20 From 79: My Favorite Films Of 1979

     At the end of the 1970’s, the world of science fiction entertainment was raging with Star Wars. Not just the movies, but also with the merchandise which was making more money than it took to build a fully operational Death Star. As a result, film production companies from all over the motion picture industry were scrambling to ride the wave and come out with their own version of the large Lucas franchise. Disney tried their hand at creating a clone like space opera in the ill-fated The Black Hole box office bomb. Universal Pictures, which owned the rights to the Buck Rogers television show, decided to take their made-for-TV movie of Buck and Co. and put it out as a silver screen release in theaters instead. And obviously, the most successful attempt at this formula was Paramount Pictures, which made the decision to also try to revitalize their Star Trek small screen property into a big-time film franchise. Backed with the budget required to follow through saw the release that Trekkies had been dreaming of ever since the TV series was cancelled.    And for what it was, I did enjoy it.
  Maybe a part of it was because I was caught up in the types of space operas that Star Wars was making so red hot at the time, or maybe it was just because I could feel that I was in the middle in a new chapter that the world of cinema was going through, in which Hollywood was now taking all those TV shows who potential were limited by the television budgets and expanding them with the new special effects and wide screen dollars that allowed these concepts to boldly go where no man had ever gone before. But whatever the reason, Trek: The Movie was the kind of movie that made me feel excited to be sitting in the dark with a bunch of fellow film fans and enjoy the adventures that were unfolding before us on the screen.
 Besides, this was the motion picture that did eventually lead up to the Wrath of Khan, The Voyage Home (my personal favorite of the entire franchise) and, of course, the awesome 2009 "reboot". All of which demonstrated that the franchise of Capt. Kirk and crew now had a new future ahead of them, one in which would allow them to truly live long and prosper.

       Look, I’m not gonna lie here, for a movie that is called Mad Max, I really expected this story to be a lot more violent and way more action packed than it was. I was rather surprised to see how much more tame it was than I expected, even by late 70's standards. The other thing that was unexpected for me when I finally got around to watching this was how very little dystopia there was in this dystopian world. I mean, I know that it takes place in an small obscure part of Australia, and from my point of view, there’s nothing wrong with that, but there doesn’t seem to be much of a reason for the story of Max to take in the future. Especially when you really can’t tell visually that it’s the future other than the flashy design of the police vehicles (and even those designs look like they can pass off today instead of some time frame that is flinging far ahead from now). Don’t get me wrong, I realize that this is a small, almost indie film that was most likely limited by a budget that was small even by Aussie standards, but based on the premise of the movie, the question still arises “Did this Mad Max vehicle really need to take place in the future?”. What makes it even more of a head scartcher is that it's an element to the film that makes the sequel look and feel like it's a totally different cinematic universe.
 All that said, at the same time, this is, in the end, the flick that introduced the character who would eventually become one of the most bad-ass personas to ever race across on the big screen. And it is the story that provides a look into what it was that "drove" the "Road Warrior" during his "pre-post apocalyptic" days.



 So, even though, on its own, it is still a solid dystopian story about the not so far flung future, I don't even have to go into further detail as far as describing this Mad Max, other than to just to give it major props for being the first chapter in the saga of one my favorite cinematic characters ever.

  When I was going through that life-defining period that we share at one point or another known as adolescence, there two very spicy things that I loved to consume regularly.... meatballs and Saturday Night Live. 
  Whether they're on appetizer sticks, in a sandwich, on top of spaghetti or in the form of a movie, I really do like me some meatballs.
 As far as SNL, the very first two seasons are and always will be my favorite. And as this movie makes pretty obvious, my favorite Not Ready For Primetime Player was Bill Murray. Therefore, knowing that this movie was going to be his big screen debut, I was really looking forward it. And after my initial viewing, I knew instantly that I liked me some Meatballs.
  Now back during this time, which was the late 70's and early 80's, summer camp was a very popular theme with teenage-targeted flicks. And TBH, even when I was sophomore, I normally found this particular brand of humor as just plain sophomoric. But, directed by Ivan Reitman and starring Mr. Murray, Meatballs, despite its theme, didn't go down the low road that we were used to seeing from this kind of comedy.
 The story itself was pretty lightweight, but with his laid-back approach to both his humor and his acting, Bill added the kind of poundage that was needed to make me smile that same kind of smirky smile that he himself always seem to carry on his face, whether he was doing a skit, a movie role or simply conducting an interview.

