User Reviews

Charly is an extremely kind, caring but mentally disabled man, living in a rigid society of the late 60's when little was known about mental disabilities, and anyone suffering from autism, Asperger's, Down's, etc. was stuck with the label "retarded." Charly undergoes an experimental treatment that changes his mind to that of a genius, but similar to the adverse effects on experimental subjects in 'A Clockwork Orange' and 'Firestarter', his genius mind has effects which are unwanted, on both Charly and the mouse, Algernon, that the treatment was tested on. Charly proves, through experiencing proper education, social interaction, love and imagination, things people had kept from him in the past, that he isn't just another statistic, he isn't just an experiment, he's a person, and messing with a person's mind, no matter the reason, can always have a chance of danger.

I read 'Flowers for Algernon' in school, but because of the outdated view on mental retardation at the time this film was made, they refused to show it in class, which I can honestly understand. Autism has been in my family a while now and it's a difficult thing for people, especially young adults, to accept. I bought the film myself and watched it, and was very shocked at how close to the book and how sad it was. It was produced around the 'Summer of Love' and along with The Baby (1973), was the first film, although by today's standards both are highly outdated, to break the silence on the subject of mental disabilities. This led the way for various other films such as The Secret (1992), Dark Night of the Scarecrow (1981) and Phoebe in Wonderland (2008), movies that point out that people with trouble learning and doing certain things are not idiots, they just have a unique way of thinking and seeing the world.

The soundtrack was an eerie melody of 60's-style hippie type music, melancholy at some points and cheerful at others. The acting, especially from Charly's character, was amazing, especially when considering the actor played both the part of a genius, and who society called a "retard", it's a huge contrast and I imagine quite a role reversal to portray.

Charly (also known as Flowers for Algernon), is a powerful and thought-provoking film that may change the way all of us view life, the way we all view and judge people, based on anything different, and maybe we should all think twice about what we see as "normal".

CHARLY is an interesting movie to watch because its premise is the antithesis of the premise in ETERNAL SUNSHINE OF THE SPOTLESS MIND. Where in Michael Gondry's movie, Carrey undergoes a traumatic experiment where he erases his mind to get rid of the memory of his great love, Cliff Robertson, playing Charly Gordon, a mentally disabled man who works in menial labor, gets a major life change: an experiment to elevate his mental activity. While you may not see the parallels in both movies, I could.

Both processes are, essentially, brain damage. One of them causes terminal amnesia and even then it's not guaranteed because the two lovers -- Carrey and Winslet -- gravitate towards each other as if they were meeting for the first time. Charly's is a breakthrough: it opens the doors of not only his perception of the world and his placement in it, but to his heart because he is able to express his love for Alice Kinian, the woman who has been the link between him and the world of intelligence. The problem being that his newfound intelligence is temporary.

CHARLY as a movie feels of its time and much of the visual exposition -- split scenes, bright colors, and inserts -- are purely late Sixties. There is even a psychedelic romp that Charly indulges in that seems to be a precursor to EASY RIDER at some point, and his walk in the woods with Alice all but evokes the folksy music of soft rock bands like Bread. However, the science fiction aspect of the story is able to transplant it to any other time frame despite the fashions and the overall look: it could happen today with the advance of science-fact.

The one point where the movie falls short of being excellent is at the moment when Charly is told that he'll revert back to his former self. True, we're given glimpses here and there, but there is a much too abrupt ending that shows him back at a child's state, still dressed as a man, playing with children on a see-saw. I guess the people involved in the production thought it would have been too much for the movie-going public of 1968 to see Charly suffer the effects of his regression, leaving the movie with that one scene in which he tells Alice to leave him alone, followed by the closing playground scene.

Even so, CHARLY is full of beautiful, understated acting. Cliff Robertson is detailed in his characters idiocy, not making Charly a one-note object of pity but a human being who is loved by his co-workers. He evolves into a man full of this frightening intelligence who becomes the thermometer of the way the world is heading, going so far as to denounce the state of the cold war and America's complacent society which echoes FAHRENHEIT 451 when he addresses that education comes from television. Claire Bloom has a role that could be thankless but isn't -- as Alice, she has a lovely, sensitive presence that complements Robertson's completely.

Contains Spoilers

Charly, a movie directed by Ralph Nelson in 1968 and adapted from the novel Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keyes, is a moving case study of what could happen to a mentally retarded person who suddenly becomes a genius. Cliff Robertson won an Academy Award for Best Actor as he portrays Charly Gordon, a 30 year retarded man who has an IQ of 56. Charly's life is a simple one, yet he continually strives to improve it both socially and intellectually.

