GOING ALL THE WAY By Harvey Karten, Ph.D. Gramercy Pictures Director: Mark Pellington Writer: Dan Wakefield Cast: Jeremy Davies, Ben Affleck, Jill Clayburgh, Amy Locane, Rachel Weisz, Rose McGowan, Lesley Ann Warren, Cup A' Joe. Perhaps the most intriguing thing about "Going All the Way" is its subtext. Since the title refers, of course, to every young man's desire in the 1950s to have sex and not simply to neck, you might think that Mark Pellington's film would show that this was a consummation devoutly to be wished. Instead, the sex comes easy, not only with the girls who, in one character's words, are hot to trot, but also with the girl next door. What's more the sex is easily available not only to superjocks but to nerds as well. As if that were not enough, "Going All the Way," based on Dan Wakefield's 1981 novel, does not even take place in New York or L.A. or some progressive college towns, but in Indianapolis, for Pete's sake. Could it be?
But that's almost besides the point. Despite the cornucopia of satisfactions available to the smooth, swinging bachelor, Gunner Casselman (Ben Affleck) and to the painfully inarticulate, inner-directed amateur photographer Sonny Burns (Jeremy Davies), the two are not content. After all, they're just a tad older than J.D. Salinger's Holden Caulfield and so it's fashionable for them to feel the angst which is de rigueur even among today's twenty-somethings. In fact, Kurt Vonnegut actually called Wakefield's novel the "Catcher in the Rye" of the Midwest. That it is, and as filmed with a discrete portion of MTV-like images by the director-- whose background includes the taking charge of music videos for PM Dawn, Malcolm McLaren and De La Soul--"Going All the Way" is a sensitive, funny, and at times heartbreaking story of two young men who form an unlikely duo but who team up to help each other to come of age. The story opens on a train to Indianapolis. Gunner Casselman, who saw violent action in Korea 1950-53 and a more pleasurable kind of activity in Japan, is returning home. He meets Sonny Burns, a repressed photographer with whom he went to school and takes an immediate liking to him despite their distinct temperaments. Pellington makes their differences clear from the start: seated for a while in the dining car, Burns cannot get the waiter's attention, while Casselman orders a beer before he even takes a seat, and gets it immediately. The picture follows their adventures and conflicts with the women in their lives. Casselman's mom (Lesley Ann Warren) is a textbook Oedipal case, a slinky, prejudiced woman who seems scarcely older than her athletic son. Burns's mother (Jill Clayburgh) is smothering, religious by nature, who is horrified by her boy's friendship with the assertive Casselman. While Burns, who by all rights should scarcely attract a fly if he were drowning in honey, makes the scene with the girl next door (Amy Locane) and with the sexy Gale (Rose McGowan), Casselman does likewise with his own easy conquests, but is truly bowled over by the alluring and sophisticated Marty (Rachel Weisz). There is more to life than sex, screenwriter/novelist Dan Wakefield has the audacity to maintain. Both fellows seem to have what they need, yet they yearn to leave home, to depart from the conventions and pseudo-religious hoopla of their Indianapolis suburb and head East to find the meaning of life- -that's East to New York, not Benares. Jeremy Davies is absolutely perfect in the role of a guy who stutters so much he may remind you of a young Bob Newhart, and Ben Affleck provides macho and convincing support for his friend while continuing the learning experience he began in Japan when introduced to Zen Buddhism. The movie has its share of fun scenes, some featuring brief dream sequences, and one in particular when Sonny enters a fundamentalist church to ask for directions to a whorehouse. You may wonder why Sonny is never turned on by his sweet, beautiful, girl next door played by the captivating Lesley Ann Warren. You may also wonder why both of these fellows are so alienated and can ponder what they expect to find in New York to liberate themselves. Whatever the answers, "Going All the Way" is intelligent, sensitive, amusing. Rated R. Running Time: 103 minutes. (C) 1997 Hollywood Hotline
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