Are you ready to get groovy, baby? Cause Netflix is about to spin the clock back to 1975 for a month-long screening series held at its Egyptian Theatre in Los Angeles this upcoming May. Titled “1975: Fifty Is the New Hollywood,” this event aims to celebrate the 50th anniversary of what many consider the year that changed cinema forever, with films like Steven Spielberg’s “Jaws,” Mel Brooks’ “Young Frankenstein,” and Francis Ford Coppola‘s Oscar-winning “The Godfather Part II” all being released within the same 12-month span.
1975 marks the highpoint of the New Hollywood era, with gifted established filmmakers like Robert Altman, Akira Kurosawa, John Cassavetes, and Stanley Kubrick all going out on a limb to make their masterworks and newcomers like Spielberg, Coppola, Martin Scorsese, and Brian De Palma breaking through in ways that would forever alter the business and creative spirit of filmmaking. International cinema also introduced the world to the unconventional, yet undeniable talents of Werner Herzog and Chantal Akerman, both of whom offered work that remains influential to this day.
In honor of the radical spirit of this era, Netflix has curated a series that can only be described as faaaar out. Winner of the Best Original Song Oscar for Altman’s era-defining jubilee “Nashville,” Keith Carradine will introduce the film, while Best Supporting Actress nominee Ronee Blakey will participate in a Q&A orchestrated by film critic David Ansen following the screening. Though many might know him for his appearance on “The Mandalorian,” Herzog will joining the crowd at the Egyptian to honor of his more personal pieces, “The Engima of Kasper Hauser, which took home the Grand Jury Prize at Cannes Film Festival in 1975. In addition, director Michael Schultz and actors Glynn Thurman and Lawrence Hilton-Jacobs will on hand to present their coming-of-age staple “Cooley High.”
Kicking things of with a big shout of “ATTICAAAAA,” the series will open with a 35mm showing of Sidney Lumet’s “Dog Day Afternoon”, which is screened in collaboration with the Los Angeles Film Critics Association (LAFCA). Each month this year, in partnership with the Egyptian, LAFCA has celebrated its own 50-year history with a viewing of one of the films its celebrated in that time. “Dog Day Afternoon” won LAFCA’s inaugural Best Picture award in 1975 and will be introduced by LAFCA member and film critic Peter Rainer.
For Memorial Day, the series will highlight winners from the 1975 Oscars, including “Chinatown,” “Barry Lyndon,” and “Jeanne Dielman, 23 quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles” — named by the most recent Sight and Sound poll as the Greatest Film Ever Made. Other programming include special screenings of Joan Micklin Silver’s “Hester Street,” Hal Ashby’s “Shampoo,” landmark The Who musical “Tommy,” “Grey Gardens, “Three Days of the Condor,” “Funny Lady,” and “Rolling Thunder Revue: A Bob Dylan Story.”
For more information and to purchase tickets, please click here.
