Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (1966)

Directed by: Mike Nichols | 126 minutes | drama | Actors: Elizabeth Taylor, Richard Burton, Sandy Dennis, George Segal

Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?’ is of course best known as the play by Edward Albee. The film (which, incidentally, was already released only a few years after the play first appeared on the stage) is also considered to be of great historical value, because it was precisely this film that revolutionized the ‘rating’ of films. The direct, mean and coarse language and the sometimes quite explicit sexual innuendo in the dialogues caused a lot of commotion. But it would be a shame if the movie ‘Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?’ considered historically important for that reason alone. ‘Who’s Afraid…’ is a great film in every way. Script, dialogues, drama, the actors, the direction, the film work: all aspects on which a film is judged are more than sufficient for this film. And that is even more clever when it is considered that director Mike Nichols made his directorial debut here.

‘Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf’ tells the story of the couple George and Martha: two people who have grown so close that they can no longer seem to live without each other, but in fact they can live even less well with each other. They are each other’s leeches: they constantly play a game in which they try to outdo each other. With apparently the rowdy and vulgar Martha (an ideal role for Elizabeth Taylor) as the continuous winner. In fact, both Martha and George themselves are disappointed in George. Once a promising scientist who was destined to take over his father-in-law’s rectorship, but after all these years still no head of the (how appropriate…) Faculty of History. The young and handsome biologist (not a coincidence) Nick, and his weak wife (“Honey”) therefore seem the ideal audience for Martha to further publicly humiliate George.

But the film is not so predictable. The night time and the copious amounts of booze take their toll on all four people, but the roles and interests of George and Martha in particular are not nearly as clear as they seem to believe. Does Martha really want to get rid of George? And why does the eloquent George remain so passive? Are there hidden agendas? All those questions and ambiguities, and especially the mysterious and sensitive role played by George and Martha’s absent son, make ‘Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf’ a film that is literally and figuratively food for psychologists. ‘Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf’ shows, albeit in a dramatized way, how incredibly complicated people are: for themselves and perhaps even more for each other. Dreams, ambitions, lies and half-truths and especially time make relationships a complicated process in which people hurt each other, precisely because they love each other in some twisted way.

The viewer sees the four characters constantly flying out of the bend in a kind of psychological roller coaster, becoming nauseous and switching positions among themselves. With a great and surprisingly subdued climax at the end. Anyone who dares to take part in this rollercoaster will fall asleep like a log from now on with any soap opera. No, for the real soap stories you still have to go to Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton.