Michael Sarne wrote and directed this odd, sometimes-charming, sometimes-not chronicle of a wide-eyed art student in '60s London who falls in with a decadent crowd. Helium-voiced Genevieve Waite is like a cross between Anne Heche and Shirley Temple. She has fantasies of bathing nude in a pond full of lilies and being dried off by her girlfriend dressed as a maid, and later one featuring the same friend being strangled by her lover. "Joanna" is incongruous: Sarne is in love with old-fashioned trappings and modern techniques. Some of his shots are delectable (Waite crossing a bridge at sunset, or running down a pathway lined with trees), but the film's eye-candy needs something substantial to go with it. As to Waite's Joanna, I never understood the leading character or felt anyone on-screen did either (at one point, the girlfriend says to Joanna, "I don't sleep around as much as you do", but we never get the impression that Joanna is promiscuous--she seems only to want true love). Donald Sutherland gives the film's only solid performance as a fey Lord and the sharp, canny editing keeps the picture popping. Otherwise, the movie is just a mod bauble, and only a hint of true cleverness is left behind. ** from ****

This film could almost be viewed as the "let's-get-real" answer to "Guess Who's Coming to Dinner", a film that probably still could not get made in the U.S. As a snapshot of "swinging London" in the sixties, "Joanna" has it all. But Donald Sutherland absolutely steals this movie as Lord Peter Sanderson; his strange, wonderful, secular soliloquy on a Moroccan beach at sunset still provokes both goose pimples and tears. South African actress Genevieve Waite, who plays the wide-eyed heroine, was declared persona non grata in her native country after making this film, solely because of her love scenes with Calvin Lockhart (she later emigrated to the U.S. and married John Phillips of the Mamas and the Papas). All in all, a strange, wonderful, campy, mystic trip to the sixties.

I remember this film as one which helped to define my life in college in the late 60's. I must have seen it along with my friends 10 times. We had the songs memorized and would sing them everywhere. I can't really understand the negative comments about this film. I would really like to find a copy out there somewhere so I could see it again. Does anyone have a copy?

"Joanna" is almost impossible to find on videocassette -- for a good reason. Director Michael Sarne (Myra Breckinridge) uses superimpositions, dream sequences, extraneous sounds, alternating b&w/color, Altmanesque overlapping dialogue, and long-held static shots to "orchestrate" the story of an innocent, pleasure-seeking art student (Genevieve Waite) trying to find happiness in "mod" London. Joanna herself is a sweet creation and an endearing character. But Sarne's irritating direction nearly ruins the film. Stylistically, "Joanna" is over-the-top, embarrassing, and laughably self-indulgent. A classic example: the scene where Joanna enters a room, dressed all in green, and everything else in the room is painted the exact same color. What was Sarne thinking?Sarne's humour (eg. the scene with the "jam jars") consistently falls flat, and he never manages to get decent performances from his actors --even Donald Sutherland looks disoriented here.Some (though not all) of the music (by Rod McKuen) is gorgeous -- particularly "Two Schoolgirls," the title song, "I'll Catch the Sun," and "Ain't You Glad You're Livin' Joe" --- making the o.o.p soundtrack LP a valuable, worthy find. But Sarne has no sense of how to pair music with image in a film --- so the songs feel thrown, haphazardly, on top of their scenes -- as if Sarne wanted to use the music, but didn't know how or where to include it.A rare exception to this rule occurs during the final sequence - a musical number at a train station. Joyous and refreshing (and not simply because it signifies the end of the picture), the finale recalls the bittersweet mood/style of Jacques Demy's picture "The Umbrellas of Chebourg." Why didn't Sarne use this mood/style for the entire picture? It would have improved the film substantially.The dialogue in "Joanna" is wildly uneven. It might be easy to dismiss the characters' lines as all trite and cliched, but that isn't the case. From time to time, you'll hear a bit of dialogue in this picture that is (intentionally) laugh-out-loud hilarious, and reveals greater depth to the characters. The best example is when Joanna meets her soon-to-be-lover, a black nightclub owner/hipster (Calvin Lockhart), and he exclaims, "Hey, Joanna -- how you been?" Joanna, who constantly tries to fit in with everyone, seems to miss the "hip" rhetoric of his question and responds limply, "I been fine. How you been?" as he speeds away. It's a funny, well-planned beat, but those are few and far between in this picture.If you have the chance to see "Joanna," it's a mildly interesting experience, but I wouldn't recommend going out of your way to find a copy (as I did). This picture is a failed experimental effort from the sixties that deserves to be forgotten.