The Year in Movies: 1974

 1974

Number of Movies I've Seen: 10

Number of Movies from my original top 365:  2

Oscar Winner:
The Godfather Part II - I remember back when I was posting on the Rotten Tomatoes forums everyone told me how much I would love this movie after reading my takedown of part 1.... Welp... they were wrong. All of my problems with Part I still exist in this one. Part of me wishes this had just been a prequel and really fleshed out the DeNiro part of the film. Everything set in "present day" was just an utter bore. What can I say? These movies aren't for me.

Box Office Winner:
Blazing Saddles - (Pictured above) Spoiler alert! I'll have more to say about Mel Brooks' genius in the next post, but this movie is simply impressive. An R-rated, N-word dropping, Oscar-nominated take-down of the most popular genre in American filmmaking that makes more money than any other movie of the year. The performances are perfect, but what makes this one is the screenplay that isn't afraid of anything. I'm not sure this movie could've been made at any other time in history. 

My Top Ten:
1. NEXT POST!

2. Blazing Saddles

3. Chinatown - Polanski's skeeviness aside, this movie is a masterpiece. Nicholson's performance coupled with a noir plot straight from the '40s make for an astounding experience.

4. Where the Red Fern Grows - I saw this in middle school. I remember like it, but it's been a long time.

5. Hearts and Minds - Essential (albeit tedious) documentary viewing about the Vietnam war.

6. The Godfather Part II 

7. The Texas Chainsaw Massacre - I am not the biggest fan of the slasher genre, but if you are going to do it, this is how its done.

8. Female Trouble - I love John Waters as a human being and artist, but his movies are VERY hit and miss. For me, this one was the latter.

9. Emmanuelle - This may sound strange, but maybe I need to give this one another shot. Roger Ebert gave it three stars after all... I think college Will may have been watching this one with a bit of an unsophisticated eye.

10. Gone in 60 Seconds - Like me, when you discover that the Nic Cage/Angelina Jolie street racing romp was actually a remake, you may be tempted to check out the original. Don't. It is trash...