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Being There

Comedy · Drama

Being There

Getting there is half the fun; being there is all of it!

7.6(1,140) 12/19/1979 2h 10m
ComedyDrama

A simple-minded gardener named Chance has spent all his life in the Washington D.C. house of an old man. When the man dies, Chance is put out on the street with no knowledge of the world except what he has learned from television.

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Trailer

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Top Cast

Peter Sellers

Peter Sellers

Chance

Shirley MacLaine

Shirley MacLaine

Eve Rand

Melvyn Douglas

Melvyn Douglas

Benjamin Rand

Jack Warden

Jack Warden

President 'Bobby'

Richard Dysart

Richard Dysart

Dr. Robert Allenby

Richard Basehart

Richard Basehart

Vladimir Skrapinov

Ruth Attaway

Ruth Attaway

Louise

David Clennon

David Clennon

Thomas Franklin

Directed by

Hal Ashby

Production

Reviews

Filipe Manuel Neto

9/10

11/22/2023

**Peter Sellers' big farewell in a film that highlights his more chivalrous side.** There are films that, even though they're good, cannot be consensual, and this is one of them. It's a film that conquers admirers as easily as it accumulates people who didn't understand it or didn't like it for whatever reason. I confess that I liked it, but I can understand both sides. The film has qualities, but it also presents a story that is not pleasant, and that is so far-fetched that it could never actually take place in real life. The film presents a friendly character who is not easy to be indifferent to: Chance is a gardener who loves what he does and is very good at taking care of plants, but who was educated in a very informal way, confined inside a man's house. boss he served his entire

CinemaSerf

7/10

4/30/2026

When the "Old Man" who has provided "Chauncey" (Peter Sellers) with an home for most of his life dies, this erstwhile gardener finds himself homeless. Dressed in his finest handed-down suit and carrying his home in his suitcase, he emerges into the outside world without a clue. He has no money; he has nowhere to say, nothing to eat - he has no friends. He's like a full-sized infant whose only exposure to reality has been through the television. Luckily, he has a bit of a scrape with the limousine of "Eve" (Shirley MacLaine) and she takes him back to their palatial home to recuperate. She is intrigued by the simplicity of the man, but not so much as her father "Benjamin" (Melvyn Douglas). He is a sort of "Daddy Warbucks" character with huge wealth and equally extensive political influence -

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