Patton 1970

The Film:

It probably won't come as a surprise that I haven't seen this one before - or that I'm not really looking forward to it very much. In fact, I don't even remember it ever being on British TV at any time since I've been old enough to notice, and I've not really ever heard anyone talking about it.

I vaguely know who Patton was - some American General in the Second World War who shouted a lot. I also know the clip from the film where he's standing in front of the Stars and Stripes giving a speech, but that's probably because I've seen the clip on Oscar compilations etc.

I'm not a great fan of war films per se - although I've generally really liked the ones we've watched so far in this challenge. I'm not, however, holding out much hope for this one. Given that it was made during the Vietnam War it's going to have to be very subtle and/or clever to come across to me as anything other than a rallying cry for the troops - which doesn't really sit very well after nearly 50 years of hindsight and with The Deerhunter not many years away. (Co-incidentally we're also watching it at a time when Paul Hardcastle 19 is number one on retro Top of the Pops...). I'd much rather be settling down to the other war film nominated that year (see below) but maybe I'll be pleasantly surprised....

The Ceremony:

April 15th 1971 at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion. Again with no host - this time there were 34 "Friends of Oscar".

Probably the most notable thing about this year's ceremony was that it was the first one in which an actor rejected their Oscar (although this did seem to start a bit of a trend).

George C Scott refused to have any part in the Academy Awards at all. He'd refused the nomination he received for The Hustler several years earlier and he did the same this year - but won anyway and then refused to actually accept the award. He referred to the Awards as "a two-hour meat parade, a public display with contrived suspense for economic reasons". I can't really disagree much with that but, having now seen Patton, I would argue that this was a case of the pot calling the kettle black (except Patton lasted an hour longer!)

Other Notable Winners That Night:

Helen Hayes in 1932

Aside from George C Scott, the other acting awards went to Glenda Jackson, John Mills (his only ever nomination!) and Helen Hayes. Hayes' win was particularly impressive as it still holds the record for the longest gap between two wins. She was one of the first ever Best Actress winners, back in 1932, and this time she won Best Supporting Actress for (the otherwise slightly ropey) Airport. She wasn't actually at the ceremony as she was on Broadway at the time (at the age of 70). Thankfully, there are still photos of her at that time - with the nomination, I think - so we can compare them!

Helen Hayes in 1971

Ring Lardner Jnr won Adapted Screenplay for M*A*S*H having previously been blacklisted (as one of the Hollywood Ten) for most of the 50s and 60s. The Beatles won their only ever Oscar (either as Band or for any of the individual members) when Let It Be won Best Original Song Score. Obviously they weren't there to receive it, as they generally weren't talking except through lawyers at this point, so Quincy Jones accepted it on their behalf.




Best Song:

I know this song as a Carpenters song - so it's a bit strange hearing someone other than Karen singing it. It's apparently from "Lovers and Other Strangers" (no, me neither, but it's got Bea Arthur in it and it sounds quite fun!) and here's a clip:

What We Could/Should Have Been Watching:

Now THIS is how you make a war film!

Well, it definitely shouldn't have been Patton as far as I'm concerned! Other nominees included Airport (which hasn't stood the test of time, thanks to Leslie Nielsen and co), Love Story (classic schmaltz, but schmaltz none the less) and Five Easy Pieces (arguably worth it for the chicken salad sandwich alone).

I'd have given the Oscar to any one of them over Patton - but my vote has to go to the wonderful M*A*S*H. If you're going to make a war film for Americans right in the middle of the Vietnam war, then my vote would always go with hard hitting satire rather than gung-ho heroism. Maybe it's a Republican vs Democrat thing (not being American I'm probably not qualified to say) but Robert Altman's comedy set in the Korean War says far more to me about the meaning and effect of war. It led to one of the most successful sitcoms of all time (one of the first to blend tragedy and humour seamlessly) - and it's also very, very funny! I'll take Hawkeye and Trapper over Patton and Bradley any day.

Our Verdict:

Iconic. But, possibly, for all the wrong reasons.

 Oh dear. It was at least as bad as I'd feared, if not worse. It's down there with Gigi and Tom Jones. I will concede that I am definitely not the target audience for this film, partly because I'm not American and partly because I'm more than a little left-wing in my thinking. I was hoping for something a bit more interesting, clever, thought-provoking (even if the politics weren't to my liking) when I saw that Coppola was responsible for the Oscar-winning screenplay, but he was definitely saving his best for a few years later.

Too many of these sort of scenes - not my sort of thing at all.

The Jerry Goldsmith score (which didn't win anything) is by far the best thing about the film, particularly in the first location scene which is the aftermath of a battle and is very hard-hitting and realistic. I got ready to be impressed, but then lost it pretty quickly.

