I’ve realised I have a real thing for movies from this era. I enjoyed The Graduate as well as Mary Poppins (which I just watched for the first time), The Love Bug, Breakfast at Tiffany’s, The Children’s Hour, To Kill a Mockingbird… and I got to thinking, there’s really something so special about films I’ve seen from that era. A certain nostalgia that feels comfortable (despite me never having known the 60s), a certain daring that’s impactful, and really just a special sort of vibe I haven’t seen anywhere else. It’s hard to explain but it almost feels like it was the last great era in a way. Nothing else I’ve seen quite has the same feeling of magic and wonder.
It’s also why I loved Mad Men so much.
Do y’all know what I mean or am I too deep in rose-coloured glasses lol
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I just got done watching the Lee Marvin noir vehicle, Point Blank, which features the type of music that's been missing from crime dramas, lately. Johnny Mandel's score features a jazzy, atonal fugue in the opening credits: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mksO1nA4t_8
This is a far cry from the minimalist slop-track style of soundtrack in more recent movies.
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Well, I'm a bit older than you, so I grew up with movies from the 1960s. One thing I love is the use of practicals. When a car flies off a cliff and explodes, someone actually pushed a real car off a real cliff, which is kind of awesome if you think about it. In The Spy Who Loved Me (1977 - I know, not the 1960s, sorry), some guy actually ski'ed off a cliff (with a parachute). Because one camera jammed, it was only filmed on one camera - no cutting. So it's just one long shot. Contrast it to when a real guy did a real jump in Assassin's Creed (2016) and there are THREE cuts, and the guy drops through what looks like CGI clouds and he's surrounded by CGI so it doesn't look real even though it was. Also... if you haven't seen 2001, see that and try to figure out how they did all the special effects without looking it up. If you haven't seen it, it will blow your mind!
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@Banafsheh I completely get your gist. Many 1960’s films grab me too. They had a certain verisimilitude, & boldness of attitude, unafraid to show a true slice of life. Some though, were rather glossy, with their own tropes, & usually franchisees like the early Bond films. I enjoy the Hammer Horrors, the Carry On comedies, emotional films such as Kes, gangster film such as Get Carter & all that Hitchcock made such as Psycho.
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I recall many of the films of post war trough the '60s era with a fondness. As I look at today's offerings, I believe that we have returned to the film (music too) dark ages.