Alien (1979)

 

Alien happens to be one of The Boyfriend’s favorite movies. He’s seen it dozens of times (so I’ve seen it many times as well), and he’s seen every film in the series (so far). We had the chance in early 2024 to see it in a theater for the first time, and seeing it on the big screen just reinforces my opinion of it being one of the most tense and claustrophobic horror/science fiction films of all time. Seven people are on board the spaceship Nostromo coming back to Earth when they receive a distress signal from an isolated – and, it turns out, quite inhospitable – planet. They detour to help and find some very bizarre architecture and a ton of large, mysterious eggs, one of which opens up and reaches into the helmet of John Hurt’s Kane and into his body. Thus, we are introduced to the title menace, at this point in the form of what’s become known as a “face hugger.” A bit later, after a false sense of security gets built up, we get to meet the “chest bursting” form of the alien, also thanks to Hurt and one of the grossest scenes in film, and I mean that in a good way. Things don’t exactly get better after that, as we in the audience start to watch a space version of “And Then There Was One.” Each member of the crew but one meets a particularly grisly ending, and although we now think of Sigourney Weaver as a movie star, when this film was made we had no sense that her Ripley would become such an iconic and heroic figure. Thanks to Weaver’s fearless performance, we now have one of the greatest female badasses ever to appear in a science fiction/horror film. At the time of filming, Hurt and Tom Skerritt (who plays Dallas) were perhaps the best-known actors in the cast, and the rest (Ian Holm, Harry Dean Stanton, Veronica Cartwright, Yaphet Kotto) were respected character actors. Everyone is well chosen here, and their group dynamic is one of the highlights of the movie. Aside from the monster itself – whose appearance is gradually revealed as the movie progresses until we get to see the full extent of its spectacular horrible appearance – the other truly great attribute of Alien is its production design. The spaceship is a maze of dark interiors, the depiction of which is clearly heavily indebted to the artwork of H.R. Giger (as is the monster’s look). The film’s visuals are also heavily influenced by 2001: A Space Odyssey; only two areas are brightly lit, and they’re communal spaces – for a reason. There are enough plot twists and shocking reveals aboard the Nostromo to make Alien interesting even if you’ve seen it dozens of times, and the fact that it keeps spawning sequels and prequels is just more evidence of how much of a cultural impact it’s had.

Oscar Win: Best Visual Effects

Other Oscar Nomination: Best Art Direction-Set Decoration

Star Trek - The Motion Picture (1979)

 

Star Trek—The Motion Picture reunites almost everyone from the original cast of the 1960s TV series and provides fanboys with a newly redesigned Enterprise to admire. The primary focus of this first theatrical film for the franchise is the appearance of a space cloud in Federation space that has destroyed a series of Klingon and Federation ships. James T. Kirk (William Shatner), now an admiral, shows up during the final stages of the new Enterprise’s construction to take command away from Captain Willard Decker (Stephen Collins), who had been in charge and who is not entirely happy that his position is being usurped, especially since Kirk is unfamiliar with the new ship’s systems. You might think that this clash between an older and younger commander would be a central focus throughout the film, but from the beginning of the story, the filmmakers seem to have another goal in mind: satisfying the rabid fan base of the show. What else could explain spending almost five minutes surveying the exterior of the Enterprise? It has been lovingly rendered, but this seemingly endless examination of the ship causes the film to drag. Other moments obviously designed to dazzle the viewer have pretty much the same effect; an encounter with an alien ship goes on for almost 15 minutes before any action occurs. And the trip through a wormhole that allows for a more direct encounter with the space cloud (called V-Ger) attempts to be reminiscent of the famous sequence from 2001: A Space Odyssey, but all the psychedelic imagery can be quite headache-inducing after a while. The Enterprise’s navigator, Ilia (played by the striking Persis Khambatta), gets kidnapped and replaced by an alien life form. V-Ger uses Ilia’s replacement to collect information from the Enterprise crew about Earth’s creator. There’s a minor subplot involving the past romance between Ilia and Decker, but it fails to have much emotional resonance. The beloved character of Spock (Leonard Nimoy) spends much of the film either on Vulcan trying to rid himself of his human emotions (unsuccessfully, of course) or sneaking off from the rest of the crew to investigate V-Ger on his own and getting attacked as a result. The ending is a little bit of a cheat, using the contemporary Voyager space program to link the Star Trek universe to current events. The religious implications of the search for a “creator” are raised but not deeply considered. Later Star Trek films provide greater excitement than this first installment, but the opportunity to see Kirk and Spock and all the rest was, no doubt, the draw for audiences in 1979.