As the movie begins, Charly is working as a janitor in a bakery and going to night classes. In the evening, where Charly attends school, he is selected to participate in an experimental scientific research project that will improve his intellect. His teacher, Alice Kinnian, played by Claire Bloom, is very protective of Charly and he, as her pupil, does everything she asks of him. Prior to the surgery, Charly competes against a mouse, Algernon, to see who can get to the center of a maze first. Charly is dismayed when the Algernon wins and, when he finds out that Algernon beat him because he has already undergone the experimental surgery, Charly decides that he wants to have the surgery too.

During the day, Charly does his best to fit in with the other employees at work. Unfortunately, they see Charly as a good-natured moron and they constantly find ways to tease and humiliate Charly. It seems that they do not think that they are harming him, as he appears oblivious to the fact that they are using him for their own amusement. One scene that stands out is when they allow him to work one of the machines and the dough in it overflows. As Charly tries to push it back into the machine, he gets completely covered by the dough. After his surgery, this scene is dramatically juxtaposed against a similar one as he unwittingly humiliates them when one of their schemes backfire because he learns how to operate a similar machine in a few minutes.

Together, these two scenes create the most poignant moments in the film, in my opinion. While they laugh heartily at Charly's failures, they are dumbfounded and disheartened at his success. I believe that they felt better about themselves when they felt superior to Charly. However, when they could no longer make him the butt of their jokes, they become almost fearful of him and he loses their friendship. This is a very dramatic way of saying that it is very lonely at the top and gives insight to how those who are intellectually gifted are treated and how they feel. To further illustrate this, Charly is dismissed from his job after he shows the plant manager how the bakery could save a lot of money by improving its production. Just as the other employees became wary after Charly's intellect blossoms, the manager seems equally threatened by Charly and fires him.

Charly's intellect grows, he becomes an insatiable learner and reads books by the dozens. He also becomes enamored with his teacher, but he is emotionally unprepared when she refuses his advances. In dealing with this rejection, Charly leaves town and travels all over the country on a motorcycle, encountering many different types of experiences so that he can mature emotionally. Eventually, he wins over his teacher and they begin a romantic relationship.

Upon his return to town, he is informed that Algernon has lost his intellectual capacity and, ultimately, died. Knowing that this will happen to him as well, Charly embarks on a quest to prevent this from happening. He learns everything that the doctors know and begins his own research. Unfortunately, he discovers that it is not possible to inhibit the reversal of the downward process his intellect will experience. As he acknowledges that his own demise is inevitable, we are left to reflect upon whether each of us would want to be a shining star for a fleeting moment or a dusty moon that only reflects others' light.

First I would like to say that I'm a fan of cinema and music from the period 1966-1974. For me, maybe it's the most fertile period in these two segments of art in the last 100 years or even a little more, a time when good and popular work was directly linked to quality, talent and creativity. From 1974 or 75 onwards, I think that the concept of quality began to shift directly towards to more commercial and formulaic productions, from disco, new wave and dance music to action, rom-com and laser beams sci-fi movies.

It's a shame that the time was very cruel with cinema dating some wonderful works, mainly due to technology, special effects and production resources. Some movies from that period today no longer has the same devastating effect that it once had, unlike music, where even today I think is more pleasurable the listening of Beatles, Dylan, Hendrix, Sabbath, Janis, Velvet Underground, Renaissance, Pink Floyd, Zeppelin, etc., than the current artists.

Even though I've watched a huge number of films from that period throughout my life, "Charly" unfortunately went blank on this list, I watched it for the first time this week, and I was obviously influenced by the dated quality. I still thought it's a good film, but not excellent.

The entire 1st act while Charly (Cliff Robertson) suffers from cognitive impairment is brilliant. I was amazed this entire segment and thinking that I was watching another great film, but unfortunately the script didn't develop well Charly's change to a genius, it was extremely abrupt and empty, just as the construction of the romance between him and Alice (Claire Bloom) was devoid of any naturalness and involvement, going from a crude scene of almost rape to a vague sequence of love in bucolic landscapes from one moment to the next, it had an evident drop in pace and narrative from the 2nd act onwards and got lost a lot, not to mention that the ending, which clearly wanted to be impactful, didn't achieve its objective because it was already a bit noticeable. Cliff Robertson and beautiful Claire Bloom managed to maintain their work at a very high level during 140 minutes, but the script and direction didn't.