There are three pivotal scenes which are very nearly great but, in my mind, fail to deliver in the way they could have done. Firstly, the iconic opening with Patton's speech in front of the flag. Maybe if it had been properly played with a bit of satire, or with more of a sense of repulsion for Patton and what he is saying (Surely this film sees him as an anti-hero rather than a hero? Or maybe not?) or even with some sympathy for his delusions. But it doesn't quite do any of those things. Are we supposed to agree with it all and start chanting "USA! USA!" or what? I really wasn't sure what it was getting at being placed at the very beginning of the film and I *really* worried what Trump supporters would make of it all.

More of this sort of scene and I could have been won over.

Possibly my favourite scene is when he goes to the site of an ancient battle and his beliefs in reincarnation come to light. The fact that he believed that he'd already been in some of the most famous battles in history is fascinating and I was really looking forward to more of this - some clear insights into what made him tick. But, no, we didn't get a lot more of this. Just loads of scenes of people blowing things up and Rommel barking at everyone in German (I'm not sure whether the German characters speaking in German was impressive or affected - I think I'm going for the latter.)

Karl Malden, still looking like a priest even when he's
an Army General.

The pivotal moment in the film could/should have been (and possibly was meant to be) the scene where Patton slaps the young soldier with PTSD and calls him a coward. That could have led to more drama, more character development etc. Instead, he gets told off, sent to Knutsford (I kid you not!) and more things get blown up and more Germans shout at each other.

I do feel that there was the potential for a good film in there trying to get out. George C Scott acts his boots off all the way through and deserves his accolades, but I would much rather this had been a proper character study. And one that was stronger in its convictions (whatever they may have been). Coppola himself has said that writing the screenplay was a weird thing and that he got fired several times and only rehired at Scott's insistence. He sees the reincarnation angle as being one of the most important parts of the film but the script was clearly subject to a lot of interference - so much so that it comes across as a weird thing for a lifelong Democrat to have written. It would be interesting to see what he could have made of the script had he rewritten it ten years later, after Apocalypse Now.

One thing I will say in its favour, Patton is a film that has attracted a lot of varied and interesting positive reviews on iMDB - some from people who had family who served under Patton himself. It's not as full of Trumpian nonsense as I thought it would be. I still didn't like it very much though.

Review of the 60s

The 60s - Historical Britain, Contemporary USA - and some Alps and Sand Dunes thrown in for good measure!

We both start and end the sixties with films about the struggles of living in contemporary New York - The Apartment and Midnight Cowboy are two very different films, but are basically just different ways of tackling a very similar problem: how to cope, how to survive, how to put bad experiences behind you, make your own mark and find friendship and companionship in the world. They also both have a much more open attitude to sex and relationships than we've seen in our winners since the thirties. Both the Hays Code and blacklisting are pretty much done with by now and the American movie industry is becoming more and more influenced by those of other countries. Five of the ten winners are incredibly British in their themes and production (interestingly, those five are the bottom five in my list below....) and of the other five, one had a British director and another had two British lead actors.

The "blockbuster" isn't really in evidence in this decade, as it was in the fifties. With the obvious exception of Lawrence of Arabia (and, to some extent, at least some of the musicals), these aren't long epic films with pots of money thrown at them. Most of the winners fall in one of two categories - "serious" musicals or character-driven drama. We double our tally of musicals in one fell swoop (and there is, to date, still only one more musical winner to come!) - but all four of these musicals have a darker edge to them than the ones that came before.

We finally get a black character that has a name and isn't a servant. We get a couple of characters that are actually gay (not just probables or caricatures) - although it will be a while before they aren't stereotypes! And we finally see our first bums since the soldiers had their medicals in the 20s and our first (female) nipples since a brief glimpse of Clara Bows - not that I've been specifically looking out for them, but they are a definite sign of a change social attitudes, public tastes and the direction that "serious" film-making was going in. And we have all that to come in the seventies.....

My Top Ten (as they stand today!) is as follows:

1. The Apartment
2= West Side Story
2= The Sound of Music
4  Midnight Cowboy

Shirley and Jack - best film couple of the 60s winners.

5  In The Heat of the Night
6. My Fair Lady
7. A Man For All Seasons
8. Oliver!
9. Lawrence of Arabia
10. Tom Jones

Best Picture

Nominees:   

The Apartment
West Side Story
The Sound of Music
In The Heat of the Night
Midnight Cowboy

And the winner is.....

The Apartment

I couldn't separate out my two favourite musicals on the list - and that allowed this one to sneak through and steal the prize. One of the best things about this challenge so far has been realising how many Billy Wilder films I already knew and loved - and how many more were out there! In terms of Oscar success, this one was his peak. It's brilliant, and it still holds up today, nearly sixty years later.


Best Director


Nominees:   

Billy Wilder (The Apartment)
Robert Wise (West Side Story, The Sound of Music)

Two of the best film musicals of all time!

John Schlesinger (Midnight Cowboy)
Norman Jewison (In The Heat of the Night)
David Lean (Lawrence of Arabia)

And the winner is.....

