Between the Lines (1977) Altmanesque exploration of an underground newspaper on the verge of a buyout.

Theme Song: As some type of halfway house for members of the E-Street Band, Southside Johnny and The Asbury Jukes play 2nd-tier horn-rock that was never able to make it out from beneath The Boss’ shadow. Regardless, half a dozen of their songs are featured prominently during an extended concert sequence in Between The Lines.

Interesting Dated References: People caring about local, independently-run newspapers; Newspaper culture as a whole; The days when everyone on the street just carried a fucking ceramic coffee cup around and grabbed coffee from various places (stores, restaurants, bodegas, etc.), because it’s just coffee, after all.

Best Line: “ … and then he’ll move to Vermont and he’ll write the mediocre American novel.”

Social Context: There’s a strong undercurrent of anti-establishment and coming-of-age life lessons, which unfortunately get buried beneath the onscreen attempts at humor and relationship theatrics. What happens when your counterculture newspaper gets too popular for its own good? What do you do when your staff begins aging out of their rebellious 20s and slowly falls into midlife complacency? Seriously juicy stuff that at times feels like an afterthought in the overall the film.

Summary: Very much post-Altman’s Nashville on a far smaller scale, Between The Lines follows several days in the life of denizens of The Back Bay Mainline, a counterculture newspaper on the verge of a buyout.

The staff talk over each other, bicker about politics, and say existential ‘70s things about health food stores. Standout cast members include: Jeff Goldblum (one year before The Fly) as Max, an over-the-top music critic; Bruno Kirby (City Slickers) as David, an over-eager new reporter; John Heard (C.H.U.D., Home Alone) as Harry, a once-great reporter who has lost his passion; and Lindsay Crouse (Slap Shot, Communion) as Abbie, an aspiring photographer caught in Harry’s career wipeout.

Much of the drama takes place in the dingy, authentic-looking office of The Mainline as the staff half-heartedly worry about their integrity as big news comes sniffing around for a buyout. In order to progress the plot, everyone decides to go see The Asbury Jukes, who insist on playing their entire discography, bringing the total running time of the movie to 7 hours and 36 minutes.

After that, they all sort of give in to the buyout and go on with their lives during an extended postscript. There are several interesting scenes throughout, including one in which Max does battle in the office with a destructive performance artist, and another in which Harry and Abbie do a story on burlesque dancers featuring a young Marilu Henner, but there’s an over reliance on relationship drama slowing things down.

Too much time is spent on Harry’s unstable relationship with Abbie, only to have him jump right into bed with Laura (Gwen Welles), who herself is struggling through a relationship with Michael (Stephen Collins, pedophile/star of 7th Heaven). It’s unengaging in context of newspaper inner workings, and together with the Asbury Jukes concert, makes for a lot of padding in the runtime.

Worth Mentioning:
– Doug Kenney (co-founder of National Lampoon) has two scenes, the last of which is kind of sweet as he and Goldblum sit at a bar and try to figure out how they know each other (both worked at different newspapers).

https://youtu.be/lSETapp3fBI?t=1h33m10s

– Extensive street and building footage of the Back Bay area of Boston, which looks a bit grimy, but wonderful.

– Directed by Joan Micklin Silver, who next did great work with Heard in Chilly Scenes of Winter.

– Abbie, Lynn, and Laura sit around and drink wine in Lynn’s apartment, which looks so fucking comfortable and ‘70s I would hang out there all night and I wouldn’t even care if it smelled like patchouli.

Poster and Box Art: Excellent poster by Richard Amsel (The Sting, Raiders of The Lost Ark, The Dark Crystal, TV Guide covers).

There’s serious next-level illustration montage going on with this one. The same art is used slightly edited in the Vestron Video Betamax release.

Availability: Despite really clean and bright screen caps included on the IMDB movie listing, I can’t find any information on this being restored, issued on Blu-ray, or available streaming. There was an MGM on-demand DVD, but it’s out of print. Currently on YouTube.