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1975: Jaws, Dog Day Afternoon, and One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest

posted 2 years ago by roger1 (3703)
26 replies | jump to latest

I was around in 1975 and I remember well how Jaws pretty much "took over the summer" from June through August.

This was before the summer was FILLED with blockbusters; Jaws pretty much had the summer to itself. (2 years later, Star Wars had the same domination, but had to make room for a surprisingly big James Bond movie and Smokey and the Bandit as "level down" competition.)

Anyway, the "Jaws summer" finally played itself out, and school went back in, and the autumn movies started to show up...with a different tone.

Dog Day Afternoon came out, I think in September. Ironically, it shared this with Jaws: a sense of SUMMERTIME but with a much more sweaty, grim claustrophobic NYC edge. The brilliant opening montage of "Summer in NYC" set the stage magnficently. Elton John's rocking "Amoreena" created an excitement for the story to come in most ironic way: there would be no more music in the movie from that point on, less a brief burst of Bugs Bunny on a TV in the bank.

Al Pacino made the most of his newly minted "Godfather stardom" -- I and II had now come out, he was a minted prestige superstar -- and working again for the director who guided him to an Oscar nomination two years before; Sidney Lumet(for Serpico, yet another grimy NYC tale) -- Lumet was "The King of New York Movies" for so long that he made Murder on the Orient Express to escape the title.

Los Angeles Times film critic Charles Champlin wrote a nifty phrase about any given movie: you only see a movie once. That is, you only see it once WITHOUT knowing the ending, and any twists along the way.

I've always thought of Champlin's phrase when I remember watching Dog Day Afternoon because I remember -- all the way through -- wondering: how is this going to END? As the situation got more dire and hopeless for Pacino and Cazale -- even with the crowd cheering them on and sympathetic hostages --- I just kept anticipating the finale.

And then I got it. Pretty straightforward and simple, as I recall.

But Al Pacino had done it again. As with his friendly rivals Jack Nicholson and Robert DeNiro, Pacino had made sure to pick important material, with an important director, and a great script(born of many improvisations) and a rather historic charcter for a major star to play: a husband to a woman, a father, revealed to also be gay with a male wife out to get a sex change operation.

Daring stuff. Pacino seemed on the way to a sure Oscar nomination and possibly a win --- compared to compressed Michael Corleone, this was an early version of "yelling Pacino" (with more Brandoesque emotion, less ham) and he got his senstive moments as well(I knew more than one woman who fell in love with Pacino over Dog Day, something about his eyes.)

But the fall months headed towards December and Oscar time and a challenger arose to Pacino and his movie: Jack Nicholson, One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest. Jack and THAT movie beat Pacino and his movie at the Oscars. Who knows why? More of a legendary property? More emotion at the end? More of a funny macho guy for Jack to play? More of a classic villain in Nurse Ratched?

Jack and Al had been to this dance before. 1973: Jack vs Al for Best Actor(The Last Detail; Serpico.) Oldtimer Jack Lemmon wins. 1974: Jack vs Al for Best Actor(Chinatown; Godfather II), Oldtimer Art Carney wins. Jack finally broke the tie in 1975 and we all figured that Al's Best Actor Oscar was "right around the corner." No: it would take 17 more years for Al to finally win his first(and to date only) Oscar for Scent of a Woman("Hoo-ah!").

Still, 1975 was a pretty fun year at the American movies. Jaws all summer long. Pacino vs Nicholson in the fall. All three up at the Oscars (Jaws got a Best Picture nom but Spielberg did NOT get a Best Director nom!) Three great movies of different types(and I'll throw in Robert Redford's fall entry: the great thriller Three Days of the Condor; but no Oscar consideration for Bob.)

[–] christomacin (4660) a year ago

I'm truly puzzled by the exorbitant overpraise (amongst Millennials it seems) that Lumet's early (and I believe first) feature film Twelve Angry has received. It currently sits at an incredible 9.0 on IMDb and Moviechat, and I believe is the in the top five highest rated films. When did this happen? While it is a fine film with an excellent cast, I don't think it's even in Lumet's Top Five best. 12 Angry Men is a solid adaption of a stage play, but lacks the cinematic intensity of his later films. Fail-Safe, The Pawnbroker, The Hill, ,Serpico, Dog Day Afternoon, and Network were all better and more interesting films. Murder On The Orient Express and The Verdict were arguably better films as well. I know that I recall being shown 12 Angry Men (along wth reading the play) in school back in the 80s, and I suspect it is still being shown in schools in the US, thus the higher rating amongst younger viewers. The Crucible by Arthur Miller is another high school perennial, but I do think the superior French language film version is as commonly shown to American students.

