"THOSE ARE HIPPIES, STEPHEN"

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HAIR
starring Treat Williams
1979
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I still remember the moment clearly: It was one day -- probably in “The Summer Of Love” (1967) -- when I was eight years old and my Mother was behind the wheel as we turned a corner in Garden Grove, California. Referring to a group of colorful, flowing Flower Children standing on the corner and waiting for the red light to change to green (what a buncha fourth-rate rebels!), I asked, “What are those people, Mom?”
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Her reply was the first time I’d ever encountered the term HIPPIE. A couple of years later and I would be dressing just like 'em -– Keith Partridge and Greg Brady had nuttin' on me! (I still have the original patches from my denim jacket back then: the classic Yellow Smiley Face; the star-spangled hand forming the Peace sign; Have A Nice Day; Come Together, etc.)
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The one thing that nearly every big city American who came-of-age in the 1960s and ‘70s has in common is the soundtrack from the Broadway musical HAIR. It seemed like that “Licorice Pizza” (LP) with its green, yellow, and red cover was in everyone’s collection. Mine spent a lot of time on the turntable. (Obviously, my Parents didn't know the lyrics to some of those songs I was listening to!)
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In 1979, Milos Forman, unquestionably one of cinema’s most talented directors -– only four years removed from his monumental, 5 Academy Awards-winning achievement, One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest -- decided to put the old 1960s musical icon, HAIR, onto the silver screen. It went mostly unnoticed. The old hippies were now too respectable and forward-thinking in their three-piece suits and plush offices to look back at their past; and the kids had shaved heads and the loud, lean sound of Punk Rock on their minds. Hair? Nobody wore it. Nobody saw it. Too bad.
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In a sense, the entire movie is almost like an LSD hallucination. HAIR opens with peaceful shots of a green, pastoral Oklahoma landscape and a son and his dad attempting, in their painfully rigid way, to express their mutual affection before the young man, Claude Bukowski (John Savage), boards a bus for New York City to answer Uncle Sam’s draft notice for an adventure in Vietnam. The old man says, “Don’t worry too much. It’s just these smart people that’s got to worry. The Lord will take care of the ignorant ones.” Soon the screen explodes into Free Love and Psychedelia. But at the end of the picture, the old man’s joke is revealed to have been weirdly prophetic.
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In New York’s Central Park, Claude meets up with a band of hippies led by George Berger (Treat Williams). There are a couple of nifty performances in HAIR: Savage with his hangdog, fish-out-of-water country reticence; Annie Golden as the screen’s most likeable little airhead since Judy Holliday in Born Yesterday; and Miles Chapin as Steve, the put-upon “proper” product of old school traditionalism. But unarguably, HAIR belongs to Treat Williams.
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ANNIE  GOLDEN  AND  TREAT  WILLIAMS

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Very rarely does an actor just light up the screen with “presence.” James Dean did it in East Of Eden in 1955. Girls in the theatres began screaming the moment he appeared on screen, inexplicably drawn, no doubt, to the brooding intensity of his animal magnetism. In recent times, Val Kilmer playing Doc Holliday in Tombstone stole every single scene he appeared in with the power of his charisma. There have been a few others, Treat Williams in HAIR among them.
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When I first saw this movie in the theatre, I labeled Williams a can’t-miss soon-to-be superstar. Although his work in Prince Of The City was highly acclaimed, somehow Williams whiffed. I thought Kenneth Branagh’s performance in Dead Again was going to propel him to megastar status, too. (Remind me of these misjudgments the next time I tell you that I’m never wrong.)
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It’s the ultra-cool confidence and dynamic presence Williams exudes that carries this movie and keeps it moving. He is the follicle of HAIR. (I’m sorry! "The devil made me do it." ...See the patch in 'Patch Photos' #4 of 5 above.) 
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Although Forman ultimately comes down on the side of the Hippie Movement, he takes jabs at, and also embraces, different aspects of the two social armies engaged in a cultural war that took place at home concurrent with an American “police action” on another continent. And Berger, despite his narcissism and hedonism which often antagonizes the “authorities” and widens the Generation Gap, is also the peacemaker who can empathize with others and effect a reconciliation. He’s a complex and fascinating character worthy of deep analysis. 
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There are a few abysmal songs to be found in HAIR, but also some real winners. Most notably, Where Do I Go? (with poor lip-synching from Savage), Good Morning Starshine (for me, Oliver’s #3 hit version from 1969 captures this era like no other song), and especially Easy To Be Hard. This last one anchors a brilliant segment in which Forman’s extraordinary directorial skills are on display. Easy To Be Hard (an outrageously powerful performance by Cheryl Barnes and alone worth the price of the soundtrack) is an exceptional piece in which hippie Lafayette’s cold distance toward his girlfriend is expressed in snowy long shots of him walking away from her and into the city. This is contrasted with close-up shots of her singing, signifying the fullness of the heartrending emotional wound he has inflicted upon her. If this scene doesn’t give you a little chill, you’re a mighty chilly person, friend.
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There are several other memorable scenes in HAIR: Although I don’t approve of nudity in movies (it's never truly necessary) and I hardly needed to see chunky Beverly D’Angelo sans the costumer’s art, if that bit where she hails a taxi in Central Park doesn’t make you laugh-out-loud, check for a pulse!
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And I’m a "confident heterosexual" (any Rustler's Rhapsody fans out there?), but if the Black Boys / White Boys segment with the Army’s Induction Board doesn’t at least elicit a smile from you, you’re definitely wound a little too tight.
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Berger’s brief visit with the folks back home is a gem (with a delightful cameo by Antonia Rey playing his mom). And then there’s that surprise ending with its growing sense of claustrophobia and impending doom swallowing up the helpless leader, which brings us back to the beginning and the old man's prophetic joke. The entire segment is another example of Forman’s artistic vision brilliantly executed.
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No, this is not a movie masterpiece. There is, however, a lot to like about HAIR, and it certainly beats by leaps and bounds the vast majority of what is being produced today. HAIR is a strange “TRIP”, but one that is definitely worth taking. 
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~ Stephen T. McCarthy
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