New Hollywood

New Hollywood

The Beginning

During the Golden Age of Hollywood (1930-1960), most film directors worked for one of the major studios. The first act to change started when some French film critics noticed that some American Directors made films that were their own personal visions and were "auteurs" (authors of their own films). Examples being Alfred Hitchcock and Orsen Welles.

The first American New Wave started outside of Hollywood by independent film makers in New York. A film from this new wave was 'Little Fugitive', made in 1953 by Ray Ashley, Morris Engel & Ruth Orkin. The film 'Little Fugitive' was a huge influence on the French New Wave, with Francois Truffaut stating - "Our New Wave would never have come into being if it hadn't been for the young American Morris Engel, who showed us the way to independent production with this fine movie".

New York New Wave

Lionel Rogosin

Rogosin made 'On the Bowery' in 1956. This film was a Neorealist view of New York, that had a mixture of documentary and scripted footage.

Robert Frank

Frank made 'Pull My Daisy' in 1959.

John Cassavetes

Cassavetes made 'Shadows' in 1959. This film contained improvised dialogue and a narrative which included interracial romance, which was banned at the time of shooting.

Shirley Clarke

Clarke made 'The Connection' in 1961. This film was a mixture of cinema vérité and French New Wave. Her films depicted drug addicts, sex workers and different races mixing together.

New Hollywood

A new generation of young filmmakers emerged in the late 1960s and early 1970s. The studios lost the right to their own theaters (example, Paramount Antitrust case 1948) and the studios struggled to sell films to independent exhibitors and were losing their audience and money. They were also now competing with television.

In Britain, 1966, British films found success in America, examples being 'Alfie', 'Georgy Girl', and 'Blow Up'. The success of these films showed that the American audiences were open to films with more explicit content and different narrative structures to the Hays Code structure.

Jack Valenti was made the new head of the MPAA in 1966 and soon updated the outdated production code that had restricted film content. This allowed new freedom for filmmakers to make anti-authoritarian films which had appealed more to the younger audiences.

Robert Benton & David Newman

Benton & Newman (writers for the New York magazine) wrote a script for 'Bonnie and Clyde' in 1967 (based upon the American criminals who, during the Great Depression, robbed and killed people) and managed to get the script to French New Wave Director Francois Truffaut. Truffaut was supposed to direct the film but then pulled out to shoot 'Farenheit 451' in 1966. Truffaut then passed on the project to Jean-Luc Godard who also pulled out in favour of shooting 'Alphaville' in 1965. 

Eventually, the actor Warren Beatty read the script for 'Bonnie and Clyde' and decided to produce it and hired Arthur Penn to direct. The film was also funded by Warner Brothers. Jack Warner disliked the rough cut and gave the film a limited release. The film also received a lot bad reviews. However, the film was well received in England. Beatty managed to get Warner Brothers to re-release the film and it became a success and was then nominated for Academy Awards. The film is notable for its depiction of sex and violence.

Mike Nichols

Nichols created 'The Graduate' in 1967. The soundtrack consists of songs by Simon and Garfunkel. The film introduced the world to Dustin Hoffman. The Graduate is about Benjamin Braddock, who has just finished college and is unsure of what to do with his future, when he becomes sexually involved with a friend of his parents, Mrs Robinson.