Robert Wise

I had to give it to Wise over Wilder - because he was the main man behind the next two films on my list, which are two of the greatest film musicals of all time. He also had to deal with a grumpy Natalie Wood on the first of those and a grumpy Christopher Plummer *and* a load of children who were growing too fast on the second one!

Best Actor


Nominees:   


Jack Lemmon (The Apartment)
Paul Schofield (A Man For All Seasons)
Peter O'Toole (Lawrence of Arabia)
Rod Steiger (In The Heat of the Night)
Dustin Hoffman (Midnight Cowboy)

And the winner is.....

Rod Steiger

I really thought it would be Jack Lemmon for this one - but in the end I went for Rod Steiger because I was stunned by how good he was. In his first couple of scenes there were so many layers and nuances to his performance and he made that character incredibly sympathetic. Great performance!



Best Actress

Nominees:   

Julie Andrews (The Sound of Music)
Shirley MacLaine (The Apartment)
Rita Moreno (West Side Story)
Audrey Hepburn (My Fair Lady)
Wendy Hiller (A Man For All Seasons)

And the winner is.....

Rita Moreno

An unashamedly sentimental award here. Again, I thought I would be going with The Apartment and giving it to Shirley MacLaine - but since we watched West Side Story again Rita has refused to go away! She wipes the floor with everyone in the film and she is still going strong and making us laugh and cry and cheer as Lydia in One Day At A Time. She was a presenter at the Oscars this year, wearing the same dress as she wore when she won - fabulous woman!


Best Non-Winning Picture

See you in a few years' time!

Nominees: 

Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid
To Kill A Mockingbird
Psycho
Mary Poppins
Doctor Zhivago
The Graduate

And the winner is.....

Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid

A tough one this, because there are so many great films that didn't get the prize. I could have gone with Psycho, which didn't even get nominated. Or any one of the others up there for that matter. In previous decades I've chosen one that was far worthier than the film that beat it, but I don't think that applies (objectively, at least) to any of those. So I've gone with a personal favourite. I think I'm ok with the fact that a very different kind of cowboy took the award that year, but I love Butch and Sundance - and not just because they are so lovely to look at! It's the better of the two Newman/Redford films - but at least we get to see the other one pretty soon...

Worst Picture

Even Sexy-Finney can't save this dross....

Nominees:    

Lawrence of Arabia
Tom Jones

And the winner is.....

Tom Jones!!!


I was even reluctant to put Lawrence of Arabia in there - as I think my dislike of that film was just personal taste, and I do appreciate what a great piece of film-making it is. Tom Jones, however, was just rubbish. I genuinely don't understand how or why anyone now or then can see it as anything more than mediocre. Baffling!

Midnight Cowboy 1969

The Film:

I've seen Midnight Cowboy before. Only once, and quite some time ago. I remember being really impressed and quite moved by it. I loved the characters and performances of Dustin Hoffman and Jon Voight (Hoffman doing something totally different just a year after The Graduate!) and I remember the general story - country boy comes to New York to seek an easy fortune as an escort and finds that things aren't as easy as he thought. But that's really all, so I'm looking forward to watching it again.

I'm also looking forward to another film that is new and fresh and different. I love my musicals, but since The Apartment hinted at something darker at the beginning of the decade, there's only really been Steiger and Poitier taking the idea any further. Midnight Cowboy dives right in there!

It still holds the dubious honour of being the only X Rated (in US terms) film to win Best Picture - although it's pretty tame in comparison to some recent films, and it did get re-classified to a more reasonable R rating a few years later. However, it's still stands as one of the key moments where the Academy recognised that films were also for grown ups and no subject was off limits if the movie was a good one.

The Ceremony:

It was held again at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, on April 7th 1970. Again, there was no actual host - it was billed as being presented by seventeen "Friends of Oscar" (not a euphemism!), one of who was.....wait for it.....Bob Hope. Of course!

This year still remains the highest-rated ceremony on the Neilsen ratings (the US system for TV ratings) which shows what a big thing it all had become by this point. The Academy also attempted to have everything broadcast right around the world for the first time this year. This didn't quite work out, due to the timings of the ceremony being awkward for many major markets. Discussions were held about changing the start time, but that idea was rejected.

It was the first year that all the acting, directing and picture nominations were for films made in colour. And it was the first and only year (to date) that a film got nine nominations without one for Best Picture. The film was "They Shoot Horses Don't They?" and it really should have got a Best Picture nom (over Hello Dolly!). It only won one award (see below!)


Other Notable Winners That Night:

Babs looking stylish again, handing over the
Oscar to Mr Marion Morrison!

Midnight Cowboy took the big two, but Voight and Hoffman lost out to The Duke - John Wayne had been pulling in the crowds (and the money) for years, but had only been nominated once before. The Academy clearly felt that this was his time. I'm not a big fan, but I do like True Grit, which was the film he won for - and I'm surprised it wasn't up for Best Picture.

