The Godfather 1972

The Film:

Ok. We've made it to the big one. Considered by some to be the greatest film ever made and certainly a strong contender for the best Best Picture winner ever. This film (and its first sequel - which we will return to) is quite extraordinary in its success, influence, enduring appeal and the way it has become woven into modern culture through both "pop references" and more significant cultural references, even today nearly 50 years on.

I've seen The Godfather about half a dozen times before - although I didn't see it for the first time until I was well into my 20s (which was probably a good thing). If someone asks me what my favourite films are, this tends to be one of the ones I mention. It gets better every time I watch it and it deserves every bit of (non-violent) hype it gets.

I took Andy to see it (for the first time) at the cinema when it was on at our local independent a few years back. (He loved it too!) I think this makes it the first of our winners that I've actually seen at the cinema - it's also the last of our winners to have been released before I was born (twenty-five days before I was born, to be precise!). I'm looking forward to seeing it again.

The Ceremony:

Not Marlon Brando

March 27th 1973 at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion. Hosted by Carol Burnett, Michael Caine, Charlton Heston and Rock Hudson (quite an interesting line up!)

The ceremony will be remembered mainly for one person, who didn't actually win an Oscar, or even accept one on someone else's behalf. Marlon Brando refused his Best Actor Oscar (to be fair, he already had one!) and sent Native American Sacheen Littlefeather along to refuse it on his behalf. He sent her along to draw attention to that year's incident at Wounded Knee and as a protest at the negative portrayal of Native Americans in Hollywood movies. Her speech received a mixed reaction from the crowd, but I think Brando made his point.



Other Notable Winners That Night:

Twiddle-dee-dee-dee-dee - two Oscars!

The big winner that night was not The Godfather (which won three - Picture, Actor, Screenplay) but Cabaret which won eight of the ten Oscars it was nominated for, including Best Director for Bob Fosse and Actress and Supporting Actor for its stars Liza Minnelli and Joel Gray. It is still stands as the film that won the most Oscars without winning Best Picture. It is still controversial to some that Joel Grey beat Caan, Duvall and Pacino to his award - but Grey's Emcee is one of my favourite supporting performances ever so I'm more than happy to take sides against the family on this one! 

With eleven awards being snatched up by the two big contenders, that doesn't leave much for anyone else. However, honourable mention needs to go to Charlie Chaplin again. A year after winning his big Honorary Award, he finally won a competitive award for the score of Limelight, which was eligible because it got its first cinema release in LA that year. Possibly winning on a nostalgic technicality, but a nice win nonetheless.

Best Song:

There's a weird thing that appears to have happened on both occasions where The Godfather has won Best Picture. Disaster movies were a big thing in the 70s and so , it would appear, were the theme songs from them, which took Oscars on the same years as The Godfather did. This one is from the Poseidon Adventure, featuring Maureen McGovern as the lounge singer on board the ship that's about to go down. Guess what happens next time we see Maureen McGovern! (Hint - I wouldn't recommend hiring her for an event, it doesn't seem to end well....)

What We Could/Should Have Been Watching:

Money!

It was always a two horse race for the big prize (if you'll excuse the mention of horses in a post about The Godfather!). The Godfather did NOT win Best Director - that went to Bob Fosse for Cabaret, which won in every category it was nominated in, except Best Picture and Screenplay. That's five Oscars more than its rival. There are many other years in which it would have taken the main prize and it also happens to be one of my favourites (although I do still think that The Godfather is the better film!)

We've been very lucky to have seen some great stage productions of Cabaret, particularly one performed in Berlin which (as well as being superb in itself) added all sorts of layers just because of where we were. Andy is less keen on the film than I am - but the staging of the scenes set in the Kit Kat Club are simultaneously joyous, disturbing, vicious and poignant. Bob, Liza and Joel all deserved their awards and - as we now know - Francis will be back again in a couple of years.

Our Verdict:

Proud (God)father and his three sons!

I'm not really sure what to write for this one. There's very little to be said that hasn't already been said somewhere. So maybe I should just say it again. I LOVE THIS FILM. There is no real reason for me to love it in terms of genre (not generally my sort of thing) stars (none that I would say are favourites) or director (sorry Francis, you're a bit hit and miss). However, this is a practically perfect piece of filmmaking in all of the ways I love film. 

