YOUNG GOETHE IN LOVE: doing "then" as "now" -- and almost getting away with it

Last year Philipp Stölzl's North Face surprised art-house America with a riveting mountain-climbing movie that also gave us some interesting behind-the-scenes history of pre-WWII Nazi Germany. This year the filmmaker is back with a less success-ful, though relatively entertaining and pretty-to-look-at endeavor called -- in its American retitling -- YOUNG GOETHE IN LOVE, based on the early adulthood of 18th Century German literary icon Johann Wolfgang von Goethe. Financed (at least in part) and distributed in its home country by Warner Bros, Germany, the film is European mainstream with a capital "M." Conflating the look of time past with the behavior of time present, the movie seems dead bent on making the iconic figure a romantic hero for high-schoolers and college kids everywhere. (When our hero is denied a degree, he writes Kiss My Ass in the snow for all the faculty to see.)

The film's actual German title, in fact, is Goethe! (that exclamation point is not mine.) Can you imagine the Russians putting out a movie called Nabokov!? Or the French a film named Rousseau!? I actually could imagine a British musical from Andrew Lloyd Webber called Willie! (about that famous writer explored most recently in the new movie Anonymous). Or even an American musical, probably devised by gays, called Tennessee! But I digress. And the reason for that digression is that, as director and co-writer (with Christoph Müller and Alexander Dydyna) Herr Stölzl, shown above, has given us such a patently paint-by-numbers version of this chunk of the writer's life that, in any particular scene, you could easily imagine the characters bursting into song -- initially joyful, later rather sad. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised to learn that, as I write this, a score is even now being composed.

So then, let's not look to Young Goethe in Love for a history lesson. The rejiggered title is actually a pretty smart one, as it will put literarily-inclined audiences in mind of Goethe's initial breakthrough novel The Sorrows of Young Werther. And what the audiences will get when they plunk down their tushies in their local arthouse seats is a very pretty movie that certainly looks (above and below) 18th Century.

The film move along at a relatively sprightly pace, introducing us to young Goethe, his father, friends, co-workers and first love.

The cast, too, is well-chosen and on the mark. As Goethe, Alexander Fehling (above) exhibits the proper joie de vivre, sorrow, and impetuousness of youth,

while Miriam Stein, as his enamorata Lotte (above) has looks, spirit and intelligence aplenty.

As Goethe's best friend, who falls for an older, married woman, and in his sad way inspires the conclusion of his friend's first artistic success, Volker Bruch (above) is impassioned, silly and sad in equal measure.

Best of all is Moritz Bleibtreu (above), the wonderfully versatile actor who can play a terrorist (The Baader Meinhof Complex) Woody Harrelson's lover (The Walker), a charming scoundrel (last year's Soul Kitchen) or an absolute hero (romantic, as In July or dramatic, as with The Experiment) with equal aplomb. Here Bleibtreu plays Goethe's strait-laced, tongue-tied boss, as well as his unknown romantic rival, and he's terrific, as usual -- the only actor of the above four who manages to seem properly "period."

The celebrity-sotted finale, again turning the past into the present, provides the perfect ending to a pleasantly run-of-the-mill historical rom-com/dram-com. Music Box Films is releasing this one, which opens this Friday, November 4, in New York City at the Sunshine Cinema and The Paris, and in the L.A, area at the Encino Town Center 5, The Landmark, the Pasadena Playhouse 7 and the Santa Ana South Coast Village.  More playdates around the country will follow. Click here to take a gander at them all.

Jonathan Lee's PAUL GOODMAN CHANGED MY LIFE offers plenty of food for thought

Paul Goodman didn't change my life. Unfor-tunately. But I wish he had. Born 30 years before me (in 1911), he published his famous work, Growing Up Absurd, around the time I was attending a Christian Science school (Principia College), a place at which a fellow like Goodman -- proudly bisexual and "out" (before the use of that word had even come into being!) -- would not have found favor. Once I abandoned that foolish religion and began to grow up (absurd or not), I did learn something of Goodman and read an occasional essay.

Now, seeing the fine documentary that first-time filmmaker Jonathan Lee (shown at right) has assembled, I realize how ahead-of-his-time the man was, and how -- as a married bisexual with children who fairly constantly gave in to his homosexual impulses -- his life and mine were relatively similar (in that regard, at least). Had I but known a more about this man and his astounding capacity for understanding and writing about so many things (education, urban planning, civil and sexual rights) in so many forms (poetry, novels, essays and ground-breaking non-fiction books), he would have, should have, been my hero.

Lee's film makes you understand the importance of Goodman at the same time as you understand how difficult a guy he could be. And not just around his own family (that's his wife Sally, shown with him, below). We hear from everyone from Judith Malina (of The Living Theater: Goodman is seen chatting with some of its actors in the penultimate photo, below) to the late Grace Paley (shown with Goodman at an anti-war rally in photo at bottom) and William Buckley, Ned Rorem, Deborah Meier, Noam Chomsky and a lot more. By the film's conclusion, we see a fairly rounded view of its subject, and while we can appreciate him fully, we don't have the nagging sense (that arrives with some biographical documentaries) of watching an exercise in hagiography.

The only thing mis-sing is Goodman himself. We so wish we could hear from him about some of these sexual sub-jects. As outspoken as he was in his day, the rest of polite society was not, and so the very ques-tions we'd ask him now (and he'd certainly answer), were never brought up then. What a shame that we were unable to make near-ly full use of the man as we might have. He was, as one inter-viewee labels it, "inconvenient."

I think it may have been Ms Meier who also points out how women simply do not seem to exist in the world of Growing Up Absurd -- even though he was married to one (and then another), and had sired a daughter with whom he was close, to boot.  From what we learn here of his politics, one imagines that he would heartily approve of the current Occupy Wall Street movement. Of his sexuality, as one friend recalls, "He made passes at everybody: at men, women, at their mothers!"

Lee's film is not at all linear; it jumps all over the place yet is never hard to follow nor for a moment uninteresting. For the section on Goodman's contribution to Gestalt therapy alone, it proves fascinating. Oddly, the most moving section comes at the finale when one interviewee, a man who only knew Goodman through his many and varied literary works, talks about how much he would have loved to have met him -- and how he has indeed changed this fellow's life. I think many of us feel that way. We've missed something. Perhaps Lee's movie will herald a renaissance for Goodman's works, most of which have gone out of print.

Paul Goodman Changed My Life, from Zeitgeist Films, is screening now through November 1 in New York City at Film Forum. Click here for FF screening times and then here to see where else across the country the film will be playing. A DVD will no doubt be available eventually, but as this is a Zeitgeist release, the wait may be rather lengthy, so grab this film however and wherever you can.