Maggie Smith took Best Actress for The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie, and Gig Young won Best Supporting Actor for They Shoot Horses Don't They? - both of these are brilliant films that weren't up for Best Picture. 1969 was a great year! Goldie Hawn also won her Oscar this year, for Cactus Flower (a film which seems to be almost forgotten)


Best Song:

They didn't get Best Picture, but "Everybody's Talkin'" wasn't written specifically for Midnight Cowboy, so Butch and Sundance were a shoo in for Best Song. This is another one that I remember being played by one of my wind-up toys when I was a child - it was a Fisher Price thing that was a bit like a radio - so in my head this is more like a nursery rhyme than a Bacharach and David classic. Anyway, here it is in it's original setting, with the lovely Mr Newman doing clever things with his bike!

What We Could/Should Have Been Watching:

Hello boys! See you again in few years' time....

I like Midnight Cowboy. Quite a lot, in fact. Objectively I can concede that it deserves its Oscar and that it was a good thing all round that it won it. However, one of my absolute favourite films of all time was nominated this year, so I have to be subjective!

Firstly, the other contenders - very serious and very highly acclaimed foreign language film "Z" (which won in its more specific category!), "Anne of the Thousand Days" (yet more lavish British history) and "Hello Dolly" (Babs again, fun but really not deserving of a nomination!) I would also have put "They Shoot Horses Don't They?" up there - I love that film!

However, it's all about the blue-eyed boys for me this year. Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid is a wonderful film and gets better with every watching (and there have been many!). Newman, Redford and director George Roy Hill got Best Picture a few years later for another brilliant film, but it almost feels like a consolation prize. Butch and Sundance are one of the best pairings ever in film - and it's a real shame that the two actors only did one more film together. I think they brought the best out of each other!

Our Verdict:

Classic buddy set up with a twist

 After declaring my love for Butch and Sundance in the previous paragraph, I went off and watched the thing again. Seeing it so soon after watching the film that stole its Oscar, I was surprised by quite how many parallels there are between the two films.

They are both about cowboys - but there's very little else in common there! What we do have is two "buddy" films where tough men allow themselves to show their love and tenderness for one another, right to the point of death. Midnight Cowboy does this in a really heart-wrenching way. Much has been written about the possible gay subtext in the film, but whether or not that is true and/or intentional is neither here nor there and a bit of a distraction from what we have got - two people struggling who need someone and find each other. The way that Buck and Rizzo start to realise how much they depend on each other and how much they care about each other is very well done indeed.

I don't think Tony Soper and Sue Ingle ever actually went
to Florida!

The other thing that BCATSK and MC have in common is the unusual filming techniques that tell the story. They both have musical sequences that slot in nicely and don't need words to tell the story (although MC's Florida sequence is slightly spoiled for Brits of a certain age who associate the music with "Wildtrack" - about as far from Florida sunshine as you can get!). They also both use black and white sequences in unusual ways to tell their stories - in Midnight Cowboy this is used sparingly and to great effect to try and get inside Buck's troubled mind. I can't think of any mainstream films that do this quite in the same way before this point - certainly nothing we've seen so far in this challenge.

Fleeting black and white arthouse-y goodness

While BCATSK uses these techniques for whimsy, Midnight Cowboy uses them to heighten the tension and deepen the dark storytelling. Objectively, this probably makes it the better film (at least in terms of winning the Oscar). In terms of themes this is the first really "grown up" film we've seen. We get sex, drugs and violence. We get openly gay (as well as closeted, and possibly closeted) characters who are there for drama, not just for laughs. We get a whole raft of morally dubious characters, several of whom we find ourselves rooting for (despite, ultimately, none of them really being likeable - although that doesn't seem to matter!)

Not all love stories follow the same format,
or even the same sort of love

This was the second time I'd seen this film. There were some parts of it I remembered very clearly, and quite a lot I had forgotten. I'm not sure I'm going to rush to see it again in a hurry, but I think it is a great film. There is a lot to be impressed with about it and there is a lot in the storytelling that is worth hearing. It was about time the Academy recognised something a bit different and a bit edgy - and also controversial. (After all, European films had been doing this sort of adult drama to great acclaim for several years now). But above all this is a story with heart - two characters showing what it means to love and care for someone. This is simultaneously the most and least conventional aspect of Midnight Cowboy and, for me, it is this that makes the whole film.

Oliver! 1968

The Film:
This is going to be our last musical for quite some time. It's a film I know pretty well and have seen several times over the years (including relatively recently). I've also seen a live production - with Neil Morrissey as a pretty impressive Fagin - and we followed the rise of Jodie Prenger (and Samantha Barks) in the Lloyd Webber "you could be Nancy" thing a few years back as well. So we're more than a little familiar with the music.

Having said this, Oliver! is not a particular favourite of mine and I know that there are a lot of things about it as a musical and as a film that just don't quite work. I think its probably the thigh-slapping cock-er-ney-ness of the whole thing, which grates on me a bit whenever it crops up on something. Ironically, that's probably one of the key things that the Academy found endearing!

