It is so blatantly obvious that Mazursky is gently parodying the self righteousness of the hippie movement. When discussing the black uprising movie, it's the black dude who tells him it's a rotten idea. In a more stern observation, his wife is clearly upset and his family life is clearly hitting the skids and he goes on about an acid trip he and his friend took. His wife makes the incredibly accurate observation that he wants her to do what he wants her to do not what she wants to do.Look I fly a little to the left of the left wing but to blather on about Hollywood being left wing when they want nothing more than to do movies where "things blow up real good" is kind of ridiculous.The movie is good. It's not great. But it is a keen and well observed characterization of a creative man who is trying to keep his personal and creative life together and vibrant but falls prey to his own self doubts.

I really liked this slice of California in the 70's (late 60's?) Donald Sutherland rules. plain and simple.. his charisma would carry a film even if it were not so well put together as this one... his character is likable but realistic, faults included.. whatever.. I just wanted to recommend the film.. I like a film to set a mood and take you there.. and this does just that, i feel like I know what it would be like to be a director on the verge of having it all in the early 70's, and for an hour and a half I lived it with the cast..I felt like the mood was similar to that of "Close Encounters of the Third Kind", at the beginning, just watching Richard Drefuss's character with his family.. just like a glimpse of what that life would be.. with the good times, and the arguments etc etc.. no explosions, no car chases, just a slice of life.

The worst movie with Donald Sutherland,one of my favorite actors, I ever saw. What in the world possessed Sutherland to take part in that movie. "Kelly's Heroes" was made in the same year and there he put down one of his best performances as "Oddball". There is no story in this movie. I even convinced myself to watch it twice on Turner Classic Movie channel, to find anything meaningful in this movie but I had to conclude that it is the worst I ever saw. Not even Donald Sutherland could pull this movie a little over the edge of disaster. He was,by the way, the only reason I watched the movie to the end twice.So this film will be erased from my memory as soon as possible and I stick to the rest of Donald's memorable fine performances.

This is definately not for everybody. I found this really interesting and since I started combining forces of cable TV with IMDB I discover really nice films. After all THERE ARE nice, different & interesting american films, even in the seventies!Anyway, this movie is not for people who like one-dimentional films. This is both serious and funny, both tragic and amusing. Even if its not too slow, it won't appeal to those who like it fast. Basicly it's about an intelligent director who is starting to lose it a bit. This is depicted in a most realistic way. I dont know what it has in common with Fellini's 8-IN-1, as I havent seen it. Anyway ALEX IN WONDERLAND implies a straight effect of 8-IN-1 on it.The dialog is the strongest about this one and people on stupid action films or those who dont like a dialog based flick wont find anything in this one.