"Gorgeous goyish guy" meets Jewish radical girl in
Sydney Pollack's glossy romance. In 1937, frizzy-haired Red co-ed Katie Morosky (
Barbra Streisand) briefly captures the attention of preppy jock Hubbell Gardiner (
Robert Redford) with her passionate pacifism, while the writing talent beneath his privileged exterior entrances her. Almost eight years later, the two are reunited in New York, when well-coiffed leftist radio worker Katie spies military officer Hubbell snoozing in a nightclub. Through her force of will, and in spite of his smug rich friends, the two opposites fall in love, sparring over Katie's activist zeal and Hubbell's writerly ambivalence after a failed first novel. They head to Hollywood so that Hubbell can write a screenplay for his buddy-turned-producer J.J. (
Bradford Dillman). But the House Committee on Un-American Activities' Communist witch hunt in 1947 tears the pair apart, as a pregnant Katie refuses to keep silent about the jailing of the Hollywood Ten, while a faithless Hubbell decides to save his career. When the two meet again at the dawn of the '60s, TV hack Hubbell and A-bomb protestor Katie feel the old pull, but they have to decide if it's worth the grief. Although blacklisted writers had returned to Hollywood -- and won Oscars -- by the early 1970s, the HUAC sections of
Arthur Laurents's screenplay were still considered dicey, resulting in substantial cuts; Laurents reportedly blamed star Redford for not fighting them hard enough. Regardless of the edits, and critics' complaints about the film's schlockiness, 1973 audiences went for the well-executed and still politically tinged weepie, turning The Way We Were into one of the most popular films of 1973 and Redford into a major heartthrob. Streisand won an Oscar nomination for Best Actress and the Streisand-sung title tune won for Best Song. Despite the eviscerated politics, The Way We Were poignantly captures the insoluble dilemma of reconciling private desires with public awareness. ~ Lucia Bozzola, All Movie Guide