List of Crap #115: Top 50 Movies of the 70s Countdown!

[Edward J Grug III]

Guys, I've cut the Popeye conversation out of the thread and moved it to its own thread where everyone else can safely ignore it as they were very politely doing thus far

[Cyrusso]

Dirty Harry ended up on my list. It's a very good, if very bittersweet movie in a lot of ways. Considering what the killer in the movie did, he should have gotten life in prison, miranda or not.

[Edward J Grug III]

I rewatched Dirty Harry for the first time in 15 years right after the list started, so too late to vote for it. However, it's still tremendous.

Are any of the sequels worth a look? I'm pretty sure I've not seen any of them.

[George-2.0]

I rewatched Dirty Harry for the first time in 15 years right after the list started, so too late to vote for it. However, it's still tremendous.

Are any of the sequels worth a look? I'm pretty sure I've not seen any of them.

In my opinion Magnum Force is the only other one worth a darn, though it's a step down. The series gets increasingly outlandish as it goes and loses sight of what made the original so good.

Edit: In regards to your comment in the western LoC... you should know that rape is the driving plot thread in Sudden Impact.

[Edward J Grug III]

I rewatched Dirty Harry for the first time in 15 years right after the list started, so too late to vote for it. However, it's still tremendous.

Are any of the sequels worth a look? I'm pretty sure I've not seen any of them.

In my opinion Magnum Force is the only other one worth a darn, though it's a step down. The series gets increasingly outlandish as it goes and loses sight of what made the original so good.

Edit: In regards to your comment in the western LoC... you should know that rape is the driving plot thread in Sudden Impact.

Thanks! I'll check out Magnum Force if I get the chance and leave it at that.

[Johnny Unusual]

#16

57 Points, 4 Lists, #3 Cole Stratton

I'm here to cooperate with ya a hundred percent. A hundred percent. I'll be just right down the line with ya, you watch. 'Cause I think we ought to get to the bottom of R. P. McMurphy.

Year 1975

What's it about?

Repeat offender Randle Murphy thinks he can avoid doing hard labour by pleading insanity and going to a mental instituion.  While there, he meets and befriends many of the other patients and runs afoul Nurse Ratched, who intimidates her patients in order to keep everyone in line.  Nurse Ratched soon sees Murphy as a trouble maker and soon begins to put harsher rules into place while Murphy tries to give them confidence after he realizes many of them are self-commited and could leave whenever they feel they are ready.  Ratched and Murphy's war of wills over the patients begins to heat up and ends in a way none of them could have predicted.

What's it REALLY about?
The idea that natural impulses are often treated as mental illnesses and questioning what that is.  Also, even though the intention may have been otherwise, Nurse Ratched treats the patients more like prisoners rather than victims of their own problems.  It is also a movie about freedom and conformity.  Though Murphy is treated largely as the better option (though he was arrested for a statutory rape), both he and Ratched are extremes what they represent, with Murphy trying to give freedom and drive to these people and Ratched trying to get them to conform for... her own sense of self-satisfaction?  Because she genuinely thinks it makes them healthier?  Because she wants them in her rather than out there?  I think her motives make for some interesting discussion.

Legacy
The film was one of the few films to win the Oscars "Big Five" (actor, actress, director, screenplay and pciture) and is considered a classic.

Trivia
Many extras were authentic mental patients.

Johnny's Thoughts
I saw this one years ago and I loved it.  After listening to a podcast called Unspooled where a critic (Amy Nicholson) and a comedian (Paul Scheer of NTSF:SD:SUV: analyzed it and made me want to check it out again.

[F-Zero]

Maybe but right now I'm pretty sure I know what movie is going to be #1.

Your abundance of faith disturbs me?

[CJones]

I've also never see GodFather part 2. I hate Gangster movies and I hate Al Pacino. Saw part 1 mostly for Marlon Brando.

One Flew Over the Cuck-Cucoo's Nest holds a special place in Hell for me. Because I've been in a Psych Ward. It was a nightmare. The only good thing about that experience was meeting the other "inmates", people as messed up as (if not moreso) than me, that I could actually relate to. For years I swore I would remember their names, but I no longer can. Just their faces  ...and their deaths.

[F-Zero]

Nurse Ratched is way too intense for me to enjoy this movie. Give that actress credit, I hate her every time I see her. Of course it helps having been incarcerated in a mental hospital. It was not amusing. "Only someone who wasn't from the street would think it was something to glorify" - Pops, CB4

[F-Zero]

I've also never see GodFather part 2. I hate Gangster movies and I hate Al Pacino. Saw part 1 mostly for Marlon Brando.

One Flew Over the Cuck-Cucoo's Nest holds a special place in Hell for me. Because I've been in a Psych Ward. It was a nightmare. The only good thing about that experience was meeting the other "inmates", people as messed up as (if not moreso) than me, that I could actually relate to. For years I swore I would remember their names, but I no longer can. Just their faces  ...and their deaths.