[–] roger1 (3703) a year ago

I'm truly puzzled by the exorbitant overpraise (amongst Millennials it seems) that Lumet's early (and I believe first) feature film Twelve Angry has received. It currently sits at an incredible 9.0 on IMDb and Moviechat, and I believe is the in the top five highest rated films. When did this happen? While it is a fine film with an excellent cast, I don't think it's even in Lumet's Top Five best.

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I'm interested in your first point -- about the "exorbitant overpraise" -- but not sure I can agree with 12 Angry Men not being in Lumet's Top Five. I think it is but...this place is about opinions, so everything's fine. But a little more discussion perhaps:

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12 Angry Men is a solid adaption of a stage play,

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Actually, along with several other major movies of the 50's, 12 Angry Men was based on a "written for television live drama" broadcast, I believe, out of New York City, with Robert Cummings in the Henry Fonda role.

A truly great decision was made by various studios and producers in the 50's to "re-stage" the best of these for "the movies" so as to have a better record for posterity of the drama. Without the movie of "12 Angry Men" in place, all we would have are fuzzy "kinoscopes"(filmed off TV screens) versions of 12 Angry Men.

And Marty(Rod Steiger on TV, Ernest Borgnine at the movies; Borgnine wins Best Actor and Marty wins Best Picture.) And Patterns. And The Bachelor Party. And The Catered Affair. All first TV productions; all preserved on film for generations to see.

CONT

[–] roger1 (3703) a year ago

I'd say that Marty and 12 Angry Men are the most famous and best of the "TV drama movies." And crucially -- 12 Angry Men got TV director Sidney Lumet a Best Director Oscar nomination with his first film! Within a few years, his NEXT movie would be "The Fugitive Kind" with Brando, Anna Magnani and Joanne Woodward. Not a great movie, but the cast it attracted kept Lumet "important."

12 Angry Men launched Lumet rather like Citizen Kane launched Orson Welles, The Manchurian Candidate launched John Frankenheimer, The Graduate launched Mike Nichols(AFTER the less youth-oriented Virginia Woolf) , MASH launched Robert Altman, The Last Picture Show launched Peter Bogdanovich(AFTER Targets) and The French Connection launched William Friedkin.

I liken this to how some long-playing hit songs launched some artists in the 70's: Take It Easy(The Eagles), Do It Again(Steely Dan), Fire and Rain(James Taylor), You're So Vain(Carly Simon). One big , anthem-like hit launched entire careers. That's right -- 12 Angry Men is Sidney Lumet's "Fire and Rain."

CONT

[–] roger1 (3703) a year ago

I know that I recall being shown 12 Angry Men (along wth reading the play) in school back in the 80s, and I suspect it is still being shown in schools in the US, thus the higher rating amongst younger viewers.

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THERE is your first key to the classic status of 12 Angry Men, right there. Many accounts show that, since its 1957 release(it was a flop at the box office), the movie ended up being shown to all SORTS of classes -- high school, college, law school...and not just in "classes about cinema" either. It was shown in political science classes, and ethics classes, and history classes(mid-century America: all white male jury), and sociology classes.

This movie is so old that it first went out to schools in 16 mm film reels, then video, now DVDs.

And this for me: in the late 60s, 12 Angry Men got a broadcast on the "Million Dollar Movie" in Los Angeles. That series ran ONE movie NINE times in one week: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday nights and two showings on Saturday and two showings on Sunday.

I was a schoolkid. Our teacher assigned us to watch 12 Angry Men on any of the nights it was shown(we had to ask our parents of course) and turn in a paper. My teacher spoke to me and said she thought I should see the movie "irregardless." She knew I liked movies even that young, it was her favorite.

Anyway, figure a LOT of people watched 12 Angry Men when it was shown 9 times in one week on televsion.

CONT

[–] roger1 (3703) a year ago

The Crucible by Arthur Miller is another high school perennial, but I do think the superior French language film version is as commonly shown to American students

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That is interesting. Because whereas "12 Angry Men" only has one definitive screen version -- the 1957 original -- there have been several movies of The Crucible and at least one major TV broadcast production in the 60s(preserved on film to show in schools.)

