Rachel, Rachel (1968)

Taglines: who cares about a 35 year old virgin?

Rachel, Rachel movie storyline. 35 year old spinster and virgin Rachel Cameron is a sad, lonely woman. She lives in the small town of Japonica, Connecticut where she grew up. She teaches second grade at Japonica Elementary School and lives with her highly demanding widowed mother (her funeral director father passed away fourteen years ago) in the same apartment above a funeral home where she grew up, despite the home now not owned by them. Rachel often uses her mother as an excuse not to do things.

Rachel represses her emotions, and is prone to daydreaming to envision alternate paths for herself in certain situations if she only had the nerve to do those things. Even when Nick Kazlik, a childhood acquaintance who has returned to Japonica for a summer visit with his family, makes it clear that he wants to have fun with her while he’s in town, she can’t act on his request out of fear of the unknown. But after a couple of incidents with her only real friend Calla Mackie, who is a fellow teacher at the school, Rachel begins to allow herself more freedom. But as Rachel’s repressions slowly melt away, how her emotions will manifest themselves becomes the question.

Rachel, Rachel is a 1968 American technicolor drama film produced and directed by Paul Newman and starring Joanne Woodward in the title role and co-starring Estelle Parsons and James Olson. The screenplay, by Stewart Stern based on the 1966 novel A Jest of God by Canadian author Margaret Laurence, concerns a schoolteacher in small-town Connecticut and her sexual awakening and independence in her mid-30s.

The film was nominated for four Academy Awards (Best Picture, Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Actress for Woodward, and Best Supporting Actress for Parsons) and won two Golden Globes: Best Director and Best Actress (Drama).

About the Story

Rachel Cameron (Joanne Woodward) is a shy, 35-year-old unmarried schoolteacher living with her widowed mother in an apartment above the funeral home once owned by her father in a small town in Connecticut. School is out for summer vacation, and Rachel anticipates a typical bored summer at home with her mother.

Fellow unmarried teacher and best friend Calla Mackie (Estelle Parsons) persuades her to attend a revival meeting, where a visiting preacher encourages Rachel to express her need for the love of Jesus. Rachel is overwhelmed by the experience, baring so much pent-up emotion that she is embarrassed; comforting her, Calla suddenly kisses Rachel passionately. Rachel, shocked, runs home and begins avoiding Calla.

Nick Kazlik (James Olson), Rachel’s high-school classmate who now teaches at an inner city school in The Bronx, arrives for a short visit. Upon first seeing Rachel, Nick makes a crude pass that Rachel rebuffs, but after the episode with Calla, she succumbs to his charms and has her first sexual experience. Mistaking lust for love, she begins to plan a future with Nick, who quickly rejects her by showing her a photo of a young boy, implying that it is his son. Through Nick’s mother, Rachel later discovers he has no wife and child.

Believing she is pregnant, Rachel plans to leave town and raise the child. With Calla’s assistance, she finds another teaching job in Oregon, but before the summer ends, she learns she is not pregnant and that her symptoms are due to a benign cyst. After undergoing surgery to have the cyst removed, she tells her mother that she has decided to relocate, and that her mother may accompany her or not as she wishes. Her mother reluctantly agrees to go. Rachel sets out with hope for the future, having learned that she has choices, that she is able to give and receive sexual pleasure, and that it is possible for her to take on life actively rather than wait for it to find her.

Directed by: Paul Newman
Starring: Joanne Woodward, James Olson, Estelle Parsons, Geraldine Fitzgerald, Kate Harrington, Donald Moffat, Shawn Campbell, Violet Dunn, Beatrice Pons, Dortha Duckworth, Nell Potts
Screenplay by: Stewart Stern
Cinematography by: Gayne Rescher
Film Editing by: Dede Allen
Costume Design by: Domingo A. Rodriguez
Set Decoration by: Richard Merrell
Art Direction by: Robert Gundlach
Music by: Jerome Moross
MPAA Rating: None.
Distributed by: Warner Bros. Pictures, Seven Arts
Release Date: August 26, 1968