Film

Alice's Restaurant

Name: Alice's Restaurant
Genre: Drama, Comedy
Released: 1969
Cast: Arlo Guthrie, Patricia Quinn, James Broderick, Tina Chen, Geoff Outlaw

Comedy

Arlo Guthrie's semi-autobiographical film about a Thanksgiving arrest for littering that spirals into absurdist commentary on authority, identity, and Vietnam-era America. It's gently funny, deliberately paced, and feels like a long conversation with a very smart friend. For fans of folk music, counterculture cinema, and stories that meander toward wisdom.

TMDb rating

3.1

Should you watch it?

Watch it if you like shaggy, digressive comedies where the jokes arrive sideways and the mood drifts from giggly to melancholy, and you don't need a tidy plot to be happy.

Skip it if you want brisk momentum or a clear through-line, since it wanders for long stretches and leans on talk and hangout scenes more than incident.

What it asks of you: Plan on a patient, unhurried 111 minutes, with rambling conversations and sudden tonal shifts, and it rewards attention to offbeat detail more than to plot.

Not sure? Find tonight's pick in a minute.

If you liked this

Five Easy Pieces1970

Jack Nicholson's casual rebellion against conformity in a story that also refuses to explain itself or wrap up neatly. Like Alice's Restaurant, it's a portrait of a generation asking what comes after rejection.

But The pacing feels deliberately slow and the ending is deliberately unsatisfying. If you need clear emotional closure, this will frustrate you.

Easy Rider1969

Released the same year, it's another rambling road story that treats America itself as a character and asks whether freedom is even possible in a conformist nation. Same era, same questions, equally uninterested in comfort.

But It's more visibly troubled and far less funny. The tone is heavy, and some of the dialogue hasn't aged gracefully.

Harold and Maude1971

Another seventies film about an oddball outsider who sees the world sideways and finds an unlikely mentor. It has genuine warmth beneath the strangeness, and the same faith in human weirdness as Alice's Restaurant.

But The whimsy is thick enough that it tips into cloying for some viewers. If you hate indie-theater energy, skip it.

Not sure tonight? Get a pick in a minute, starting from Alice's Restaurant

The wildcard

Something you would not have found on your own.

Stalker1979

Both films trust that a journey without a guaranteed destination is enough. Both ask what we're really after when we think we're after something specific. Both move at the speed of thought.

Andrei Tarkovsky's science-fiction meditation on desire and meaning. A guide and a client walk through a mysterious zone toward a room. It's exactly as slow and as profound as that sounds—pure cinema about why we want what we want.

But It's 163 minutes of walking and talking with no conventional plot. Tarkovsky believes in boredom as a path to truth, which either opens you or shuts you down completely.

Nashville1975

Robert Altman's sprawling ensemble about America, authenticity, and performance. It shares Alice's Restaurant's interest in folk culture and its fundamental mistrust of institutions and authority.

But At 159 minutes with no clear protagonist, it demands patience. The sprawl itself is the point, which frustrates people who want narrative momentum.

Midnight Cowboy1969

Another 1969 film about a young person adrift in America, trying to make sense of survival and morality. It's darker than Alice's Restaurant but asking similar questions about innocence and corruption.

But It's genuinely depressing and deals with sexual exploitation. The bleakness never lets up, and the film doesn't offer easy answers or warmth.

The Graduate1967

Benjamin Braddock is another young man rejecting the expectations of his world, though this one's faster-paced and more conventionally romantic. The same generational anxiety, better soundtrack, clearer story.

But It's become a cultural touchstone that's harder to see fresh. Also, Benjamin's journey resolves more tidily than Arlo's does.

Slacker1990

Richard Linklater's film about a day in Austin with interlocking conversations and no plot. It's spiritual descendant of Alice's Restaurant—the same faith that talk and presence matter more than narrative.

But There is essentially no story. If you're watching for something to happen, you'll find the lack of incident exhausting.

My Own Private Idaho1991

Gus Van Sant's road movie about queer street life and the search for home. Like Alice's Restaurant, it's a wandering meditation on belonging and marginalization, with the same poetic patience.

But It's sexually explicit and deals with hustling and addiction. The narrative is deliberately fragmented, which some find pretentious rather than profound.

Brewster McCloud1971

Robert Altman's absurdist comedy about a young man building wings in a domed Houston stadium. It shares Alice's Restaurant's willingness to be strange and funny without explaining the strangeness away.

But It's genuinely weird in ways that don't cohere. The plot is nonsensical even by sixties standards, and not everyone finds experimental comedy rewarding.

The Ballad of Little Jo1993

Both find a particular true story and use it to ask larger questions about identity, authenticity, and who gets to belong in America. Both are wary of simple answers about freedom.

Maggie Greenwald's western about a woman passing as a man in the frontier. It's based on a true story like Alice's Restaurant, but it's a historical drama rather than a modern absurdist comedy—a quieter, stranger kind of American rebellion.

But It's a revisionist western that's slower and sadder than traditional ones. Some viewers find it underdone rather than understated.

People

Alice's Restaurant

Where to watch

Not streaming anywhere we can see.

Checked 18 October 2026.

Age rating

Rin United States

Ratings come from the people who assign them in each country, and they do not mean the same thing in any two. We show the one given where you are.

Released: 1969
Genre: Drama, Comedy
Status: Released
Runtime: 111 min