I am not even familiar with the French version, but then...I'm limited.

"The Crucible" made a comeback as a DISCUSSED play in Aaron Sorkin's 2017 poker drama "Molly's Game." Stars Jessica Chastain and Idris Elba kept discussing the play and it "informed" Molly's story.

PS. William Friedkin directed a 1997 Showtime version of 12 Angry Men and I suppose it gets shown a lot , too -- several African-American actors were substituted into the cast. Jack Lemmon had the Fonda role and George C. Scott had the Lee J. Cobb role and my feeling was: these two guys would have been GREAT if this version had been made in ....1967. But by 1997, both Lemmon and Scott were tired old men and for all their skill, could not overcome a major change in the dynamic: 12 Angry Men became 2 Old Men.

A Los Angeles stage play was mounted -- "12 Angry Women." I think the actresses who played Cagney and Lacey were stunt casting in the Fonda and Cobb roles.

CONT

[–] roger1 (3703) a year ago

All that said, my own verdict on 12 Angry Men is...I do love it, I think it is probably Lumet's BEST film (because its classic nature has held it above all his others over decades of competition now), and it is very great for various things that it represents.

First, I can't remember drama structure very well, but does 12 Angry Men not have "unities": of place(one jury room -- plus a bathroom and a brief glimpse of the courtroom), of time(one afternoon into night), of FEELING(a hot, humid summer NYC day).

And there is a contrived-but-profound mathematics to the drama: 12 male jurors. Murder case: did a teenage boy stab his father to death with INTENT? First vote(secret): 11 "Guilty" -- 1 "Not guilty." Groans and protests: "What?" "Who voted that?" "There's always ONE guy!"

The one Not Guilty vote reveals himself: its our star , of course. The great and noble Henry Fonda(perhaps better in this role than the more emotional James Stewart would have been.)

Fonda says "can't we just talk about this for awhile?" Some are willing, most aren't, but he prevails, winning a couple of jurors over to say "sure, let's discuss it."

CONT

[–] roger1 (3703) a year ago

The dramatic math continues. Fonda finally brings in one more "Not Guilty" vote. Then another. Then another. But as he brings "Not Guilty" votes IN....some of the "Guilty" votes dig in their heels and a battle ensues...a movie long "fight of ideas." The "other side" includes one bigot (Ed Begley SENIOR) and one VERY angry man(roaring Lee J. Cobb -- the "other lead" versus Fonda, his main opponent) and one very crucial "Guilty" vote -- a bland, bespectacled, very intelligent and logical "brain" played by the bland but compellling EG Marshall. Fonda knows he HAS to win over Marshall to have a "noble verdict."

But how about ...the jury foreman. A nice, decent, "regular guy" who is allowed this duty and slowly begins to chafe under the pressure("Here...YOU want this job? TAKE it!") Its a short, balding actor named Martin Balsam and a very famous director named Alfred Hitchcock screened "12 Angry Men" to decide on hiring Balsam for ANOTHER classic movie called Psycho. Hitchcock had a feast of character guys to look at in 12 Angry Men -- Jack Klugman, Jack Warden(big, gruff, tough, amiable enough), Cobb...but he chose Balsam to play a private eye doomed to a horrific murder. It think it was Balsam's big bald head(for a knife to slash) and small-but-scrappy build that got him the role, plus his heartfelt, cool acting style. (Jack Warden became as well known as Balsam, but he was too big and brawny to play Hitchcock's detective, who needed to be "killable by an old lady.)

But wait: "Don Draper" is on the jury too. Young, suave, handsome Robert Webber as the "coolest guy on the jury" -- a Madison Avenue Mad Man -- but one not terribly interested in getting too involved.

Indeed, that's ANOTHER key to 12 Angry Men. The jury system throws 12 total male strangers together, asks them to try to be polite and civil to one another -- and THEN forces them to fight, take sides, bully, and understand. There's a lot of human nature on display in 12 Angry Men.

CONT

[–] roger1 (3703) a year ago

A political angle: Henry Fonda was one of the Hollywood liberals of the time(when his pal James Stewart was not) and 12 Angry Men has a heavy reputation as a "liberal movie" (Jane Fonda loved it.) There can be no doubt that the "bad guys" on the jury include a bigot and a guy who is total "law and order versus the bleeding heart liberal," and the fact that 12 Angry Men lives on in honor surely regards its high ranking in progressive circles(though not so much anymore, what with the all-male cast -- two or three of the characters are NOT WASP, though.)