The real star of the show

Firstly, this is a character study that manages to study several characters and their interactions, motivations, reactions, emotions etc so cleverly, subtly and (most importantly) interestingly. For me, this story is all about Michael - particularly when you watch the whole trilogy, but also when you just take this film on its own. The line "just when I thought I was out, they pull me back in" doesn't come until Part 3 - but so much of what leads up to it is here in the first one. It shows on his face rather than in anything he says. If anyone could have taken the Oscar from Joel Grey, for my money it would have been Pacino.

The storytelling throughout the film is also brilliant. It isn't too wordy, but it also doesn't rely too much on set pieces action scenes. It blends the two beautifully to tell an evenly paced and sometimes complicated story in a way that sucks you in from the start and keeps you hooked right to the end. The opening scene of Connie's wedding starts things off as they mean to go on. You get to know the family - by being shown them and being told about them (by Michael to Kay) and you get an emotional feel for them as well by joining them at a happy and (usually) typical family occasion. I checked the timer at the end of the wedding and we were already twenty five minutes in. It didn't feel like it - but it made me want to watch more (even when I knew exactly what was coming next)

The point of no return.....

This is a film about very unpleasant, dangerous and violent criminals - and yet I'm sort of on their side, without ever feeling that I need to condone their actions. I'm on Sonny's side when he beats up Connie's husband, I want the Corleones to get one over on the other families - and the only reason that I don't want Michael to find that gun behind the toilet is because it's the point of no return for him, not because I don't want him to kill those b*****ds.

What else is there to mention? The film looks good. The cinematography is great and the colour palette is so effective, particularly in the contrast when Michael goes to Sicily. The acting is superb by pretty much everyone - I would argue, controversially, that Brando is one of the weakest of a very strong bunch. The ending is satisfying if you want to let the film stand on its own, but also works very well as the lead in to a sequel.

Those pesky oranges

There are lots of things about this film that now sound like cliches when you hear them - offers you can't refuse, sleeping with the fishes, taking sides against the family, leaving guns and taking cannolis, freaking out when you see an orange - and various references to horses heads. However, they all still work in the context of a film that, despite being 46 years old, has aged very well indeed. I'm not sure I can quite say the same for myself, but 1972 was a very good year!

The French Connection 1971

The Film:

I'm pretty sure I've seen this one before, quite some time ago. I definitely remember the car chase, but I'm not sure about much else - so I'm looking forward to seeing it (again). I used to get it muddled in my head with Chinatown (which is a couple of years later and a very different film) so maybe I don't really know what I'm about to watch.

I do know that this film won out in two very strong categories (Film and Director). Following on from Midnight Cowboy a few years earlier, it has a very modern, "gritty" style and subject matter and is another example (along with In The Heat of the Night, Midnight Cowboy and the Godfather films that are on their way) of a Best Picture winning film that represents a new and different way of doing things. Welcome to the 70s!

The Ceremony:

This all happened a week before I was born - on 10th April 1972 - so everything after this point is within my lifetime.

It was at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion again, with only four hosts this time - Helen Hayes, Alan King, Sammy Davis Jnr and Jack Lemmon.

The ceremony was notable for being one of the last public appearances of Betty Grable who was suffering from cancer and died the following year.

Nothing else really special to report, except for a certain award given to a certain film pioneer (see below!)

Other Notable Winners That Night:

And about time too!

Best Actor went to Gene Hackman, and Best Actress to Jane Fonda, winning her first Oscar for Klute. Both the supporting awards went to performances from The Best Picture Show (Ben Johnson and Cloris Leachman). The fact that all these are for morally complicated characters in morally complicated films definitely sets down a marker for the 1970s!

The biggest and most popular award of the night by far went to Mr Charles Chaplin who won a long overdue honorary award for his contribution to film-making (he got one in 1929, but with very little fuss or fanfare, and it wasn't a statuette!). Most of his best films and greatest innovations happened before the Awards began (which is a shame - The Kid should have swept the board for starters, except there wasn't a board to sweep!) so he had to wait until his 70s to get his own statuette. He received a twelve minute standing ovation, which is still (and probably will remain) the longest in Oscars history.

