TNMC
This site’s design is only visible in a graphical browser that supports web standards, but its content is accessible to any browser or Internet device.
A Decade Under the Influence
Wednesday August 20 through Friday August 22, 8PM EST
Starting tonight, IFC is running a three part documentary A Decade Under the Influence, that looks closely at the films of the 1970s. The documentary was assembled by Richard LaGravenese (The Fisher King, The Ref) and the late Ted Demme (The Fisher King, The Ref) by talking to many of the great actors, directors and writers of that decade. Also sharing in the interviewing chores are directors like Neil LaBute (Nurse Betty), Nick Cassavetes (John Q) and Alexander Payne (Election, About Schmidt), as well as writers like Robert Mark Kamen (The Fifth Element) and Scott Frank (Minority Report, Out of Sight). Thus we have a documentary made by young filmmakers clearly in love with the films of that period by getting the people who made that decade what it was to talk.
The documentary doesn't seem to follow a particular timeline but it definitely has an arc to it. It jumps around from film to film or following a particular person' career for a bit. The point seems more to provide a sense of the period and the evolution of the young artists of the time rather than a strict linear tale. Part one, "Influences and Independents," opens with the big gala premiere of Hello Dolly and all the requisite Hollywood excess that goes with it. The idea is quickly established that artisticly, Hollywood had hit a wall. They no longer had any idea what audiences wanted or how to dig out of the hole they were in. From that point on we start to meet the young filmmakers who would, often with the help of B movie king Roger Corman, start churning out experimental or inventive movies with incredible energy and passion. The influence of foreign filmmakers like Goddard, Trufaut, Kirosawa and Fellini among others are discussed to help set the stage. These youngsters were making a name for themselves quickly. You know them, names like Martin Scorsese, Robert Altman, Francis Ford Coppola and William Friedkin. They started turning up new actors too, people lacking the movie star looks of their predecessors but more than making up for it with talent and daring. Robert De Niro, Bruce Dern, Clint Eastwood, Jon Voight, Al Pacino, Dustin Hoffman, Sissy Spacek, Roy Scheider and Jack Nicholson all emerged during the period covered. These are imaginative and passionate people and they have some great stories to tell. Part one is the most purely entertaining section of the documentary. They tell about finding their audience by making films that spoke to what they thought of as the real world and not the perfect concept of society put forth by the establishment.
Part two, "The New Hollywood," is about Hollywood's reaction to all this. They did the smart thing and instead of trying to fight off these new filmmakers, they just hired them. So this section tells about making some landmark films like The Godfather, Taxi Driver, The Exorcist, The French Connection, Dirty Harry, Chinatown and All the President's Men. We hear of executives who decided to take a very hands off approach and trust the artist and others who didn't. Coppola talks of being in serious trouble with The Godfather, going approximately 200% over budget and basically being a no-name to the studio until oddly the film hit big. Robert Altman talks of trying to stay underground while making M*A*S*H, basically keeping such a low profile that the studio wouldn't even think of taking too close a look at what they were doing. A significant section of part two is devoted to women and trying to find roles that didn't fall into what Ellen Burstyn refers to as "the mother, the wife or the whore" categories. It focuses on her following The Exorcist with Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore, Jane Fonda's career and Faye Dunaway in Network as examples of breaking the mold.
Part three, "Yesterday, Today and Tommorrow," is where we can start to see the arc that the documentary is taking. Here it looks at the later part of the decade and the emergence of what was a revolutionary new concept to Hollywood, the blockbuster. Much of the decade had been concerned with inner drama, films that scolded the establishment and dark themes. The public was getting a little desperate for some cheerier fare and they found it in Rocky an underdog story that hit huge. Following that was a horror film that really touched a primal nerve with the public and became the first true summer blockbuster. Jaws was the work of yet another hot young director and it started to turn the establishment on its ear yet again. Completing the transformation a couple years later was Star Wars, a monstrous hit almost sneered at by the documentary as "escapist entertainment." But after watching the preceding couple hours you can see where these filmmakers might not be thrilled with Star Wars, not so much for the film itself but for what it did to Hollywood. That was the beginning of the quest for the blockbuster, which has more recently evolved into the desperate need for a huge opening week. One after another the interviewees bemoan the direction the industry has taken. Movies used to be opened slowly and nurtured along until they found their audience. Now it's more of the nuclear bomb blast approach to marketing, a point that sits poorly with these legends. They see that those early hits for Spielberg and Lucas, themselves hot young directors at the time, was the work of great talent and that building an industry around that kind of success is somewhat self-defeating. The third section is the weakest part of the documentary as it loses focus on the decade and starts dwelling more on the present industry, some twenty years after the period under the magnifying glass. It's not that the material isn't relevant but it starts to make the legends start to sound like the Dana Carvey "Grumpy Old Man" bit from Saturday Night Live. "In my day we didn't have blockbusters. We had tiny little films about misery and we liked it!"
That last grumble aside, this is an excellent mini-series documentary and well worth your attention. It has plenty to say and it all comes straight from the lips of those who did it. There is virtually no narration at all, instead letting the interviewees and clips from their movies tell the story. If IFC gets the idea to make more of these documentaries centering on other decades, I wont' be complaining.
Rating: 8.5 out of 10
What do you think? Talk about it on the Forums