I rate it 10 for the actors, 7 for the film as a whole.

It's been too long since I read "Flowers for Algernon" to draw a comparison with "Charly', although other reviewers on this board state that the film doesn't do Daniel Keyes' novel justice. I'm willing to go along with that, as there were a handful of scenes that didn't lend themselves to the continuity of Charly Gordon's (Cliff Robertson) transition from a mentally challenged adult to questionable genius level. I had two main problems with the story line, the first being the physical attack against Alice (Claire Bloom), which some would no doubt consider a sexual assault. That episode certainly didn't reconcile itself to the romantic relationship that eventually evolved between them. The other aspect that fostered concern was the destructive behavior Charly engaged in following that initial rejection. That seemed credible enough on the face it, but that entire biker period sequence seemed just so unnecessary. It didn't really fit into the picture at all.

Even if the story is fictional, what's instructive is how far science and medicine has come during the last half century in the approach to and treatment of mental illness. Having family members who are afflicted adds additional resonance to certain aspects of the story here. What really caught my attention and brought home the fact that this film was made fifty years ago (as I write this), was when the 'genius' Charly stated to Alice Kinnian - "You know what's going to happen in the year 2018?". All I could think of was that I would finally get around to watching this picture for the very first time!

Directed by Ralph Nelson and adapted from the novel 'Flowers for Algernon' by Daniel Keyes, the movie tells the story of Charlie Gordon (Cliff Robertson), a mentally handicapped bakery worker. I'm glad the movie change the title from Flowers for Algernon (which refers to the protagonist's fellow test subject - a white mouse) to Charly. Charlie soon become a test subject of his own, to an experiment to increase human intelligence. Led on, by his teacher Alice Kinnian (Claire Bloom) and other doctors, Charlie agree to the new surgical procedure, not knowing if it is going to work or not. When it was done on Gordon, things become clearer for him, leading to both positive triumph and negative tragic results. I have to say, without Cliff Robertson as Charlie Gordon, this movie wouldn't had work. Cliff Robertson brings in the role, both the childish charm, and the smarts. Cliff Robertson has always wanted to do this movie, ever since starting in the dramatic television TV Show's CBS's Steel Hour, where one of its episodes was 'The Two Worlds of Charlie Gordon', an adaption of the same novel by Daniel Keyes. After a number of his TV shows, in which he acted upon were turned into films with other actors playing his role, such as 1961's the Hustler & 1962's Days of Wine and Roses. Robertson bought the rights to the story, hoping to star in the film version one day. To my knowledge, I heard that 1961's TV episode and this movie written by Stirling Silliphant are mostly similar to each other in the beginning, but the movie has some really awful montages to make the length of the story longer than a one hour movie. There is the awful creepiest and disturbing series of montages about Charlie learning about love & sex. The movie could had explore it in a clever way, but it just goes off the wall acid trip with awkward sexually assaults. The film uses a montage sequence to show Charlie with a mustache and goatee riding a motorcycle, kissing a series of different women, smoking and dancing. It's never explain if it was just a dream or it really did happen. I thought it really went so far off from the rest of the film, that it was distracting. I know, the producers probably wanted to show that he is going through extreme adolescence due to the speed of knowledge being fed into him, but I really doubt a growing genius is going to go all Brando from the Wild Ones. He's more liking to become a book nerd than that. About the romance, I thought it could had been told better, when he passes normal IQ and moves into the genius category. I would love to see the film explain more on his emotional development falling behind, as he become more misanthropy jaded and cynical. Unlike other critics, I love the Q&A sequence. It really hits home to see how much he was right about society in the future. You can really tell, the movie was made in the 1960's with this sequence in the film. You get all those split screens, multiple images, still shots or slow motion that kinda works, but also dissonantly out of place. It could had work more, if the movie follow the same format as the book. The book was told entirely in journal entries or progress reports. It does a wonderful job of showing how Charlie's intelligence changes. It is often used in School Study Media. There are many different between the book and the film version. The movie barely spoke about Charlie's abusive parents. Charlie's sexual issues are due to traumatic experiences with his mother, Rose; he almost has a reverse Oedipus Complex, fearing his mother and relying on his father for protection. There is no mention of the character of Fay Lilliman that was Charlie's love interest besides Alice. She was an overtly sexual, artistic, and whimsical person that could had been used in the scenes between Charlie as an adolescence male and Charlie as an ego mastermind. Nor does the movie explore Charlie's dealing with homosexuality. There isn't any mention of the religion tones such as the speech about Adam & Eve and the tree of knowledge. I found the biggest lost is the symbol of the window. The window symbolizes the emotional distance that Charlie feels from others of normal mental ability. I understand that even a slim novel has to be trimmed to fit into movie form, but other things were added that brought nothing of comparable value to the film. Film's direction is a bit clumsy in the middle, but it does find the right path by the end. I love the metaphors mention of Plato's Allegory of the Cave & Don Quixote. That really got me to like it. People who've read the literary work before seeing the film are usually biased against the film. I am definitely not part of that crowd, I found the movie thought provoking. The movie does show the mistreatment of the mentally disabled. There is a key scene where Charlie as a genius, helps a retarded waiter whose clumsiness is cruelly laughter at by the pub's patrons. This is after he finds out that he also been mistreated at his own job by his co-workers and Charlie himself repeatedly looks down on those around him for not being at his level of super-intelligence. Charlie struggles with the same tendency toward the same prejudice and condescension he has seen in other people, when dealing with the mentally disabled. Then there is the tension between intellect and emotion. Are people more compassionate, warm, and friendly when dumb down or when you gains intelligence, we tend to fight more often? Overall: Albert Einstein once quoted 'the different between stupidity and genius is that genius has it's limited'. While this movie is indeed limited, it was worth watching