The story of the Black Stallion does quite an exceptional job of elevating the story a young lad and his beastie BFF above the level of dated “cornball” that audiences were accustomed to seeing from any such type of production from Disney Studios at the time. The story here manages to combine intelligent yet simplistic storytelling with exceptional cinematography, along with great performances (particularly by the two little humans who headline this cast, Kelly Reno and Mickey Rooney.... although the horse ain't none too bad either....) to do an excellent job of establishing and delving into that rare kind of relationship between man and animal. In the tradition of Ol' Yeller and National Velvet, The Black Stallion is an enchanting (that’s a descriptive word that used to scare me when used in conjunction with any piece of cinema that was labeled “for the whole family”) tale that shows that family friendly pet movies, if handled sincerely and artistically, still have the ability to become classics without becoming cringeyly corny.

 Ah, yes, the justice system. Is there anything that we rely on more to help put things in order, to help make sense of why we exist, to help make sure that everything we do is right and good and keeps bad people from gettin' away with it? And yet, isn't the justice system one of the most flawed, heck, oft-times even the most corrupt institutions that we have set in place within our society?
  Yeah, as much as we've all evolved as humans, one look at the justice system, in any country anywhere, and it almost always shines as a blaring example of just much further we all still hafta go.
 But the truth of it is, the hard truth, is that it is the best that we've got. 
Both sides of the ruling of what the justice system is and what it represents is no better demonstrated than in the fiction that we write about it. Particularly (and fortunately, for the purposes of this list) what we write about it in the movies. 
 It always takes a certain amount of intellectual acumen and wit, not to mention some moral aptitude, in order to be able to present an effective court drama. One that teaches the viewer something, makes him/her think, but above all, holds onto their attention by providing some degree of entertainment value. 
 There have quite a decent amount of films that have done this, but for this entry, the one that is the focus in this discussion is "...And Justice For All". And aptly titled movie considering not just the genre of the movie but also the overall subject about the system. Written by Barry Levinson and his then wife, Valerie Curtain, the script was nominated for Best Original Screenplay at the Academy Awards for that year, which I guess means that it was pretty good. Me personally, I'm no expert, but I liked the way it covered the concepts that it did, and the way that it juggled so many characters and their situations, every one of which was seemed to be a representation of flawed everyone involved in the system can be (even a judge), and why rising above our own flaws is the only hope we can have in making sure that courtroom proceedings of all kinds work to the advantage of the justice that it is built to obtain. The actors in this cast are the typical usual suspects that we expect to see in well-written melodrama of the period, with each one providing the kind of personal investment required for their respective roles. Al Pacino, in particular, demonstrates why we was the fiery rising star at the time by delivering a final scene that will become one of the famous movie quotes of all time, and demonstrating signs of his over-the-top type of yelling acting that will become his tried-and-true signature during the latter half of his career.

  Back in the mid 70s, when Steve Martin first broke out into the comedy scene, I gotta say that, honestly, unless he was on SNL doing some sort of skit, I didn’t find them to be particularly funny. His style of comedy back then seemed to be aimed at the more the unintellectual fraternity boys who were on campus more to party than they were for any kind of scholastic reasons. I know that sounds more contradictory to the long career that he has been able to establish since then, but if you look at those early films that he starred in (some of which she even wrote), there is not really all that much that is funny there other than a guy who is willing to "go out there" in order to make people laugh. In short, he seemed to be a poor man’s Jim Carrey, but without all the wit, or just plain straight up humor, that Jim was able to convey via his physically elastic talent.

