Conventional wisdom: the 70s were a Golden Age for American film; inspired by the Godards, Truffauts, Antonionis and Fellinis who came of age in the 60s, ignited by Vietnam and Watergate, the Easy Riders and Raging Bulls—Scorsese, Ashby, De Palma, Altman, Spielberg, et al—brought new sophistication and bite to American cinema. Nothing like it before, nothing like it since. The 30s had belonged to Lubitsch and the Marx Brothers, the 40s to film noir and Preston Sturges, the 50s to Rock Hudson and Doris Day, the 60s and the 80s were dead zones, the 90s were strictly indie, and the turn of the century saw the beginning of a great decline.
To test these stereotypes against my own experience, I crunched the numbers on my list of 400 favorite movies. By decade:
30s—16
40s—39
50s—50
60s—39
70s—49
80s—36
90s—52
00s—37
10s—3
Throwing out the 30s (I’ve seen far fewer movies from that decade) and the current decade (the jury’s out), there’s nothing significant about these figures. No Golden Age, no stereotypes, no decline, nothing to conclude, except…
…of my top 25 American favorites, eight fall in the 50s. People tend to dote on the movies (and music) they grew up on, and these movies usually look quaint to later generations. Jimmy Kimmel: “About nine things don’t look lame when you look back on them.” Given enough time, pretty much everything looks stodgy—styles of montage, acting styles, lighting styles, dialogue conventions, how long a shot can be held before it goes dead, etc. Today’s hyperkinetic action, fart jokes, and hair extensions will feel as quaint 20 years from now as the reaction shots, matte paintings, back-lot exteriors, and “trick photography” of yesteryear. Golden Ages come, Golden Ages go.
My top 25:
SWEET SMELL OF SUCCESS
THE LADY EVE
ROMAN HOLIDAY
THE BEST YEARS OF OUR LIVES
CHRISTMAS IN JULY
ALL ABOUT EVE
BARRY LYNDON
SHERMAN’S MARCH
PSYCHO (1960)
TO BE OR NOT TO BE (1942)
THE BAD AND THE BEAUTIFUL
THE LAST DETAIL
TAXI DRIVER
ALPHAVILLE
BADLANDS
THE LAST PICTURE SHOW
CONTEMPT
SINGIN’ IN THE RAIN
SOMETHING WILD
ON THE WATERFRONT
SABRINA (1954)
THE THING (1951)
THE SHOP AROUND THE CORNER
THE FOUNTAINHEAD
DOUBLE INDEMNITY