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Being There [1979]


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Editorial
Amazon.co.uk Review

Hal Ashby's much-praised Being There stars Peter Sellers in what was perhaps his finest comic performance. Chance the gardener has spent his entire life in an old man's house and has no idea of the world outside except for what television has given him. Sellers manages to make his innocence touching and oddly impressive rather than an offensive exploitation of disability. Jerzy Kozinski's screenplay neither entirely endorses nor discounts the twin possibilities that Chance's simplicity and closeness to the natural world give him access to real wisdom, or that he is simply a blank on whom people project what they want to see and hear. What is clear is that he gives his dying friend Ben (Jack Warden) peace of mind and consoles Ben's wife (Shirley Maclaine). Whether he's being groomed for the Presidency or appearing to walk on water, he always does something right, and the same is true for Sellers' minimalist performance.

On the DVD: Being There is presented in a widescreen visual aspect of 1.85:1 and has 1.0 Dolby Digital mono sound; it comes with the original theatrical trailer, information about the stars and director and a list of the film's awards. --Roz Kaveny


Being There: a review
Review date: 2008-08-24 Rating: 10 out of 10

'Being There' is a film Peter Sellers made right at the end of his career. Whatever you make of this troubled man's life, I think you will agree that the role he plays here, of Chance the gardener, represents a brave exit from the glitzy world of movies. Indeed, Being There could be seen as a satire on the celebrity industry of which Peter Sellers was so much a part.

Chance is a man who has never grown up. Employed for the whole of his existence by a rich man in Washington who has just died, Chance's life has been dominated by gardening, television and little else. His employer's huge house, a home that Chance has never left for a moment, is being sold, and Chance finds himself out on the street, and hopelessly ill-equipped for this encounter with tough reality. He is bemused to discover that unwelcome events, like a mugging, cannot be banished by his television remote. But he has a stroke of luck - he is knocked down by the car of an influential businessman, and he and his wife take Chance under their wing. There is something about Chance that endears him to his hosts - his lack of front, his simple way of relating to others, and his lack of competitive edge. Nobody quite knows what to make of him, Chance the gardener, or Chauncey Gardner as he becomes known - nobody can make out "where he's coming from." Rumours start to spread - his careful advice over what to do in your garden ("Prepare for growth in the spring") is mis-interpreted as a take on the economy from a financial guru. The media feverishly search for information on Chance's past, but there is none to be found. He is thrust into a milieu where he is completely different from anyone else, and is thus completely refreshing. His statements are always literal, which means that no-one believes him. "Are you writing a book?" asks one reporter. "I can't write," replies Chance. "Of course, who of us has time to write these days," replies the hack. But Chance is serious - he can't write, he's never learnt. Everything he says is misunderstood, despite it being completely truthful - and these misunderstandings always seem to make other people happy. Chance is invited onto people's television screens, and his years of watching have prepared him perfectly, for he appears totally at home on the other side of the camera. He has been off society's radar for fifty years and so society cannot get a handle on him.

I think 'Being There' is a deeply spiritual film. Chance is a pure soul, forcibly thrust into an alien world with no defence mechanisms available to him. All he has is his intense love of plants (alongside a keen addiction to television) and somehow this saves him and those around him. His `otherness' is in a way Christ-like. Christ was a threat to those in authority, and Chance is too, in a quiet and puzzling way.
Chance fools the world by telling the truth. In our society, we learn to lie to those beneath us, and to allow those above us to lie to us - if we play it any other way, we are in trouble. Chance just doesn't live those rules, and the world senses that the rules he lives by are the ones that they really want, deep down. There is nothing explicitly religious in this film, but his early life has been that of a hermit monk, an experience that has given him a self that is extraordinarily self-sufficient. Maybe Chance has glimpsed the Kingdom of Heaven by tending a walled garden for forty years, and maybe through him the world glimpses that glimpse.


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Reviews


Perhaps not the most 'accessible' masterpiece of modern cinema?
Review date: 2008-05-29 Rating: 10 out of 10

This is a challenging, dare I say, somewhat difficult film on so many levels to watch and then critique. On the one hand, those Sellers fans expecting another Clousea-esque comedy will be sorely disappointed ...it's certainly not a laugh out loud, laugh-a-minute comedy, and there's little to zero physical hi-jinks or PS capery!

But for those prepared to watch for nuances, subtle underplay and an inate depth of performance in a character ...well, then it's perhaps Mr Sellers' greatest ever cinematic portrayal as so many have said over the years.

I find - and I'm the actor's greatest fan - that I have to be in the right mood to watch Being There ...but to paraphrase Shirley Maclaine, who famously stated she took her role in the film so as to be able to work with the genius that was Sellers ...it is indeed 'pure' comic genius at work!

You need only watch the scene when the old man dies and Chancey gets a most visual and aural lump in his throat to know that it is a most compelling, unique and captivating performance by the great man ...and one that should have certainly won him the Oscar for Best Leading Actor!

