I read the article on 1968 by A.O. Scott in the Arts & Leisure section of today’s New York Times, linked here:
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/27/movies/2...r=1&oref=slogin

It's all about two coming retrospectives in New York with a 1968 theme, one at Film Forum devoted to Godard and one at Lincoln Center devoted to all the filmic activity connected to the turbulent events of that year. Significantly, there’s only one film represented in both series that I actually saw in its initial release, ZABRISKIE POINT (which is a 1970 release).

So I got to wondering…what was I seeing in theaters in 1968, a year that began when I was still in junior high school? And what 1968 releases did I actually see when they were current? So we’re actually talking about 1967-69 here, given the slower release patterns back then. I would be seeing almost as many 1967 films in 1968 as actual 1968 releases and many more 1968 films in 1969 than I’d actually seen in 1968. Granted, given my age and sensibility and the programming offered in neighborhood theaters, I was more apt to see a "Man From U.N.C.L.E." movie spinoff than Godard's WEEKEND, but the list is interesting nonetheless. And, never one to pass up a chance to make some new lists, here’s what I was able to determine:

1967 films I saw in 1968:

THE AMBUSHERS
HOT RODS TO HELL
IN THE HEAT OF THE NIGHT
COOL HAND LUKE
BONNIE AND CLYDE
WAIT UNTIL DARK
WHO'S MINDING THE MINT
RINGS AROUND THE WORLD


1968 films I actually saw IN 1968:

BERSERK!
FIRECREEK
ARIZONA BUSHWHACKERS
PLANET OF THE APES
WILD IN THE STREETS
BUCKSKIN
YOURS, MINE AND OURS
THE ODD COUPLE
THE DETECTIVE


1968 movies I saw in 1969 (when they arrived at my neighborhood theaters):

WHAT’S SO BAD ABOUT FEELING GOOD?
BARBARELLA
I LOVE YOU, ALICE B. TOKLAS
UP TIGHT
SKIDOO
CHARGE OF THE LIGHT BRIGADE
FINIAN’S RAINBOW
ROMEO AND JULIET
HANG ’EM HIGH
COOGAN’S BLUFF
ICE STATION ZEBRA
DARK OF THE SUN
SHOES OF THE FISHERMAN
BULLITT
THE SCALPHUNTERS
RACHEL, RACHEL
CHARLY
IF HE HOLLERS, LET HIM GO
THE HEART IS A LONELY HUNTER
THE NIGHT THEY RAIDED MINSKY’S

Of course, in a flurry of moviegoing activity in later high school and college years I would eventually catch up with other major 1968 films on the big screen, including:

2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY
THE PRODUCERS
ROSEMARY’S BABY
TARGETS
THE TRIP
THE THOMAS CROWN AFFAIR
YELLOW SUBMARINE

plus tons of others too numerous to mention, including the relevant Godard films and Renata Adler's entire New York Times Ten Best list from 1968 (hey, that's how she structured the course she taught us at Hunter College in 1973).

What film from that period had the biggest impact on me at the time? Easily PLANET OF THE APES, which I saw around seven times on the big screen, and which inspired a lot of reading on my part, including Boulle's book. But I was also seeing the first five James Bond films in their frequent re-releases, as well as the perennial neighborhood theater favorite, WEST SIDE STORY. Plus three 1967 releases that got a lot of theatrical play in 1968, but which I first saw on the big screen in late 1969 and early 1970: A FISTFUL OF DOLLARS, FOR A FEW DOLLARS MORE, and THE GOOD, THE BAD AND THE UGLY.

Interestingly, one of the more anticipated “youth culture” films for my age group in 1968 was WILD IN THE STREETS, which I saw and was quite moved by at the time. Yet, I never felt a need to revisit it, whereas I HAVE revisited its co-feature, the A.C. Lyles B-western, BUCKSKIN, starring Barry Sullivan and Lon Chaney Jr., among others, which I’ve even gone so far as to review on IMDB.

For me, in the overall picture, 1968 will always be a lesser year, movie-wise, than the years that sandwich it, 1967 (YOU ONLY LIVE TWICE, EL DORADO, THE DIRTY DOZEN, BONNIE AND CLYDE, THE ST. VALENTINE'S DAY MASSACRE, ONE-ARMED SWORDSMAN, SAMURAI REBELLION, the Leone trilogy, etc.) and 1969 (THE WILD BUNCH, ONCE UPON A TIME IN THE WEST, ON HER MAJESTY'S SECRET SERVICE, PUTNEY SWOPE, Z, TAKE THE MONEY AND RUN, LATITUDE ZERO, etc.). Granted, the good folks at Film Forum and Lincoln Center are relying on an entirely different set of criteria for their programming choices. If you're feeling nostalgic for endless barricades and tear gas and Maoist slogans, as some of my old film-school buddies no doubt are, well then, please be my guest... :P

Intriguing topic. I hope others here add their memories.

