MAYBE I'LL BE HOME IN THE SPRING

US, 1971, 74 minutes, Colour.
Sally Field, Eleanor Parker, David Carradine, Jackie Cooper.
Directed by Joseph Sargent.

Maybe I’ll Come Home in the Spring is a topical film for family audiences, especially for parents dealing with teenage children.

Sally Field portrays a young woman who has gone off to live a hippie life and returns back to her middle-class suburban family, clashing with her mother, coping with boyfriends, concerned about her younger sister following in her footsteps. The film is dramatic, but has plenty of dialogue, given some force by the leading performers.

Sally Field had been Gidget in thirty-three episodes and The Flying Nun in seventy-seven episodes during the 1960s. She made the transition to telemovies and films during the 1970s, by the end of the decade winning an Oscar for Norma Rae. She had substantial roles during the 1980s including Backroads, Absent of Malice and another Oscar for Places in the Heart. She later appeared in Forrest Gump as well as the television series Brothers and Sisters. The film was directed by Joseph Sargent who made a number of striking telemovies and films ranging from The Taking of Pelham One-Two-Three? to Choices of the Heart.

1. The tone of the title as spoken by Denise? Was this a contemporary story? Was it contemporary and real?

2 Comment on the editing style, the cross-cutting, the modern mix-up, the overtones of drug trips, the overtones of confused memory?

3 How was the film a deconstruction of the parable of the Prodigal Son? The implications of the Prodigal Daughter? The daughter who stayed at home? The loving and distrusting parents? How was Denise the centre of the film? What kind of girl was she? Why did she leave home? Whose fault was this? Why did the film show that she returned? What did she want from her return? What had she learnt by her absence from home and the drug culture in which she lived? Did she want a future? Did she need love? Sympathy? How well was the home situation pictured? Especially in her return? Sue's reaction to her, loving and jealous? Her mother fussing over her little girl? Dad and his welcoming her home? And yet the parental suspicions and fears?

4. Their shouting and screaming at one another? The superficial society parties? The parents’ values as seen by Denise when she returned home after a different way of life? Was judgment being made on the mother and the father and their values?
5. How important was Sue in the film? What kind of girl was she? Why was she envious of Denise? Why did she conceal the drugs? Why did she lie? What did she hope for from the drugs? Why were her mother and father so suspicious of her? Why did they persecute her? Why had they not learnt from their experience with Denise? Why were they driving Sue from home?

6. Denise’s boy friend? What did he add to the film? How did he represent the drop-out drug way of life? How significant was the showing of his journeying to find Denise? What choice did he offer her? Why did she not go with him? How strongly did she want to? What could he have offered her?

7. How strong was the film on history repeating itself? How tragic and sad was this?

8. How optimistic was the ending? Even though Sue was repeating Denise’s mistakes, would she repeat Denise's coming home? The final image of Denise hoovering at home? What were the implications of this?

9. How well did the film explore contemporary values? Its picture of the family, was it too American or was it universal? The theme of independence, family loving and hating, fighting, suspicions?

10. What kind of a picture did it give of the drug scene and the counter culture values? The attraction of the counter culture?

11. How valuable a film would this be for families to see together? To discuss?