Splendor in the Grass (1961)

Star Rating: 4
Length of Film: 124 minutes
Director: Elia Kazan
Cast: Natalie Wood, Pat Hingle, Audrey Christie, Barbara Loden, Zohra Lampert, Warren Beatty, Fred Stewart, Joanna Roos, John McGoverrn, Jan Norris, Martine Bartlett, Gary Lockwood, Sandy Dennis, Crystal Field, & Marla Adams
Oscar: William Inge (screenplay)
Oscar Nomination: Natalie Wood (actress)




Set in Kansas 1928, Dean (Natalie Wood) & Bud (Warren Beatty) have been going steady for 4 years. The movie starts out with the two main characters in a parked card facing a waterfall making out. Things start getting hot and heavy...

Deanie- Bud..
Bud- Deanie, please..
Deanie- Bud, I'm afraid. Oh Bud...don't, Bud.
Bud- Deanie...
Deanie- No...we mustn't, Bud...no...no...
[Bud gets out of the car]
Deanie- Bud, don't be mad
Bud- I better take you home

Bud has a sister, named Ginny (Barbara Loden) who's very promiscuous; she's already had an abortion, and an annulled marriage, to say the least, she's very experienced, sexually. Bud becomes frustrated not getting any from Deanie, after 4 years of dating, and discusses it with his father. His father Ace, (Pat Hingle) tells him NOT to get married, and that he needs to go to school first. Once he's done with college, then he can marry Deanie. Dad even offered to pay for their honeymoon. Then...dad told Bud to find another girl, to fulfill his needs, sexually. He breaks it off with Deanie, and goes for the girl with the reputation for giving it away, sending Deanie into a depression.

Deanie's mother (Audrey Christie) kept pushing Deanie, asking if she has given herself to Bud and that's why she's upset. This whole scene is going on while Deanie is taking a bath. This is Deanie's response:
"No mom! I'm not spoiled! I'm not spoiled mom! I'm just as fresh and virginal like the day I was born, mom!"

Very powerful! Natalie Wood did a really good job playing a teenager whose life was turned upside after being broken up by her longtime boyfriend. She didn't know where her place was in the world anymore, especially since her life was wrapped around Bud. She had to deal with the stress that her boyfriend broke up with her, because she wouldn't have sex with him.

During English class, she had to sit behind the girl who her ex boyfriend is currently sleeping with and the teacher reads a poem by William Wordsworth:

"That though the radiance which was once so bright be now forever taken from my sight. Though nothing can bring back the hour of splendor in the grass, glory in the flower. We will grieve not, rather find strength in what remains behind."

The teacher calls on Deanie, she gives her interpretation of the poem, and asks to be excused, storming out crying. Deanie mopes around the house for months, and her girlfriends bring up the dance, Bud's friend "Toots" (Gary Lockwood) asks Bud permission he could ask Deanie. Bud agrees, and he asks Deanie. While getting ready, Deanie sings the same song, that promiscuous Ginny was singing. Deanie is not the same girl she was in the beginning of the movie. She cut her hair, and dressed more seductress like, in a red dress, revealing her shoulders.

Toots puts the moves on Deanie (at the same spot where Bud took Deanie in the beginning of the movie). She got upset and ran towards the rocks, started climbing, and was headed toward the waterfall, jumping to her death. Classmates caught her before she could, and her parents decided to send her to a hospital, for help.

While Deanie is in the mental institution, Bud goes off to Yale, where he can't focus, and ends up being kicked out. Depressed and drinkin, he meets an italian waitress named Angie. She flirts with him and invites him to the kitchen for pizza.

He's so handsome! I absolutely loved him in Bonnie & Clyde

Time goes by and we visit Deanie at the hospital. She is painting and chatting with a man. Deanie's parents visit and invite her to dinner at their hotel, and she turns to her nurse for guidance. She speaks up and tells the parents shes had a long day and needs her rest.

After 2 years being hospitalized, Deanie goes back home and is engaged to a doctor she met at the hospital, he was also a patient. While at home, the first thing Deanie wanted to do was visit Bud. Her mom tried to sidetrack Deanie, but she was determined to see him. Her father, gave Deanie the address, and she went with two of her friends from school to see Bud.

Deanie got the closure she needed...foreshadowing to the quote Deanie read in school, 2 years ago. "Though nothing can bring back the hour of splendor in the grass, glory in the flower. We will grieve not, rather find strength in what remains behind."