  Obviously, this is my way of saying that I didn’t like much of his early cinema work, which does include this movie, The Jerk. But alas, my change of heart sort of evolved since back when this movie was first released in theaters and I don’t know if it’s because of some sort of sense of nostalgia or because the mellowing that comes with age, but slowly and surely, Steve as a Jerk began to grow on me. The crass humor that I shunned before now seems very lightweight compared to the edge that today’s comedies which tend to proudly display a badge of cringe as a methos to evoke laffs from their audiences. Martin's reputation as the nice guy in his later movies, particularly as the anarchistic, father in such films as Parenthood, Cheaper by the Dozen, and of course, Father of the Bride, have given him a genuine likability that has accumulated over the years and in my eyes at least, made me look at his younger self through a much softer lens. Therefore, when I see him here as The Jerk, I realize that the word that is the basis of the title of this movie, is defined more from its old-skool definition of a dumb guy who doesn’t know any better compared to the more modern translation, which is usually more towards someone who goes out of his way to be not a very nice person.

That doesn’t mean that this movie has gotten to the point now where it’s for everybody, especially since no comedies really are, but it is worth giving a looksee to see if any of Steve’s arrow through the head approach to comedy will be enough to make you react with indifference or react as one wild and crazy guy.

  In some parallel world close to this one, the streets and subways of New York City are besieged by hundreds of members from various, themed-based street gangs. With turf battles abounding, the biggest gang of 'em all calls for a summit to arrange a city-wide truce so that the gangs can take over the island of Manhattan. But the weapons free gathering is interrupted by a lone gunshot and as the resulting chaos ensues, the group known as the Warriors are wrongly fingered for the hit. Now, in order to make it back "home" these Warriors must transverse through various enemy turfs, packin' nothing but a bounty on their respective heads.
"Can you dig itttt...!!??"

It's the status quo vs the status I-don't-know as a bicycle race becomes the coming-of-age vehicle for a group of local boys (known as Cutters) in a match-up against the more future-assured college kids.
Can the working-class sons of Bloomington Indiana, stuck in a "quarry" of adolescence, take advantage of this opportunity to finally break away?



  Breaking Away was a movie that had gained quite an amount of fame at the time of its release for the wit and smarts with which it was writ. It took me several years before I finally got around to actually see it based on its reputation as a nice smart little movie. And I think its rep is one that remains true, despite that maybe the passage of time and the advent of popular scriptwriters such as David Mamet has overtaken the sharpness of this movie's dialogue, but only by a nose. It well worth taking the time to watch Breaking Away today and appreciate it's lightweight candor into the psyche of a small Midwest town as it comes to grips with the changing mindset and attitudes that American society is still growing into. It has a combination of a well-drawn cast (including a breakthrough role for Dennis Quaid) and a quick narrative that allows the film to shine with enough of an intelligence and of a down-to-earth homey feeling that's makes it an above satisfactory watch for the even the more discernible modern-day viewer.
 For me, BA is an excellent example of film of its time trying to break away (yeah, I'm using that metaphor yet again!) from the reigns of the classic formula for drama that that headed the era of "New Hollwood" and was now racing into the more insightful, deeper delving approach of the upcoming 80's cinema that was just ahead, beyond the ribbon that is the finish line.

  Before there was Tom Hanks as Forrest Gump, there was Peter Sellers as Chance the Gardener (hey, I just noticed as I was typing this, both those names are somewhat plant-based...). 
 As the 70's decade was winding down, Sellers' career seemed to be lying face down in quite the rut. Almost exactly twenty years earlier he had broken out of a popular radio comedy troupe and into a slew of award-winning films, such as Lolita and the very first installment of the Pink Panther franchise (which was so popular, it even spawned a popular cartoon series featuring an animated anthropomorphic panther whose original intention was just to be a title mascot).
It was career that was going strong and eventually peaked with one of Stanley Kubrick's most well-known work, Dr. Strangelove. To this day, it is considered one of the best films ever made and many attribute Peter's ability to successfully portray three different roles in it as one of the major reasons why. 
It was after this that Sellers began his downward spiral with not only his career, but also with his personal life (and as anyone who knows about it, it was a mess). 
  It seemed as though the only roles that were allowing him any kind of success were the Pink Panther films, and the truth was, even the color that was the basis of those comedies had already begun to fade. But as the saying goes, sometimes, "desperate times lead to desperate measures. And for Peter, that was him taking a "chance" on a role that would either bomb big or win big. Luckily for the multi-character actor, it won big for him. So much so that he even scored an Oscar for his part as a simple-minded gardener who had never wandered outside his employer's townhouse property. In the story of this film, when the employer of a socially inept and slight minded gardener named Cjance dies, he begins a Forrest Gump style journey into a world, where his actions, which are guided by his unusually limited intelligence, get mistranslated by many who meet him. Eventually, this all results in Chance's irregular behavior getting him national attention and soon, he is regarded by the media driven public as some kind of uber-intellectual and spiritual guru. 
  Now, of course. at this point of the. description, it becomes pretty obvious that Being There is, from top to bottom, filled with some form or another of metaphorical message (oh, and now that I think about it, the title of this film points in that direction also). And while that may turn some people off, the truth is, if you're going to do a movie like this one, that has a layered hidden meaning throughout the entirety of it, the good news is that that meaning is not too far off from the surface. The metaphorical imaging in this plot isn't too abstract so that the audience isn't constantly questioning what the heck it all means., but also, it's not so obvious that it doesn't cause one to think a little bit. 
  In other words. and I know this is based more on my opinion than critical fact, but this is a story that is quite a satisfactory watch, particularly if instead of leaving it at the door, you're the kind of person that doesn't mind watching a movie with your brain also being there.

