Why 70s Movies Look and Feel Different

The 70s were a time where the people were more cynical, and movies from that decade have a certain look and feel to them. Why do movies from the 70s look different? Why do 70s movies FEEL different? Is it just nostalgia or is there something tangible behind it?

In this video, we dive into the topic of why 70s movies feel like 70s movies.

If there are reasons you think we missed, make sure to leave a comment. We'll be sure to join in on the conversations.

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Chapters
00:00 - Intro
00:28 - Types of Movies
03:55 - Tone and Look
05:45 - Pacing and Motion
08:51 - Technology
11:30 - Fashion

#70sMovies #70sFashion #70s #moviechannel

Why do 70s movies feel different? / Why do movies from the 70s look different? / The Godfather / Mean Streets / Taxi Driver / A Clockwork Orange / Robert DeNiro / Steven Spielberg

[Oblivionburn]

A big thing I've noticed about movies in the 70s compared to later decades is that they often [intentionally] showed the characters travelling from Point A to Point B instead of just cutting to them arriving at a destination, because movies in the 70s were more about the journey than simply what was happening at the destination. They have a very different form of storytelling than later decades. The longer cuts just add to that more grounded-in-life feel to them.

[matman]

One thing I love about 70's movies is the extensive use of zooms. These days zooms are often unfairly judged as lazy and inferior to dolly shots, but it's just a different technique. Early 60's and 70's movies used them very effectively to add dynamic to a scene, build tension or connect several shots into a single take.

[foljs]

The 60s made movies for families. The 70s made movies for adults. The 80s made movies for teenagers. The 2010s onwards make movies for man-childs

[objectiveperspective]

1:01 A little thing to mention but the 70s also had a huge crime wave and crime was discussed more on TV than ever before. Top this off with the coverage of the Vietnam war and film started to reflect the realities of the dangerous world we live in.

[TheDefeatest]

The people in these movies looked like real people that we see and interact with everyday. These days, every actor is dressed too perfectly. Every hair and every article of clothing is perfect...even if it's supposed to be a person, let say on the fringes or not "normal" Everyone is a caricature of a person. No one looks like the kid on my street, only a theatrical fake wanna be version of the kid on my street. The 70's and 80's had it right, because people for the most part looked like everyday people, making it more believable. Me thinks anyway.

[DarthHater]

One of the biggest things that makes 70s films different was the emergence of light-sensitive Eastman Kodak color film, subverting Technicolor, which needed huge amounts of light, often in a studio. It was grainier and desaturated, but you could shoot in much lower light, giving movies like the French Connection their signature look, and allowing filmmakers to shoot on the fly, in real settings, and just made shooting faster and required much lower budget, allowing a different type of movie than one shot on a stage with a massive 2 ton Technicolor 3-strip camera.

[parallaxview]

Gritty and visceral. The French Connection is the ultimate 70s movie.

[aliensoup]

The rise of independent film and technology are probably the greatest influences for the 70's "look". The independents broke production out of the confining studio system, and encouraged free expression. Smaller cameras, faster film stock and lenses broke filming out of the studio and into the raw, gritty environment of the real world. Once the new technology and techniques were mastered, the gloss went back on in the 80's and 90's.

[conmereth]

Personally I generally prefer the slower pacing of older movies because in addition to the plot and the characters I'm oftentimes really interested in the world they inhabit and in a slower movie it can be a lot easier to stop, smell the roses, and appreciate the world building.

[PolishGod]

70s was the best era for movies : A Clockwork Orange, 2 Godfather films, Taxi driver, one flew over cuckoo's nest, Apocalypse now, Star Wars, Alien, Mad Max, Jaws, the Exorcist, Halloween, Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Chinatown, Rocky, Barry Lyndon etc.

So good

[xandercruz]

The 70s was the last era where virtually all films were indy or experimental. There was a real sense that you were going to get something you simply didnt think was possible to put on film, so they all had this "sharpness" to them as well as being rough around the edges as they were all redefining genres into more gritty versions of themselves (westerns) from the golden age of Hollywood, or building whole new ones from the ground up (sci-fi), and even reviving old favorites with less spectacle and more "frankness" (musicals). So many had no real money compared to today that they improvised all over the place, which also just made them seem more "real".

And most were done on budgets that were close (or less) to some adult films, which were basically now mainstream releases in some cases! I still love how many 70s films just had these moments with no music playing, likely because they didnt have the budget, but it just makes those movies seem more in the moment.

That is why so many of the movies from then became cult classics or all-time defining movies of cinema.

[robclark]

The increase in pace is probably why I haven't liked many movies I've seen in the last decade or two. Nothing but non-stop action, flashing from scene to scene, and not really much of any story.

[michaelfontana]

The 70's also had a strong independent movie scene with John Cassavetes, Melvin Van Peebles and Elaine May were standouts of the time continuously experimenting and making films better.

[artirony]

I remember in one of my film classes we had a whole lesson on how the Steadicam changed moviemaking forever

[justinsteinweiss]

The 70's may be my favourite decade for movies, particularly as a fan of crime drama and the horror genre. In addition to some darker themes and brutal reality becoming an inspiration for various filmmakers, I also like the gritty atmosphere captured in some films of the era (which also appears in some genre movies of the early 80's).

[AScreenwritersJourney]

70s fashion pieces I recall were T-shirts with iron-on decals, usually from favorite films (Star Wars, Grease) or TV shows (Charlie's Angels/Farrah Fawcett).

[mrsbluesky]

My brother loved the martial arts movies back in the 70s. The local channels used to run them every weekend, badly edited and scratchy copies, but he still watched. Miss you brother ❤

[Marcus-xtzh]

What I love about them:1) their artictic honesty 2) rarely "happy endings" (probably because life rarely "ends" in a happy way.)

[lisathuban]

The first time I actually watched a film on a VHS machine was 1984. NO ONE I knew had a VHS player in the 1970's. They were a luxury item. We weren't poor, but we were not in the class of people who started buying those machines in the LATE 70's. It came in on the tail end of the decade.

[teeing]

I have said this for a while, most current day videos and movies have a cut about every 3 to 5 seconds, and it can get annoying after a while, hell this video does it.