Andrew Sarris
“Coming Home is clearly a labor of love, but somewhere along the way it has miscarried. The characters do not connect as they should; the rhetoric seems forced and unearned. It is a pity because there is considerable chemistry and charisma in the cast, and there are enough creative credentials involved for a season of worthy films. As the production notes teel us, ‘Coming Home represents a blend of some of the most viable talents in 1970s cinema….
“…. As it turns out, these half-dozen characters must bear the psychic and physical burdens of a whole decade of dissent and disillusion. As written, or, rather, as unwritten, they are not up to the task….
“It occurred to me, as the film unraveled, that the players are trying to get inside of characters they did not really understand. Jane Fonda is certainly pretty enough to have been the high school cheerleader who married a Marine captain, and Jon Voight is certainly muscular enough to have been the high school football hero who went charging off to fight for his country. Hence, on the iconographic level of Fonda and Voight, their explicit sex scenes together are lyrically archetypal. But on the sociological plane of Sally Hyde and Luke Martin, they can find very little to talk about. The whole idea was to show how two sweetly apolitical people by the war and the natural flow of their own emotions. There are probably case studies on file with precisely this kind of recorded transformation. Sally Hyde and Luke Martin, however, do not convey to us a plastic past because Fonda and Voight are unable or unwilling to strike a note of congenial triviality….
“Hal Ashby’s framing and editing contribute to keeping the characters in a loosely lyrical relation to their situation, as if they were only trying to keep in touch with their feelings and nothing else….
“…. As it happens, I am writing this pan with more recgret than relish. I would just as soon see Ashby, Fonda, Voight, Dern & Company have a big hit. They are among the industry’s most prominent risk-takes, and they deserve to be given thebenefit of every doubt. Perhaps Coming Home will be as wildly overrated as Julia was. I hope so. I would like to see these people have the opportunity to take more chances in the future. As a critic with gut-level responsibility to my readers, however, I cannot conceal my disappointment simply to influence long-range policy decisions in the film industry….
“… [T]he main problem seems to be the rambling ballad form to which Ashby seems to be increasingly addicted. It worked, in my opinion at least, in Bound for Glory because of an overpoweringly vital and detailed personality at the center of the film. In Coming Home, unfortunately, the characters seem to have been denied fully distinctive personalities because of a misguided pursuit of universality. I could never believe for a moment that Sally Hyde and Captain Hyde (where’s Jekyll?) had ever spent any more time together beyond that required for Fonda and Dern to perform their chores on the set…. I often had the probably illusory feeling that the best part of Coming Home wound up on the cutting room floor. I was waiting, waiting, waiting, but finally there was nothing left on the screen, and I had to go home to write this review. Please see the film for yourself, nevertheless. Fonda and Voight are icons of a very special kind, and I wouldn’t miss them for anything in the world.”
Andrew Sarris
Village Voice, February 20, 1978
“…. As it turns out, these half-dozen characters must bear the psychic and physical burdens of a whole decade of dissent and disillusion. As written, or, rather, as unwritten, they are not up to the task….
“It occurred to me, as the film unraveled, that the players are trying to get inside of characters they did not really understand. Jane Fonda is certainly pretty enough to have been the high school cheerleader who married a Marine captain, and Jon Voight is certainly muscular enough to have been the high school football hero who went charging off to fight for his country. Hence, on the iconographic level of Fonda and Voight, their explicit sex scenes together are lyrically archetypal. But on the sociological plane of Sally Hyde and Luke Martin, they can find very little to talk about. The whole idea was to show how two sweetly apolitical people by the war and the natural flow of their own emotions. There are probably case studies on file with precisely this kind of recorded transformation. Sally Hyde and Luke Martin, however, do not convey to us a plastic past because Fonda and Voight are unable or unwilling to strike a note of congenial triviality….
“Hal Ashby’s framing and editing contribute to keeping the characters in a loosely lyrical relation to their situation, as if they were only trying to keep in touch with their feelings and nothing else….
“…. As it happens, I am writing this pan with more recgret than relish. I would just as soon see Ashby, Fonda, Voight, Dern & Company have a big hit. They are among the industry’s most prominent risk-takes, and they deserve to be given thebenefit of every doubt. Perhaps Coming Home will be as wildly overrated as Julia was. I hope so. I would like to see these people have the opportunity to take more chances in the future. As a critic with gut-level responsibility to my readers, however, I cannot conceal my disappointment simply to influence long-range policy decisions in the film industry….
“… [T]he main problem seems to be the rambling ballad form to which Ashby seems to be increasingly addicted. It worked, in my opinion at least, in Bound for Glory because of an overpoweringly vital and detailed personality at the center of the film. In Coming Home, unfortunately, the characters seem to have been denied fully distinctive personalities because of a misguided pursuit of universality. I could never believe for a moment that Sally Hyde and Captain Hyde (where’s Jekyll?) had ever spent any more time together beyond that required for Fonda and Dern to perform their chores on the set…. I often had the probably illusory feeling that the best part of Coming Home wound up on the cutting room floor. I was waiting, waiting, waiting, but finally there was nothing left on the screen, and I had to go home to write this review. Please see the film for yourself, nevertheless. Fonda and Voight are icons of a very special kind, and I wouldn’t miss them for anything in the world.”
Andrew Sarris
Village Voice, February 20, 1978
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