Fluentiama Perfect cast and a good story

BroadcastChic Excellent, a Must See

Zandra The movie turns out to be a little better than the average. Starting from a romantic formula often seen in the cinema, it ends in the most predictable (and somewhat bland) way.

Walter Sloane Mostly, the movie is committed to the value of a good time.

IceboxMovies For the first time ever in his career making movies, Hall Bartlett knew exactly what he was doing. He was adapting a best-selling novella by Richard Bach about a prophetic seagull, and he was going to turn it into a major motion picture. It was going to be an independently-financed film with as little studio interference as possible. And by the end of the ten-month shooting schedule, Bartlett had mortgaged his home and invested every last one of his savings into the film's $1.5 million budget; he was willing to do anything to make his dream project a reality. "I was born to make this movie," he declared. He was absolutely right. In his entire 30- year filmmaking career, Bartlett helmed a series of flops, misfires, close calls, small gems, and at least one masterpiece: Jonathan Livingston Seagull (1973).The film was absolutely reviled when it came out. Reviews were terrible. Then there were the lawsuits. Richard Bach sued Bartlett when Bartlett refused to honor Bach's right to final cut. Neil Diamond threatened to sue Bartlett if he didn't incorporate more of the music from the soundtrack into the film; Diamond was also upset when composer Lee Holdridge requested to share credit with Diamond over the music. Ovady Julber, the director of 1936's La Mer, sued over suspicions that Bartlett's film might have plagiarized his work. And toes were stepped on. Associate Producer Leslie Parrish had worked hard to hire the crew members and help take care of the real seagulls being used for the production (these seagulls were trained by Ray Berwick and Gary Gero, and stored in a room in a Holiday Inn), but in the end, Bartlett demoted Parrish's credit from Associate Producer to "Researcher".In spite of the tension which occurred behind the scenes, Jonathan Livingston Seagull belongs right up there with Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) as one of the great surrealist films released in the later half of the 20th century. It is a rich, liberated celebration of a writer/director's artistic sensibilities, free of any constricting narrative rules, enhanced with the help of the cinematography by helicopter photographer Jim Freeman and veteran cinematographer Jack Couffer (the latter of whom was hired after his impressive work on Walt Disney's True Life Adventure series). That Couffer's cinematography netted the film one of two Academy Award nominations is not surprising in the least: it remains one of the finest examples of natural footage ever captured on celluloid.Neil Diamond and Lee Holdridge's score for the film has often been dismissed as "overbearing", but I've always begged to differ. Among the other songs used on the soundtrack, "Be" represents Jonathan's independence, while "Dear Father" epitomizes his self-doubt and "Skybird", his liberation. To me, the film's soundtrack remains exhilarating, and it is also a reminder of Hall Bartlett's often- overlooked talent for juxtaposing the right kind of music with his cinematic stories.Jonathan Livingston Seagull was not embraced by critics or audiences, but I have a feeling that Bartlett himself always knew, deep down, that he had left the public with a masterpiece. Maybe he knew that he wouldn't live to see the film get the attention it deserved. Maybe he was aware that the film's mediocre reception would outlive him. After this film, he would only go on to make two films, The Children of Sanchez and Love is Forever. Neither was particularly impressive. But I wish he were alive to know how much I love this film. I wish he knew how much it has changed the way I look at movies. And I wish he knew how much I cherish the way he ends the picture with Jonathan's immortal closing monologue: "Look with your understanding. Find out what you already know. Use it, Fletcher. Teach it… show it forth. And you'll know the way to fly."

