Recently on That ‘70s Movie Podcast (which you can check out here and here), we’ve been kicking around the idea of talking about some “seventies films” that were not made in the 1970s. (Stay Tuned – our first foray into this genre is coming soon!)
Counterintuitive as this may sound, seventies films can still be made—they faded away not with the turning of the decade, but due to changes to the industry and to the broader movie-going culture, which made it much harder to get them produced. And it should be remembered that not all films made in the 1970s were “seventies films.” The New Hollywood reflected a shared ethos, not a properly numbered decade: the movement started in the late 1960s, and petered out as the late 1970s anticipated the cultural wasteland of the 1980s.
A seventies film, in broad brush, is character driven, modestly scaled, has something to say, tends to feature downbeat and/or open endings, is more interested in challenging than pandering to its audience, and, always and of course, is steeped in moral ambiguity. And even though the suits and the mass audience moved on, dozens of filmmakers have still carried the New Hollywood torch, sort of like the way (uber-nerd alert) Post-Keynesians, if marginalized by mainstream macroeconomics, saw themselves as the true intellectual progeny of Keynes.
All of which is to say, you don’t need the seventies to make a seventies film. And so, with apologies to Was (Not Was), here are ten 70s (Not 70s) films—exemplars of the post-70s movement. I have limited the selections to American films, and I have certainly left out many great candidates. Also, with one exception, I have leaned away from directors who were already established as New Hollywood titans. This fits the spirit of the exercise—one would not put Keynes on a list of post-Keynesians. Thus the giants left on this particular cutting room floor include Scorsese (Raging Bull, 1980; The King of Comedy, 1982), Altman (Jimmy Dean, 1982; Short Cuts, 1993), and Coppola (Tetro, 2009).
The Anniversary Party (2001) Alan Cumming and Jennifer Jason Leigh brought some of their friends together for a micro-budgeted limited-location affair—and they achieve Cassavetes-levels of interpersonal drama. Smart and intense, funny and often finely detailed, there is so much to praise in this small movie; from this ensemble we’ll give a shout out to John C. Reilly, and Phoebe Cates’ utterly perfect explanation of what it means to be a parent.
Boogie Nights (1997) Wow. With this film, and followed by Magnolia (1999), Paul Thomas Anderson staked his claim to “the most seventies post seventies auteur.” Both films feature brilliant ensembles, including post-70s icons Julianna Moore and Philip Seymour Hoffman. (Moore, throughout her career, has given us an astonishing array of brilliant, daring, ambitious performances.) I regard Boogie Nights are the stronger film – and original, and a masterpiece – but here’s Moore from Magnolia with a speech we imagine being directed at Henry Kissinger.
Drugstore Cowboy (1989) Wow Again! Could it get any more 70s than this? Matt Dillon and Kelly Lynch lead a modest, amiable band of small time, drug addicted crooks in Portland in, um, the 1970s. And as Dylan put it, “the cops don’t need you, and man, they expect the same.” Then William S. Burrows shows up to steal his scenes. New queer cinema icon Gus Van Sant would follow this with the shattering My Own Private Idaho (1991), staring River Phoenix and Keanu Reeves, but we give the edge to Cowboy.
Husbands and Wives (1992) Woody Allen was not a New Hollywood filmmaker (his tastes, instincts and traditions reached back to an earlier era)—but in many ways he kept the 70s Film ethos alive in the 1980s, with small, personal films over which he exercised complete creative control. When asked why he didn’t test-market his movies, Allen answered “I’m not interested in collaborating with my audience.” The wrenching Husbands and Wives (with outstanding performances by Sydney Pollack and Judy Davis), is the most seventies of them all. It’s the kind of movie that can end with its writer-director asking, “Is this over now? Can I go?”
Late Schrader No one has carried the torch of the New Hollywood more admirably than Paul Schrader. In contrast to Scorsese (for whom we have unbounded admiration), who in late career went bigger and bigger, chasing “important” movies with massive budgets, Schrader went small—in the best possible way. Of his late “man at desk” trilogy, we are especially impressed with First Reformed (2017) – with Ethan Hawke, an actor who is steeped in seventies sensibility – and the very daring Master Gardner (2022). But we are borderline in awe of the deeply moving, quietly subversive Oh, Canada (2024), with Richard Gere and Uma Thurman.
A Most Wanted Man (2014) Overshadowed upon release by the tragic death of Philip Seymour Hoffman, with the passage of time the greatness of his performance here is more easily appreciated. Director Anton Corbjin’s adaptation of the simmering-with-despondent-rage John le Carre novel, Wanted Man is a worthy descendant of the very 70s The Spy Who Came in From the Cold (Martin Ritt, 1965), which is in turn comparable to, and contrasts with, the fine but very Not ‘70s Bridge of Spies (Spielberg, 2015).
One False Move (1991) Carl Franklin’s neo-noir is one of the great films of the 1990s. Which, if anything, is an understatement. I could go on. If fact, I did go on, in my review of the Criterion special edition for Cineaste.
The Pledge (2001) Sean Penn is a divisive figure for some, but with Schrader, and some of the actors mentioned above (and numerous others, including Cate Blanchett and Kristen Stewart), he has our admiration as a major 70s (Not 70s) icon. A great actor (do check out his mind-blowing turn as John Mitchell in the mini-series Gaslit), his choices as director could not be more seventies. In fact, The Pledge, with Jack Nicholson leading a marvelous cast, is so seventies (especially with its soul-crushing ending), that it even left us saying, “dude, maybe take it down a notch?” Essential viewing—I mean, if you’re up to it.
Prince of the City (1981) Sidney Lumet was an established titan of the New Hollywood, but I include this movie for two reasons. First, it makes my point. Which is: Prince of the City is much more of a seventies film than Lumet’s celebrated Serpico (1973). Serpico, for all its many New Hollywood bona-fides, is a story about good guys and bad guys. Prince of the City . . . has no good guys. Second, it’s a great movie. Bonus round—while we’re on the topic of Lumet’s 70s (Not 70s) movies, do check out Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead (2007), with Ethan Hawke and Philip Seymour Hoffman (and Albert Finney and Marisa Tomei).
The Shrouds (2024) David Cronenberg is another director who would have thrived in the New Hollywood—and has managed to thrive in the subsequent decades. I should report that some of his films have rubbed us the wrong way. But that’s ok—that’s what happens when an artist is constantly pushing the envelope. (Crash, from 1996, which bagged a special jury prize at Cannes, left me cold, but huge props to James Spader for taking on a role that few others would touch.) As for The Shrouds, does the plot add up? No. Was it commercially viable? Surely not. But it is a remarkable, beautiful, cinematic, and, of course, very daring and personal rumination on grief? Yes it is. And that is what we want from the movies.