Despite it having a big budget, a (patchy but) impressive cast and a top-end director, I don't really see it as being any higher in artistic merit or entertainment value than several other similar films of the era. But it was a big box office smash and an Oscar winner - and, I'm sure, it will still be a pleasant way to spend a Sunday afternoon!

The Ceremony:

There were a few changes to this ceremony from previous years. The date was similar - 14th April 1969 - but the venue changed to the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion where it then stayed for well over a decade. The evening was hosted by......no one! (for the first time since 1939).

There were a few interesting controversies that year. Firstly, the original Best Documentary winner (Young Americans) was disqualified a few weeks later when it was discovered to have had a limited release in 1967. It is the only film to date to have had its award revoked. (It was eventually given to a film called Journey Into Self - all about group therapy.)

Price Waterhouse got into trouble this year as well - though not quite to the extent they did over La-La-Land and, it turns out, probably unfairly. On the Tonight Show that night, which was recorded three hours before the ceremony, Johnny Carson and Buddy Hackett correctly "guessed" the Best Picture winner and Best Supporting Actor. People were fired over it, but it was later proven to be just a lucky guess - and broadcasters have been more careful about the way they predict such things since!

Other Notable Winners That Night:

Sparkly Babs!

It was a year for headlines and potential controversies! Best Actor went to Chris Robertson for "Charly" (a film based on "Flowers for Algernon" which is probably far too cringy for modern audiences in its portrayal of what was then still referred to as "mental retardation"). There was much mumbling about all the other nominees being far more deserving, with suggestions that aggressive and inappropriate marketing led to his win.

In the Best Actress category there was also an unusual result - a tie, between Barbra Streisand and Katharine Hepburn. Kate won for a second year running (as her dear departed Spencer had done previously) and for a record-breaking third time. But she had to share it with Babs. Unfortunately Kate didn't attend the ceremony so there are no photos of the two of them together - but it did mean that all the attention was on Babs and her very fashion-forward sparkly sheer trouser suit!

The other winner worthy of a mention is Stanley Kubrick - he got his only ever Oscar for Visual Effects for 2001:A Space Odyssey.

Best Song:

It could have been Chitty Chitty Bang Bang but, thankfully, it's not. This one is an absolute classic and a beautiful song - although it does always remind me of Hannah Gordon being blown away on Morecambe and Wise!

What We Could/Should Have Been Watching:

*insert inappropriate Fanny joke here*

I've never seen Rachel, Rachel or (shockingly) A Lion in Winter - so I can't really comment on them.
Zeffirelli's Romeo and Juliet was a bit of a big thing in its day but it already felt dated when I first watched it in the 1980s and we've since had Lurmann's version to compare it to as well.

That leaves us with another musical that I find overlong, overproduced and a bit underwhelming - but with some great moments, including one of my favourite over-the-top camp musical songs "Don't Rain On My Parade". I'm not a massive fan of Streisand but she is perfectly cast as Fanny Brice (last seen on this blog wiping the floor with everyone in The Great Ziegfeld!). So I'm sort of conceding that Oliver! probably deserved its win, with a runner-up prize for Funny Girl.

Many critics would say, in hindsight, that Stanley Kubrick deserved more than just Visual Effects for 2001: A Space Odyssey. (He was nominated for Best Director but not for Best Picture) I, however, am not one of those critics. I'm not a big fan of Kubrick and I find 2001 very difficult to like. I'll stick with the singing urchins....

Dubbing Alert:

The voice, but not the face, of Oliver

Mark Lester was (according to Carol Reed) visually perfect for the part of Oliver, and he could act the part convincingly as well. However, he would be the first to admit that he was definitely not a singer. (Apparently he was absolutely awful!)

However, this is still the sixties, so that was not a deal breaker. Aspiring actress Kathe Green happened to be the daughter of Music Director Johnny Green and happened to be on set at the time.

She had a go at dubbing for Oliver, trying specifically to sound like a small, sweet and frail little boy - and she manages to pull it off pretty well. And so, that sweet and tragic voice singing "Where Is Love?" is actually the voice of a twenty three year old woman!

(As for Kathe, she picked up a few more IMDb credits in her twenties and thirties, but she now seems to mainly spend her time turning up on different shows talking about dubbing for Oliver!)

Our Verdict:

No caption really required for this one.....

I'm not really sure what there is to say about watching Oliver! again - partly because I've seen it lots but don't love it, and partly because I've seen it fairly recently. I tried to look at it a bit differently this time - but I didn't really succeed!

I started off deliberately getting annoyed by the cute, sweet, wholesome cleanness of Oliver himself. And the posh voice he spoke in is not one he would ever have picked up in a workhouse 70 miles north of London (it would have been some sort of working class cockney/brummie hybrid!). He was frail and sickly, not cute and wide-eyed. (These things matter!)