MartinHafer JONATHAN LIVINGSTON SEAGULL is a film about a bird and his philosophical musings. As he flies about, he wonders if there's more to life than just eating fish heads, how high he can fly and is there some special purpose to life--all in a live-action two-hour film! Yes, this is #253 of why you should hate the 1970s--right between the song "Muskrat Love" and Richard Nixon! Okay, there really is no such list--but if there was, this film would be on it! That's because this is a god-awful film that was actually embraced by "with it" people and made the book a huge best-seller and the film a must-see. And to make it worse, the film is so deadly serious and tries so hard to be philosophical--while all it really consists of is a seagull flying about as inane dialog blares on the screen. Could this get any worse?! Well, yes, because while the music does sound lovely, Neil Diamond also sings several songs that made "Heartlight" (sure to be included if there was a "reasons to hate the 1980s" list) seem hard-edged! So what positive things do I have to say about the film? Well, the cinematography is lovely and must have been spectacular on the big screen. Also, when Neil Diamond isn't singing, the music is lovely. However, with two hours to the film, these reasons become irrelevant after just a few minutes as the rest is just a ponderous pile of....well,... guano. And the fact that so many once-respected actors LOVED the project and agreed to do voices for it is a testament to the power of mood altering drugs and hippie psychology!! Harry Medved included this in his book "The Fifty Worst Films of All Time". While I have disagreed with some of his choices, I can heartily agree that this film merited, no DEMANDED, inclusion! In summation, I'd rather eat glass than see it again! It's THAT bad!!!

my_corpse_remains I won't bother to give a plot description because there is no plot and what little there is to say about what happens over the two unbearable hours this movie steals from the viewer's life has already been adequately covered in previous comments.I'd like to give my perspective as a "Gen X"er who was shown this movie by his Baby Boomer father. I was 18 at the time and my father had dumped my mother for another woman 12 years prior. I was lucky to have a step-dad, because my old man put in the obligatory every-other-weekend like it was parole. He usually just left me with his wife, who hated my guts, while he worked overtime making six figures. She at least mailed the support checks, because when he dumped her, I quit seeing them.When I was 16, he moved to Texas to avoid paying her support too, so him and I didn't talk for a couple of years. It took six months of refusing to take his calls to get a plane ticket and a week of his life. The trip was suppose to help us to reconcile and I hoped to get answers as to why up until now my existence had been some sort of thorn in his side.I asked him the tough questions, the ones I'd asked myself my entire childhood. I was treated to a reluctant "sorry", some evasive non-answers and a lot of whining about how lousy his childhood was and it was everyone else's fault for his mistakes. Then one afternoon, he sat me down to watch "Jonathan Livingston Seagull", while he helped his girlfriend make dinner. He gave me a whole prep talk about it before. This movie was suppose to answer everything for me.After watching this movie I accepted what I already knew. That my father was a narcissistic people-user who was incapable of doing anything for anyone if it somehow inconvenienced his life. There are great films out there about families who drift apart and reconcile; movies about people who realize the error of their ways and make amends with their past. Instead, I get shown a cheesy relic about a G- D- seagull who wants more out of life than helping his "family" survive.Apparently, Jonathan is better than the other seagulls. They can catch fish heads for the flock while he finds new ways of flapping his wings. I mean, WTF? Apparently my father's idea of philosophy is meaningless double talk that wouldn't be fit for inclusion in the DVD extras of "Kung Fu". Read the quotes! Yes, do whatever you like, because freedom is "being" or happiness is not thinking about anyone else but yourself or something to that effect. Fly, fly away from the District Attorney. Explore new horizons where they can't garnish your paycheck.My father has four kids and none of us keep in touch with him. Maybe he's leeching off some woman right now? Maybe he's homeless? I haven't talked to him in five years and I couldn't care less. I got sick of Jonathan Seagull asking to borrow my credit card so he could go fly off and "discover himself" over and over again. So to me this movie is about my father and every other self-romanticizing Baby Boomer with a Beamer, arthritis and grandkids he never sees. Maybe Greenpeace will be there for all the elderly seagulls who fly out to sea alone.

SoylentGreenIsPeople91 This review is based on the first 45 minutes of the film - it is the only film I have ever walked out of. The single worst film I have ever seen. Pretentious drivel masquerading as some sort of art. Not even watchable in a "so bad its good" way. It is way, way below that standard. A seagull who wants to "fly" - not fly, "fly" (possibly with 2 y's). It is every bit as bad as the plot synopsis (and that is the entire plot) sounds. I thought that the book had had some interesting ideas, even if it was a bit on the twee side, but the film removed any vestige of charm from the book in favour of a literal interpretation of the book's message. All we have is a seagull who wants to "fly".(Please note that this review was not written by SoylentGreenIsPeople91, who has actually never seen this film)