Oscar Nominations: Best Art Direction-Set Decoration, Best Visual Effects, and Best Original Score

Norma Rae (1979)

Sometimes, the reputation of a film is based upon the strength of a single powerful performance. A great actor or actress can lift a seemingly ordinary film to a realm where it is considered strong enough to vie for the Oscar for Best Picture. Such is the case with 1979's Norma Rae, which features an iconic performance in the title role by Sally Field. So good is Field as a single mother who gets involved in attempts to unionize the workers at the textile factory where she works that what might be considered a merely good film is now considered a classic of the late 1970s, one of the greatest decades for American movie-making.

I hope that first paragraph doesn't sound like too much of a criticism because I admire the work that director Martin Ritt has done here. Norma Rae has its heart in the right place, certainly, and I agree with its politics. I just think that much of the film's reputation falls squarely on the small shoulders of Field, who was making quite a leap by taking on this part. It's a gutsy performance, anchored by the scene with which everyone is familiar. Oh, you know the one I mean. Norma Rae walks through the factory, having been fired by the factory bosses, and holds up a sign with the word "Union" scribbled on it. Even if you haven't watched the entire movie, you've seen that scene.

Yet focusing on that scene alone undermines the powerful acting job Field pulls off here. At the film's beginning, there's only a hint of the union activist she will become later. Norma Rae lives in the same small town in which she grew up. She works beside her mother at the textile factory, and her father is in another part of the building doing his job. It's her mother's temporary loss of hearing (from the noise of the machines running all day) that prompts the first outburst in the movie about the need to do better by the workers. Contrast that moment, though, with what follows. Norma Rae goes to a local motel to meet a married man who comes to town regularly. She's bored with him--she's bored with her life, really--and she wants to break it off. After he hits her so hard that her nose starts to bleed, Norma Rae meets Ron Liebman's Reuben at the same motel. He's in town to organize the workers at the plant, and he's everything a Southerner would be suspicious of: Jewish, New Yorker, union sympathizer, abrasive, you name it. It takes a good actress to allow us to see how complex a woman like Norma Rae is, someone who could look past her mundane life to be intrigued by what Reuben plans to achieve in her hometown.

The factory bosses, in an attempt to silence Norma Rae, give her a supervisory job with additional pay. She doesn't like having to "spy" on her co-workers, but the money could help with her family's expenses. However, Norma Rae is never one to give in too easily, and after several clashes with the bosses over what she considers horrible working conditions and too much resentment on the part of her colleagues, she goes back to her old job. Her activism on behalf of the workers isn't over, though, and she begins attending and organizing meetings of the workers outside of the factory to discuss the possibility of forming a union. She also begins helping Reuben by passing out fliers as the workers enter the factory each day. There is, of course, resistance from many people in town, but Norma Rae and Reuben, as unlikely a team as you could expect, slowly gain support and earn the right for the workers to take a vote on unionization.

There's a lovely romantic subplot involving Beau Bridges (who remembers him being this cute?), a fellow factory worker with a daughter of his own. Norma Rae has two children, each by a different father, so she doesn't think of herself as marriage material. Yet Bridges' Sonny Webster is remarkably persistent, and the film shows us the happiness the newlyweds experience as well as the difficulties they face in the depressed economy of their town. Even when the inevitable rumors begin that Norma Rae has been having an affair with Reuben--and, to be fair, she is certainly intrigued by him, perhaps sexually excited by him--she remains loyal to Sonny.

As a study of small town labor organizing, Norma Rae pays careful attention to details. Although not as graphic as later films would be, this movie does show the beatings that union sympathizers had to endure. And there are even attempts by the factory bosses to incite racism among the white workers by claiming that the black workers plan to take over if a union is organized at the factory. Even the police seem to be on the side of the factory bosses. When Norma is arrested, they carry her to jail and charge her with disorderly conduct. Field certainly ought to earn your respect for her acting in that scene. Four men have an awfully difficult time getting her inside a police car.