The dark underbelly of London Town

But I know that's not the point and there are many things to give credit for in this film. Firstly, even though it's a family musical, it tackles some serious issues about crime, poverty and violence without sugar-coating them too much. By the time Oliver is in London most of the characters are morally dubious - including the ones we root for, like Nancy and Dodger. And even Fagin - he's a thoroughly nasty piece of work, a child abuser to at least some extent (quite how far that goes is open to interpretation, even in the film), and yet it actually is satisfying that they changed the ending for him from that of the book and (possibly) saved him from hanging.

Poor Jack Wild.....

A fair bit of that is down to Ron Moody who is by far the best thing in the film. He is superb in the role - playing for laughs only when appropriate, only showing Fagin's softer side when he really has to, and still allowing the character to be grotesque whilst keeping just enough of the audience's sympathy. His rendition of Reviewing The Situation is a masterclass in not just singing a song but acting every word of it - and it's probably my favourite part of the film.

Jack Wild as Dodger is the other stand out. The part he was born to play - and for which he was rightly nominated as Best Supporting Actor! (He struggled with life, as do many child stars - but apparently Ron Moody stayed in touch and became a strong support for him during difficult times.)

If you look closely you might spot Elaine Paige, Jason Donovan's
Dad and Gail off Coronation Street!

The other real strength of the film is the big, slickly choreographed street-dance (in a literal sense) scenes. There's Consider Yourself through the bustle of London Town (during which I get slightly distracted trying to spot a teenaged Elaine Paige and Gail off Corrie!) and then there's the clever staging of Who Will Buy taking over Bloomsbury Square (which actually still looks quite similar today, though much noisier and without milkmaids!)

In conclusion - Oliver! is by no means a bad film. It's actually rather good. It's just not a personal favourite of mine. It probably deserved its Oscar, particularly when you look at what it was up against. And it's the last musical we're going to be watching for several decades-worth of winners.....

In The Heat Of The Night 1967

The Film:

I've heard a fair bit about this film - I can quote its most famous line ("They call me *Mister* Tibbs) and I know it's a Sidney Poitier classic (and I used to think it was the one he won the Oscar for, but I know better now...). Other than that I am fairly ashamed to say I didn't really know very much else before I started to do a bit of research in the lead up to watching this.                                                                                                                                       It's quite a change from previous films this decade. So far every film we've watched (and the last two that are still to come!) has had at least one (and often two) of the following qualities - it's been set in contemporary New York, it's been a musical or it's been set in historical London. This one doesn't fit any of these categories. It's contemporary, but it's significantly set in Mississippi, with all the racial tensions that the setting implies.

Having read a bit more about it I'm really looking forward to it. It will be good to see Rod Steiger again, a decade on from On The Waterfront and I'm intrigued as to how far it will hold up more than 50 years on, when it is no longer a contemporary drama - will it hold up as a historical piece? And will it (sadly) still have things to say to a 21st century audience? And, above all, is it any good?

The Ceremony:

The ceremony was originally scheduled for 8th April 1968, but was postponed for two days following the assassination of Martin Luther King Jnr. (In less unusual news, it was at Santa Monica and Bob Hope was the host!)

Due to the marked decrease in the numbers of black and white films being put forward for consideration, from this year onward any awards that still had separate b&w/colour categories had these categories merged into one.

It was the first time that three different films were all up for the "Big Five" (picture, director, actor, actress, screenplay - so far only It Happened One Night had actually won all five). Although none of those three films - Bonnie and Clyde, The Graduate, Guess Who's Coming to Dinner - actually won Best Picture.

It is also the last time to date that a film has won Best Director and absolutely nothing else. The film in question was The Graduate. (I'm writing this on the night of the 90th Academy Awards - but I predict that this is extremely unlikely to change!)


Other Notable Winners That Night:

Finally!

I've already mentioned that Best Film and Best Director were split that night. Best Actor went (deservedly so in my opinion) to Rod Steiger. After eight unsuccessful nominations, Katharine Hepburn finally won her second Oscar, thirty four years after her first one. (She wouldn't have anywhere near as long to wait for her next one!)

The other most notable winner that evening was - finally! - Alfred Hitchcock, who was given the Irving G Thalberg award. Probably one of the most famous (and famously-snubbed) film-makers of all time, this was the only time he received any sort of Academy Award. It technically wasn't an "Oscar" but more accurately an "Irving" as you can see from the photo. I am sure Hitch had plenty that he wanted to say to the Academy, but instead he delivered one of the shortest acceptance speeches ever - "Thank you.....very much indeed!"


Best Song:

I don't get it. Doctor Dolittle is all very nice and everything, and "Talk To The Animals" works quite well in the context of the film - but it's just a little ditty that's speak-sung by Rex Harrison. (To be fair, I've never really got the cockerney Leslie Bricusse / Anthony Newley thing - except when David Bowie did it, that is....)

Other nominees included The Bare Necessities and The Look of Love. Just saying.....

What We Could/Should Have Been Watching:

Yes Ben, she's trying to seduce you...

