The film revolves around a team employed at The Back Bay Mainline, an alternative newspaper in Boston,[6] as they face the threat of a takeover by a major corporation. The key figures in this story include Harry Lucas, a disenchanted lead reporter with an on-and-off again girlfriend Abbie, Max, a flaky music critic, Michael, a writer/author intending to relocate to New York, David, an eager cub reporter, and Frank, a beleaguered editor-in-chief.[7]
Various subplots unfold throughout the narrative. For instance, Laura grapples with her relationship with self-absorbed Michael, who plans to move to New York using the proceeds from an upcoming book. A party celebration leads to Laura spending the night at Harry's house before Michael arrives for a confrontation. Ultimately, Laura decides to accompany Michael to New York.
David, a youthful reporter who commutes on a bike, seeks a significant and potentially risky story. Max, Harry, and Abbie attempt to intercept him as he meets a source, arriving just in time to witness David getting a bloody nose.
Throughout the film, rumors circulate about the newspaper's acquisition by a corporation, specifically a communications empire. Towards the end, it is revealed that a group led by Roy Walsh intends to purchase and manage the paper. In a meeting, Walsh asks Frank to dismiss Harry, branding him a "moving force in the wrong direction." Lynn, the secretary, is the first to resign.
In response to his termination, Harry fantasizes about walking to Walsh's office and shoots him with a suction cupdarttoy pistol. In reality, he meets Abbie and Max at a bar, and Max cons a stranger into buying him a drink.
Cast
John Heard as Harry Lucas, disillusioned lead reporter[8]
Lindsay Crouse as Abbie, talented photographer, Harry's girlfriend
Fred Barron, who had written for both The Phoenix and The Real Paper, used his and Harper Barnes'[15] alternative newspaper experiences as the basis for his Between the Lines screenplay. Joan Micklin Silver had herself worked for The Village Voice.[16]Doug Kenney, co-founder of the National Lampoon, has a cameo role.
It was largely filmed on location in Boston for two weeks,[1] with locations including pawn shops, record stores, bars, porn theaters, strip clubs, and derelict apartments.[17] The remainder of filming was done in New York City, though no scenes are set in New York.[1]
The film marked the screen debuts of John Heard, Joe Morton, and Marilu Henner.[17]Robert Costanzo makes a brief appearance as a hired goon, his second film role.
The film received positive reviews at the time of its release.[21] Gary Arnold of The Washington Post wrote, "Joan Micklin Silver's second feature, Between the Lines, an episodic romantic comedy about the staff members of the Back Bay Mainline, a prospering "underground" weekly in Boston, is the most likable and encouraging American movie to be release so far this year."[22]
What makes Between the Lines such a timely film even decades later is its depiction of the diminishing space offered journalism in a world of corporate takeovers. Pages of copy are cut to make way for more advertisements; writers are asked to choose between walking out and compromising their integrity. The film makes it clear that the Back Bay Mainline, even in its diminished capacity, still has its finger on the pulse of the Boston community in a way no major newspaper could. When that is gone, something vital goes with it...
Those looking for the newspaper industry’s answer to Broadcast News will find a welcome film in Between the Lines. The film has countless moments of insight into the struggle of the American journalist, from the staff’s shabby living conditions — the film offers perhaps the most realistic look at big city apartments ever committed to film — to how well-meaning writers navigate the competing interests of truth and financial trendlines. With an all-star cast and some great comedic bits — enjoy watching Goldblum engage in a battle with a local performance artist at the Back Bay Mainline headquarters — Between the Lines is a late addition to the already impressive canon of essential 1970s cinema.[26]
Steve Prokopy of Third Coast Review wrote, "There’s not much by way of story in Between the Lines and a great deal of the dialogue feels spontaneous and improvised, which only adds to the film’s authenticity."[27]The Hollywood Reporter expressed that "the most memorable scenes work better as stand-alone episodes than as part of storylines".[11]
Richard Winters of Scopophilia opined "when the film deals with the relationships there seems to be too much of a feminist bias as the men are always shown to be the ones at fault due to their 'insensitive and selfish natures' while the women come off the ones who are 'reasonable and unfairly neglected'. This could be a product of the fact that it was directed by a woman as well as the era where men were somehow supposed to feel guilty simply because they were men."[28]
In The Guardian, Ryan Gilbey described the film as "a fond but not uncritical portrait of the disaffected staff at a formerly radical, fictional alt-weekly Boston newspaper, from the street-corner hawker all the way up to accounts, editorial and the much-despised incoming corporate boss...Silver’s sympathy for radicalism, and her deft cutting between different pockets of action unfolding in the same space, lent the film an Altmanesque feel."[29]
Margaret Moser of The Austin Chronicle said, "There's no way for us to modestly skirt this film's effect: This story of an underground paper in Boston facing corporate buy-out was the inspiration for starting the newspaper you hold in your hand."[25][30]
^Heuck, Marc Edward (May 8, 2019). "Joan Micklin Silver's Between the Lines". New Beverly Cinema. Los Angeles. Retrieved April 16, 2023. When it premiered at the Berlin International Film Festival in June 1977, Silver won two prizes – the Interfilm Otto Dibelius Film Award, and the Reader Jury of the Berliner Morgenpost Award – and the film was nominated for the Golden Bear, ultimately won by The Ascent from the Soviet Union.
"The Ultimate Legacy". Global City Press. Retrieved April 16, 2023. Susan Haskins-Doloff was the first Art Director of La MaMa Experimental Theater and now is the Artistic Director of Theater Talk Productions, for whom she oversaw 23 years of their weekly NY Emmy Award-winning series, Theater Talk, nationally syndicated on PBS. A graduate of Sarah Lawrence College, she taught over three decades at Pratt Institute. She is a freelance graphic artist and illustrated the books On The Streets: A Guide to New York City's Buskers, Good Garb, and Moment of Bliss.
