The Paper Chase

"The Paper Chase" is about an aggressive, very bright, terribly

engaging first-year student at Harvard Law School. The movie respects
its hero, respects the school, and most of all respects the venerable
Professor Kingsfield, tyrant of contract law.

Kingsfield is really the movie's central character, even though John

Houseman gets supporting billing for the role. Everything centers
around his absolute dictatorship in the classroom and his icy reserve
at all other times. He's the kind of teacher who inspires total dread
in his students, and at the same time a measure of hero worship; he
doesn't just know contract law, he wrote the book.

Into his classroom every autumn come several dozen would-be Harvard
law graduates, who fall into the categories we all remember from
school: (a) the drones, who get everything right but will go forth to
lead lives of impeccable mediocrity; (b) the truly intelligent, who
will pass or fail entirely on the basis of whether they're able to
put up with the crap; (c) those with photographic memories, who can
remember everything but connect nothing; (d) the students whose
dogged earnestness will somehow pull them through; and (e) the
doomed.

One of each of these types is in the study group of Hart, the movie's
hero, and the one who is truly intelligent. He's a graduate of the
University of Minnesota and somewhat out of place among the Ivy
League types, but he does well in class because he really cares about
the law. He also cares about Kingsfield, to the degree that he breaks
into the library archives to examine the master's very own
undergraduate notes.

Hart is played by Timothy Bottoms, the star of "The Last Picture

Show." Bottoms is an awfully good actor, and so natural and
unaffected that he shows up the mannerisms of actors like Dustin
Hoffman or Jon Voight. Bottoms never seems to try; he's just there,
complete and convincing. He falls in love, fatefully, with Susan
(Lindsay Wagner), who turns out to be, even more fatefully,
Kingsfield's daughter. Their relationship is a little hard to follow
in the film; we aren't sure why she treats him the way she
doesÑafter all, she loves the guyÑand the movie jerks abruptly in
bringing them back together after a split-up.

But that isn't fatal because the fundamental relationship in the

movie is between Hart and Kingsfield. The crusty old professor
obviously appreciates the intelligence and independence of his prize
student, but he hardly ever lets his affection show; there's a great
scene in the classroom where he calls Hart forward, offers him a
dime, and says: "Call your mother and tell her you will never be a
lawyer."

Houseman is able to project subtleties of character even while

appearing stiff and unrelenting; it's a performance of Academy Award
quality, and resulted in an Oscar for Best Supporting Actor.
Lindsay Wagner, as the daughter, is also a surprise; she made her
movie debut in the unfortunate "Two People," which had Peter Fonda as
a conscience-stricken Army deserter. She wasn't able to make much of
an impression in that one, but "The Paper Chase" establishes her as
an actress with class and the saving grace of humor.

What's best about the movie is that it considers interesting adults--

young and old--in an intelligent manner. After it's over we almost
feel relief; there are so many movies about clods reacting
moronically to romantic and/or violent situations. But we hardly ever
get movies about people who seem engaging enough to spend half an
hour talking with (what would you say to Charles Bronson?). Here's
one that works.