You've Got to Walk It Like You Talk It or You'll Lose That Beat is a 1971 low-budget comedy-drama film directed by Peter Locke and starring Zalman King. The story concerns a young hippie and his search in New York City for the meaning of life. The film is notable for early-career appearances by several artists: Richard Pryor has a small role playing his signature "wino" character; Wes Craven made his professional debut as the film's editor; the film's soundtrack was co-written and performed by Walter Becker and Donald Fagen, who went on to form Steely Dan. The film is considered lost, although the soundtrack survives.

Plot

Young idealistic hippie Carter Fields visits New York City's Central Park to try to find meaning in his life. He meets an array of strange characters, his girlfriend becomes pregnant, and he gets mixed up with a gang of pickpockets. He marries his girlfriend and finds a job in advertising on Madison Avenue. But Fields is one of life's losers: he's fired for incompetence, and his wife deserts him. He returns to Central Park with his child.

Cast

Soundtrack

The soundtrack album, produced by Kenny Vance and credited to "The Original Soundtrack", was released in 1971 on Spark Records (SPA-02). In a contemporary review of the film in The New York Times, the music is credited to "Walter Becker, Donald Fagin [sic] and Billy Cunningham" but Cunningham's involvement is not reflected in any published album credits.

Personnel

Production

The film was shot entirely on location in New York City. In an interview on the Los Angeles KPFK Radio Captain Midnight Show in 1977, Walter Becker said of the film: "It was underbudgeted, which means that some of the exposures didn’t match some of the others so you could tell where the new pieces and the old pieces were".

Critical reception

A.H. Weiler in The New York Times wrote that the film: "projects lots of walking and talking but precious little heartfelt beat, despite its willing cast and a plethora of sight gags and surface philosophies." Variety wrote:"Low budget socially conscious comedy which is sometimes refreshingly hilarious, but more often flat and tasteless. Also, inadequate production values. ... Although some of the screwball dialog, preposterous sight gags and bit character roles are hilarious, the film suffers from a weak storyline, comic situations that are overdone and tasteless, sloppy editing and color, and camerawork that is too often blurred and shaky. These negative factors give You've Got To Walk It... little chance of b.o. success. It may, however, have some appeal to New Yorkers, youth audiences, and devout followers of Robert Downey (director of Putney Swope [1969]) who has a cameo role. In fact, it appears that Locke has been significantly influenced by Downey's brand of comedy, and that of Brian de Palma (Hi Mom! [1970]), He is, however, less disciplined, less technically proficient, and less adept at introducing elements of 'bad taste,' without making them seem utterly vulgar. Zalman King, as the young man, mugs well, but otherwise walks blandly through a bland role. Suzette Green, as his girl, minus the mugging, does likewise. Allen Garfield, as a sort of contemporary Fagin, is humorously greasy and lecherous; and the rest of the performers ham up their roles. But they all seem participants in a comedy revue. Use of silent movie titles, mock-melodramatic narration, soap-opera organ music and other stylistic gimmicks are amusing for a while, but it all suffers from chaotic excess. Locke includes anything for a laugh and doesn't seem to care where or how often he uses it, Consequently, the film moves in spurts of hilarity with too many lags between them."In the New York Daily News Ann Guarino wrote: "Masquerading as satire, the comedy as written, produced and directed by 27-year-old Peter Locke, is sophomoric and absolutely dull." The film is described by TV Guide as "A mishmash of intent and execution and too annoyingly clumsy to watch." The Independent Film Journal said: "This film's satire never touches reality in an effective enough way for it to hit its marks. enough way for it to hit its marks. There just isn't enough bite and where there is, it is generally misplaced." Archer Winsten in the New York Post wrote: "It is a picture that leaves a dent on your consciousness because it goes out of its way to do so, but when you try to remember what it was about, ten minutes afterwards it has vanished, like something very wet poured on sand."