Early 1970s: newspapers advertise pornography. 1972: over 30 dailies ban
reviews and ads of X films. Porno Chic: ex: Deep Throat (1972). – Gerard
Damiano.
Vietnam on Film During Vietnam War 1959-1975 > few films about the war – The Green Berets (John Wayne, 1968) with government support – First TV war / difficult to find the reasons / villain Focus on War Veterans return to the U.S.: – Chrome and Hot Leather (Lee Frost, 1971): Exploitation films / Biker films – Billy Jack (Tom Laughlin, 1971): Violent vets > $60 million in box office – Returned home veteran turned violent vigilantes After the War: emotional responses > lacks realism: – Coming Home (Hal Ashby, 1978) – The Deerhunter (Michael Cimino, 1978) – Apocalypse Now (Francis Ford Coppola, 1979) – Praised, but also criticized for their lack of specificity
Apocalypse Now (Francis Ford Coppola, 1979)
With: – – – –
Marlon Brando Martin Sheen Robert Duvall Dennis Hopper
Produced by: Zoetrope Studios 8 Oscar Nominations -- won 2 for Cinematography and for Sound A “surreal” depiction of the war in Vietnam.
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Week 7 Questions
• What is your reaction to Apocalypse Now ? • How does this film represent the Vietnam War? Give specific examples. • Do you consider this a realistic depiction of the Vietnam War or perhaps a mythic/fantasy representation? Or perhaps both? Describe scenes that support your argument. • Describe the impact the Vietnam war has on the men in Vietnam. Why do you think Colonel Walter Kurtz (Marlon Brando) has secluded himself within the Vietnamese jungle? What does his action represent? • Do you see any relation between this film and other 1970’s films we have watched? In terms of story, style, and/or theme?
New Markets: HBO and VCR Home Box Office (1972): first pay/premium TV channel 1975: satellites for transmission of programming 1983: original programming VCR: • 1963: Ampex > $30,000 • 1972: AVCO CartriVision system > films • 1976: Sony’s Betamax > $2,000 • 1976: JVC’s VHS > lower quality • Studios began authorizing releases of films for video > Paramount, then 20th Century Fox • 1977: RCA sells first VHS machine in U.S. • 1977: Video Station in LA • 1984: Supreme Court > not illegal to copy films for personal use • Pornography on tape • Independent films direct to video • Theater attendance decreases
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Review for Midterm •
1950s: – Studio System – Production Code – Post-war problems – Differentiations
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1960s: – Industry in 1960s – Musicals / Roadshows – Packaged production / Runaway production – Ratings / Effect on Films – Art Cinema / Auteur Theory – Exploitation films / Teenage films / Youth films
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1970s: – New American Cinema / Influence of Art Cinema – New Blockbusters -- saturation, event pics, tent poles – X-rating – Blaxploitation: specific demographic – Vietnam
Hollywood Studio System
Lasts from 1915 to 1950s: mass production of high quality product (films) Vertical Integration: • Production • Distribution • Exhibition “The genius of the system” Big 5 and Little 3 distributed 95% of all films produced in the US
Big 5 (fully vertically integrated): – MGM – Paramount – Warner Brothers – 20th Century-Fox – RKO Little 3 (partially integrated): – Universal – United Artists – Columbia Oligopoly: control of a market by a small group of companies
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Exploitative elements in the early 1930s -
Gangster films Betty Boop Jean Harlow Barbara Stanwick Mae West And others.
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Regulation of Content
Motion Picture Producers and Distributors of America (MPPDA) Catholic Legion of Decency 1930: Production Code 1934: Production Code Administration Lasts to 1966
Hollywood Style
Story departments > crucial to Studio System Star system: – Long term contracts (7 year contracts) – Type cast Studio System: Vertical Integration and Contracts Production Code: Regulation of content. Led to a particular Film Style, which would dramatically change once the System and Code fell apart.
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Post-War Period 1947: beginning of Hollywood decline Some reasons: – Television: 1946: first large scale network programming; 1949: close to 1 million televisions ; more convenient for suburban families. – HUAC (House of Un-American Activities Committee): late 1940s to mid-1950s / investigating Communism. – Paramount Decrees: 1948 > no longer Vertical Integration. – Rise of Independent Productions: directors, actors, and others form their own production companies and are now represented by Talent Agencies > Package Productions.
Hollywood differentiates itself from TV 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7.
Color Widescreen processes 3-D Films Improved sound Big budget blockbusters Changing content / Ratings Changing audiences
By 1956, Hollywood would enter the TV business.
