STACK July 2017 Issue 153

18 / 107

018 JULY 2017
corrupt, dejected losers, eccentric loners, drug
users, thieves or even violent killers. Free from
studio interference, the auteur filmmakers'
gritty movies, often with ambiguous endings,
delivered for audiences an entirely different
kind of American cinema.
The first wave of auteur films scored big at
the box-office, some winning Academy Awards.
Successful films such as M*A*S*H, The French
Connection, Little Big Man, The Exorcist, Mean
Streets, The Wild Bunch, Chinatown, Five Easy
Pieces, The Godfather and its sophisticated
sequel, The Godfather Part II, brought – for a
brief period of time – fame and power to a few
of the auteur directors. In particular Francis Ford
Coppola. The corporate film studios were only
too happy to invest in the productions of young
filmmakers as long as they were successful at
the box office. However, the popularity of the
auteur film was in fact beginning to decline
just as the "second wave" of young Hollywood
filmmakers emerged.
Movie prodigy Steven Spielberg had begun
his career working in Universal's television
studios, where he directed a memorable
segment of Night Gallery titled "Eyes", starring
veteran actress Joan Crawford. There followed
various episodes of Marcus Welby, M.D.
and Columbo where he honed his skills as
a director. He was then given his first full TV
feature film, Duel (1971), which was deemed
worthy enough to be released theatrically. In
1974, Spielberg became a fully-fledged movie
director with The Sugarland Express – a fugitive
couple road film with more than a nod to
Bonnie and Clyde. This positioned him for a film
that would turn him into a movie wunderkind,
and arguably Hollywood's most famous film
director/producer.
Jaws played on man's primal fear of the
sea and what lurks beneath it. The film tells
the story of a rogue Great White shark that
terrorises bathers in a New England summer
resort. Following an innovative nationwide
television advertising blitz, Jaws was mass
released into more than 460 US theatres in
June 1975. This was a huge gamble as the
summer was usually a low season for the film
industry. But the media frenzy that ensued
coined the term "Jawsmania". By the end of its
opening weekend it had become the must-
see "movie event" and in that pre-home video
era, not just once but repeatedly. During that
long summer of 1975, practically the whole of
Movie storylines written
during Hollywood's first
Golden Age followed a
simple and well tested template.
They had a straightforward narrative
structure that proceeded in a
logical cause and effect manner to
a clear and satisfactory resolution.
The classical Hollywood movies
produced during this era regularly
presented an idealised version of a
patriotic America that perpetuated
the myth of the American dream.
Good was always rewarded, evil
was always routed.
But the new wave of young
auteur film directors, who rose
to prominence in early 1970s
Hollywood, completely dismantled
that template. As educated
cineastes, steeped in film history, they
overhauled and revamped the classic film
genres to align with the political and social
awareness of young, modern moviegoers. The
result was a myriad of motion pictures that
presented a more critical view of America's
past and present. A large proportion of
their films projected a seedier side of
American life that featured morally ambiguous,
idiosyncratic protagonists. Moreover,
these characters were predominately either
HOLLYWOOD'S
SECOND
GOLDEN AGE
1975-1981
visit EXTRAS FEATURE
Part IV:
The Dawn of the Summer Blockbuster
and Decline of the American Auteurs
...practically the whole of
America – young and old –
went to see Jaws
Little Big Man depicted former American hero General George
Custer as a murderous lunatic. A prime example of the auteur
directors' critical view of America's past
The end of Quint in Steven Spielberg's Jaws