Vintage 1979: Kramer vs. Kramer, Sweeney Todd, Chris Pratt, Rosamund Pike, and More...
Wednesday, May 27, 2015 at 6:14PM 1979 is our "Year of the Month" and this post was way way too much fun to research. Before the main course of the Supporting Actress Smackdown (pushed to June 7th), let's marinate a little in the year that was.
original print ad for Kramer vs. Kramer (available on eBay)
Jackie Earle Haley, Dennis Quaid, Dennis Christopher, and Daniel Stern broke out via "Breaking Away"
BEST MOVIES ACCORDING TO...
Oscar: Kramer vs Kramer*, All That Jazz, Apocalypse Now, Breaking Away, and Norma Rae were the best pictures nominees but they also loved La Cage Aux Folles, The China Syndrome, Manhattan, Being There and The Black Stallion
Golden Globe: (drama) Kramer vs Kramer*, Apocalypse Now, The China Syndrome, Manhattan and Norma Rae (comedy) Breaking Away*, Being There, Hair, The Rose, and 10
Cannes: Apocalypse Now AND All That Jazz (Glenn discussed this odd consecutive Oscar-adjacent business)
Box Office: 1) Kramer vs. Kramer 2) The Amityville Horror 3) Rocky II 4) Apocalypse Now 5) Star Trek: The Motion Picture 6) Alien 7) "10" 8) The Jerk 9) Moonraker 10) The Muppet Movie
Gene Siskel: 1) Hair 2) Kramer vs Kramer 3) The Deer Hunter 4) Breaking Away 5) Manhattan 6) The Marriage of Maria Braun 7) Nosferatu 8) The Onion Field 9) Time After Time 10) The China Syndrome
Roger Ebert: 1) Apocalypse Now 2) Breaking Away 3) The Deer Hunter 4) The Marriage of Maria Braun 5) Hair 6) Saint Jack 7) Kramer vs Kramer 8) The China Syndrome 9) Nosferatu 10) "10"
List-Mania continues with music hits, debut characters, new toys, and adorable "born in '79" people & things after the jump...
Nathaniel's Favorites: Manhattan, All That Jazz, Apocalypse Now are my three favorites (and not just of that year but for an all time favorites list too) and The Muppet Movie is one of only two movies I remember seeing in the theater that year and loving as a kid (the other was something called The North Avenue Irregulars with Cloris Leachman). Maybe I saw more than two but I was little I don't remember. But to make a full top ten list, I'd need plentiful rewatches.
Important Careers Launched in 1979
Diane Lane in A Little Romance (even landed on the cover of Time)
Hayao Miyazaki with The Castle of Cagliostro (recently discussed in Tim's column)
Timothy Spall in Quadrophenia
Wallace Shawn ("Inconceivable!") in Manhattan, All That Jazz, and Starting Over
JoBeth Williams, future Poltergeist mom and Today's Reigning President of SAG, nude in Kramer vs. Kramer which "Mad Magazine" promptly lampooned
thanks to Retro Space for this flashback
TV Series That Debuted in '79
Hart to Hart, Buck Rogers in the 25th Century, Knots Landing, and Canada's You Can't Do That on Television. Plus two we just recently discussed: The Facts of Life and The Dukes of Hazzard
Comic Book Characters That Debuted in 1979
Kitty Pryde & Emma Frost 'The White Queen' (in the January 1980 issue of The Uncanny X-Men released in December '79), Lucius Fox (Batman), War Machine & Justin Hammer (Iron Man)... all of whom have since made it to the movies. Also The Black Cat (Spider-Man) who has not though Felicity Jones was originally intended to play her, as I understand, before Sony decided to rethink their Spider-Man plans altogether
Tony Winners of 1979
Musical: Sweeney Todd, the Demon Barber of Fleet Street
Play: The Elephant Man
(Both still immensely popular and frequently revived today)
New Best-Sellers That Would Quickly Become 1980s Movies
Sophie's Choice (William Styron), Birdy (William Wharton), The Dead Zone (Stephen King) and The Right Stuff (Tom Wolfe)
Top Ten Singles of '79 According to Billboard
- "My Sharona" - The Knack
- "Bad Girls" - Donna Summer
- "Le Freak" - Chic
- "Do Ya Think I'm Sexy" - Rod Stewart
- "Reunited" - Peaches & Herb
- "I Will Survive" - Gloria Gaynor
- "Hot Stuff" - Donna Summer
- "YMCA" - Village People
- "Ring My Bell" - Anita Ward
- "Sad Eyes" - Robert John
Born in '79 Mixtape
P!nk, Aaliyah, Pete Wentz, Brandy, Adam Levine, and Norah Jones
Classic 1979 Albums
ABBA's "Voulez-Vous"
Pink Floyd's "The Wall"
Michael Jackon "Off the Wall"
The Clash "London Calling"
Fleetwood Mac "Tusk"
The B-52s "The B-52s"
Hot New Products
Trivial Pursuit the game, and The Sony Walkman which cost a fortune at $200 (reminder: average monthly rent in '79 was only $280 for Americans) and more...
MORE 1979 FLAVOR
Click on the photo to embiggen this random collection of magazine covers. How will 2036 people of the future know what was popular in 2015 the way we know what was popular in 1979 without the easy reference point of magazine covers? Tumblr & Personal Blogs & Big Websites are so daily and ephemeral, archives constantly vanishing with redesigns and relaunches
(I seriously can't get over Sam Elliott's pornstache. Or how young both Isabelle Huppert & Isabelle Adjani are on the cover of Paris Match! Or that People magazine ran an Olivia Newton-John on roller skates cover well before Xanadu arrived. While doing random google searches for covers from this year Robin Williams, Margaret Thatcher (of all people) and various Charlie's Angels were inescapable.)
