I attended college in the late Sixties, and I wanted to chime in with Titov and others who says that this is one of only a handful of movies that captures the time as lived experience rather than journalistic cliché. I can think of only three or four others: "Baby, It's You"; "Dog Fight"; and to some extent Milos Forman's first American film, "Taking Off." Not one of these films is available on Netflix. I saw each when it came out. "Taking Off" was revived pretty often for three or four years, so there must have been others who liked it as much as I did. The others I haven't seen since they were first in theaters, so I can'be sure of my present reaction. But for 40 years I've remembered the last line of "Drive, He Said," which says something.

Jack Nicholson directed this story of a college basketball star coming to grips with the fact that world is a miserable place. William Tepper is exceptional in the lead role, strung along by his would-be girlfriend (Karen Black) and badgered into being a "good boy" by his win-at-any-cost coach Bruce Dern. The fact that Black is also the girlfriend of one of Tepper's professors really complicates things. Disillusioned and, as he says, feeling disengaged, Tepper personifies an entire generation of late 60s/early 70s youths mired in angst. His roommate is played by Michael Margotta. Margotta is slowly goes mad with paranoia, anger and a pretty sad determination to avoid the draft. The film is melancholy but with a lot of touches of humor, particularly involving Dern's hyperactive pep talks. Black is fine and writer Robert Towne plays her boyfriend. Henry Jaglom, David Ogden Stiers (who, as a professional basketball team owner, has a pretty amusing exchange with Tepper during a contract negotiation), and a silent Cindy Williams are in it too. Nicholson's solo directorial debut is a stunner. He would never direct again with such a sure hand. The great cinematography is by Bill Butler.

I lived in Eugene in 1971. Took part in some of the "crowd'' scenes. Never had a chance to see the movie, though. Something, though I'm not sure what, recently jogged my memory about the filming of "Drive.''I've read the reviews. Not surprised. The crew seemed a little wigged out, like most of us were in those days. I had read something in the Register-Guard about the film needing extras, so some friends and I went to take part. One of those crazy, 1970s Eugene days. Oh those were the days!At the time, I didn't know any of the names of the people in the film except director Nicholson. Would love to have the chance to see what was banned in Oregon at the time. I remember the filming causing a stir, but never saw the completed project to find out why.Are there any copies of this movie available?

This may be the only film that actually comes close to capturing on film the essentially uncapturable world of the American college experience of the late 60s-early 70s. Go ahead, name another movie that even approaches this one: "Getting Straight"? "RPM"? These are caricatures. "Return of the Secaucus Seven" has its moments, but that's a retrospective film about (self-obsessed) individuals more than a film about a time and a place depicted *in* that time and place. "Drive, He Said" portrays-- with subtlety and nuance where it should, and a swift kick in the shorts where that's the only appropriate way-- the anti-draft movement, the ambiguity of big-time college sports (especially when there's a war on), the sexual revolution of the period, and the general unreality of the day. Believe me, it was like that.The whole cast deserves commendation (as does the director, of course) but particular praise should be reserved for Bruce Dern, as the basketball coach, and Karen Black, the hero's very unusual-- except for that time-- love interest. William Tepper, as the lead, also rates a real round of applause both for his perfect capturing of the student-athlete of the period and for actually playing real college basketball in the film (remember Anthony Perkins in "Tall Story"? Yikes!).All in all, a classic of a kind-- and the last film someone currently in 6th grade should be writing comments on ("boring", "repellent"-- um, right, sonny, please go back to your Arnold movies). Why isn't this film available from imdb?