Where does the Hollywood Renaissance actually begin and end?

Where does the Hollywood Renaissance actually begin?

It is often defined as being the period from Bonnie and Clyde (1967) to Star Wars (1977). Everything else before or since has nothing to do with it.

I have always felt that this limits its impact on our film culture and have always wanted to know just where the ideas that formulated the new wave of American filmmaking ideas actually formed. Of course, the further back you go one can always find some earlier film that could be inspirational.

I traced the ideas and ideals back to the late noir films of the 1950’s, where a both a certain photorealism and desire to attack problems crept into the genre. The primary example is Orson Welles’s Touch of Evil (1958) alongside others such as Kiss Me Deadly(1955), and the early films of Stanley Kubrick: Killers Kiss (1955), The Killing (1956), and Paths of Glory (1957). This in and of itself can be traced back towards two films by one man which revitalized noir and made it a criticism of our own version of humanity. These are Billy Wilder’s Sunset Blvd.(1950) and Ace in the Hole (1951). One examines the dark underside of the Hollywood dream factory and the other reveals our society’s complete lust for fame, fortune, exposure, and power. Combined, they are a portrait of America so true that no one wanted to really think about (and in the case of Ace in the Hole, no one wanted to see this either…) Sadly, Wilder was forced to go running for cover and spent the rest of the 1950’s making more box office friendly products. It was not until the 1960’s that he was able to make a more daring and risky expenditure.

I have already traced the provoking lineage of the Hollywood Renaissance to 1950. Is there any need to trace it further back? By going one year further in time, we arrive in 1949, where the film that changed the world was released, Carol Reed’s The Third Man. Here we have the beginning of everything, the lack of lies, real world locations, shadowy figures in both visuals and plot, no clear sense of good and evil, sympathization with supposedly bad characters, worthless “hero”, and lack of all resolution. It sounds as if I am describing one of the classics form the Hollywood Renaissance. All of it is present here in The Third Man. The medium practically began in 1895, but it took until this time for film to discover both itself and the world outside it. Here we have the first truly modern film that is not afraid to go into war torn Vienna that even after four years cannot pull itself out of the rubble of WWII.

The film is an unsmoked cigarette that is tossed off in self-disgust.

After the runaway success of Jaws in 1975, the Renaissance is often said to have being nearing the end. Star Wars is the film that killed it off completely and ushered in the age of the corporate blockbuster. Both of these successful popcorn entertainments were actually products of the new movement. They were so steeped in the wave of fresh ideas and enthusiasm that their success was more of a direct appeal to the public than selling out. The Renaissance did not die in 1977. It actually continued through notable films and exceptions to the rule through the 1980’s, but with increasing loss of potency.

Apocalypse Now (1979), Being There (1979), Manhattan(1979), The Shining(1980), Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981), Prince of the City (1981), Blade Runner (1982), To Live and Die in L.A. (1985) are just some examples of this work. Films like these became both harder to finance and sell to an audience due to a lack of interest by studios because such high returns could be made from mass marketing one blockbuster. Interestingly, all of these films have become largely influential to the few who have seen them and have sparked entire genres onto themselves. William Friedkin’s career since the Exorcist (1973) has been one long series of ups and downs. In 1985, his To Live and Die in L.A.was released to little fanfare and marginal box office returns. Yet its influence can clearly be seen in the television series Miami Vice, and virtually every late 80’s action film franchise form Lethal Weapon (1987) to Die Hard (1988). It was an unexpected and virtually unseen return to form for Friedkin, who then promptly did nothing with it.

Films like these were unmarketable in the happy go lucky world of film in the 1980’s. The corporations had bought the studios and had decided that every movie must be a blockbuster and make them millions. This is what killed the Renaissance period, this along with the fact that the artists let them do it.

Lumet

I had never heard of Sidney Lumet up until several years ago, but the man’s output is nothing short of astonishing. He has never made a truly bad film, although some are better than others, and each is crafted with such an intricate care towards story and actors that the filmmaking becomes practically invisible. We become wrapped up entirely in these narratives that draw us completely into their fold.

12 Angry Men, The Pawnbroker, The Hill, The Offence, Serpico, Murder on the Orient Express, Dog Day Afternoon, Network, Prince of the City, The Verdict, Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead.

Who else but Lumet could have made films as diverse as these and yet always stayed completely true to the original story’s intent? The genius of a Lumet film is the fact that it is a movie first and foremost. It has no pretensions of being a “film” or something more important. There is no desire for box office glory, mass appeal, or making a name for one’s self. Lumet simply likes making good films.

His extreme workmanship stems from his days directing 50’s live television. In this field everything was done in sequential order, in one take, and live for the masses sitting at home around their television set. There could be no room for error. You simply got what you got and had to make do and live with it. Thus, rehearsal became an important tool for making sure nothing was left to chance. Lumet continued this practice on virtually all of his major productions and thus became known as an “actor’s director”. This is complete crap. It is because of this attention to performance that Lumet’s films stand apart from the rest.

Most had written the man off, but in 2007 Lumet used the independent film industry to his advantage and came way out of left field with Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead. With this film he proved both that he still had fight left in himself, and just what a real filmmaker can do with a movie. Lumet is not afraid to make statements or ask questions to an audience. A key comparison that establishes this is the difference between his The Verdict and Scorsese’s follow up to The Hustler, The Color of Money. Both feature Paul Newman as an aged older man who has nothing left in his dreary life. Both feature the possibility of redemption and of something to live for again. However, it is Lumet’s film that actually makes you feel and believe this. Color of Money is tossed of Scorsese that was done to get financing for The Last Temptation of Christ. The difference between the two is startling.

Lumet can tackle anything given the correct material to start with. His magic is making the material as strong and sound as possible by working with cast and crew to achieve this. Rehearsals add new ideas and inspirations and these are incorporated into the script. Then this is shot for the finished product which thus has the feeling of spontaneity that keeps things fresh for us and the strong narrative we secretly crave.