The supporting cast, including Liebman and Bridges, is also uniformly good. The great character actor Pat Hingle plays Norma's father, and all of the performers who play factory workers let their faces show the way that such work slowly causes one's self-esteem, one's sense of self-worth, to disintegrate. All of them look "real," as if they truly worked in a factory. No Hollywood beauties or leading men among the supporting cast, thankfully.

If I have any problem with this film, it has to be the theme song. The title is "It Goes Like It Goes," and it won the Oscar for Best Song that year. I still can't quite believe it. It's not as if it faced stiff competition or anything (although I do like "Through the Eyes of Love" from Ice Castles and "The Rainbow Connection" from The Muppet Movie well enough that I wouldn't have been offended by a win for either of them). The best and most popular song from the movies that year, the title song to The Main Event, wasn't even nominated, so the voters went with this Norma Rae ditty. I know it's sung well by Jennifer Warnes, whose music I tend to like. It's just an inconsequential song that tends to repeat a cliche too many times. A movie as good as Norma Rae deserves better than that, and the Academy voters should have known better too.

Apocalypse Now (1979)

Apocalypse Now, nominated for Best Picture of 1979, is a fever dream of a movie. For me, it's always been all about the imagery. I know that some people come away from this film confused about its plot; I don't have that particular problem, but I can see how it would be easy to be lured away from the details by the stunning visuals that float throughout this movie. From the images of palm trees being napalmed to the strains of The Doors' "The End" that open the film to the intercutting of the ritualistic slaughter of an ox and the death by machete of Col. Kurtz near the end of the film, the filmmakers have made a stunning visual masterpiece about the war in Vietnam and our role in it.

Directed by Francis Ford Coppola, best known for the Godfather movies, Apocalypse Now is the story of Capt. Willard (played by a young Martin Sheen), who is sent to "terminate" the command of Col. Kurtz (played by Marlon Brando) after the colonel has abandoned army protocol and gone into the jungles of Cambodia to carry out his own version of the war. Much of the film follows the travels that Willard and the four men assigned to help him on the mission as they slowly navigate a river through Vietnam into Cambodia, where the United States was not "officially" supposed to be. It's the trip itself that provides much of the visual splendor of the movie.

By the way, I don't think it's truly a spoiler to tell you that Willard succeeds in killing Kurtz at the end of the movie. That's his sole purpose in the mission anyway, and I think it's far more interesting and suspenseful to see how much he learns about Kurtz as he's reading the documents provided to him about the colonel's history. Knowing that Kurtz dies doesn't detract from the way the film ends in any way. I've seen this film several times now--including its longer incarnation as Apocalypse Now Redux--and knowing how it ends has never left me feeling dissatisfied during the rest of the movie.

Here are just a few examples of the kinds of images I'm talking about: Robert Duvall as Lt. Col. Kilgore has his men play Wagner's "The Ride of the Valkries" as they descend upon a village; he claims playing opera from the helicopters scares the native people. A crowd of GIs swarms the stage as three Playboy Playmates try to dance to the song "Suzie Q," so overcome by lust are these men who have been trapped fighting in Vietnam. Boatloads of Cambodians with their bodies painted white greet Willard and his remaining men when they reach Kurtz's camp, and all around the camp are the heads and bodies of those Kurtz has ordered slaughtered. And everywhere in this movie there is smoke and mist, some of it from the weapons the men are using. I'm assuming that Coppola is making a point here about the "fog of war," but he never has any character comment upon it (thankfully). It's a beautifully rendered metaphor, though, and we as viewers are constantly struggling to see a clear path just as the characters in the film are.

Apocalypse Now is, certainly, a comment upon the insanity and ineptitude of the military leadership during the Vietnam War, and there are examples beyond the obvious one of Col. Kurtz (of course, his "insanity"--so described by the military brass--is also questionable). I'll just point out one: Duvall's Lt. Col. Kilgore. Duvall actually gives my favorite performance in this film and was deservedly nominated for Best Supporting Actor. He never flinches when shells land near him. No amount of gunfire can rattle him, it seems, and that's a rather scary trait in a man who should be somewhat more concerned about the safety of his men. It's as if the prospect of death holds no power over him any longer. He's also obsessed with surfing, paying more attention to the ways that the waves break than to the helicopter maneuvers he is supposed to be guiding during the attack on the Vietnamese village. I don't even think I need to comment on his most famous line, "I love the smell of napalm in the morning." Everyone at the top, it seems, is crazy, or perhaps the war makes everyone at the top crazy. Either explanation is, I think, appropriate.

