Search - If... [Criterion Collection] on DVD

If... [Criterion Collection]

Actor(s): Malcolm McDowell, David Wood, Richard Warwick, Christine Noonan, Robert Swann
Director(s): Lindsay Anderson
9

Movie Details

MPAA Rating: R
Content Advisory: Violence, Brief Nudity, Adult Situations, Not For Children
Movie Release: 1968
DVD Release: 06/19/2007
Format: DVD - Black and White,Color,Enhanced Wide Screen Letterbox for 16x9 TV
Edition: Restored/Remastered
Audio Tracks: English
SwapaDVD Credits: 2
Number of Discs: 2
Run Time: 1 hrs 52 mins
Studio: Criterion
Members Wishing: 30
Genres: Drama, Satire, Coming-of-Age

DVD Synopsis

Rebellious students at an English private school plan a violent revolt against their repressive environment in director Lindsay Anderson's highly acclaimed but extremely controversial drama. Centering on a small group of non-conformists led by Mick Travis (Malcolm McDowell), the film paints a distinctly negative picture of the British school system and, by extension, English society. Seeing the powers-that-be as humorless, bureaucratic, and needlessly restrictive, Mick and his cohorts indulge in small acts of rebellion, including sneaking into town to romance a local waitress. Their actions are discovered and punished with harsh beatings, leading the students to plot revenge. This effort culminates in the film's most famous sequence, a surrealistic depiction of a bloody uprising by the students against the adult world. Daring and unpredictable in content and form, If... mixes color and black-and-white cinematography as easily as it mingles satire with dark fantasy. The film's ambiguous attitude toward violence caused controversy at the time, as many commentators saw the film as a potential incitement to violence. It became a great success among younger, counter-culture audiences who appreciated the audacious shock tactics and embraced the satirical, anti-establishment message. Often compared to Jean Vigo's French classic Z�ro de conduite, which also featured surrealistic boarding-school rebellion, If... has become a high point in the cinema of youth rebellion. Anderson and McDowell later collaborated on O Lucky Man! (1973), Look Back in Anger (1980), and Britannia Hospital (1982). ~ Judd Blaise, All Movie Guide

Actors

Malcolm McDowell - Mick
David Wood - Johnny
Richard Warwick - Wallace
Christine Noonan - Girl
Robert Swann - Rowntree

Member Movie Reviews

SV S. from LONGMONT, CO wrote on 11/21/2009...

This movie blew my mind. That doesn't happen a lot. Truly a ground-breaking piece of work, if you ask me. To say nothing of the plot, there are inexplicable surreal moments, and a bizarre mixture of black & white and colour photography.

A movie set in a boarding school in England in the late sixties might seem very closely specialised, but this film is completely accessible to anyone who's ever been to school, and especially to anyone who was an outsider.

The word 'outsider' tends to indicate an "underdog becoming the hero" by the end of the movie, so I guess that's sort of misleading. if.... is miles ahead of those sorts of black-and-white stories. It's honest, brutal, and all shades of grey when it comes to subject matter and characterisation.

The story follows the lives of a core group of five young people who don't see eye-to-eye with the rest of their society, for many reasons. Besides an open affirmation of homosexual love (one of the best romantic/erotic scenes I've ever watched, and very atypical - the part in the gymnasium), this film also has something I thought was even more unusual for a movie of the time: a confident and sexually aggressive female character (this part is one of my top three favourite sex scenes now). One still doesn't see very many such characters, actually.

The film alternates between describing fleeting moments of intense beauty, and the small yet terrible things that occur every day in a school or group of people, especially one as rigid as a boarding school. This builds to the climax of the movie, which is also the end of it. The lack of a resolution is critical to its success - it leaves the door wide open for the viewer. I refuse to give away the ending, but by the time the credits were rolling I was amazed at how completely relevant the story was to the world of today. It may, in fact, be even more relevant today than it was when it was made.

Truly a Great film.