Sally Field had her first significant dramatic role in this "generation gap" TV movie. After a year's time in the world of hippies and drugs, Field returns home to the parents who'd all but booted her out. Mom and Dad (Eleanor Parker and Jackie Cooper) try their best to understand their wayward daughter, but still can't overcome their judgmental attitude. When Field's younger sister (Lane Bradbury) begins experimenting with drugs, her parents react with the same blind, close-minded rage that had driven Field away the year before. Realizing that she can never really come home, Field leaves once more, hoping that someday she and her parents can solve their problems without recriminations and screaming. Unlike other "youth" films of the 1970s, Maybe I'll Come Home in the Spring refuses to take sides: Field's hippie lifestyle is shown to be just as shallow as her parent's suburban existence. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
Review
Although modern audiences may find it a bit dated and somewhat familiar, Maybe I'll Come Home in the Spring will probably still strike chords with many people who grew up in or lived through the 1960s. The decades since this was produced have seen dysfunctional family movies proliferate, and there's been more than a little bit of attention paid to the social upheavals of the "hippie" era, so Spring is not as fresh as it once was. But the film still is powerful and earns points for spreading the blame around: it's about as critical of the hippie lifestyle as it is of the suburban one. Some viewers will feel that it's too critical, that there are good points to both of these lifestyles that the film ignores, and that's valid. But Spring is more concerned with viewing the damage that many people, young and old, experienced at the time, and it does so in a laudable fashion. Granted, many of the daring visuals are a bit "quaint" now, and the "ribbon forming the word 'Happy'" segment feels a bit off the wall now; but overall, Spring is quite involving. It's also noteworthy as the performance that enabled Sally Field to start shedding her Gidget image, and she does very well her -- as, for that matter, do Eleanor Parker and Jackie Cooper as her parents and David Carradine as her boy friend. A bonus: a young Linda Ronstadt's vocals on the title tune. ~ Craig Butler, All Movie Guide
Joseph Sargent - Director, Pembroke J. Herring - Editor, Charles W. Fries - Executive Producer, Helen Miller - Composer (Music Score), Earl Robinson - Composer (Music Score), Bruce Feldman - Composer (Music Score), Roger Atkins - Composer (Music Score), Russell Metty - Cinematographer, Joseph Sargent - Producer, Linda Ronstadt - Singer, Bruce Feldman - Screenwriter