My man. That's almost a coke jinx. It warned me someone posted on the topic and I ignored it thinking what are the odds.

[MartyS (Gromit)]

I've never seen One Flew Over the Cuck-Cucoo's Nest, I've had the DVD for ages but just never got around to watching it.

[Edward J Grug III]

One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest is excellent but wasn't on my list.

[Johnny Unusual]

#15

59 Points, 5 Lists, #7 Johnny Unusual

You stop this fight, I'll kill ya'!

Year 1976

What's it about?

Rocky Balboa has been given a chance like no other.  An aspiring boxer who uses his strength as a muscle man for a loan shark, Rocky has been told with his opponent unable to compete, heavyweight boxing champion Apollo Creed needs someone to fight.  Rocky has some raw talent but he needs serious training to face the world champ, including help from his estranged trainer.  Rocky also begins a relationship with Adrian, a pet store employee with an emotional abusive brother.  Seeing regret and failure all around him and Rocky doesn't know if he can win... but maybe he can fight without regrets.

What's it REALLY about?
It's an underdog story, but its also about a man from a community were failure is just part of life and when he reaches a point where he wants to stop accepting less and doing the hard work it takes to change his life.  And a lot of that is also doing it with people he cares about and how they can push each other to be better (although even a slightly better Paulie is still pretty shitty, amiright?)

Legacy
One of the greatest sports films which spawned a long-lasting and increasingly cartoonish franchise (not necessarily a bad thing) with an all time classic character.  The steps to the Philadelphia Museum of Art are often called the Rocky steps after appearing in the film .  They even made a statue of that scene, originally placed at the top of the steps for Rocky III, though since then it was moved (but is still nearby the Museum)

Trivia
After producers Irwin Winkler and Robert Chartoff became interested in the script, they offered Sylvester Stallone an unprecedented 350,000 dollars for the rights, but he refused to sell unless they agreed to allow him to star in the film (this despite the fact that he had only 106 dollars in the bank, no car and was trying to sell his dog because he couldn't afford to feed it). They agreed, but only on the condition that Stallone continue to work as a writer without a fee, and that he work as an actor for scale. After Winkler and Chartoff purchased the film, they took it to United Artists, who envisioned a budget of two million dollars, but that was on the basis of using an established star (they particularly wanted Robert Redford, Ryan O'Neal, Burt Reynolds or James Caan). United Artists didn't want Stallone to star, and when Winkler and Chartoff told them that the only way they could get him to sell the screenplay was to agree to cast him, United Artists cut the budget to one million dollars, and had Chartoff and Winkler sign agreements that if the film went over budget, they would be personally liable. The final cost of the film was 1.1 million dollars. The 0.1 million dollars came after Chartoff and Winkler mortgaged their houses, so as to complete the project.

Johnny's Thoughts
I think with the increasingly overblown (not always in a bad way) sequels, its easy to forget how humble this film really is.  There's a melancholy air around it that the other films often touched on but have only been able to replicate in small doses, which makes the finale all the more inspiring and touching to see how far Rocky could really go.

[F-Zero]

None of these awesome movies could be made today. A toast to the 70s.

[Johnny Unusual]

#14

64 Points, 6 Lists, #9 Darth Geek

The suspense is terrible... I hope it'll last.

Year 1971

What's it about?

Charlie Bucket is a boy from an impoverished family who has just done the impossible: won a Golden Ticket to the legendary chocolate factory owned by the great confectioner and chocolatier, Willy Wonka.  Legendary not only because of the quality of the product but also how mysterious it all is:  no one leaves, no one enters and the only thing that comes out is delicious chocolate.  But now Charlie is one of five children who will take a tour and take home a life's supply of chocolate.  What Charlie doesn't expect is that the factory is more wondrous and stranger than anyone could possibly imagined.

What's it REALLY about?
Some children should be taken to a chocolate factory to be tortured.

Legacy
Initially, the film had mixed reviews and low box office returns but time has been kind to it and it is regarded as a children's classic.  The song "Pure Imagination" is beloved number and some of the scenes are so freaky, they are engraved in the minds of young viewers... forever!

Trivia
The reactions of the actors and actresses in some scenes are spontaneous. For example, when the children first enter the Chocolate Room and see the candy gardens, their reactions are real, it was really their first view of that particular set.

Johnny's Thoughts
I don't have the love of this film a lot of people do but Gene Wilder is brilliant as the mercurial and strange candy man and Pure Imagination is a great scene.  Plus, I always admire films that want to scare children.  WE SAW A CHICKEN'S HEAD CUT OFF!  WHY DID YOU THINK WE NEEDED THAT?!