The 70s

The 70s represented a new and exciting time in cinema, many consider this decade to be the new golden age of film.

Much blame the fall of the old studio system to the fact that Hollywood was run by old moguls who no longer knew what people wanted to see. Since this happened, a new kind of freedom happened. Young filmmakers fresh out of school came to Hollywood with a fresh new approach. These were the filmmakers who were more influenced by what was going on in Europe rather than what Hollywood was dishing out at the time.

Independent filmmakers such as John Cassavetes were inspiring their students to experiment with more personal stories, by the late 60s things were coming to a boil with films like "Bonnie and Clyde" and "Easy Rider" bringing forth a new youth movement. Famed B-movie producer Roger Corman was giving young talent their first break by letting them makes small budget films for his company.

By the time the 70s happened, these young people were now in charge of Hollywood. Many put these filmmakers in a clique known as "The Hollywood Brats". These consisted of filmmakers such as Francis Ford Coppola, Martin Scorsese, Peter Bogdonavich, William Friedkin, Brian DePalma, George Lucas, and Steven Spielberg. All of these guys were young kids who grew up with film and understanding the language. In just one decade they would make films that were both financially successful, and deeply personal, it was something Hollywood had never done before.

America was going through changing times, in the 60s, people lived through the Civil Rights Movement, Vietnam, and political assassinations. In the 70s things things became even more disenfranchised, nothing was cut and dry or black and white, people were screaming for realism in their films.

Films became more about real people dealing with real issues, sometimes they had a political agenda, you could see it in mainstream action films like "Dirty Harry", or thrillers like "All the Presidents Men", people were starting to show off their point of view more clearly.

The idea for violence took leaps in this area as well, Francis Ford Coppola's "The Godfather" became an instant hit depicting violence in a more realistic way. Martin Scorsese even went further with violence in his films like "Mean Streets" or "Taxi Driver". His films usually depicted the most despicable people, yet Scorsese had a great talent for making us feel for them.

Other filmmakers were able to create the films they wanted to make by always going with a modest budget, allowing them more freedom, and it is something that they were able to get away with throughout their careers. Woody Allen is someone who springs to mind when you think of this, many people consider the 70s to be his greatest output of films, starting from "Bananas" and ending with "Manhattan", he never seems to hit a false step. Robert Altman is another director who came up with his own unique style which it could safely be said could never be equalled. Altman was about 20 years older than the other brats of Hollywood, but he was just starting to create his style starting with "M*A*S*H". His films played with genre sometimes deconstructing them such as the western ("McCabe and Mrs. Miller"), the film noir ("The Long Goodbye"), and gangster film ("Thieves Like Us"). He would go on to create "Nashville", which many believe is THE film of the 70s.

By the 1975 however, a certain event happened that would change the face of Hollywood yet again. Steven Spielberg's "Jaws" became the first worldwide blockbuster. Spielberg's horror masterpiece caught the attention of film goers around the world, and suddenly the studio was making money again. Things even got bigger when George Lucas released his space opera "Star Wars" which became a pop culture phenomenon. This was the beginning of the end for the new golden age. By the time the 70s ended, there was a mixed bag. Studios were still producing personal film projects like Malick's "Days of Heaven", Cimino's "The Deer Hunter", and Coppola's "Apocalypse Now", but there people were also getting more escapist, special effect driven films like Spielberg's "Close Encounters of the Third Kind", Scott's "Alien", and Donner's "Superman".

By the time the 80s began, Hollywood had to reform yet again, it was truly an end of an era, as the movie franchise was born.