Shampoo (DVD, 2003)

When "Shampoo" was being filmed, the ever so sensuous, 1965 Best Actress Oscar winner, screen beauty, Julie Christie (Jackie Shawn) & Oscar-nominated leading actor in "Bonnie & Clyde," Warren Beatty (George Roundy), were lovers in their 30's. Author, playwright & actress Carrie Fisher was making her film debut. And, the story of an acclaimed Beverly Hills hair stylist, on the eve of Nixon's election, in November 1968, is loosely based upon events in producer Jon Peters' life (who was, for a time, Streisand's lover & Streisand was the genius who led Peters to production. During the filming, Peters was still married to actress, Lesley Ann Warren).

1960's political revolutionary, Robert Towne & Warren Beatty co-wrote the screenplay. One of the most radical directors of the Vietnam era, Hal Ashby, took the helm of the film that is as much a political satire as it is an extremely candid critique of So. Californian sexual mores during the 1960's. George Roundy (Warren Beatty), a very cute & much sought after hair stylist in a Beverly Hills beauty salon, strikes upsexually numerous sexual relationships with almost all of his women customers. Why he does so within a few days just before Richard Nixon's 1968 Presidential election is still a curiosity.

A gorgeous married customer, Jackie Shawn (Julie Christie) is one of George's lovers. Although their sexual escapades are outrageously candid & oft times quite humorous, the point of the film is to demonstrate how emotionally destructive their sexual permiscuities have been to each woman, and even moreso to George.

Hindsight of Nixon's corruption profits Towne & Beatty's screenplay. They use political corruption satirically to parallel the hair stylist's sexually corrupt life. That comes to its heights on the eve of the election, after all of the women who've had their hair styled by George gather for an election night party. Just like Nixon's political corruption is exposed, George Roundy's sexual deceptions are too.

Given the historical significance of this decadent film & how the acting careers of the leads went upwardly mobile afterwards; given that this is only one of a great many of influential films Hal Ashby's directed, the DVD is the media to own because it has special features that include the original film trailers, as well as optional subtitles in Chinese, English, French, Japanese, Korean, Portuguese, Spanish & Thai!