Category Archives: 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die

Woodstock
Directed by Michael Wadleigh
1970/US
IMDb page
Repeat viewing/YouTube rental
One of 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die

We are stardust
We are golden
We are billion year old carbon
And we’ve got to get ourselves back to the Garden. (“Woodstock” by Joni Mitchell)

One part concert film, one part spectacle, and one part close looks at the hippies in the crowd — this documentary works on many levels.

I watched the almost four-hour director’s cut which includes about an additional hour, mostly of acts that did not appear in the documentary including Janis Joplin.  I would have happily watched something double the length.  These musicians (and others) were in their prime: Joplin, The Who, Santana, Crosby Stills & Nash, Sly & the Family Stone and Jimi Hendrix.

The film also captures the monumental feat the organizers carried out.  This thing attracted half-a-million people that swamped all kind of planning and turned the event into a free concert.  It became a small city, occupied solely by young people high on various substances, complete with soup kitchen and hospital.  And all this without any major violence or police presence.  Could we do this again?  We couldn’t even do it again in 1969.

The filmmaking is incredible.  There is liberal use of aerial shots, split screens, and all the bands have a different “feeling”.  I don’t think anyone could have done any better with the material.  Wadleigh was assisted by Martin Scorcese and his regular editor Thelma Schoonmker both in shooting and in the editing room   Most highly recommended.

Woodstock won the Academy Award for Best Documentary, Feature.

Easy Rider
Directed by Dennis Hopper
Written by Dennis Hopper, Peter Fonda, and Terry Southern
1969/US
IMDb page
First viewing/Amazon Instant
One of 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die

Billy: That’s what it’s all about, man, I mean, like, you know. You go for the big money, man, and you’re free! You dig?
Captain America: We blew it. Good night, man.

Somehow I waited this long to see this film.  It did not disappoint my expectations.

Wyatt – AKA Captain America (Peter Fonda) = and Billy are best buds and spend much of their time smoking buds as well.  They sell cocaine to Mexicans at a handsome profit. Their next goal is to reach New Orleans in time for the start of Mardi Gras the following week.  In a haze of good vibes and drugs, they drive though the beautiful Southwest.

Their fortunes turn sour when they reach the American South.  Red-necks have no love for drugged-out hippie long hairs.  Wyatt and Billy are forced to spend a night in jail.  There they meet George Hansen (Jack Nicholson) who is drying out from his latest drunk. George, a lawyer,  evidently comes from money and is treated with deference. Nonetheless, George is game for whatever is thrown at him and experiences a new world as the journey continues.

I have been following Jack Nicholson’s career since his appearance in The Cry Baby Killer (1958). The intervening years saw him act in many B genre pictures, lots of them produced and/or directed by Roger Corman.  He was a pleasant juvenile.  He is in this picture for seventeen minutes – during these he demonstrates an astonishing depth and star quality that are miles ahead of his previous work. One of the great breakout performances.

Other positives are Lazlo Kovac’s  gorgeous cinematography of desert vistas and the awesome soundtrack featuring the druggie hits of the era.   I’m not as enamored of the script.  Nonetheless, this was a seminal film of the era and earns its must-see status.

Easy Rider was nominated  by the Academy for Best Supporting Actor (Nicholson) and Best Writing, Story and Screenplay Based on Material Not Previously Published or Produced.

“Born to be Wild” begins at approx 1:25

The Color of Pomegranates (Sayat Nova)
Directed by Sergei Parajanov
Written by Sergei Parajanov based on poetry by Sayat Nova
1969/USSR
IMDb link
First viewing?/Criterion Channel

Poet in the cloister: My brain is all delusional; oh, may my enemy, too, be like in misery.

I never did discern a plot but I was inspired by 80 minutes of beautiful imagery washing over me.

Parajanov takes the folkloric elements of his Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors (1964) strips out the legends and creates a sort of minimalist surrealism that is hard to describe but enthralling to look at.  The director really let his mind run wild and we are the beneficiaries. Like all plotless movies should be, but are often not, this one is blessedly short..  Recommended.

Midnight Cowboy
Directed by John Schlesinger
Written by Waldo Salt from a novel by James Leo Herily
1969/US
IMDb link
Repeat viewing/Amazon Instant
One of 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die

 

Joe Buck: You know, Cass, that’s a funny thing you mentioning money – ’cause I was just about to ask you for some.

I have always loved this movie.  Somehow I came out of it exhilarated rather than depressed, making it a good Lockdown pick.

The movie’s protagonist is young, strong, handsome Joe Buck (Jon Voigt).  He starts off from a small Texas town.  We learn bits and pieces from his back story via various snippets in flashback.  Though not explicitly stated, it appears that his grandmother, who raised him, is the smothering type while at the same time being a “wicked woman” of some kind.  Joe may have also been accused of a gang rape of his sex partner “Crazy Annie”.  At any rate, his history has caused him to believe that he can make big money as a gigolo/male prostitute in New York City.

