The 60s

I've said before that if there was a decade I would want to be alive during it would be the 1960s, not that there aren't other decades to choose from. So much came out of the 60s that have been such a huge part of my life, the mantra became more youth oriented movies, while the dynasty of the old studio crumbled away.

The 1960s were full of films by the studio that became mainly out of touch with today's youth. Movies became bloated with budgets or musical production numbers, and were made with minds with less emotion. Most of these films made money, but none can be considered classics. Perhaps the most famous of these blunders was 1963's "Cleopatra" starring Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton, the film was a colossal failure causing its company 20th Century Fox to almost go bankrupt.

Still despite all of these dinosaur pictures that didn't quite fit well with this new era, there were some old pros who still had something to say. John Ford who made his career making the best westerns ever made made perhaps his darkest but most nostalgic film "The Man who Shot Liberty Valance" which was about the death of the old west and the birth of a new civilization. It was as if Ford was saying, there wasn't room for war horses like him anymore. Alfred Hitchcock in the meantime was reinventing himself and reinventing the suspense genre he mastered so well since his debut. His "Psycho" became one of his biggest hits and influenced generations of horror filmmakers, he followed that up with the no less scary "The Birds". Then there was that master satirist Billy Wilder who found new life with his acting muse Jack Lemmon, together they made a series of great comedies of the decade which started with "The Apartment". Wilder never seemed to be one of those directors who was ever out of touch, for him the 60s were just catching up with the type of sexual politics he was always putting in his films.

New filmmakers were making names for themselves during this period as well. Men like Sam Peckinpah and Sergio Leone in particular created what is known as the revisionist western with their films like "Once Upon a Time in the West" and "The Wild Bunch". These films could be much more violent and operatic in the depiction of the west, plus the characters were less heroic and darker than you would find in a Ford or Hawks western.

However the biggest surge of talent this year wasn't coming out of Hollywood, but from Europe. The French New Wave came in full force with films by Godard, Truffaut, Malle, Rohmer, and Chabrol to name a few. The french new wave brought new ideas to the forefront and relied on technique that was seen as more improvised, they changed the rules using extensive jump cuts and breaking continuity, it was a fresh approach to cinema. The most prolific director of this time was Godard who made 15 films between his first film "Breathless" in 1960 and his culminating film "Week end" in 1967.

Other European filmmakers made a name for themselves in the 1960s, Bergman for one would continue where he left off in the 50s with films that probed the mind and man's search for meaning. It in this decade he made films like "Persona" and "Through a Glass Darkly" both of which are considered masterpieces. In Italy Fellini became and even more out there and edgy artist with his two most ambitious (and some would say autobiographical) films "La Dolce Vita" and "8 and a half".

While these films were making an impact, Hollywood was watching, a new youth movement was happening, and by 1967, things were getting very interesting. Soon studios were overrun by radical youths who were influenced by the films in Europe and went on to change the face of Hollywood. Edgier films starting with "Bonnie and Clyde", and "Easy Rider" were made, and soon young film students like Martin Scorsese, and Francis Ford Coppola were making their very first films. As the 60s ended, the 70s were looking more promising than ever.