The answer to that is: "Yeah, sure, its a liberal movie" BUT it has an overall focus beyond partisan politics and on to the niceties of the legal system so...its a movie all political people can get behind.

I've always liked the fact that Fonda's steerage of the jury to a "Not Guilty" verdict just might lead to the freeing of a GUILTY young man. But there's that "reasonable doubt" thing...

Cinematic visuals: Lumet appllied TV techniques to a movie and so we get the images "slowly entrappping and overcoming the men." Low angles -- the ceiling presses down on them. Ever closer close-ups. (I think Hitchcock borrowed the ENTIRE style of 12 Angry Men for the scene in Psycho where Martin Balsam amiably interrogates Anthony Perkins.) 12 Angry Men had great drama, great dialogue, great acting -- but ALSO great cinematic representation.

And those are my thoughts on that one. "Later Lumet" classics are classics indeed, but Network is as much Paddy Chayefsky's acheivement; I don't think Murder on the Orient Express(with Martin Balsam) is as compelling; Serpico always seemed to drench its hero in a depressing no-win situation. Lumet made a LOT of great movies(and even lesser known stuff like The Anderson Tapes -- with Martin Balsam -- and his final film, "Before the Devil Knows Your Dead," but...it all starts with 12 Angry Men and THAT's the movie more people of more generations know.

[–] christomacin (4660) a year ago

Maybe I need to watch it again. I think it's status as "required viewing" probably has colored my perception a bit. I recalled thinking it was "OK' but haven't seen it in a very long time. I still don't know about Top 5 of all time, but you've given me an incentive to rewatch it as a non-student.

Anyway, I've been looking over Lumet's filmography... quite a few oddities and misfires along with the classics. Lumet was rather "all over the place" (by design as he mentioned in interviews). According to Lumet, he couldn't have done the witty Network before doing what he termed the "souffle" of "Orient Express" first. The huge box office success of Dog Day and Orient Express gave him the opportuinty to make anything he wanted, which he proceeded to do up unti his career started to peter out in the mid-80s and 90s with a series of mostly forgettable films.

[–] roger1 (3703) a year ago

Maybe I need to watch it again. I think it's status as "required viewing" probably has colored my perception a bit.

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That's very possible. There are movies -- some of them Oscar winners -- that have a "take your medicine" quality to them, and people naturally resist being REQUIRED to view them, particularly for homework.

But 12 Angry Men is really structured rather like a THRILLER. And the camera angles make it look like one, too. I find it compelling start to finish.

The film is also a marvelous "collection of mid-century character guys." Henry Fonda is the leading man -- a necessary "star anchor." But all around him are guys who would end up in various positions of "power" as TV actors(in the main) and movie actors(sometimes.) I mean, look at the list:

Martin Balsam(Psycho, Best Supporting Actor Oscar for A Thousand Clowns.)
Ed Begley(Oscar for Best Supporting Actor, Sweet Bird of Youth)
Jack Warden(eventually a MAJOR movie guy -- in Shampoo and Heaven Can Wait and The Man Who Loved Cat Dancing)
Jack Klugman(The Odd Couple and Quincy on TV)
EG Marshall(soon to be on the key TV law series, The Defenders)

..and Lee J. Cobb, well along in his career when he made 12 Angry Men but this ended up HIS greatest performance. Yells to put Al Pacino to shame.

CONT

[–] roger1 (3703) a year ago

I recalled thinking it was "OK' but haven't seen it in a very long time. I still don't know about Top 5 of all time, but you've given me an incentive to rewatch it as a non-student.

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Yes..I might add that I NEVER saw 12 Angry Men in a classroom. I saw it on TV back on The Milion Dollar movie and then regularly on TV(certain channels would have "classic film months" and it played year after year after year, along with Casablanca and...Psycho.)

You nicely "set up the question" on 12 Angry Men given its underwhelming impact on you, I appreciate that I could come in and make my own case. But my case is NOT the final case, and I like 12 Angry Men for my own reasons(maybe that cast of guys above all.)

CONT

[–] roger1 (3703) a year ago

Anyway, I've been looking over Lumet's filmography... quite a few oddities and misfires along with the classics.

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He was one of those "working directors" who seemed to mix "great ones" with some basic "stuff."