Things definitely do not go as planned.  A woman Joe picks up on the street (Sylvia Miles) expects Joe to pay her.  One of the first people Joe meets is scrounger/con artist Enrique “Ratso” Rizzo (Dustin Hoffman) who rips him off and sends him to service a religious fanatic (John McGiver) .  Joe discovers for himself that his main attraction is for the gay clientele cruising  42nd Street.  When he meets Ratso again they form an unlikely friendship.  I will stop there.  With Brenda Vacarro as a client.

This movie is certainly of its time.  I think its larger theme is the culture clash back when feelings were running high throughout the country.   It also works perfectly as a character story.  Its filmmaking style is a heady mixture of all things “new”.  Sometime Schleshinger goes overboard but more often he is right on.  There’s a fair amount of black comedy peppering the misery.

The performances of Voigt and Hoffman are a thing of wonder.  The music was the soundtrack of my youth. I’ve seen this several times over the years and it has gone from great, to dated, and back to great in my estimation. Highly Recommended.

Midnight Cowboy won Oscars in the categories of Best Picture; Best Director; and Best Writing, Screenplay Based on Material from Another Medium.  It was nominated in the categories of Best Actor (Voigt and Hoffman); Best Supporting Actress (Sylvia Miles); and Best Film Editing.  It was the only X-rated film to ever win the Best Picture Oscar.  The film now carries an R rating.

Kes
Directed by Ken Loach
Written by Barry Hines, Tony Garnett and Ken Loach from a novel by Hines
1969/UK
IMDb link
First viewing/Netflix rental
One of 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die

[box] My heart in hiding/ Stirred for a bird,—the achieve of, the mastery of the thing! – Gerard Manley Hopkins, “The Windover”[/box]

A fine film.  Nevertheless, a bit on the despairing side for Lockdown.

Billy is 15 years old.  He lives with his family in a working-class home in Yorkshire. Everyone speaks in a thick Yorkshire dialect.  His father is not in the picture, his mother works all day and goes out at night, and his older brother is a real bully.  Billy is slight in stature and dreamy in nature and is also bullied mercilessly at school by classmates and even teachers.

But Billy has a special gift with animals.  He spies fledglings in a kestrel nest and steals one he names “Kes” to train.  He steals a book on falconry and seems to be a natural at the sport.  Will this relationship with nature improve his situation in life?

The birder in me loved the scenes with Kes and David Bradley gave an outstanding  performance.  Films that feature intentional cruelty especially to children are a hard watch for me.  There is a lot of bullying to endure in this one.  Recommended if you can take the brutal with the poetic.

Kes

The Wild Bunch
Directed by Sam Peckinpah
Written by Walon Green, Sam Peckinpah, and Roy N. Sickner
1969/US
First viewing/Amazon Instant
One of 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die

[box] Pike Bishop: We’re not gonna get rid of anybody! We’re gonna stick together, just like it used to be! When you side with a man, you stay with him! And if you can’t do that, you’re like some animal, you’re finished! *We’re* finished! All of us![/box]

This bloody, violent Western holds out little hope for humanity.  Maybe not the thing for the disgusted during Lockdown.

The year is 1913.  The place is somewhere near the Mexican border.  Pike (William Holden) leads a gang of railroad and bank bandits.  The most prominent members of the gang are played by Ben Johnson, Warren Oates, Ernest Borgnine and an unrecognizable Edmund O’Brien who steals every scene he is in.  After a botched attempt to “do one last” job on a train, they take off for Mexico with Deke Thornton (Robert Ryan) and his gang of bounty hunters hot on their trail.  Their plan is to hijack a train carrying guns and ammunition and sell the loot to a corrupt revolutionary general’s army.

Pike and his men have nothing but trouble in Mexico.  Thornton is still after them and the Mexicans they deal with are drunken, whoring, sadists who can’t be trusted.

This movie is famous for its violence.  That it definitely has in spades.  I cannot stand the way Peckinpah shoots massacres in slow-motion.  I wasn’t a fan of the ethic stereotyping either.

Those niggles aside, it is clear why it was an “important” film for its time.  The action is beautifully choreographed.  The film also benefits from its superb cast.  Holden and Ryan showed they were still at the top of their game.  Once is enough for me but I’m glad it is on the List and that I have finally seen it.

The film is usually classified as in the “death of the Old West” category.  In many prior films this is symbolized by encroaching “civilization”- families, farms, churches etc.  In this one, the death of Holden and his gang is caused by corruption and debauchery.  The New West looks a lot worse than the Old West in this version.  I should have waited until after Lockdown.

The Wild Bunch was nominated for Academy Awards in the categories of Best Writing, Story and Screenplay Based on Material Not Previously Published or Produced and Best Music, Original Score