Mine are a bit limited, having been only nine to eleven years old in the years covered, but I'm surprised how many you mentioned I did see, and how few of them were 'family fare'. Only WHOS MINDING THE MINT'?, and YOURS, MINE AND OURS really fit that bill, and that last just barely (all the middle aged marriage with families attached anxiety). The fact is that there were scarcely any decent old fashioned entertainments for kids produced at the time, and my parents -with decidedly mixed feelings- loosened their strictures about acceptable violence and suggestive situations just so we could all share some enjoyable theater time together. Thus, among others, I saw 2001 (in its initial NYC engagement, what a trip), CHARGE OF THE LIGHT BRIGADE (in its London premiere, complete with a full theatrical playbill and a pit orchestra in attendance for the intermission of this interminable film: I enjoyed the animated sequences, but the rest of it was way out of my ken, and I alternately shuddered and dozed). PLANET OF THE APES, HEAT OF THE NIGHT, BONNIE AND CLYDE, BULLITT, YELLOW SUBMARINE, SCALP HUNTERS, THOMAS CROWN AFFAIR, HEART IS A LONELY HUNTER (of those you list) were all seen by me upon debut or within a year.

Isn't it pretty obvious that "1968" is a concept of youth rebellion in the Film Society of Lincoln Center series, rather than a year? They could've called it "a bunch of films about late '60s/early '70s leftist politics," but the 40th anniversary of May '68 makes a better hook. If memory serves, there was a MOMA program in 1998 celebrating the year's thirtieth anniversary with films made then. I saw Maurice Pialat's NAKED CHILDHOOD there.

Although it was 30 years before I actually saw the film, now to got me itching to put on my LD of THE DEVIL RIDES OUT...

Having been born in '62, I wasn't being all that big a fan of the '60s. In my circle, just a bunch of damned dirty hippies being hassled by the fuzz.

But Planet of the Apes and Night of the Living Dead certainly made me sit up inn the back seat. Of course, since I saw them at the drive-in, it was probably 1969 when Serling and Romero imprinted my tiny little brain.

Last night, a couple of hours after doing the original post, I was channel surfing and turned to the Western Channel and there I was in the last 20 minutes of a 1968 western, SHALAKO. My jaw dropped at the sight of Sean Connery, Brigitte Bardot and one-time B-western great Don "Red" Barry all in the same shot! And then who should show up but Peter Van Eyck and Alexander Knox. And then Jack Hawkins and Stephen Boyd! The last time those two were together was in BEN-HUR! What were all these people doing in a western?! Well, then I remembered...hey, it was 1968! Anything was possible.

One of the films on my list of 1968 movies seen that really stands out for me is the Frank Sinatra cop movie, THE DETECTIVE. It made a big impression on me at the time as a mature Hollywood movie which tackled adult themes that would have been censored just two or three years earlier and offered a kind of realistic approach that I had not associated with Sinatra. When I re-viewed it on cable a few years ago, it held up remarkably well. Well, in checking out Anne Thompson's blog, Thompson on Hollywood (highly recommended), I found a link to an article on Sinatra and his film work in London's Daily Telegraph, covering a retrospective planned to coincide with the 10th anniversary on May 14 of Sinatra's death. And sure enough, the article mentions THE DETECTIVE.
Here's a link to it:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/arts/main.jhtml.../bmfrank126.xml

. . . yes, we just returned from Paris and there were posters here and there advertising various "1968" events that would be taking place - none seemed to be movie related . . . we did not see too many movies in 1968 as we were "dirty hippies" working to end the war (a different one) and elect Clean Gene - the films we did see would have been pretty much restricted to whatever was showing at the "Art House Cinema" featuring "foreign language" movies as that was a period in our life we thought most American films were not worth seeing - sort of like now - exceptions were made around that time for THE WILD BUNCH, BONNIE AND CLYDE, A SPACE ODYSSEY, ROSEMARY'S BABY, PETULIA, and the like by directors we admired . . . fortunately, since that time we have caught up with many of the films mentioned by Brian and others and realize we were in error regarding some of them - particularly John Brahm's HOT RODS TO HELL which is very cool . . .

...and by 1971, the world was changing and angry Dirty Harrys :angry: started taking over.

Some old dirty hippies went underground :ph43r: ... others became organic farmers, aka dirt hippies.

Possibly inspired by this thread, I pulled Stanley Kubrick Interviews off the shelf to read on the subway this morning and I came across a fascinating snapshot of the era in a passage from an interview Kubrick did for Playboy in 1968 after the release of 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY. Here it is:

Playboy: Some prominent critics—including Renata Adler of The New York Times, John Simon of The New Leader, Judith Crist of New York Magazine and Andrew Sarris of the Village Voice—apparently felt that 2001 should be among those films still exempted from the category of art; all four castigated it as dull, pretentious, and overlong. How do you account for their hostility?

Kubrick: The four critics you mention all work for New York publications. The reviews across America and around the world have been ninety-five percent enthusiastic. Some were more perceptive than others, of course, but even those who praised the film on relatively superficial grounds were able to get something of its message. New York was the only really hostile city. Perhaps there is a certain element of the lumpen literati that is so dogmatically atheist and materialist and Earth-bound that it finds the grandeur of space and the myriad mysteries of cosmic intelligence anathema. But film critics, fortunately, rarely have any effect on the general public; houses everywhere are packed and the film is well on its way to becoming the greatest moneymaker in MGM’s history. Perhaps this sounds like a crass way to evaluate one’s work, but I think that, especially with a film that is so obviously different, record audience attendance means people are saying the right things to one another after they see it—and isn’t this really what it’s all about?




(There's tons of great stuff in the interview, things way beyond the parameters of this board, esp. in discussions of the possible nature of life forms in the rest of the universe. I'd urge others to find it and check it out.)