THE PANIC IN NEEDLE PARK

US, 1971, 110 minutes, Colour.
Al Pacino, Kitty Winn, Alan Vint, Richard Bright, Kiel Martin.
Directed by Jerry Schatzberg.

The Panic in Needle Park was one of several films of 1970/71 which reflected the crisis in the taking of drugs and their widespread use in America. Another example was Stuart Hagman's Believe in Me. This film is distinguished by an early performance of Al Pacino. He was then to go on to great fame with the Godfather films, Serpico and Dog Day Afternoon. The heroine is Kitty Winn who was to appear in the Exorcist films. The director was Jerry Schatzberg, a former fashion photographer who made Puzzle of a Downfall Child with Faye Dunaway at the same time, which was set in the world of fashion models. He has not made many films. Scarecrow, also with Al Pacino and Gene Hackman, was a very good film of 1973. Schatzberg was a fatality of the Streisand, A Star is Born. He then made a minor comedy crime film, Sweet Revenge. The Panic in Needle Park was very telling and moving in its day. It reflects the atmosphere of the time, but may seem somewhat dated now, although the problem still remains.

1. How does this film reflect the atmosphere in America of 1969-70? Its American impact? The fact that it was not released outside America widely until five years later, in the wake of the director's success and the main stars’ success?

2. Audience interest in the drug problem in New York, audience involvement with the people and their problems, the amount of sympathy asked for? How real did the people in the situation seem? How real the problems?

3. How important the drug problem in New York? As presented here, realistically? How was the problem heightened because of the concentration of population in New York, availability of drugs, squalid conditions? How does it throw light on the problem elsewhere? Has the drug problem changed since 1970?

4. The device of entering the plot via Helen? Her ordinariness, a Midwestern girl, lost in the big city, the change that the city wrought on her, her relationship to Margot, the importance of the abortion and its effect on her, the depths to which she was going? How credible a girl from the country going to the city, her potential for drug-taking?

5. Helen as a character? Her weaknesses and strengths? The encounter with Bobby, her reliance on him, the nature of the liaison and the effect on her? Her curiosity about his drug peddling, his drug taking? The decision to take drugs to be like him? Her downhill progress after this? The move to prostitution to support herself and her drug taking, the effect on Bobby? Her growing involvement in drug peddling? What had happened to her as a person, her conscience, values?

6. The importance of the police and the drug squad, their detection, their pressures on the addicts to give information on one another? The character of Hutch and his job? His pressure on Bobby, the pressure on Helen and her decision to give Bobby in?

7. The film's focus on Bobby as the young man of New York. produced by the city, intense, in the peddling racket, an addict? The strengths and weaknesses of his character? The relationship with Helen and its effect on him? Did he really love her? His involvement in the robbery with Hank, the fact that he wasn't particularly good at it? His arrest, his resentment against Helen and her prostitution, the emotional response to his betrayal by Helen? His leaving jail and then finally going with her? What future did he have?

8. The character of Marco, the city type, the using of Helen, forgetting her? Hank and the big-time, the robbery, using Bobby, using Helen etc.? The types of New York?

9. How sympathetically and accurately were the police presented, especially in the character of Hutch?

10. Audience response to the picture of the drug culture, the way of life, apartments, money, meals, rooms? The detailed picture of drug-taking and its effect? Was it a deterrent?

11. The film's use of the authentic New York, its style? The use of close-ups, conversations, long and rather intense sequences?

12. The social importance and impact of this kind of film?