"I want to be smarter, just so I could get a little closer, you know?" Charly Gordon

Made in the days when doctors smoked cigarettes, this is Cliff Robertson's brilliant portrayal of a man isolated from society by an IQ of 69 who through a brain operation becomes a genius.

Robertson won a well-deserved Oscar for Best Actor in 1968 for his part in this wonderful and inspiring film, and it's a great movie, albeit on a "b-movie" budget. But entwined in its message is a dark reflection on how society treats people who are mentally handicapped.

Charly is the nicest guy you would ever meet, considerate of all, kind, but simple and naïve. Everyone around him either laughs at him or is condescending toward him. No one sees him as a man, not even a human being, just whatever they label him as - "dumb-assed janitor", or just plain "moron". Then he gets his operation and becomes the smartest man on Earth, but still he is labeled, and still he is isolated.

What I got most from this film is not a clinical study of mental retardation but the way society deals with mental retardation, and in this the film soars, and it will bring a tear or two if you have even a bit of humanity. It is a wonderful film, on many levels, testing us all on how we deal with those who are so unfortunate as to be mentally handicapped.

In "Charly", society doesn't win in the end, but the movie does! 9 out of 10.

The director, Ralph Nelson, used to be the property master on the Twilight Zone, if I remember correctly, and to be honest he doesn't bring much to the party here. Split screens -- ugh.

But this is more than made up for by almost everything else about the film -- the location shooting, the photography, the score, and the performances.

People have won Oscars for playing mutes, ADDs, and height-challenged people, as a kind of sign, I suppose, that the voters are on the side of the angels. Cliff Robertson deserved his Oscar, though. He's entirely good in the role. His full-scale IQ is supposed to be around 70 but he brings to his performance the expressions and body language of someone who is profoundly retarded, if the residents of Mussbrugger Hall at the New Jersey Neuropsychiatric Institute are any example. He overacts, that is to say. But it fits the role perfectly.

I'll give just one example. Early in the movie, just after the opening, he wanders around a college campus, uncomprehending, as he watches and listens to the students discuss Jung. One of the students flings a jacket over a shoulder. Robertson, in imitation, takes off his own unfashionable leather jacket and flings it over his own shoulder. Not once, but twice -- the first time evidently not having satisfied him. What a neat touch. And it belongs to Robertson.

The score is by Pandit Ravi Shankar, of whom we hear little today. But Ravi Shankar belongs up there in the ranks of instrumental virtuosos with Heifitz and Rubenstein. "Sitar" is an from an old Indo-European word, which has also given us "guitar" and "zither".

The movie has a tolerant attitude towards such things as smoking pot. "Danger: Smoking May be Hazardous to Your Health." We've come a long way towards self righteousness since then. Now you can't make a joke out of it, let alone actually DO it. This is a complicated subject that I will restrain myself from going on about. My position, in French, could be rendered as "A chaque a son gout." In the end, Charlie loses his boosted IQ and returns to his previous state. I am happy for him that he managed to smoke some dope and get laid in the brief interval of his lucidity.

Having read the original short story (A Hugo winner, I believe) as a youth, and having just missed the US Steel Hour live production (It was on at 10:00, right after my bedtime), I really looked forward to seeing the film version of "Flowers for Algernon". The original short story is brilliantly a brilliantly written "diary," Charly Gordon's chronicle of a man who's IQ is more than tripled by a medical treatment. The film, admittedly captures that spirit, even though it's ends differently.

