not actually happen but it calls to mind some of the real world "experiments" from those days, like those of Stanley Milgram and John Money, most of which were found to be highly unethical and would never be repeated today. It's been said that Politics is downstream from Culture, so intellectually bankrupt movies and even documentaries based on spurious assumptions and historical inaccuracy are still being made and still influencing beliefs and public policies.
Back in those days, we used to wear a button that said "Question Authority". It was a good idea then and a better idea today.
I gave this 2 stars instead of 1 or none because it was fun to see all the naked coeds. Maybe fifty years haven't changed me that much in some areas LOL.