One title given him (that is ALMOST correct) is that he was a "New York director." Off the top of my head, here are his NYC-based movies:

12 Angry Men
The Pawnbroker
The Anderson Tapes
Serpico
Dog Day Afternoon
Network
Prince of the City
Q and A
Night Falls on Manhattan
Before the Devil Knows You're Dead(final film.)

Lumet was so affiliated with New York, it was said, that the Hollywood based Academy held it AGAINST him. He never won a competitive Oscar.

And yet we find Lumet films NOT set in New York. Murder on the Orient Express was a great big rebuttal to his own career of gritty NYC films -- lush, European, all star cast(with Martin Balsam snuck in there from the NYC films). And The Verdict was set in Boston. And The Fugitive Kind was set in the South.

Lumet copped up to another aspect of his work. He liked to do movies about crooked cops on the take vs. the good ones: Serpico, Prince of the City, Q and A, Night Falls on Manhattan. He said he made so many of those because "a corrupt police force is the greatest danger to society."

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CONT

[–] roger1 (3703) a year ago

Lumet was rather "all over the place" (by design as he mentioned in interviews)

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He made one with Don Johnson and Rebecca De Mornay...a thriller...that ended with the two of them falling through mid-air in an embrace (Johnson is the villain) and Rebecca TWISTING IN MID-AIR so that Johnson hits the marble floor first on his head, dying and cushioning Rebecca's fall! I still marvel at that climax. Not one of Lumet's best.

Meanwhile, I'd have to go over to IMdb and look but I am sure I missed all sorts of Lumet movies of note. Long Day's Journey Into Night, Running on Empty...more.
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According to Lumet, he couldn't have done the witty Network before doing what he termed the "souffle" of "Orient Express" first.

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Fair enough.

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The huge box office success of Dog Day and Orient Express gave him the opportuinty to make anything he wanted, which he proceeded to do up until his career started to peter out in the mid-80s and 90s with a series of mostly forgettable films.

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The 70's was the time of Freidkin, Bogdanovich, Lucas, Spielberg and Scorsese...but it was also SURELY the time of Lumet. Some classics in there, a true run of them. (And The Anderson Tapes is one of my favorites, Sean Connery leading a caper in NYC.)

As for the forgettable films -- well, Tarantino always contends that directors start to lose it as they age. Not so sure about that -- and Lumet "went out" with a very good one(Before the Devil Knows You're Dead) with some great actors(Phillip Seymour Hoffman, Albert Finney, Marisa Tomei) which I value because it opens with a helluva sex scene...a clue that Lumet hardly went out "an old man."

CONT

[–] roger1 (3703) a year ago

Trivia from my storehouse: director Alfred Hitchcock had suffered a "slump" of late 60s movies from Marnie through Topaz. But he managed to get a comeback hit in 1972 with the R-rated psychothriller Frenzy.

Evidently before Frenzy was released -- when it was in the editing stage -- "New York" director Sidney Lumet made a "courtesy call" on Hitchcock at his Universal office in North Hollywood. THAT interests me right off the bat -- Lumet sought Hitchcock out. Also interesting: Hitchcock granted the visit(remember, Hitch was in decline at the time and Lumet was getting hot.)

Hitch's records show that he offered Lumet the opportunity to watch a scene from Frenzy in Hitchcock's screening room. Hitch chose the scene: it was the movie's central and very disturbing rape-murder of a woman by a psychopath(he strangles her with a necktie.)

Hitch evidently felt that he had a winner in Frenzy -- and that its brutal centerpiece scene would make him relevant in the 70's. So he showed Lumet the scene. I wonder what Lumet THOUGHT of that scene. We will never know.

[–] christomacin (4660) a year ago

[–] roger1 (3703) a year ago

I find Lumet's use, or rather non-use, of a music score in many of his films (Orient Express being a famous exception) interesting. He said something to the effect of: "If want realism fiddles won't help." So he differed from Scorsese, but especially Lucas and Spielberg, who were known for their use of music.

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Well, its a funny call, isn't it? I daresay that Steven Spielberg's career would not EXIST without John Williams there from the get-go. Williams music for The Sugarland Express was good, soulful, kind of Western/Southern stuff but THEN: Jaws. And Close Encounters. And 1941(with Williams greatest march IMHO) And Raiders. And especially ET...the tears flow in that movie from the music as much as the story.

But the "realists" like Kubrick and Lumet and William Friedkin and some modner directors simply don't want that "fantastical element."

I GO for big music. But I don't notice with a good movie(Dr. Strangelove, The Birds) if there's none.