  When I was in the first grade of elementary school, my parents got divorced. As a result, for a short time, my mom moved me and my siblings in with her sister, my aunt, and her family. This family consisted of one brother and three sisters. This brother was my older cousin and because he only had sisters, when my family moved in with his, he took me under his wing as the younger brother he never had. Because of this, he let me continually hang out with him and his friends who were also his age, and therefore also older than me. This was a circle of buddies who the only thing that they enjoyed more than going to watch a movie at a theater was sneaking in to watch a movie in a theater. And they continually let me hang with them whenever they did this. One of the after-effects of this was that I developed a much more mature taste for films than most kids who were my age at the time. So unlike many kids who were also in their first year of elementary school, I wasn’t a big fan of children’s programming such as Sesame Street. When it came to things like cartoons or puppet shows, I much preferred watching things with a little bit more of a bite to 'em. For example, why most little tykes my age were watching Disney cartoons on the Mickey Mouse Club, I was much more into Warner Brothers and their Bugs Bunny universe (which was well known as being aimed more at adult audiences than it was to more kiddy viewers). And when it came to Muppets, the only time I had any interest in watching them was when they were on The Muppet Show and not on Sesame Street. I’m not sure how dated that show feels like today, but back when I first watched the very first episode, just a few minutes into it, I quickly recognized that it had a much more sly sense of humor than probably even most adults wouldn’t have caught. Needless to say, by the time The Muppet Movie came out, I was pretty happy to hear that my favorite felt friends were transversing from the little screen to the big screen. 

   Norma Ray is the movie that began the road for Sally Field wherein she finally realized that movie fans liked her, they really, really liked her.  
  And to be honest, it's kind of surprising that it took her that long for her to realize that many people have always liked her. I mean from the get-go. Sally's career began with her being a very likeable teen actor. Her down to earth quality permeated through her pretty looks, her bubbly personality and even though her onscreen talent. It was the combination of those three aspects of her that made TV viewers love as a beach combing surfer chick in Gidget, and then, as the wild and wacky nun who could fly in The Flying Nun (and in case the slight chance that there is there is a young person out there reading this, yes, there was once a series about a nun who fly back in the 1960's... look it up). And it was a niceness that has never left her. All one has to do is look up any interview with on YouTube, and it's becomes quite evident almost instantly what a natural born sweetheart this Mz. Field truly is.
  So, what does all this about her likeability have to do with Norma Rae? Well, I think that her affable personality is what sold this movie, to make it the success that it was. Despite being a very high quality drama, the themes that mae up the story are pretty simple. Blue collar workers have rights, trying to blalance work and family, and the wwoman's role in both the house at the factory. This is the kind of stuff that is dependent on the natural tone of the script and the acting talent of its cast. And these are the two aspects of Sallly Field that drive Norma Rae. We believe her both as a person who has very little vision of her role as in the houshold and in her role as a plant manager in the industrial cotton mill. Two things that most women in the country during that period of time had very little exerience in the 70's decade now that dust had settled from the aftershocks of the world-altering of the 1960's.  
  Here, through Sally's heart in hand performance, we see a woman trying to make sense of two positions in life that she was nowhere near prepared for. Norma has to juggle the job of caring for her kids and her third marriage along with maintaining a job that banks on treating its workers with only the skimmest of human rights. It may be the kind of stuff that awards shows eat up, but it only nets any results if they can get someone at the top of the bill to make it all believeable. And since this type of story has always been a gamble at the box office oofice, that is a trait that must also resonate with movie goers. 
  Luckily, for Norma Rae and her legacy, Sally Field manages to pull this off, in spades, and finally show the world that after a start as a bubbly waif-sized servant of God with her head literally in the clouds, she now has enough weight to be able to stand in the middle of all of her fellow workers, whether in they be fictional factory workers or as "reel-life" thespian collegaues, and make 'em all finally take notice. 

