Classic Films From The 1970s That Left Their Mark

If you ask a film aficionado what they feel is the greatest decade in the history of American cinema, there is a good chance that they will tell you it is the 1970s. That decade saw many great young filmmakers flourish, and many of them have gone down in history as some of the all time greats such as Steven Spielberg, George Lucas, Martin Scorsese, and Francis Ford Coppola. 

The era was led by the filmmakers rather than the producers, with individual voices getting to translate their visions to the big screen with less studio interference than ever before. Filmmaking as we know it changed, and the impacts from the '70s are still felt on modern cinema. Read on to learn about four 70s classics that left their mark on popular culture.

Taxi Driver

Nowadays, antiheroes are all the rage, but at one point it was expected that the protagonist in the film should be traditionally relatable and follow conventional moral codes. One film that was a game changer for antiheroes was Martin Scorsese’s masterpiece “Taxi Driver" which starred Robert De Niro as a taxi driver who balanced some combination of being appealing and appalling, with his terrifyingly disturbed interior psychology being the film’s core conflict.

The Paul Schrader scripted classic about a man who had recently come back from serving in Vietnam shows how a seemingly ordinary person can erupt into violence, and the film is compelling throughout even as it is disturbing. It is now considered to be one of the greatest films ever made, and it shook audiences up at the time, while its quality was impossible to deny, with the film earning four Oscar nominations.

Jaws

Steven Spielberg’s classic horror film “Jaws” redefined the summer blockbuster, becoming the biggest film ever made at the time and showing that what you don’t see is scarier than what you do see. As the story goes, the technical difficulties they had shooting a faulty mechanical shark led to showing less of the shark that initially planned, and the suspense was ramped up by focusing on the unknown rather than in your face effects.

The film also proved that horror movies and dramas could effectively come together in one film, with the two elements enhancing each other rather than compromising one another. Spielberg brought sophisticated storytelling to “Jaws” that made it much more than what audiences typically expect from a killer shark movie. As a result, it didn’t just influence generations of horror films and summer blockbusters but also people’s lives, as people were terrified of going to the beach for years after the film came out.

The Godfather

Gangster movies have been one of the most enduring cinematic genres, and ever since the early days of film we have had a steady supply of violent tales of bootleggers, smugglers, money launderers, bank robbers, and other criminal enterprises that are well organized and run as businesses. The one gangster film that stands tall above all others, though, is Francis Ford Coppola’s “The Godfather.”

The classic mafia movie spawned a sequel that many consider to be even better than the first and then a second sequel which is unanimously considered to be the worst of the trilogy by a wide margin. It is the first film, though, that changed everything, elevating the organized crime genre, which was typically the material for B movies, into high drama, with masterful performances by the likes of Marlon Brando and Al Pacino, brilliantly atmospheric cinematography from Gordon Willis, and operatic music from Nino Rota. Never had a gangster movie had so much depth and detail, and the film won numerous Oscars and is considered to be one of the greatest movies ever made.

Star Wars

While film fans may debate endlessly about what is the best film of the 1990s, there is no dispute over what is the most influential film, and that is “Star Wars.” George Lucas’ space opera broke boundaries with its groundbreaking special effects, fast paced editing, and depictions of other worlds that are riveting and realistic. It also invented the modern multi-media film franchise with its universe spanning not just sequels but also books, video games, toys, TV shows, theme park rides, and more to the point where Star Wars is practically an industry in itself. 

While Star Wars the franchise has become so much bigger than “Star Wars” the film (which has been rechristened as “Star Wars: Episode IV - A New Hope”), the film still stands as one of the greatest ever made. Beyond being a spectacular technical achievement, it is a rip-roaring adventure with great characters that still holds all of its charms many decades later. It has perhaps the finest musical score of all time, courtesy of the legendary composer John Williams.