Classic Movie Review: 'The 300 Year Weekend'

The 300 Year Weekend is a strange experimental film that, though made in 1971, has not been seen since. The film aired on television one time, more than a year after it was completed and was specifically kept from theatrical release. The movie was not aired in primetime either, but in a late night slot where it was likely swamped by Johnny Carson or lost in a sea of more audience friendly midnight movies. Let’s just say, The 300 Year Weekend is not for the casual film watcher.

The 300 Year Weekend is based on a real transcript of a real life marathon therapy session run by a once famous psychiatrist. The psychiatrist, whose name now escapes me, became a figure on the Mike Douglas Show of some renown. He had a rather novel notion about group therapy, a 24 marathon of therapy in which 10 participants are called upon to share extreme forms of honesty about their lives, even with their significant other in the room.

Actor Michael Tolan portrays Dr Marshall, the stand-in for the actual doctor who created this odd form of marathon therapy. He’s leading this weekend and has brought along his fiance, Nancy (Sharon Laughlin) and encourages her to participate in the therapy as a patient. Dr Marshall promises that he will engage in the extreme form of honesty that this type of therapy relies upon, even with Nancy on hand and affected by his honesty.

Among the patients in this experimental therapy are William Devane, the most recognizable face in the cast, and Dorothy Lyman as Tom and Jean, a married couple on the verge of a divorce. Tom is a truck driver who has a son from a previous marriage whom Jean loathes. As we will learn however, Jean has contempt for just about everyone, not the least of which a child. Jean drives two portions of The 300 Year Weekend with her vitriol and histrionics.

Rockne (Bernard Ward) is a black man who is dealing with the anxiety of holding his dream job as a lawyer at a major firm while hiding the fact that he is gay. Rockne appears to be here because of this anxiety and dichotomy over his public and private life but as the 24 hour marathon moves along we will find other aspects of Rockne’s issues. These issues include a desire to have a child and, perhaps, the notion that he’s not entirely gay.

Hal and Wynter, played by Roy Cooper and Gabriel Dell are two other single men in this group who have complicated back stories. Hal is a disgruntled immigrant who has grown violently dissatisfied with his marriage. Hal becomes a de facto villain among the group as his hatred for his absent wife spills out in awful and potentially deadly detail. Wynter, on the other hand, is a supposedly happily married journalist who is writing a story about this extreme therapy but will also be drawn in as a participant, against his initial plans for objectivity.

James Congdon and Carole Demas round out the cast as a married couple. Congdon’s character is also a psychiatrist and he uses his job as a defense mechanism. Congdon’s doctor likes to drive the action by asking probing questions of everyone else while also working to keep his wife, Joy, quiet. There is one more patient, Carole (M'el Dowd), and her secret is interesting but the movie is only 83 minutes long and much of her screen time is muted.

The 300 Year Weekend was made by ABC Films, the former theatrical release arm of the ABC Television network. It appears that the network did not know what they were in for when they gave director Victor Stoloff the greenlight to make this movie. Made in 1971, the film hits hot buttons of the time from drugs, to abortion (BEFORE Roe v Wade), homosexuality, infidelity and pop psychology.

The movie was, fair to say, ahead of its time and thus it can’t be much of a surprise that ABC Films got cold feet. That they did end up airing the movie, as a late night feature wreaks of a contractual obligation. Prior to the movie being acquired by Kino Lorber, the only evidence that The 300 Year Weekend even existed was a 1972 TV Guide story about ABC taking a loss on the movie, among a few significant flops for the company before it was liquidated.

The 300 Year Weekend is unique. The movie boils down to a series of powerhouse monologues delivered with guts and vitriol. These actors may not be well known but they each have a stage presence that radiates from their belt it to the back of the room intensity. The actors fearlessly approach the uglier parts of their characters and while some are on the softer side, such as Devane’s amiable Tom, the sharper edged characters like Jean and Hal are ballsy in their unabashed willingness to be nasty or merely disagreeable.

The 300 Year Weekend will be released by Kino Lorber for the very first time on DVD on December 15th.