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Studio System attempts to stay alive •
60s Musicals West Side Story (Robert Wise, 1961) The Sound of Music (Robert Wise, 1965) Flops: Dr. Doolittle (1967), Star! (1968), Hello! Doly! (1969)
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The Cleopatra Disaster Cleopatra (Joseph L. Mankiewicz, 1963) Emblematic of the breakdown of the studio system
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The Road Show
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Runaway Productions – Reduce production costs / Subsidies from foreign governments – More easily marketable to an international audience – Lawrence of Arabia (David Lean, 1962) – Dr, Strangelove (Stanley Kubrick, 1964) – 2001 (Stanley Kubrick, 1968) – The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly (Sergio Leone, 1968)
1960: 40% of films financed by Hollywood were shot overseas.
Studio Take-Overs: begin in the 1960s All major studios are bought by large corporate conglomerates Except for Disney, Columbia, and 20th Century Fox Selling of lots and properties Package production: – – – –
No longer long-term 7 year contracts Now short-term contracts for an individual film Lawyers and Talent Agents Credits
Horizontal Integration: – All companies will now diversify – Mixing production: TV, Film, Leisure, etc.
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Changes in Film Content and Regulations Miracle Decision (1952) 1966: Production Code abandoned. Jack Valenti: new president of the MPAA in 1966 (changed from MPPDA in the late 1940s) Code was seen as outdated and restrictive 1968: Revision of ratings system • Encourage artistic freedom • Curtail government censorship • • • •
G: General audiences M: Mature > then GP (1969) > then PG (1970) R: Restricted > under 16 with adult (17 in 1970) X: 16 or older (17 in 1970)
Art Cinema European art film began in 1944 with neo-realism in Italy Most were released without a PCA seal of approval – Breathless (Jean-Luc Godard, 1959) – 8 1/2 (Federico Fellini, 1963) – Blow-Up (Michelangelo Antonioni, 1966) – Hiroshima Mon Amour (Alain Resnais, 1959)
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Art Cinema
• Film presents action relying more heavily on dreams, fantasies, mental states. • Characters do not have clear goals. • Confronted by obstacles and conflicts, but these are unclear. • Film lacks closure, often unresolved plotlines. • Rarely a cause-and-effect narrative.
Rise of the Auteur Francois Truffaut in France in the 1950s: – “Politiques des auteurs” – Cahiers du Cinema – The directors distinct personality / world view
Andrew Sarris in the US in the 1960s: – “The American Cinema” – The auteur theory > Pantheon of American directors – New York Observer
• Dominant discourse in the late 1960s and into the 1970s for: – Film Critics – College Film Studies courses > over 1,500 film courses by 1967
• Studios: looking for young, film school educated (USC, UCLA, NYU), “auteur” directors > emulate art cinema, Easy Riders...
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American International Pictures (AIP) American International Pictures (AIP): formed in 1956 and dedicated to producing and distributing low-budget films geared to teenagers (1950s-1970s) Roger Corman: ‘B-Movie King’ > Director/Producer Exploitation films: films which are made to exploit popular trends > Successor of B-films Often low-budget, short, sci-fi/horror quickly made films / Saturation releasing • • • •
The Little Shop of Horrors (1960) Premature Burials (1962) The Wild Angels (1966) The Trip (1967)
Helped launch the careers of many directors: Francis Ford Coppola, Monte Hellman, Peter Bogdanovich, Jack Nicholson, Martin Scorsese, and others.
The Trip (Roger Corman, 1967)
Youth Films
Easy Rider (Dennis Hopper, 1969) About different cultures in the U.S. > about the cultural and ideological divisions Produced for $375,000 Earned over $50 million at the box office This encouraged Hollywood to embrace the youth market. Music became crucial as it was in the The Graduate Youth cult explosion was extremely brief Concert Documentaries: Woodstock
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Film Industry: 1970s Industry recession: 1969-1971 – Over $500 million in losses during this period – Most studios are bought and under new managements – 1969-1970: 34% fewer films produced – 40% of Hollywood filmmakers unemployed – Directly caused by the overproduction in 1968 > flops – Harder to predict what would be successful – 1972: The Godfather > 1975: Jaws > 1977: Star Wars Hollywood “New Wave”: New American Cinema – Less restrictions – Inspired by Art Cinema – Inspired by the counter-culture / youth oriented – Taking more risks – Experimenting with alternative narrative and stylistic techniques – More creativity and memorable subject matter -- a questioning spirit – Roger Corman – Scorsese, Altman, Mallick, etc.
Francis Ford Coppola and The Godfather UCLA > The Terror (1963), Dementia 13 (1963): Roger Corman 1969: American Zoetrope with George Lucas Patton (1970): Oscar win as best co-screenwriter The Godfather (Francis Ford Coppola, 1972): 1st big blockbuster •
Attempt to minimize risk: Based on pre-sold property: Mario Puzo's pulpish best-seller
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Changes in distribution: From platform release to saturation release.