Sheen is very good here, but I'm still on the fence about his voice-over narration. I know we can't be privy to his thoughts in any other way at times; he is, after all, reading classified information. And the film is consistent in its application of this conceit, moreso than a lot of other films using the same device. I just wanted, at times, for there to be more direct interaction between Willard and some of the other characters. Yes, I do know that's not the point of the film, particularly on that long, rather silent journey up the river. I understand that it isolates us the same way that Willard isolates himself.

If you've read Joseph Conrad's The Heart of Darkness, you might understand the film in a different way. If you've read T.S. Eliot's "The Hollow Men" or some of his other poetry, you might understand the film in a different way too. (I suppose if you've read both, you might understand it in a third way.) However, if you pay close attention to the plot, you won't get lost. It's a bit of a jungle, sure, just as you would expect a movie that trafficks in metaphors to be. But I'm not sure that you aren't just supposed to sit back and be dazzled by the way the story unfolds on a visual level anyway.

Oscar Wins: Cinematography and Sound

Other Nominations: Picture, Director, Supporting Actor (Robert Duvall), Adapted Screenplay, Art Direction, and Film Editing

Breaking Away (1979)

I loved Breaking Away, a nominee for Best Picture of 1979, when I saw it in theaters with my family upon its original release. I hadn't seen it in probably 25 years, so when I sat down to watch it again this time, I was afraid that it wouldn't hold up. So many fond memories of one's childhood get dashed upon being revisited, don't they? However, Breaking Away is still just as enchanting and thrilling as I remember. It is one of those small gems of a movie that you can enjoy over and over again.

The film is the story of Dave Stoller (Dennis Christopher), a cyclist who has fallen in love with all things Italian thanks to their prowess at cycling. He speaks Italian around his parents, the delightful Barbara Barrie and Paul Dooley, and even shaves his legs the way the Italian riders do. When he isn't riding, Dave spends time with three of his friends from high school: Mike (Dennis Quaid), Moocher (Jackie Earle Haley), and Cyril (Daniel Stern). Each of his friends has his own post-school crisis. Mike, who dreamed of being a football star in college, has been injured and now has no prospects outside of menial work. Moocher's family, in an attempt to find work, has left him behind and moved to Chicago, and he wants to get married in spite of a lack of means of supporting himself and his new wife. Cyril, although intelligent, has never been encouraged by his father to see himself as having potential. They spend the summer together swimming in the remains of a quarry that was where many of their dads worked. It's a pretty idyllic environment.

All of this takes place in Bloomington, Indiana, home of Indiana University. There is, naturally, tension between the allegedly wealthy kids who attend the university and the "cutters," the people who live in town. Even Dave and his friends are known as cutters although the quarry itself has been closed down for years. Still, the setting provides Dave with an opportunity to fall in love with a beautiful girl who, not realizing that Dave is not truly Italian, falls in love with the image of this romantic foreigner. His serenading of her is one of the most touching moments of the film.

As an aside, the girl's boyfriend is played by Hart Bochner, one of the most beautiful young men ever to appear on film. Years ago, I was at a screening of a collection of movie trailers that had been saved, and the audience was mostly gay men (and a few lesbians and token straight people). When a movie starring Bochner came on the screen and the first shot of him without a shirt appeared, there was an audible gasp of appreciation from the assembled masses. I can't imagine what that group of men would do with this film, which also features a young Dennis Quaid with a set of abdominal muscles anyone would want to have. Quaid has always been one of the hunkiest of movie actors, but he spends most of Breaking Away shirtless and/or in a pair of cutoff shorts. It's enough to take your breath away.

I suppose in some ways you could call this a sports movie. Certainly, the climax of the film occurs at the Little 500, a race that pits one team from town (Dave and his friends) against dozens of teams from the university. And the cycling sequences are pretty spectacular. When Dave finally gets the opportunity to ride alongside his idols, the Italians, you get to feel the exhilaration he feels, at least temporarily. However, this film is much more than a sports movie, and that's what makes it exceptional. It's about the ways that we interact with our families. It's about the bonds that develop between friends. It's about the ways that we divide ourselves and the ways that we are sometimes able to overcome those divisions. Breaking Away is a rich film, and it evokes for me the dreams that people in small towns like Bloomington have. Dave is one such dreamer, and it's a pleasure to spend a couple of hours with people like him.