I love Chaplin films. He has a strong claim to have invented (at least in Hollywood terms) both Romcoms and the sort of Social Commentary/Political Satire that we still have today. Some of his best films are nearly a century old now and still work for contemporary audiences in both these genres. Hooray for Chaplin!

Best Song:

This year it's all about cool cops strutting around New York. And this is one of the coolest songs ever to win an Oscar! Isaac Hayes may have had a bigger UK Chart hit with his Chocolate Salty Balls several decades later, but this is his finest moment:

What We Could/Should Have Been Watching:

Come to think of it, I don't recall Maestro Pembridge ever
conducting Beethoven's Ninth!

It's a pretty strong category this year - including Nicholas and Alexandra (historical dramas about royalty were on their way out though), Fiddler on the Roof (as were muscials).

I think The French Connection was a deserved winner, but two others could have equally been seen as strong winners. The Last Picture Show is a very good film that has stood the test of time and is in the US National Film Registry (as is The French Connection). However, I'm going to go against my usual instincts and give honourable mention to a Kubrick film for once - A Clockwork Orange is very good, which is probably why it is so problematic, so much so that I'm a bit surprised that it was nominated. It got significantly edited for US release (I'm guessing that was the version that got nominated). It ultimately got banned (by Kubrick himself) in the UK after copycat violence and became one of those films (like The Exorcist) that was a must see for students in the 90s. The Exorcist could be seen in "members clubs" in the 90s (ie. in the SU as long as you paid £1 to join Film Soc) - Clockwork Orange was only available crammed into the room of someone who was cool enough to have an illegal copy. Amazing how times have changed......

Our Verdict:

Good cop, bad cop - all in one!

I enjoyed this film far more than I thought I would. Firstly I was worried that it was going to be an early example of something that has now become formulaic - it is that, but it's such a good example that it stands nicely as the original with everything else (to a greater or lesser extent) an inferior copy. There are several scenes which, by the late 70s / early 80s, had been imitated regularly on the sort of cop shows the US was churning out for Saturday night viewing. But the mastercopies are here and they are brilliant!

Chat et souris - le souris gagne!

Secondly, I was bothered that it was going to be difficult to watch because, given the characters and subject matter, it would have become dated. I was worried mainly about casual racism, sexism, homophobia etc. Some of that was there, but it was so well bound up in the characterisation and scene-setting - particularly in the first twenty minutes or so - that it just about justified its existence.

Thirdly, this sort of cop drama, car chase sort of thing really isn't my sort of film. I wouldn't have chosen to watch it, had it not been on this list, or at least been something which was highly praised by critics. I needn't have worried - I really enjoyed it, and I agree with the critics that it is a very good film indeed.

About as 1971 as any movie scene ever gets!

I generally prefer my films to be character-led with great storylines that develop those characters (hence my love of Wilder, Capra and Mankiewicz!). This doesn't really have any of that. Apart from Hackman's Popeye Doyle, we don't really see into any of the characters at all - and even with Doyle it's snapshots of the various (sometimes very morally dubious) motivations he has as a cop, rather than anything more substantial. We don't even really have that much of a complicated or clever plot. There's some drugs coming in from France, Doyle and Russo are trying to find them. That's basically it! (I know, I'm simplifying things, but not by much)

Russo and Doyle - like an American Carter and Regan

What I liked most about The French Connection were the surveillance and/or chase scenes, of which there were several, all expertly shot and paced. I read somewhere that this film is basically just people watching and chasing other people - and you're never entirely sure if anyone really gets caught (except the ones that get a bullet!). That's probably a fair summary - but its done so well. The scene where the top baddie ("Frog One") is being followed on and off (and on again) a subway train by Doyle is brilliant. And the famous car chase scene, where the car is chasing the train that is travelling above it, is also fantastic - even though the posters weirdly reveal the end of that sequence! It's not too much of a spoiler to reveal that everything comes to a head in an abandoned (and very wet) warehouse, but the ending is wonderfully ambiguous and yet still weirdly satisfying. As an example of the genre, The French Connection is a masterclass - and it still holds up nearly 50 years later.

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.....