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Changes in marketing: TV advertising.
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Ads for specific demographics.
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Budget: $6 million.
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Over $80 million in its initial release.
The Godfather: Part II (Coppola, 1974) The Conversation (Coppola, 1974)
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The Exorcist (William Friedkin, 1973) • The French Connection (1971): Gene Hackman • Warner Bros: The Exorcist (1973) adapted from William Peter Blatty's novel • About the demonic possession in a teenage girl • Very controversial: religion, devil, sexuality, vomiting, etc. • • • •
Made for $9 million Made over $89 million dollars domestic 10 Oscar nominations > won 2 One of the most profitable horror film of all time: $402,500,000 worldwide
Steven Spielberg and Jaws •
Cal State Long Beach > rejected from USC
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TV work
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The TV movie: Duel (1971) > suspense thriller very similar to Jaws in concept
Jaws (Steven Spielberg, 1975): •
Based on Peter Benchley's novel in 1973.
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Blockbuster strategy > Seasonal release.
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Event Picture.
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Saturation release > over 400 theaters
1st film to reach more than $100 million at box office $470 million worldwide Ancillary market / synergy Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977)
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George Lucas and Star Wars USC Internship at Warner Bros. in 1968 Founded American Zoetrope with Coppola in 1969 THX 1138 (George Lucas, 1971) American Graffiti (George Lucas, 1973) Industrial Light and Magic in 1976 Star Wars (1977): $127 million in initial release Low salary to write and direct > but 40% of merchandising rights. Formed production company Lucasfilm, Ltd., 1979 Formed Pixar in 1979
Manufacturing a Blockbuster The Deep (Peter Yates, 1977 with Nick Nolte and Jacqueline Bisset): $9M budget, over $30M box office / Columbia Pictures Peter Guber: – Pre-sold the film because of hard-back publication – Poster like that of Jaws – Behind-the-scenes in the Virgin Islands – Wet T-shirt – Product tie-ins (boat, watches, sportswear, cosmetic line) – Mass TV ads – Timed with paychecks of audiences Rising Cost of Production and Marketing (could be 3 times more than cost of making film) Tentpole films: companies needed one major blockbuster to survive Looking for a franchise
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The X-rating and Sexuality X rating: 1968 > Valenti was initially against “adult only” ratings Convinced by theater owners > demand X rating: not copyrighted / pornographers could self-administer the rating: impression of MPAA approval. Difficult to distinguish between Adult films (Midnight Cowboy) and Pornography > 1990: NC-17 – A Clockwork Orange (Stanley Kubrick, 1971) – Last Tango in Paris (Bernardo Bertolucci, 1972) – Carnal Knowledge (Mike Nichols, 1971)
1969-1970: 1/3 of films submitted to MPAA cut their films to receive an R > stigma of X
The X-rating and Sexuality Early 1970s: newspapers advertise pornography 1972: over 30 dailies ban reviews and ads of X films Porno Chic: ex: Deep Throat (1972) – Gerard Damiano – With Linda Lovelace – $24,000 – Box office: over $20 million – Highest grossing film of the year – Widely attended by middle-class audiences – Reviewed by major newspapers like the New York Times -The Devil in Miss Jones (1972) Created controversy > political and cultural debates
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Blaxploitation
New demographic: the black urban audience First all-black film to be a crossover box-office hit: Cotton Comes to Harlem (Ossie Davis, 1970) Sweet Sweetback’s Baadasssss Song (Melvin Van Peebles, 1971) – Fully independent / All black crew – Young criminal on the run / violent, sexual anti-hero / X rated – Aimed at urban black audiences – Designed to upset white audiences: militancy, sex, anti-white sentiment, revenge theme, violence Hollywood style Blaxploitation: – Shaft (Gordon Parks, 1971) – Superfly (Gordon Park, Jr., 1972)
Over 200 films made > mostly non-black crew Foxy Brown (Jack Hill, 1974) with Pam Grier > All female version
Vietnam on Film During Vietnam War 1959-1975 > few films about the war – The Green Berets (John Wayne, 1968) with government support – First TV war / difficult to find the reasons / villain Focus on War Veterans return to the U.S.: – Chrome and Hot Leather (Lee Frost, 1971): Exploitation films / Biker films – Billy Jack (Tom Laughlin, 1971): Violent vets > $60 million in box office – Returned home veteran turned violent vigilantes After the War: emotional responses > lacks realism: – Coming Home (Hal Ashby, 1978) – The Deerhunter (Michael Cimino, 1978) – Apocalypse Now (Francis Ford Coppola, 1979) – Praised, but also criticized for their lack of specificity
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