And this: one of my favorite movies is "The Perfect Storm." From beginning to end, start to finish, its got great BIG wraparound music that first connotates (1) the life on the open sea and then (2) turns into big time tearjerker music(ala ET) at the end.

I recently re-watched The Perfect Storm and forgot how basic and corny the dialogue and characters were(albeit movingly doomed.) But James Horner's score? As magnificent and moving as I remember it -- and we lost Horner a few years ago.

CONT

[–] roger1 (3703) a year ago

I find Lumet's use, or rather non-use, of a music score in many of his films (Orient Express being a famous exception)

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Trivia: Lumet evidently consulted with Bernard Herrmann on the score for that movie...but didn't hire him. Herrmann said that the music for the first turning of the wheels as the train leaves the station should be heavy and ominous: "this is a train of death leaving the station."

The movie as we have it has a much more lush and lilting -- almost romantic -- turn of those wheels. I can't remember who scored it.

CONT

[–] Otter (24464) a year ago

[–] roger1 (3703) a year ago

I saw all of them in the theaters back in the day, at the age of... 14, if I'm correct. Yes, back then people took kids to adult dramas that were full of sex and gore and tragedy and the unfairness of life, and while we were probably only there because our parents we were too old for babysitters and they didn't trust us alone in the house,

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With me it was to save babysitter costs in the 60s, which meant I saw a lot of movies that weren't R rated, but were certanly "over my head" and rather dull to me.

Came the 70's and the R, it was like you say.

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I think that seeing R-rated films did more good than harm.

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It was quite an education -- on sex, on the downside of violence, on language, on the "rougher parts of life."

With regard to R-rated sex scenes I always felt this:

A father and his son go to an R-rated movie. There's a hot sex scene with nudity.

The father would have enjoyed that scene if the SON was not there.
The son would have enjoyed that scene if the FATHER was not there.

But trapped together under a R-rating(not admitted without parent or guardian)NOBODY got to enjoy the sex scene.

A solution of the 70's: local drive-ins used to admit us teenagers in by the carload to watch R rated movies. No parents around. A shared experience -- and often "co-ed."

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Yes, there was a lot of godawful parenting in those days, unhealthy levels of neglect were in fashion, but now unhealthy levels of coddling are in fashion and some young adults are so shocked by their first exposure to an adult world that won't even give them "trigger warnings", that they just shut down. Maybe young kids *should* be watching movies like "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest" at early ages.

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Yep. The movies with the content of the 70's are being made "less and less." Though certainly some are made. Tarantino prides himself on keeping high levels of violence and language, and sometimes sex(though he says that's more embarrassing to film on set; there isn't much.

[–] Otter (24464) a year ago

[–] Tabbycat (878) a year ago

1975 was the last of four of Hollywood’s greatest years, starting with 1972. There are probably more great films in that period than any other — so many I’d have trouble listing them all. Even many films that weren’t great, like Earthquake, were hugely entertaining and big in a way that today’s movies can’t match at all.

As you state, two names are responsible for a good chunk of that greatness — Al Pacino and Sidney Lumet. They broke expectations and reached some of the highest heights in film ever, and they did it over and over again. There’s a terrific short documentary covering the crazy hard work that went into making this film what it is, including Pacino making himself as uncomfortable and stressed as possible by staying up all night. It’s on YouTube. If you’re a fan of this movie, don’t miss it.

[–] roger1 (3703) a year ago

There are fewer R-rated movies made, just because the audience for R-rated fare is smaller than it used to be. If kids under a certain age can't go, and babysitters are prohibitively expensive, and parents either don't want to expose sheltered kids to certain things or don't want to see anything sexy with the whole fam, then that means a smaller audience than when I was 14. The big money is in movies that will interest "the whole family", so nothing can get a massive blockbuster-sized budget unless it's rated PG.

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All true. The 70s had other situations going, as well. For instance, as I noted, drive-ins were far more plentiful and showed a lot of R movies and let teenagers in groups come on in an "learn all about sex" (as best could be taught in studio movies.)

Also, the movies had been SO censored, for SO many years that the studios, directors and writers went NUTS. They ALL wanted to make sexier movies because -- the Europeans had gotten to for years. Now it was the Americans turns. So we got all these sex movies and from noteable directors too.

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As for sex, I think the popularity of internet porn has something to do with less sex in movies. Why pay to see the R-rated version, when you can get porn for cheaper?