With the possible exception of Doctor Dolittle (can you tell I'm not a fan?) the nominated pictures this year are all classics. And all a bit daring and edgy - a sign of a change in the style and subject matter of films that were being taken seriously by both the public and the industry. Any of Bonnie and Clyde, Guess Who's Coming to Dinner or The Graduate could have won it - and, in fact, the actual winner was the only one that I hadn't already seen. I'm ok with (and pleasantly surprised by) the Academy's choice - but I think my vote would have gone to The Graduate. It's clever, dark, dramatic and funny. It's got some great performances in it (including a very young Dustin Hoffman) and it's got a great soundtrack that is used really inventively. Oh, and William Daniels is in it (my favourite tv teacher and my favourite tv doctor) and that always a bonus in my book!

Our Verdict:

Expertly placed window.....

One of my first thoughts after watching this one is to wonder why I hadn't seen it before. Then to remind myself quite how long ago this film was made - right in the middle of the Civil Rights movement for one thing, and a fair few years before all the cop shows and movie franchises of the seventies and eighties (of which this is a superior prototype!).

My other main thought was about how good Rod Steiger was. It was interesting to note that a film which was basically about a Black cop struggling in a racist town won an Oscar for its White star, but not even a nomination for its Black star. Having seen the film, I get why. Sidney Poitier does exactly what he needs to do - basically, be Sidney Poitier. In other words, a smart, well-educated, well-spoken and dignified Black man. He does that really well, and (at that time at least) it needed to be him doing it, but it wasn't the biggest acting stretch of his career. Steiger, on the other hand, is just superb!

Body language is everything.....

A very significant slap!

The story itself is a good one - and very timely, given the reasons for the postponement of the ceremony this year. There is a murder in a small town in Mississippi and the local cops (who are clearly not really used to such things) go out "round up the usual suspects" as it were. Poitier is Tibbs, a homicide expert from New York who happens to be passing through, at the local station waiting for a train. He also happens to be Black - and so he is seen as suspicious and hauled to the Police Station as a suspect. The local chief Gillespie (Steiger) gradually realises who Tibbs is and what has happened - and the way he struggles to deal with this in the first twenty minutes or so after they meet is some of the best film acting I've seen. Steiger, with relatively few words, gives us a character who is basically decent, wants to do his job well, but also doesn't want to cause any fuss or stir up tensions - and is also a product of his upbringing in a racially segregated area.

Tibbs agrees (reluctantly) to stay on a few days and help with the investigation of the crime - despite the view of many around him that he probably won't survive the investigation, given who is involved and their views on Black people. Tibbs does his job, expects respect and - in most cases, particularly from Gillespie - eventually gets it.

Not quite a partnership - but a taste of things to come for
the buddy-cop genre!

If you take out the dramatic and social significance of the racial tension, the rest of the film is fairly standard cop drama stuff. It's done very well and, as far as we could work out, is probably the first of its kind. But there were many more that came after it (including a few sequels to this film, and a TV show). Among others, two decades later we had substituted Gillespie and Tibbs for Riggs and Murtaugh (and they are still going strong!). The soundtrack, the cinematography, the editing etc - all of these must have been something quite different to cinema-goers in the mid-60s. They became very familiar to TV viewers of the 70s and 80s.

It's not a perfect film by any means, and if we're looking at things on artistic merit then the Oscar should probably have gone somewhere else. But it is a good film, with social significance and an important story to tell (which it does without being preachy or mawkish) - and two great leads that elevate the whole thing beyond just the sum of its parts. I'm glad we gave ourselves a reason to watch it!

A Man For All Seasons 1966

The Film:

This is the first of a sub-group of Oscar winners that I know certain chunks of in far too much detail because they've been shown in my lessons. (The others in that group are Gandhi, Schindler's List and Million Dollar Baby!). I used to work at a school called Thomas More and our school motto was "God's Servant First" - so, naturally, this film was compulsory viewing.

I tried a bit of it on Year 8 last year when we were looking at British church history. Not having the Thomas More connection completely lost it for them. They couldn't get their heads round the double historical thing of a 1966 film set in the 1530s. They'd never heard of Orson Welles and just thought he was a silly fat man. And they found the whole thing slow and dated (and didn't like the background music....). I'm not sure if this is a damning indictment of the youth of today or if it just goes to show how filmmaking has changed in fifty years. But I didn't subject them to too much of it - once Henry had said his bit we went back to the textbooks!

I'm looking forward to seeing the rest of the film again, outside the context of the classroom. It's a story I know well (and have studied the nuances of) and we've also seen the play live, with Martin Shaw as Thomas. Can I watch this film as Filmfan-Kath or will it forever be associated too much with Teacher-Kath?

The Ceremony:

Fred Zinnemann adding to his Oscar haul

10th April 1967 at the Santa Monica Auditorium - and hosted again by Bob Hope.

In terms of nominations, it was all about two films - A Man For All Seasons and Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf (both of them filmed versions of successful stage dramas!). They were the only two films to also be nominated for Best Director - and Fred Zinnemann took both of them.