  Back in 1982, the government of the United Kingdom passed a law that abolished what was known as the borstal system. A borstal was a kind of youth detention center that was commonly used in throughout Great Britain, with the offenders that made these detentions centers being under the age of 21.  So basically, it was a prison for teens, or what we would refer to here in the United States as "juvies". 
 Therefore, if one were to come upon a movie that used a borstal as its centerpiece, chances are pretty good that just liked many other prison themed films, one of the aims of the story would be to depict the kind of corruption and cruelty that occurred within the walls of these institutions of reform behavior.  That's has always been a popular formula that filmmakers always liked to inject into motion pictures that featured their primary characters who were serving their time in lock up. To ask the question of which is more evil, the criminals who committed crimes and as a result, landed themselves in such a setting, or the political machinations of the crew who ran the facilities for their own self-serving and dark purposes. It was the inmates versus the staff in a constant struggle between crooks and the crooked staff.
  Well, if that's what you want in your prison flix, you shan't be dissatisfied with Scum.  This is a in-depth view into just how the borstal system functioned with all of the key players and parts both being wounded beyond what the original intentions of the inventors of such institutions planned for.
  Up to the time of its release, Scum was one of the grittiest, realist and bloodiest depictions of a system that was broken from deep within. These breaks began somewhere in between the mindsets of the archaic wardens and guards who were responsible of maintaining order and discipline, to the stilted operations that were created to treat the inhouse delinquents as wretched throwaways who worth were nothing short of mangy mongrels.



  A very young Ray Winstone (and when I say young, I mean so young that I can barely recognize him as Ray Winstone) stars as teen delinquent who has been sentenced into a borstal and who uses his abilities as a repeat offender to rise to the top of the pecking order of the inmates. However, despite whatever "power" he gains while in the inside, it becomes quite apparent that, whether it be through the eyes of his fellow offenders, the warden, the guards or even through the eyes of the system itself, it is all hopelessly flawed to the point that he will not be to escape the fact that, ultimately, he is just "scum".

  So, now, after covering a prison movie about teenage scum from across the pond, we movie to a prison movie about adult dregs from across the bay.
  After cementing his status an outlaw of the Ol' West in a buncha westerns both in the spaghetti and straight up genres, and then establishing himself as the outlaw police detective within the police system in a bunch of "dirty" cop movies,
the old Clintster tries his hand at being an outlaw among outlaws within the traditional escapist confines of prison movie. Here in Escape from Alcatraz, as the film title heavily implies, he portrays what appears to have been the very first successful (allegedly) escapee from that most infamous of infamous island prisons, the big rock known as Alcatraz.
  To be honest, the role of Frank Morris, one of few men to ever escape Alcatraz, wasn't much of a stretch for Clint, who really just seems to be playing himself. Or at least, the typical tough guy of few words. But the performance serves its purpose of providing the plot a center figure for the audience to root for as the formation and actual enaction are carried out. Rounding out the solid cast are Fred Ward, who once tried his hand as Remo Williams, Patrick McGoohan, famous for playing a prisoner of a different sort, and finally, some droopy face character actor who I remember from an episode of Seinfeld, where he played "another Kramer".
You guys know which actor who I'm talking about...?

Yeah, yeah....
that guy.



