Since last week I alluded to the subtle references to sexuality in films like It Happened One Night, I thought this week it would be only appropriate to discuss the sexual revolution brought about by what is known as the American New Wave. With the coming of New Hollywood, the proverbial beds were pushed together and the “walls of Jericho” were blown to smithereens.
Prior to last night’s class, I must admit, I was a Graduate “virgin.” Dustin Hoffman’s nervous, insecure demeanor in his performance as Benjamin Braddock was a fitting representation of the time period. Hollywood was just breaking into the realities of sex, testing the waters and seeing what would appeal to viewers. Audiences at that time were craving more – more shock, more entertainment, more realism, and more of a human connection – for their money. Hoffman’s character was “a little worried about his future,” just as the film industry was a little worried about theirs. And, in both cases, drastic steps had to be taken.
Perusing a list of quintessential “New Hollywood” films, it doesn’t take long to notice that many of them were focused very specifically, and sometimes exclusively, on sex. Two years after The Graduate (1967), with its brief glimpses of Anne Bancroft’s nude body and that exceedingly uncomfortable scene in the strip club, the limits were pushed yet farther with Midnight Cowboy (1969), again starring Dustin Hoffman, this time as John Voight’s unlikely pimp. Midnight Cowboy was originally given an “X” rating, but that was changed to an “R” in 1971. Also in ’69, the movie Bob & Carol & Ted Alice (sort of a precursor to The Big Chill [1983]) broached the topic of swinging and partner swapping. The movie poster for this film was, once again, a reflection of the times. “Consider the possibilities,” read the tagline. That could have been the motto for the American New Wave.
The Last Picture Show (1971), shot in black and white, was Cybill Shepherd’s film debut, and included both male and female full frontal nudity. Even more impressed on my memory than this, though, is the sound of the bed-springs creaking during one of the more awkward sex scenes. Because of the context of the scene, that sound was like nails on a chalk board. This was not the glamorized on-screen lovemaking as we are so accustomed to today. Instead, Peter Bogdanavich gives the viewer a taste of the real ineptness and physical pain of a first-time sexual encounter.
Two films released in 1971, Stanley Kubrick’s A Clockwork Orange and Sam Peckinpah’s Straw Dogs (again starring Dustin Hoffman), contained very graphic and controversial rape scenes. The following year, Deliverance (1972) was released with its now famous male rape scene.
Since this era of thematic experimentation, the waves seem to have calmed a bit. While we still see the occasional controversial film hit the big screen, as in Kubrick’s Eyes Wide Shut [1999] or Ang Lee’s Brokeback Mountain [2005], audiences are not as easily shocked, and it would seem that, at this point, the envelope could not be pushed much farther without deteriorating into pornography.
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| Bridging a 34-year gap, Larry McMurtry wrote the screenplay for both The Last Picture Show and Brokeback Mountain. |
wow Jessie i really like this blog. great job. i like how you really understood the sexual revaluation in film. i also never seen the graduate before that class and was a little shocked myself.i wonder is bring so much sex to film was a good thing?
ReplyDeleteI like the reference to "The Wall of Jericho" coming down with reference to the sexual revolution. I have also noticed that beauty and sensuality were traded in for somewhat raunchy and sexual. I also loved the correlation between what Benjamin was going through about an unknown future and using that reference for the unknown future of Hollywood - nice touch. Very nice examples of movies, very representative of the times and well researched. Another movie with an intense rape scene from the 70's would have to be Wes Craven's 'The Last House on the Left' which was toned down for the remake. It does seem like some of these scenes will never be reproduced because again it seem we as a nation are expecting more tasteful images again. Maybe almost like an un-evolving of all that experimentation that was done back in later 60's and 70's.
ReplyDeleteYeah it seems as though sex will never be as accepted on film as it was in the 60s and 70s. For example, I don't see another X-rated film about male prostitution winning Best Picture anytime soon. It's strange how we've almost seem to gone backwards in the way of social acceptance of sex, and it's even stranger how violence in film has become more socially accepted than sex in film, even though the latter is much more common in everyday life. We've become so afraid of sex, that a parent is more likely to allow their child to see someone getting shot in the face than a naked breast. The world we live in is a crazy one.
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