Charly (1968)

Click here for CHARLY @MOVIE FANFARE

Cliff Robertson won the Oscar for his role as the title character - a mentally retarded man who undergoes a new experimental procedure which transforms him over the course of several weeks into a genius. The reason that Robertson won is obvious: he essentially plays two different characters in this film and the differences are staggering; it's also startling to see such two opposites in one film. He also depicts the gradual change in Charly as he becomes smarter. This is not some lurid sci-fi/horror film (a la Frankenstein) or even very much of a sci-fi story but more of a psychological study of the human condition through the prism of such a radical metamorphosis - the change is in the mind, not the body. The sci-fi element is this miracle treatment, yes, but it's merely the catalyst for most of the story.
The most interesting scenes are when Charly begins to get smarter; most of the stuff before and after is kind of dull, including his eventual romance with Claire Bloom's character (his doctor/psychiatrist), though there is always something of interest. The film also relies way too much on that multiple-screen-images technique so prevalent in the late sixties in film. There's a montage when he runs off to find himself, joins a motorcycle gang and becomes a swinger; it's brief and comes off as silly - it should have conveyed a long stretch of time but fails. There is a riveting scene near the end when Charly is presented on stage to a large group of scientists. The main thing about this film is that it causes a viewer to think things over afterwards. BoG's Score: 7.5 out of 10.
Charlie's Trivia: Based on the story and later novel Flowers For Algernon (Algernon is the name of the mouse)
and the play The Two Worlds of Charlie Gordon.