BTW, for any of you who didn't pick up on the metaphor,
that pic is also a play on words for the title of this movie.

  Seriously though, after so many years of old skool Hollywood cranking out one romance film after another, whether they were rom-coms or just straight-up love stories, that eventually, a backlash began to build up among certain filmmakers, which culminated to the "New Hollywood" of "anti-romance" films that dominated the 1970's. Films like Scenes From a Marriage, An Unmarried Woman, and A Woman Under the Influence, focused more on those factors that broke up a romance rather than those that brung them together. Even one particular movie, Annie Hall, which is still regarded as a classic in the romantic comedy genre, since it covered the subject from such an "intellectual" standpoint, it was a demonstration of how the reality of human flaws makes the concept of "happily ever after" such a fictional concepted that lives more onscreen than in real life. 
  So, it is only fitting that by the time we reach the final year of the 70's, we have a film like Kramer Vs. Kramer. A departure of the romance in its burgeoning stages, it's a story that begins with the disintegration of one instead. Driven by a maturely penned script, and the heavyweight thespian talents of Dustin Hoffman and Meryl Streep, KvK takes a deep dive in the struggles of a family that must cope with the dissolution of what the world of entertainment used to tell us was the foundation of what made the world go round. Not exactly the escapists type of fare that fueled "matters of the heart" movies, but it was one that long overdue. 
  Movie goers would now get to see that admitting that a marriage was over was not a lonely instance. Couples from all over were learning this the hard way. But now with the Kramers, they would be able realize that this was a scenario that many modern households had to deal with and that they were not alone. Initially, when it was released, the battle of the two K's may have not been an easy watch, but upon a little marinating, it became obvious, that it definitely was a welcomed one.

  Woody Allen and Diane Keaton. Martin Scorsese and Robert De Niro. Robert Altman and Shelley Duvall. Alfred Hitchcock and Jimmy Stewart. Quentin Tarantino, and Samuel Jackson. John Huston and Humphrey Bogart.  Like I said, normally, I hate remakes, but let me be even more honest right now … I don't even like watching remakes that are generally considered good. Because, even if they're good, they're still not as great as the original. I was always of the belief of why should I settle for watching something "good" when I can watch something "great" instead? So, by that line of logic, I’d rather choose watching the original.
 All that said, I’m sure it’s pretty easy to see where I’m going now….
 Obviously, since Nosferatu the Vampyre is on this list, it’s one of the rare few that are the exception to the rule. I don’t necessarily regard it as being better than the silent version, who's full title was actually Nosferatu: A Symphony of Horror (which, when you think about it, is an ironic title, considering that it is a silent film). But the long title is not the only difference between that one and this one. Naturally, this modern take is a ”talkie”. But also, NtV does not change the name of the corpuscle consuming Count from Dracula to Orlok. Here, the fanged fiend retains the name that was given to him by its literary creator, Bram Stoker.
Directed by the stylishly cinematic talents of German-born auteur Werner Herzog, it's no wonder that the updated Nos pays homage to the original quite faithfully, yet with just enough distinction to stand on its own. Kinski brings his typical energetic and emoting savoir faire to the role of Dracula and ends up with a portrayal that displays Ol’ Drac as a sad creature (I think those in the thespian field call it “pathos”), who truly looks upon at his curse as a curse, even when he dines on the life fluid of a doomed damsel with the same level that is reached in an orgasm.

   The talents of the two continually clashing titans here allow Nosferatu the Vampyre to take a few strides away from being just a typical retread, despite being practically the same story as the silent version.  Along with the visually rich production that takes advantage of its jump into the more varied areas of the spectrum, it’s a brand-new visual treat of highbrow horror that comes just a natural result of Herzog's direction. More than an updated copy, more than a homage, this is a retelling of the legend of Count Dracula that flows successfully with the blood that is of a different color.

