Baloney. I’d say “Heaven’s Gate” and the resulting chilling effect on giving directors artistic control over their films did far more to hurt good cinema. And some damn good movies were made from 1977 to 1987.
Why is emphasizing character better than emphasizing plot?
I would pick:
Bonnie and Clyde (violence, breakdown of Producers Code)
The French Connection (Gritty cop dramas)
Dirty Harry (Renegade cop on the edge; quasi-fascist revenge movies)
Jaws (Blockbuster thrillers)
Star Wars (Blockbuster product tie-ins)
MAS*H (TV spinoffs, modern anti-war films)
Jurassic Park (Hel-looo, CGI!)
Pulp Fiction (Dialogue-heavy, story-light stagelike movies)
Animal House (Gross-out humor)
Friday the 13th (Teen slashers)
Some that are more recent, and so hard to judge, that I suspect will end up being remembered as influential will be “Saving Private Ryan” (ultra-realistic, deliberately harrowing war films) and “The Matrix.”
The only movie not mentioned so far is One Flew Through the Cuckoos Nest. Showed that the mentally ill are not all that much different from the rest of us.
Well, “Blade Runner” wasn’t a huge hit, but it’s been hugely influential. Its vision of the future (advanced AND poor, high-tech AND dilapidated, progressive and yet bleak) has become the norm in science fiction films.
Now, I’m aware that this vision of the future was common in sci-fi LITERATURE, but until Ridley Scott made “Alien” and “Blade Runner,” Holywood’s vision of the future was always much more upbeat.
Ever hear of Snow White? Fantasia? Bugs Bunny? Daffy Duck? They were around and ground breaking before the mere IDEA for Lion King was ever even in anyone’brain.
Ever hear of The 10 Commandments? Ben Hur? Spartacus? Gone With The Wind? Again those were epics that were considered classics while mel Gibson was still taking dumps in his pampers.
Well, okay, but the whole point of this thread was to name influential movies that were made after 1960, these were all made before. No one is questioning their significance.
And while I’m here, let me put in a bid for The Graduate.
Goodfellas is one of my all-time favourite movies. But, as much as I love it, I’d be hard pressed to call it influential. Maybe that will become apparent as time goes on, but as of today I can’t see it having influenced movies in general, or the mob genre, in particular.
Ahhhhh, I knew I messed up. I tried to read this thread and and post a reply during a 10 minute break at work today. I did want to say One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest. Just excuse me for the brain fart. My truck was stolen yesterday and my mind has been on other things.
IMO 2001: A Space Odyssey was boring, but definately influenced SciFi to take a much more cerebral approach to moviemaking. The Star Trek movies for instance (most anyway).
Halloween was the real father of the slasher movies.
No votes for Kurosawa? ‘Ran’, or ‘The Seven Samurai’?
Jaws created the notion of the summer blockbuster. Before that, big movies came out at Christmas, and summer was the time when B-movies like “Corvette Summer” were distributed. In terms of industry influence, Jaws is probably number one.
Technically speaking though, you are correct.