The Sterile Cuckoo [Pookie] *** (1969, Liza Minnelli, Wendell Burton, Tim McIntire) – Classic Movie Review 10,023

Producer Alan J Pakula makes his promising début as a director in the bittersweet 1969 campus romance drama of first love The Sterile Cuckoo [Pookie] and gives Liza Minnelli a great role that she grabs in a performance that gained her an Oscar nomination in her second adult film as Pookie Adams, an insecure, misfit young woman pressing her attentions on quiet, shy new student Jerry Payne (Wendell Burton).

They are students from neighbouring colleges in upstate New York, where their romantic interlude unfolds over the course of an entire school year.

Minnelli proves she can engage audiences emotionally without a song, and young Burton scores too in a selfless support act for the star.

Despite the Minnelli emotionalism, the film is low-key and truthful. Alvin Sargent’s expert screenplay is based on John Nichols’s 1965 novel. The Oscar-nominated song ‘Come Saturday Morning’ is by Fred Karlin (music) and Dory Previn (lyrics) and performed by The Sandpipers.

Also in the cast are Tim McIntire as Charlie Schumacher, Austin Green, Sandra Faison and Elizabeth Harrower.

Unfortunately, neither its title The Sterile Cuckoo nor its UK title Pookie inspires much confidence. Nevertheless, it became the 13th highest-grossing film of 1969 at the North American box office, grossing $13,982,357.

Minnelli’s Oscar win for Cabaret (1972).

The Sterile Cuckoo was nominated for two Oscars: Best Actress (Liza Minnelli) and Best Original Song (‘Come Saturday Morning’). It is Minnelli’s only Oscar nomination other than for her Oscar win for Cabaret (1972). Her first credited film is Charlie Bubbles (1968).

Minnelli’s mother Judy Garland thought the part of the troubled, friendless Pookie was an unattractive role for her daughter and was concerned Minnelli identified too closely with Pookie. But by the time it was released on October 22, 1969, Judy Garland was dead (on June 22, 1969).

It was shot at Hamilton College in Clinton, New York, Sylvan Beach, New York, including the Sylvan Beach Union Chapel, and at the park in Vernon Center, New York (bus stop scenes).

The Sterile Cuckoo [Pookie] is directed by Alan J Pakula, runs 107 minutes, is made by Boardwalk Productions, is released by Paramount Pictures, is written by Alvin Sargent, based on John Nichols’s novel, is shot by Milton R Krasner, is produced by Alan J Pakula and is scored by Fred Karlin.

RIP Alvin Sargent, Oscar-winning screenwriter of Julia and Ordinary People, who died at 92 on May 9, 2019.

© Derek Winnert 2020 Classic Movie Review 10,023

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