Was on the brink of doing a post on one of the key movies of the 70s (so key, I'm surprised it hasn't been done here already. It's lurked around a fair few other posts). However, I'll instead direct your attention to this excellent piece by Philip Matthews. If he's reading, can I make it clear that he'd be more than welcome as a contributor to these blogs? I attempted an invite, but can't seem to access his email with my senile computer.
5 comments:
I watched Taxi Driver about a month ago with a friend who was the same age I was, 20, when it came out. I had seen a lot of movies by that time, but few, if any, of those that most influenced Scorsese. Certainly not The Searchers whose star had become poison to those of my generation, draft eligible, romantically alienated, and nearly perfectly aligned with Travis's world view in the most shallow way. The movie captured the surface filth of the era and also the insanity that seemed a logical response to an insane world.
Of course, over time, as my views broadened, the movie became more powerful. I watch it every few years to see what is new about it to me, usually with someone who had never seen it. My friend, a post- unification German without much of the cinematic history that Scorsese used, loved the film for capturing of the confused american hero, doing evil while thinking it good and being cheered by a society he is not a part of for murder. She also spoke of the many ways she saw the film in recent movies for example.
So, It is certainly of the '70's a belongs here. But it gives and gives.
it's a funny one - I used to love it, went right off it, but come right back to it again. View it very differently now. It's flawed, but always worth rewatching.
I thin Schrader kept his 'mojo' longer than Scorcese though (and definitely longer than Deniro). Autofocus and Affliction are much better than anything Scorsese's made since 1990.
another seminal film of the 1970s is the borderline cult film "Who'll Stop the Rain?" with Nick Nolte, Michael Moriaty, Tuesday Weld and Anthony Zerbe, a surprising introspective presentation of the domestic amorality that grew out of the Summer of Love and the Vietnam War
while the rest of the cast has been right praised, Zerbe is great as the rogue cop, you forget how good he was in bad guy roles, even though he was a bit overexposed at the time
Seeing as we are recommending films it's definitely worth giving another Paul Schrader screenplay a watch called Rolling Thunder. A real little jem, not the revenge movie the poster/trailer would have you believe. It is unfortunately nigh on impossible to get hold of, only on request and I bet that's expensive. There is another way, have a search on a site called letmewatchthis, do a search for that on google it should be top result. I don't usually condone the above route, but when a film company refuses to put a film out on DVD what can you do.
Who'll Stop the Rain is a great movie. There were loads of good 'lost generation' US movies from the end of the 60s up until the early 80s. All the great actors of the time had a shot at playing confused drifters.
The cycle probably ended with the brilliant Cutter's Way (and it's gentrified, containable mirror image in The Big Chill). Now that's a film crying out for a post on the 80s blog, come to think of it.
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