  Okay, before we start, the China Syndrome is a fictional scenario described by scientists which explains how, should a nuclear reactor have a meltdown, the radioactive components could actually meltdown through the ground and "burrow" it's way as far down as the center of the Earth (although, on a metaphorically level, it could cut all the way through until reaches the other side of the planet, which, symbolically, is supposed to be China). 
That is an explanation of the wording of the phrase for those not in the know, and it's meant to convey just how dangerous and catastrophic such an even would be. And what emphasizes even more, is that this is a possibility that would occur strictly out of the human error of a human construct. Which would make such a grand tragedy even more tragic on an even grander scale.
There are all sorts of points of discussion that would need to be covered in a conversation about this form of manmade energy source with an almost unlimited shelf life, and all the kinds of prices that would be paid for its utilization, but this 1979 nuclear thriller covers the most basic and most obvious of 'em all.
      A thriller that relies on conventional yet effective storytelling and on the concept of making the viewer decide which is more scarier:
the idea a nuclear reactor meltdown that can result in the China Syndrome or
the fact that the big corporate mindset is willing to do anything in order to hide from the public the truth that such a cataclysmic scenario is indeed a very real possibility.



A compelling "almost disaster" flick that tackles the issue of commercialism vs. environmental/international safety, topped off with the acting heavyweight trio of Jane Fonda, Michael Douglas and Mr. Jack Lemmon.

   From the earliest days of civilization, up until just before World War I, armies were a great way for countries to keep those males with a warrior mentality busy. And back then, there were a lot of these types of guys. However, as the civilized world evolved, and wars became much more “regulated” (especially with rise of nuclear weapons), the need for those with the mindset of a warrior became much more diminished. That didn’t mean that those type of men went away, just that the necessity of their way of being wasn’t in as much in demand. As a result, those men who felt like they were born to engage in physical battle had a difficult time finding their place in this world that continually kept trying to give peace a chance. The story of the Great Santini is an example of one of those type of men.
In "reality", the Great Santini is named Wilbur "Bull" Meechum, with the Santini nicknamed being something that he inherited from his father. In a slight bit of coincidence, the second Santini is portrayed by Robert Duvall, who also played a similar single-minded machismo type of character (albeit one within a war and therefore, with a "purpose") in another "great" piece of cinematic drama called Apocalypse Now. However, unlike in that movie, his non-distaste for the smell of napalm in the morning is one that he never really gets to experience, along with any kind of combat experience that he yearns for more than even for the emotional stability of his own family. It seemed as though the entirety of the 70's decade was filled to the brim with how war, particularly, the still freshly finished Vietnam War, impacted the hearts, minds, bodies and even souls of those who engage in it and lived (even barely) to ""talk"" about it. Therefore, it seems fitting that in the final year of the decade, the world of cinema finishes with two distinctively different films which, deep within their similarly themed cores, demonstrate the ultimate scars of those who lived through it, and those who wished that they did.
   Which may sort of have presented the question: which is worse... dying in action or dying from inaction when one is dying for some kind of action?
Yeah, it's probably a weird take from me on the happenstance of The Great Santini when compared to Apocalypse Now, but it is an interesting observation when realizing that this the kind of stuff that such deep emotionally delving films can spring into mind when they are positioned to bookend the final year of that ten year cycle which was filled with introspection and self-analysis of why men thrive on the imagined "nobility" of battle, even when the cause itself isn't as noble . 

   While this movie couldn't match the spontaneous quality of its predecessor, back when this came out, it was still rare for a sequel to reach the level of both box-office and financial success that this one did. The romance between the Rock nd Adrian flows wonderfully into its next level as two people trying to form a unity based on each other's distinct personalities. Carl Withers is not forgotten as Apollo Creed as this installment enters deeper into the life of the champ who's titleship comes into question. And even Mickey manages to surprise us by revealing some of the heart that seemed hopelessly buried beneath his years-long thick crust of curmudgeon hide.
  It may not appear to be one at face value, but Rocky ll is somewhat of an anomaly when it comes to being a sequel. And when I say that I don’t mean it in any kind of a negative light. Because as a follow up to the first film, the plot in Rocky's 2nd. crack at the world belt does succeed exceedingly well as coming off like an natural extension of the story that had begun in the first film rather than just as a sequel out to cash in on the success of that initial effort. And for me, that’s a big part of what makes it come off as an anomaly. Because despite it feeling as an extension, Rocky ll is a film that follows all the typical formulas that is expected from a sequel, particularly one of its time. I mean, basically, the structure here is pretty much the same one that we saw in the first installment of the series, right down to boxing match that ends the story and acts as the climax of the film in the exact same manner as it did in its predecessor. And therefore, based on the way that we usually see in sequels that follow this formula structure, it really should not have been as good as it was. Because in the way that the typical dynamics of cinema operated at this time, most sequels that followed the same pattern as its successor, almost tended to be just a shadow of its first film.
  But why the sports aspect of the story is just a repeat of what we saw before, the dramatic sections of the story are more of a continuation of the relationship of its lead characters, Rocky and his girlfriend Adrian.