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Absolutely. Porn on the internet REALLY killed off sex in studio films. Studio films simply cannot compete and studios don't want to "make" actresses do the sex scenes much anymore. Too much trouble.

Keep in mind that back in the 70s, VHS tapes weren't on the mass market yet. If you wanted to see a porn movie, you h had to go to a porn theater and watch with other patrons. Generally just SOME men and SOME couples did this. I know of a few drive-ins that got away with showing porn(exclusively) because the screens faced open fields with no housing or buildings.

CONT

[–] roger1 (3703) a year ago

Still, sexy studio films -- and foreign films -- were made more frequently in the 70s, like Carnal Knowledge(which ended up in the US Supreme Court on obscenity charges) and Last Tango in Paris(a foreign film with a major American star -- Marlon Brando.)

There was something called "Porn Chic" in the 70s, with couples and "intelligent adults" going to see the X-rated Deep Throat, and Behind the Green Door, and other such films. Pauline Kael wanted to write a review of Deep Throat for the New Yorker, but her boss wouldn't let her.

Anyway, the "barriers came down" on porn in the 80s with video tapes, and then on to DVDs and now on to the internet.

And the movies simply cannot compete and their R-rated sex scenes don't make the grade.

CONT

[–] roger1 (3703) a year ago

Just don't let me get started on the idiocy of stopping kids from seeing R-rated dramas, but letting them get internet porn...

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What can the studios do? They "self regulate" their R rated content in the face of censorship(to avoid an NC-17) and "cancellation from all sides."

The internet is the wild west.

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Still, I have fond memories of some great to good movies from the 70s which had significant sex scenes which I remember -- you got a good movie with some erotic content via fine actors, and that was good:

Carnal Knowledge
Klute
The Last Picture Show
Don't Look Now
Thunderbolt and Lightfoot
Rancho Deluxe
North Dallas Forty

..are the ones I remember.

On the DOWN side, so many "major directors" went for the nonsensual rape of women in movies:

Straw Dogs
A Clockwork Orange
Dirty Harry
Frenzy
The Hunting Party
The Klansman

and one major one with the male rape of a man: Deliverance.

I'm glad the rape movies are gone. Consensual all the way...

I don't miss ANY of those.

[–] roger1 (3703) a year ago

1975 was the last of four of Hollywood’s greatest years, starting with 1972. There are probably more great films in that period than any other — so many I’d have trouble listing them all.

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1973 had the biggest VOLUME of movies -- great, good, blockbusters, art. The Exorcist, The Sting, and American Graffiti were the blockbusters, and everything else got in line behind them.

1971 was great -- if filled with violence and specifically sexual violence.

1972, 1974, 1975...I count more than four.

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Even many films that weren’t great, like Earthquake, were hugely entertaining and big in a way that today’s movies can’t match at all.

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The 70's was also the decade of the disaster movie and most of those were pretty fun and one of them got MAJOR stars(The Towering Inferno) and..nobody called them Oscar material though The Towering Inferno got a (deserved) Best Picture nomination.

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As you state, two names are responsible for a good chunk of that greatness — Al Pacino and Sidney Lumet. They broke expectations and reached some of the highest heights in film ever, and they did it over and over again.

Lumet had been around since 12 Angry Men but he really blossomed in the 70's(indeed, he had a rather weak late 60s.)
But when the streak hit, it hit. i say it started with The Anderson Tapes(very NYC) and then just kept rolling: Serpico, Orient Express, Dog Day, Network....boom.

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CONT

[–] roger1 (3703) a year ago

There’s a terrific short documentary covering the crazy hard work that went into making this film what it is, including Pacino making himself as uncomfortable and stressed as possible by staying up all night. It’s on YouTube. If you’re a fan of this movie, don’t miss it.

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I'll take a look. The end result of "crowd acting" and sheer energy is very great and Al really sweats and yells and then broods his way through the picture.

Pacino had the two Godfathers of the 70's as his anchor -- Michael Corleone was all the classic role he needed for history. But he also gave an Oscar worthy perf in Dog Day -- and got one more great one for his resume. I'm partial to Scarecrow, in which the star of The Godfather and the star of The French Connection -- Pacino and Hackman -- play Mutt and Jeff hoboes(for lack of a better term) on the American road. Pacino slumped a little after Dog Day and came back strong (and funny) in 1979 in And Justice for All.

And Scarface was waiting in the 80's.

And "Hooah" was waiting in the 90s...