Life is hard – movies are better

I coined this phrase at the outset of last year’s Cinema 74 article and I like it; Ima use it more often.

And here we are at the start of another year – another year of life, love, ups, downs and the constant presence of film to make things easier. And it’s another year I will spend looking back 50 years and trying to watch as many movies as I can from 1975. Looking through the list I’ve compiled, I see there is much cause for excitement as there are some great titles for me to get to for the first time. Others are unfamiliar to me and I love that often I will know nothing about the film and go strictly by title, star and/or director. Last year I’m sad to have not gotten to The Gambler, The Phantom of the Paradise and The Sugarland Express but I’m at least happy I still have those worlds to conquer.

1975 was the year of One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest and the story of the making of the film deserves its own post. In 1962, Kirk Douglas bought the rights to Ken Kesey’s recently published book about life in a mental institution, outbidding young Jack Nicholson. Kirk hired Czech Milǒs Forman to direct and sent him a copy of the book – but the political situation in that part of the world was so dire that Forman was under surveillance and the book was intercepted and Forman couldn’t leave home. Kirk tried for years to get the film made until his son, Michael, convinced him to let him produce the film. Director Forman had finally made it to New York (the Chelsea Hotel) some ten years later and now it was Douglas the Younger who sent the Czech the novel, Forman not even realizing this had been the property he was hired by Kirk to direct years before. Through Michael and Milǒs, the story acquired its rebellious and revolutionary tone; Micheal compared it to his generation’s student activism and Forman considered Nurse Ratched to be the Communists in his country that had tried to rule his life. Thirteen years and two Douglases later, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest became one of the greatest films of all-time and it swept the Academy Awards, becoming the second after Capra’s It Happened One Night in 1934 to win the five major Oscars – Best Picture, Actor, Actress, Director and Screenplay. Its kinda too bad I’ve already seen it as it would be great to discover this one for the first time again.

Other Oscars were awarded to George Burns for The Sunshine Boys, Lee Grant for Shampoo and John Williams for Jaws. Annie won her Golden Globe for Tommy, Fred Astaire earned a BAFTA Award for The Towering Inferno and the English also gave Pacino a Best Actor statue for both The Godfather Part II and Dog Day Afternoon. Interesting to see that Brenda Vaccaro won the Golden Globe for Best Supporting Actress for Once is Not Enough, a film that is on my list for this year. Brenda plays Al Pacino’s wife, Mary Alice Schwarz, in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood though all you see is the back of her head.

In terms of box office gross, Spielberg invented the summer blockbuster and Jaws topped the list earning some $133 million in domestic rentals – consider that Cuckoo’s Nest came in second with a “mere” $59 million, making the shark movie’s numbers all the more staggering. Last year I mentioned that Mel Brooks films interest me not one iota and from 1975 I see that there is another popular movie I may never watch – The Rocky Horror Picture Show came in third 50 years ago followed by Shampoo, Dog Day Afternoon and next came the return of Sellers as Clouseau in The Return of the Pink Panther which marked the reemergence of the franchise and brought it into the Seventies with its broad comedy as opposed to the swank style of the original film. The four films rounding out the top ten are two on my list, one I will never watch and one I never heard of. Can’t wait to watch Three Days of the Condor (#7) and Tommy (#10), can’t stand Babs and so won’t watch Funny Girl (#8) and never knew of the existence of The Other Side of the Mountain (#9), a film in the tradition of Love Story.

Here’s some of the films that I’m looking forward to first-time viewing during Cinema 75 this year. In something of an embrace of the 21st century, I have gone from writing out my list on a piece of foolscap and keeping it handy throughout the year to making a fancy spreadsheet for this year’s film fest. I have scouted early where I can watch these films because that is always an adventure. Netflix? Not a chance. Some I have found on Tubi and even some on YouTube. The others will require my pirate site of choice. Yarrr, matey. I’ll be tracking my progress so watch for dispatches. Let’s get this party started!

• Mr. Ricco – should have seen this Dino flick before; may have to buy it
• The Yakuza – neo-noir with Mitchum
• Aloha, Bobby and Rose – one of the two “other” Paul LeMat movies
• The Wind and the Lion – out of respect for Milius
• Posse – western directed by Kirk Douglas
• Once is Not Enough – Jacqueline Susann’s other filmed book
• The Drowning Pool – Newman returns as Harper
• Mandingo – was sent out of the room as a child
• Mitchell – Joe Don Baker as a savage detective
• Three Days of the Condor – long overdue; Sundance never looked better
• A Boy and His Dog – Don Johnson, set in 2024, directed by L.Q. Jones!
• Mackintosh and T.J. – final film of Roy Rogers
• The Killer Elite – Cann, Duvall, Peckinpah
• Aaron Loves Angela – Black Romeo & Juliet