The film follows the radicalization of Simon, a student at a fictional university in San Francisco. Indifferent to student protests going on around him, Simon learns of plans by students to occupy a university building to protest construction of a gym against the wishes of the local minority community. His curiosity is aroused, and he makes his way to the protest. On the way, he spies a fellow student, Linda, with whom he falls in love at first sight. He follows her into the protest, and they both join in. Together, they later rob a local grocer when the strikers become hungry. However, over time, as their relationship develops, Simon confesses to Linda his lack of commitment, as he worked so hard to gain college admission in the first place. Linda responds that she cannot date one who is not equally committed to the movement. Thus they part company, for now.
Afterwards, Simon is assaulted by a right-wing athlete, George; Simon uses his injuries to claim police brutality. Gaining attention among students, he is unexpectedly seduced by a young woman protester. Later on, though, Linda returns, announcing her decision to remain with Simon. They spend an afternoon at the park, where they are accosted by a group of African-Americans, one of whom destroys Simon's camera. A furious Simon later expresses disillusionment, telling protesters that those they seek to help seem no different from the violent cops. But Simon revises his thinking during a hospital visit with George, the jock who earlier assaulted him. George now suffers from injuries sustained when attacked by right-wingers as the police stood and watched.
On leaving the hospital, Simon visits the dean's office, warning an administrative assistant to call off construction of the gymnasium or risk violence. Eventually, city police and the National Guard with bayoneted rifles arrive and crush the university building takeover using tear gas. With the strikers choking, police and guardsmen haul the demonstrators from the building, beating them with batons. As Linda is carried away, kicking and screaming, Simon attacks a group of police all by himself and segments of his happier times in college flash before the viewers' eyes as the film ends.
Clay Felker, editor of New York magazine, showed producer Irwin Winkler a column James Kunen had written and told him it was going to be a book (it would be published in 1969). He read it and bought the film rights with partner Bob Chartoff. "We thought it could create understanding – the schism was so great between the generations then", said Winkler. "It was an important subject. These youths who are looked upon as anarchists are really just American kids reacting to problems in our society. Here was a story about an ordinary guy becoming an anarchist."[2]
Winkler had seen The Indian Wants the Bronx and It's Called the Sugar Plum by Israel Horovitz and asked if he had an idea how to adapt the book. Horovitz pitched the movie to MGM saying it should be shot at Columbia (University). "At the time, there was a student group that had shot a lot of black and white documentary footage of the strikes at Columbia", he said. "I wanted to intercut this documentary footage with the fiction that I planned to write. "[3]
The pitch was successful as MGM announced they would make it in May 1969.[4] MGM's president at the time was "Bo" Polk and the head of production was Herb Solow.[5]
Israel Horovitz was signed to do the screenplay.[6] He said he wrote ten drafts over two years.[7]
François Truffaut was offered the film to direct but turned it down. The job eventually went to Stuart Hagmann who had worked in television and advertising.[8][9]
Horovitz says he struggled to write the film after MGM wanted to shift it to the west coast. He talked to Kunen for a few days then asked himself, "Who is this movie for really? What's the point of this? If it's to preach to the learned already--then it will have no worth"."[3]
Horovitz says "I took the approach that Michael Moore must take with his documentaries. Moore doesn't talk to the people who are already in the know--he's talking to those who don't know. So I started to head in that direction with the re-write of the script."[3]
Irwin Winkler later wrote in his memoirs that Hagman's directorial style, which involved "a great deal of camera movement" meant "the actors sometimes suffered from the crew's allocation of production time versus acting time. But they were game and young, though they required a lot of on-set communication."[10]
"The scenario was cut by the director", said Horovitz, "but not by MGM. It was diluted by cutting – it should have been much stronger than it is. But then it would have lost most of its audience straight away."[11]
Kim Darby says the director "was very kind. He was lenient. He was a lot of fun too. He had done many commercials before, and there was the air of freedom around us."[17]
The film was a commercial and critical flop. "The critics attacked the style instead of the substance", said Winkler. "Most disappointing was the dismissal by audiences."[2]
Vincent Canby of The New York Times wrote that the film "only lacks an occasional, superimposed written message ... to look like a giant, 103-minute commercial, not for peace, or student activism, or community responsibility, but for the director himself."[19]
Gene Siskel of the Chicago Tribune gave the film two-and-a-half stars out of four and called it "a movie with its heart, if not always its intelligence, in the right place ... The major problem with the film is that during the period before Simon James, a 20-year old student at Western Pacific university, is radicalized, neither his life style as a member of the college crew, nor the political movement on campus is very interesting. Director Stuart Hagman [sic], in his first feature effort, substitutes overly enthusiastic camera techniques and popular music played against the San Francisco scenery for a more complete character definition."[20]
Charles Champlin of the Los Angeles Times wrote, "I found 'The Strawberry Statement' inconsistent and uneven, all too glossy and yet suddenly all too real and populated with children I have no trouble recognizing as my own. And it's the true measure of the film that we are all likely to remember its best moments: The moments when we are made to see the terrible and ironic costs of innocence and idealism."[21]
Gary Arnold of The Washington Post stated that the violent climax "would be absurd even if it were well staged, because Hagmann and Horowitz haven't earned their catharsis. There is something howlingly inappropriate about a movie that turns 'angry' after an hour-and-a-half of puppy love, puppy protest and the confectionery audio-visual style pioneered by 'A Man and a Woman' and 'The Graduate.' It's difficult to forget that the script has been fundamentally negligible and incompetent."[22]
David Pirie of The Monthly Film Bulletin wrote, "The Strawberry Statement is certain to be attacked for its patchiness and for hollow commercial opportunism; but while students are being killed on university campuses in America, one can't help preferring its highly emotional, if faltering and uneven, tone to the slick reportage of a film like Medium Cool."[23]
Brian De Palma said "big studio revolutionary movies" like Strawberry were "such a joke. You can't stage that stuff. We've seen it all on television."[24]
"Bad timing", said Davison. "Everyone had enough of the country tearing apart."[25]
Horovitz says when he saw the film "I was really upset with it. I thought it was too cute and Californian and too pretty." He came to accept the film "for what it is, what it was, and what it represented in the time in which it was made. I'm glad I got to write it."[3]
Leonard Quart expressed a more measured view in Cineaste, writing that while The Strawberry Statement is basically a "shallow, pop version of the Sixties", it still provides "a taste of the period's dreams and volatility." That's a reasonable take on the film, which is more accurate than it may seem at first glance, depicting an uncertain time when many aspiring rebels were motivated as much by romance and excitement as by principles and ideologies. The Strawberry Statement is a terrific time machine that's also fun to watch.[26]