The broadcast of the ceremony was threatened with cancellation/postponement due to a Union strike which was settled with just three hours to go - which was just as well, or we may have been deprived of Mitzi Gaynor's finest hour (see below!)

Other Notable Winners That Night:

Liz Taylor (and some fabulous jewels). By this time
she was on husband number five, and Oscar number two

The two favourites scooped up eleven awards between them, with Paul Schofield taking Best Actor  and Elizabeth Taylor Best Actress - so, one a piece. Sandy Dennis took another for Virginia Woolf as Best Supporting Actress, with the other Supporting Award going to Walter Matthau for The Fortune Cookie (a Billy Wilder/Jack Lemmon comedy - it is a wonderful thing that such films exist!!)

The other notable winner that year, as far as I'm concerned is the Documentary Feature, which went to British film The War Game. The War Game is notorious (and brilliant) for a number of reasons. Firstly, it's not really a documentary - it's one of the first examples of what we now call a Docu-drama. It depicted, docu-style, the aftermath of a nuclear war. Secondly, it wasn't shown in the UK for nearly another 20 years, as it was banned by the BBC in 1965 shortly before it was due to be broadcast. It did, however, get a limited release in the US the following year - hence the Oscar. It was directed by Peter Watkins, who is about as arthouse as I get when I list Directors I really like. I spent far too long (in Andy's opinion) at the Tate Modern one afternoon a few years ago watching a Watkins installation that completely mesmerised me - and several decades earlier I had been similarly mesmerised (and freaked out) by his film Privilege when I caught it late on Channel 4 one night. I still find it slightly strange that Watkins has an Oscar - he probably does as well!

Best Song:

It's a classic - although I will always end up singing Fletch's version...."Born free, til somebody caught me".

It beat out two other absolute classics though - Alfie and Georgy Girl. Both of them would have got my vote over Born Free (even though Matt Munro does sound lovely). Actually, both of them were much better received when performed on the night. Although Cilla had the (slightly) more famous version of Alfie, Dionne Warwick sang her version at the ceremony. And although The Seekers version will always be the definitive Georgy Girl, Mitzi Gaynor's performance that night is the stuff of Oscars legend. So here it is in all its camp sunshiney glory!

What We Could/Should Have Been Watching:

Burton and Taylor at their finest

It was definitely a year for film versions of famous plays - three of the five in contention had been big on the stage first. The two that weren't were "The Russians are Coming, the Russians are Coming" and "The Sand Pebbles". The other two that were are "Alfie" and "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?" The latter was the favourite to win for a lot of people - and it still holds the distinction of being the only film ever to have been nominated in every category it was eligible for. The voters eventually went for English restraint over US emotion - but I think I'd have been happy either way.

Our Verdict:

Just a silly fat man in a red dress (apparently!)

I don't think I was quite in the mood for this when we actually watched it this time. Or maybe it was just that I was still all loved-up by our previous two musical films that this one fell a bit flat. But, my verdict this time has to be that it was, well, a bit flat.

There is no denying that this is a great film. I am very pleased that it exists (not just because it helped my planning when at Thomas More, Willenhall) and I'm very pleased that it got the recognition that it did. It's really well made and really well acted. I just wasn't feeling it this time.

Rumpole playing accuser rather than defender....

There are several people that cite it as one of their favourite films (including director Kevin Smith, so that's ok by me!) and the number of gushing 10/10 reviews on IMDb surprised me. But, again, pleasantly so.

The film is beautifully well shot, using the English landscape to its full advantage. It is really well acted - particularly Paul Schofield who is a wonderfully understated and measured Thomas More, Robert Shaw who is wonderfully over-the-top as Henry VIII and Wendy Hiller who makes the most of her role as Thomas' wife. The script is superb. Bolt doesn't change a great deal from his original play, and the set piece speeches are wonderfully written - the English language used masterfully in homage to More himself, who was an expert in its nuances!

Thomas, we're going to need a bigger religion! (I know,
I know - the line was said *to* Quint, not *by* him, but hey!)

However, I totally understand why my students didn't get it. Whichever way you look at it, it is still a play that takes a very specific (and legally technical) view on a specific aspect of British history. So much of what drives Thomas is to do with his particular view on a particular part of his faith - and he tackles it with a clever legal mind. As a Catholic RE teacher with a law degree, I think this is brilliant. I'm not sure how far others would agree? (Genuinely - I'm curious. My lawyer husband is also a Catholic who knows his history, so he's not got much of a different perspective on this!)

Behind every great man.....

Clearly the mid-sixties Academy loved it - or, at least, they loved it more than Burton and Taylor drinking and shouting in a similarly clever and verbose fashion. And hooray for that! It's still a great film - and, if nothing else, it's great for spotting some future stars in earlier roles (as well as the aging Welles in one of his later roles!). A very young John Hurt plots some dastardly things with Rumpole of the Bailey and a goblet that originally belonged to Mildred Roper - for Brits of a certain age that's a bit of a weird set up in itself!