The Graduate Movie Analysis

The Graduate is a comedy-drama based in the 1960’s, which follows the story of a struggling college graduate who is seduced by an older woman and ends up falling in love with her daughter. Directed by Mike Nichols, The Graduate ‘captured the spirit of the times’. The 1960’s marked a change in film scoring, instead of the well-established orchestral ‘Hollywood sound’ the industry demanded a more modern approach thus marked integration of popular music. Nichols approached Simon and Garfunkel a raising folk-rock duo to contribute to the composition of the score. Simon was hesitant at first been quite underwhelmed by the book, ‘I didn't like anything about the film at first…. I was only impressed with Mike Nichols who asked us to do it’. Convinced
by management as a strategic career move, Simon and Garfunkel eventually agreed to do it, assuming the duo would write new material for the film pre released material, such as ‘The Sound of Silence’ was temporarily used in the score. However due to intense schedule demands Simon and Garfunkel struggled to write material for the production. Perhaps the most associated of all the duo’s tracks, Mrs. Robinson, was barely used within the production however Nichols was pleased with the contributions and decided to keep the pre-released material. Simon and Garfunkel’s chart toppers where accompanied by traditional film scoring by composer Dave Grusin. Although this scoring was quite minimal it set the tone and mood presented on screen.