Robert Mulligan - 1970s

1970s

Mulligan began the 1970s with The Pursuit of Happiness (1971), based on the 1968 novel by Thomas Rogers, which had been a finalist for the National Book Award. The film starred Michael Sarrazin as William Popper, a college student (disillusioned with both right-wing and left-wing American politics) whose life is complicated when he accidentally runs over and kills an elderly woman and is quickly sentenced to one year in prison for vehicular manslaughter. He then contemplates breaking out of prison and fleeing the country with his girlfriend (played by Barbara Hershey), since neither feels their lives have made any significant difference in America.

Also in 1971, Mulligan released Summer of '42 (1971), which was based on the coming-of-age novel by Herman Raucher and starred Gary Grimes as a teenage stand-in for Raucher who spends a summer vacation in 1942 on Nantucket Island lusting after a young woman (Jennifer O'Neill) whose husband has shipped off to fight in the war. A box office smash, Summer of '42 went on to gross over $20 million, and Mulligan was nominated for a Golden Globe Award for Best Director.

Summer of '42 was followed by The Other (1972), a horror film scripted by former Hollywood actor Thomas Tryon from his own book. It told the story of two 9-year old boys, Niles and Holland Perry (played by real-life twins Chris and Marty Udvarnoky), who get involved in a series of grisly murders at their home on Peaquot Landing in the 1930s. Although the film was not an immediate success at the box office, it has since gone on to gain a steady cult following.

Mulligan rounded out the 1970s with three films dominated by performances from A-list Hollywood actors: Jason Miller as a Los Angeles locksmith threatened by hitmen in The Nickel Ride (1974); Richard Gere as an Italian-American youth trying to break from his working-class family in Bloodbrothers (1978); and Alan Alda and Ellen Burstyn portraying George and Doris, a pair of long-term adulterers, in Same Time Next Year (1978), based on the play by Bernard Slade.