Oh, and as far as disaster movies go, I’ll agree that The Towering Inferno had the most palpable 70’s vibe.
One more: Semi-Tough. (Very 70’s. Definitely in my top 10.)
–sniff-- I didn’t think my titles required definition. Do they?
Annie Hall defined the complexities of relationships in that era.
Woodstock wasn’t really about the 60’s of course, it was about the early 70’s even though it was shot in 1969.
All That Jazz was about narcissistic tendencies and death. Two bit-time 1970’s ethos’.
Coming Home was an early offering in the Vietnam War Movies Sub-Genre. God I wept at what Bruce Dern did at the end of that film. The intercutting of his suicide with John Voigt’s speech was the stuff of deep sadness. I walked into the IHOP where I worked, weeping…
Of course, the 1960s did not end until the U.S. pulled out of Vietnam in 1973. The 1970s ended with the takeover of the U.S. embassy in Tehran in 1979. So, it was a brief decade.
I disagree, although the Beatles breaking up was a major bummer that tricked things up for a bit and there was something to finally pulling out of Vietnam, I feel that the 60s officially ended the day Tricky Dick defeated McGovern in a landslide election (McGovern taking only ONE state, Massachussetts, in 1972).
I’d like to include some science fiction movies. Regardless of what future year they’re set in, sf movies typically reflect the attitudes of the time they were made; that’s why you can feel nostalgia while watching a movie set in what is still the future.
There were a number of early 70’s sf movies that, when I see them now, seem to carry a load of sheer melancholy that relates to a country that doesn’t know where it’s going. The Vietnam war was ending, with no victory; we had achieved the miracle of Apollo but then inexplicably turned away; worries about the environment were becoming mainstream; anyway, I had in mind Soylent Green, The Omega Man, The Andromeda Strain, and definitely Silent Running (that one has Bruce Dern as a granola-eating tree hugger in space, who unfortunately has to kill a few guys).
In the 80’s thread someone mentioned The Wedding Singer, which was made well after the 80’s. So, I’m going to mention…
[drumroll]
Dazed and Confused
[Matthew McConaghy (sp?)]
“I love these high school girls. The older I get, they stay the same age.”
[/Matthew McConaghy (sp?)]
“In some ways the sixties ended the night we got rid of that van. December 31st, 1969!”
I will agree that Dazed and Confused did “70’s high school” pretty well.
And Baldwin, I’ll also agree that the science fiction movies you mention are noticeably “of the 70’s.”
Star Wars, on the other hand, does a better job of transcending the decade in which it was made. Well, except for the haircuts.
What? 70’s sci-fi flicks and no mention of Logan’s Run?!
(Shame on you Baldwin! )
The first film I thought of when I read the thread title was “Dazed and Confuzed” It did a good job of capturing the feel of being in high school in the seventies…and as much as I hate to admit it, I was there.
Keith