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Strong and Moving!

Through painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable

By the time the dramatic fireworks start popping off, each one feels earned.

Through painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable

Told in flashback, "Summer of '42" is a nostalgic return to teen-age summers, ripe with possibilities, and the years of sexual awakening. Set during World War II, it is also a bittersweet reminder of a dramatic era in America's past.Gary Grimes plays the young Hermie, awkward and confused as he grapples with the mysteries of adolescence and sexuality. Jenifer O'Neill plays Dorothy, a beautiful newlywed who appears enchanting and full of life to the admiring teen.Like "Stand by Me", the film is very successful at recalling a more innocent time. But the reality of war lies just beyond the idyllic coastal setting. The haunting musical theme from "Summer of '42" is as iconic and integral to the story as the theme from "Love Story". It conveys a romanticism that is mirrored by the warmth of Dorothy as she offers an instructive friendship to Hermie.

Hermie (Gary Grimes) recalls the summer of 42 on Nantucket Island when he was 15 with his family on summer holidays. His best friends are Oscy and Benjie. The boys are sex obsessed and Dorothy (Jennifer O'Neill) is Hermie's biggest obsession. New bride Dorothy sends her husband off to war leaving her alone in the beach house. He helps her carry the grocery home. Oscy picks up three girls at the movies. Oscy chooses the pretty blonde Miriam and leaves Hermie with the mousy Aggie. Benjie runs off and Gloria also leaves.I think every guy has had an Oscy in his life during that age or maybe was the Oscy of the group himself. Oscy gives a nostalgic realism feel to this memory laden movie. Dorothy is a fantasy that is understandable by all men past the teenage years. The young guys fit their roles very well. Jennifer O'Neill is pretty. I wouldn't say anybody acted exceptionally well but they all do their parts. This has the condom buying scene plus other coming-of-age standards. There is a really slow climatic scene which feels odd for the subject matter in the modern sense.

In a way, this movie is a companion piece with "The Way We Were" (1973). As I noted in my review of that movie, the scene where Katie first has sex with Hubbell challenges our attitude about rape and the double standard. In that case, it had to do with having sex with someone too drunk to have given consent. "Summer of '42," on the other hand, challenges our attitude about rape and the double standard when it comes to having sex with someone too young to have given consent.With both movies, we pretty much have the same three time periods: the 1940s, when the movies were set; the early 1970s, when the movies were made; and today, when we watch them from the perspective of the twenty-first century. In "Summer of '42," a 15-year-old boy named Hermie falls in love with a 22-year-old woman named Dorothy. One evening, she gets word that her husband's plane has been shot down over France, and he is dead. She and Hermie have sex, and the next day she is gone.I never really cared for this movie, but that is neither here nor there. The sense of it was that Dorothy, in her grief, turns to Hermie for affection, and that what happens is a deeply meaningful and positive experience for him. Now, I don't know what the laws were in Massachusetts in 1942, but I am pretty sure that in most states, if a 22-year-old man had sex with a 15-year-old girl, he would be guilty of statutory rape, and if found out would be sent to prison, especially when the jury was told that he had sex with her on the very night he found out his wife had been killed, for that would make him seem callous. Should we condemn the man but excuse the woman? Did Dorothy deserve to go to prison for rape, just as a man would?Once again, as with "The Way We Were," we have a situation in which there is consent after the fact, in this case, when the boy becomes a man. Does that matter? And if it does, what would our attitude toward Dorothy be if the adult Hermie was psychologically harmed? And once again we have to distinguish between the attitudes existing when the movie was set, when it was made, and the attitudes we have today.Even today, the double standard lends itself to late-night humor. Typical was when Jay Leno was discussing a story about a female teacher that had sex with one of her male students, leading Leno to ask in exasperation, "Where were these teachers when I was in Junior High?" Humor aside, could "Summer of '42" be made today? More to the point, could such a story be told in a contemporary setting? Probably not. But I wonder if that represents a genuine change in attitude, or simply a fear that the movie would not be well received. I, for one, would have a hard time condemning Dorothy, even if the story were set in the present, just as I would have a hard time condemning Katie for what she did to Hubbell, even if the story were set in the present.

The last line of the film says it all... the teenage angst, the melancholia that the movie leaves behind, the longing for something better, more fulfilling, yes, even happiness. For me, it left the same feelings that the last episode of the "Wonder Years" TV show did -- life went on without the two who could have been the loves of their lives. "I was never to see her again. Nor was I ever to learn what became of her. We were different then. Kids were different. It took us longer to understand the things we felt. Life is made up of small comings and goings. And for everything we take with us, there is something that we leave behind. In the summer of '42, we raided the Coast Guard station four times, we saw five movies, and had nine days of rain. Benji broke his watch, Oscy gave up the harmonica, and in a very special way, I lost Hermie forever."