You're a Big Boy Now (1966)

Warner Bros.
Directed by Francis Ford Coppola
My rating: 3.5 stars out of 4
IMDb
(DVD, Warner Archive Collection)

Peter Kastner is a mama's boy desperately trying to cut the apron strings in mid 60's NYC. He strikes out into his own apartment and strolls 42nd Street late at night. He spies go-go dancer and aspiring actress Elizabeth Hartman and instantly falls in love. He writes her a naive letter and she invites him to her dressing room. She dominates and abuses him, and he is unable to perform in bed. Meanwhile, Karen Black is his innocent co-worker at the library who really loves him. This basic plot is formulaic and predictable, but Coppola transforms it with off-kilter situational comedy and excellent location shooting in New York. For example, the film ends with a dog leashed to a wooden leg chasing a man holding a Gutenberg Bible through downtown department stores. Similar in theme to the later and better known film The Graduate, although its obscurity is undeserved.