Entertainment

Absurd ’60s thinker gets his due

Paul Goodman is mainly forgotten today, but once upon a time he was so well known that he rated a mention in Woody Allen’s “Annie Hall.’’

According to Jonathan Lee’s documentary “Paul Goodman Changed My Life,’’ Goodman achieved prominence — some would say notoriety — as the author of “Growing Up Absurd,’’ a best-selling examination of male juvenile delinquency. He also was a bisexual husband and father, pacifist, poet, anarchist and psychologist.

“Most of the vocations in our society are corrupt,’’ the pipe-puffing Goodman says in a film clip. “The law is corrupt, business is corrupt, politics is corrupt,’’ he adds in what could be a statement by the Occupy Wall Street protesters.

Lee’s well-thought-out documentary combines vintage and new interviews with the activist’s fans, relatives and lovers. Lee also gives Goodman’s detractors room to complain about his shabby treatment of his family and his condescension toward women. But no matter what people say about the abrasive intellectual, who was 60 when he died of a heart attack in 1972, there’s no denying that he had an vast influence on public discourse in the ’60s.