WARNING: SPOILER

In the short story, Algernon dies and the doctors discover during the autopsy that Algernon's brain has become perfectly smooth. So, Charly doesn't just revert to his former self, he faces dieing as a "vegatable."

END OF SPOILER

Ralph Nelson is clearly the wrong director for "Charly." Nelson can be brilliant ("Lillies of the Field," "Soldier in the Rain," "Requiem for a Heavyweight"), but his color work is, to be generous, less than stellar. Cliff Robertson "created" the role of "Charly Gordon" on the "US Steel Hour," garnering an Emmy nomination in the process. However, I was surprised and disappointed to find this fine actor unconvincing as a mentally challenged individual. His "Charly Gordon" is far too studied and lacks, most importantly, the dullness in the eyes one sees in virtually all mentally challenged individuals. Lon Chaney, Jr. in "Of Mice and Men," Peter Sellers in "Being There," Juliette Lewis in "The Other Sister" and John Mills in "Ryan's Daughter" were far more convincing, just to name a few. Robertson beat Peter O'Toole and Ron Moody for the Oscar, and both were clearly better. Even worse, actress Claire Bloom lacks chemistry as Robertson's love interest. Clearly, she needed to show more passion and sexual tension with Robertson, and Ralph Nelson fails to exploit that angle during the sluggish first two thirds. However, Robertson handles "brilliant" far better than he does "retarded," and his transformation is handled beautifully and profoundly. Unfortunately, Nelson then resorts to the tired, dated split screen effect to summarize much of the final third. What is genuinely praiseworthy in Charly is Lilia Skala's fine performance and Arthur Ornitz's extraordinary cinematography.

I give "Charly" a "6". I just wish it could be a "10".

I read Daniel Keyes' book, *Flowers for Algernon,* when aged nine and few books before or since have affected me as much. Surgical experimentation is frequently controversial and can be devastating in its consequences. Beyond the ethical issues are Algernon and Charly, one a mouse, the other, human, who are affected by a particular experiment -- Charly, especially, in a multitude of ways.

Robertson does extremely well in a particularly complex role. Throughout we see his humanity. His "transformation" is believable, and by the actor's skill, Charly is portrayed as a sympathetic Everyman in an extraordinary situation.

I give this film the highest recommendation.

This film is a lot of popular saying mashed together, like "the flame that burns twice as bright, lasts half as long," "it's better to have loved and lost, than never have loved at all," "with great power comes great responsibility..." And "no means no!"

"Charly" has mental issues, with an IQ below 60 points. He realises that people pick on him because of that, but his mental capacities are too "limited" for him to actually grasp the full meaning of it, so he just smiles and goes on, until the day he's offered to undergo a surgical procedure to enhance his brain power, maybe to genius levels.

He accepts the proposal, obviously, for plot's sake, and, even more obviously, the procedure works and he gets the advertised superbrain. After that, the film takes a weird path, one that leads to him falling in love with his teacher. With the mental age of a child, he doesn't know the difference between love and sexual attraction, and that quickly derails into an attempted rape, which is stopped the way most 1960-something films did, with her slapping him on the face.

After that, two things happen. First, we completely lose any sympathy for the protagonist. Second, he becomes a biker and goes on a spree of sex, drugs, bad music/dance, bad facial hair, bad clothes... Well, basically, bad everything.

Eventually, he goes back home and, plot twist, the teacher had been waiting for him! Apparently, "no" and a slap on the face didn't mean "no," it was more like "let's try the 'surprise sex' without the 'surprise' part some other time..." And so they engage in copulation for recreational purposes for a very long time... Which we find out, afterwards, to be just four weeks since he attacked her.

During the presentation of the research results to the scientific community, it's disclosed that Charly will soon revert to his previous intellectual levels, as the procedure had only temporary effects. He tries to use his superior brain power to find a solution to his problem, but all is in vain. Lastly, Charly asks the teacher to leave, like freeing a bird from its cage. The last scene shows the teacher going after Charly, who's playing with some kids in a playground, happily and oblivious. Credits roll.

Despite the final gesture of kindness from Charly, expelling the teacher from his life, I couldn't feel anything for him. Maybe this film was okay-ish for 1960-something standards, but it's not for today's, and never again, hopefully. The acting is very good, but the script is completely messed up on its final part, so the film is worth one watch and that's all.