I would, with respect, recommend that some viewers watch this film a couple or three times to gain the maximum understanding and enjoyment from this film. If I had to choose just one word to sum-up both the film and Peter Sellers' performance, it would be enigmatic!

Surprisingly dull
Review date: 2008-01-01 Rating: 4 out of 10

We were really looking forward to this film, after reports about Sellers' "finest comic performance" etc. After an hour, we pressed the eject button without even having chuckled.

The idea of the film is interesting ... but not believable. You can just about imagine someone like Chance being in that situation, but the other characters' reactions to him are ridiculous. That's one major problem. But the main flaw is worse: the film is very slow and very tedious. A big disappointment.


Poignant, subtle, genius, joyous
Review date: 2007-11-23 Rating: 10 out of 10

I can't believe there are so few reviews for such a fantastic film.

It works on so many levels. The humour is tender and warm. The direction allows all the main players to inhabit their characters convincingly. It just envelopes the viewer in a wonderful experience; a combination of a writer, director and cast on top of their game. Nothing spoils it.

At heart it's actually a farce, but farces don't come any gentler or more charming than this. It is truly a thing of beauty with Sellers utterly convincing and endearing as the innocent whose only reference points in life are TV and gardening. It would have been so easy to over-egg his backward nature, but both director and lead get the balance just right.

It gave us all a glimpse of Sellers giving a fine comic performance while playing it straight. What a shame he had no opportunity to do it again.

I have read that director Hal Ashby kept every take from the movie and these tapes were discovered after his death. What a pity that the politics and power games that this film mocks will probably put the kybosh on any of this footage seeing the light of day.

And if you think that the story is too far-fetched to be believable, you only have to look to today's White House to see that truth can be stranger than fiction.

See it. You may not like it. But if you do like it, you will absolutely adore it.

Oh what an awful project from start to end
Review date: 2007-08-22 Rating: 2 out of 10

I went a long time without seeing this rather elusive film, and as a Sellers fan I had to eventually get to see it, driven on by the steady trickle of recommendations I'd heard it given. But, quite a long time before the film ended, I really wished I hadn't bothered, and seriously thought about not watching the end. I made myself stay with it, and it just helped confirm my dislike for the piece. God it was awful. The concept, the terrible script, the weakness of the satire, the dreadful Americanness of it all, including the syrupy sentiment you usually get when an American film tries to make a human story. There was a glimmer of a good satire in there somewhere, but it was handled with such overkill by the director that it did not come off, unless of course it was just me on an off day, and not the film. Well, several will think just that, judging by the largely positive reviews, but I stick to my original assessment of this being a bit of a stinker, and a project not worthy of the great man's patronage.

Then there is the subject of his performance...I'll just say, to me he looked tired emotionally and physically. He may have done what he usually did in almost channelling the soul of the character he played into his own being: The way he became the character was impressive, as always - but this performance was overwrought, at times bizarre, and quite honestly terrible (If you really don't think so, look at it again-At one point he gives us one of his goon laughs-Out of character or what??!!). To me, quite clearly what this seriously overworked and privately troubled actor needed was a complete rest. As a result of not taking that rest, what I felt I saw, was a very uncomfortable baring of a man's soul. This was a dire film which only the Americans could have championed as high wit or satire, as they seemed to do. Awful.

p.s. Again on the thorny subject of Sellers' performance here, which some reviewers seem adamant is brilliant and won't have a word said against - It is well known within the industry that his nomination was one of the Academy's infamous token gestures to show their appreciation of his career's work, which had somehow missed getting the really big awards-one of their's. In other words they had no intention of giving him the thing. They'd been pilloried before for making that mistake with Taylor, and weren't prepaired to let themselves be open to it again.

Product Details/Specifications


Actor(s):
Melvyn Douglas
Peter Sellers
Shirley Maclaine
Richard Basehart
Jack Warden

Creators:
Peter Sellers (Primary Contributor)
Shirley Maclaine (Primary Contributor)

Director(s):

Recording label: Warner Home Video
Manufacturer: Warner Home Video
EAN: 7321900009386
Binding: DVD
Number of items: 1
Format: PAL,
Release date: 2003-02-10
Number of discs: 1
Aspect ratio: 1.85:1
Audience rating: Suitable for 12 years and over
Region code: 2
Running time: 124 minutes
Theatrical release date: 1979-12-19
Language: English (Original Language)
Language: Italian (Original Language)
Language: Russian (Original Language)
Language: English (Subtitles For The Hearing Impaired)
Language: English (Subtitled)
Language: French (Subtitled)
Language: Spanish (Subtitled)
Language: Portuguese (Subtitled)
Language: Arabic (Subtitled)
Language: Romanian (Subtitled)
Language: Dutch (Subtitled)
Language: Norwegian (Subtitled)
Language: Swedish (Subtitled)
Language: Croatian (Subtitled)
Language: Czech (Subtitled)
Language: Greek (Subtitled)
Language: Polish (Subtitled)
Language: Turkish (Subtitled)

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