   Ridley Scott directs a tale of "in-your-face" first contact, followed by a fatal game of hide and seek between a interstellar search party crew and a xenomorph, just one of what will turn out in following sequels to be a hive-race of double-mouthed acid-blooded slick black visitors who take the role of their hosts quite literally.
Never have the film genres of horror and science fiction been so perfectly blended as in this stylish, dark and damp first entry into the franchise which first introduced what is, in my opinion, one of the most unique and simply bad-@ss alien life-forms ever produced for film.

   Sometimes, a few of these favorite films by year lists tend to get a little crowded at the top, particularly when it comes to the number one and number two positions. This list is one of those lists. Because let me tell you, this first Alien movie, which would unknowingly have ended up being one of the biggest science fiction cinema franchises ever, really should have been my favorite film of 1979. I remember being in my first year in high school when it came out, and one day, after the last bell rang, me and my best friend at that time decided to take in a weekday matinee. We had heard about this movie and were very intrigued by the trailer (which was, and still is, one of the most intriguing trailers ever) and decided to give it a looksee, even though we weren’t expecting much. Mostly because, by this point in time, the end of the 1970s, the only really good science fiction movies that were being made for the big screen were coming from a guy named Spielberg or Lucas. Me and my BF I didn’t have the slightest clue who this Scott fella was.

  But boy, let me tell you, when we walked out of the theater that day, we were stunned. George Lucas showed us that an alien themed movies could be epic and fun. Steven Spielberg showed us that an alien themed movie could be fuzzy and warm. Now Ridley Scott had shown us that an alien themed movie could be scary as hell. Not to mention, pretty gross at times. But in a good way

 Alien turned out to a perfect blend of sci-fi and horror, fueled by a very smart script, not in just the way that the players of the story spoke to and interacted with each other, but also in the manner that the science and dynamics of this new extraterrestrial life form that was introduced. This was a claustrophobic tale of trapped terror that was set out in the infinity vastness of cold outer space, a combo that really enhanced the tension filled trepidation that filled up so much this movie's running time. 
  Any other year, this could've very easily made it as my number one film of the year. But, as much as I like the first Alien movie, as it turns out, what I like just a little bit more, is the smell of napalm in the morning......

        After all the problems that he went through during the making the very first Godfather movie, you would’ve thought that, with the film’s massive success along with its new label as quite possibly the greatest movie ever made, director Francis Ford Coppola would have had an easier time with any other movie projects that He followed up with after that.  However, as we all know by now, the nightmare that became the production process with Apocalypse Now has become legendary. So troubled was the production of Apocalypse that a documentary of its making has become almost as critically acclaimed as the movie itself. That documentary is called Hearts of Darkness: A Filmmaker's Apocalypse. Started by his wife, Eleanor and then finished and edited by Frances himself, it is not only a great companion piece to this film, but a also a great work of cinema in its own right (definitely worth it's own watch).
  The irony of Apocalypse Now is that, at the time of its release, even though it was pretty well received overall, the biggest criticism that was directed towards it was it's rather anti-climatic point about the whole Vietnam War, particularly considering how a vast amount of the movie's running time was spent on a journey down a river, which left most viewers with an acute sense of anticipation of how it would all end. Personally. I didn't share in this point of view. I was of the impression that the conclusion of this story was not meant to be the film's emphasis, it was the journey itself. In the same way that the process of making this "major" motion picture was filled with trials and tribulations from start to finish, the plot point of several men slowing moving down the river and the wild surreal and even maddening events that they experience along that river ride, IMO, was quite an accurate and very effective metaphor of what was going on with the particular war, especially at that particular time.