I saw this movie in the theater when first released. It so accurately captured that time, when the Sexual Revolution was in full swing, and couples woke up together knowing virtually nothing about each other. That's how this movie opens; they don't even know each other's first name. Through flashbacks to the night before, you see Dustin Hoffman and Mia Farrow trying so hard to be cool yet successful in the frenzied meat market of the Friday night Manhattan bar scene. The morning has the two of them waking together and trying to navigate conversation, while we also hear their thoughts as they agonize over how their last statement must have sounded. The awkwardness of getting acquainted, what to ask, what not to ask, how to say it, is so genuine and palpable. At that time, the West Side was not gentrified the way it is now, so Mia describes where she lives as "a very respectable neighborhood...it only has one or two stabbings a week". The ending is asking each other's name. Sex first, names last, it's 1969.
Review of John and Mary