BORN IN 1979
The Few The Proud The Oscar Nominees
Rosamund Pike (Gone Girl), Sarah Polley (Away From Her, Stories We Tell), Heath Ledger (R.I.P.)
Awesome Art House Auteurs
Sebastián Silva (The Maid, Nasty Baby), Jamie Travis (The Saddest Boy in the World, The Armoire)
More Directors
Lake Bell (In a World...), Neill Blomkamp (Chappie, District 9), Josh Boone (The Fault in Our Stars), Jon M Chu (Step Up 2 & 3)
Perfect Physical Specimens Created in Lab To Make Everyone Else Feel Ugly
Chris Pratt, Rosario Dawson, Nate Parker, Jesse Bradford, Morena Baccarin, Daniel Henney, Maggie Q, Adam Brody, Andrew W Walker, Mike Vogel, and many more from these other categories...
World Cinema
Sarah Bayet (Iran), Anders Danielsen Lie (Norway), Hani Furstenberg (Israel), Ludivine Sagnier (France), Doona Bae (Korea), Tang Wei (China), Zhang Ziyi (China), Alba Rohrwacher (Italy), Diego Luna (Mexico), Yehuda Levi (Israel), Lisa Loven Kongsli (Norway), Noomi Rapace (Sweden), Agnieszka Grochowska (Poland)
People Who Aren't Claustrophic
Lee Pace, Luke Evans
Bond Girls & Superheroes
Olga Kurylenko "Camille", Berenice Marlohe "Severine", James McAvoy "Professor X", Shawn Ashmore "Iceman", Brandon Routh "Superman," "Todd Ingram," & "The Atom"
Whatever Happened To...?
Giuseppe Andrews, Mena Suvari, Ariana Richards, Chris Klein, and Nick Stahl
Recently Caught Scene Stealing...
Natasha Lyonne (in anything. Bless), Riki Lindhome, Chris O'Dowd, Kevin Hart, and James Ransone (so funny in Tangerine, one of this year's true must-see films)
Felt So Terrible For Him When He Got Beaten Up, Then Tied Up, Then Blown to Smithereens in Daredevil
Matthew Blumm
Tom Hardy's Stunt Double
Jacob Tomuri ... you know he more than earned his paycheck on Mad Max Fury Road !
Mr Emily Blunt
John Krasinski
Big On TV
Claire Danes (Homeland, My So Called Life), Busy Phillips (Cougar Town, Freaks & Geeks), Travis Fimmel (Vikings, Tarzan), Caitriona Balfe (Outlander), Aaron Paul (Breaking Bad), Vincent Kartheiser (Mad Men), Jayma Mays (Glee), Rutina Wesley (True Blood), Jennifer Carpenter (Dexter), Rick Gonzalez (Reaper), Nick Stevenson (Orange is the New Black), Scott Porter (Friday Night Lights), and Juliet Rylance (The Knick)
I Don't Get It
Stars whose appeal mostly escapes me. You may (probably do) feel differently...
Jason Momoa, Evangeline Lilly, Alison Lohman, Kate Hudson
Comedy Queens
Mindy Kaling, currently seeking a new (Mindy) Project, Tituss Burgess ("Pinot Noir | Caviar | Myanmar
| Mid-sized car ♫" ), and Rose Byrne (and who knew she'd prove so masterful in this genre when she came to fame with such glum-face drama?!)
Voice work pays, people
Laura Dickinson, Josh Keaton
Queen of Twitter, Broadway Royalty, and Should Be Roughly 100 Times More Famous Than She Is... Someone Give Her a Movie Musical!
Laura Benanti who is even great in terrible shows like Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown
Happy Birthday to anyone reading who was born in 1979!
P.S. Reminder: we're gearing up for the Supporting Actress Smackdown of 1979 in less than a fortnight (Sunday June 7th - new date due to unforseen issues off-blog) and your votes are required. Readers are the final collective Panelist as you know. So make sure to get your votes in by June 4th. (If it's close readers can and do tip the scales.) How do you vote? Send us an email with your vote of 1 to 5 hearts on each of the Supporting Actress nominees of 1979 (only the performances you've seen please, no cheating). We'll announce the panel and the rest of this seasons Smackdown years in two days.
Reader Comments (31)
Scott Lang, the Ant-Man they're making a movie about, is also a 1979 debut.
Such a lot of talent it makes me feel proud to have been alive. ;-)
People Who Aren't Claustrophic...LOL
Pushed to June 7th??? You want me to die in the meantime???
Anyway, I'll sound like a granny but music used to be so good, right? Look at those singles and albums!
Kramer vs. Kramer was number one at the box office?
San Fran -- yep, in todays' dollars it was literally exactly as big a hit as AMERICAN SNIPER -- people were obsessed with it. very zeitgeisty.
peggy sue -- sorry. couldn't be helped.
"People Who Aren't Claustrophobic" - Brilliant!
I was 12 in 1979, and saw "Kramer Vs. Kramer" with my alcoholic manic depressive Grandmother. She was certainly a factor in my parents' divorce a few years later.
Roller Boogie was big thing in 1979, with the knee high socks on giant roller skates.
Jason Mamoa... it's the muscles, and the chest hair on the muscles, and the muscular chest hair.
I also remember jogging being a hot trend, thanks to Bo Derek and Farrah running everywhere sans bras, and playing with Star Wars and Simon the Light Memory Game. And Kermit showed up at the Oscars!
Siskel and Ebert both ranked "Hair" that highly? Don't get me wrong, I'm a fan, but I was under the impression it was panned at the time.
Dave S -- that surprised me too. especially since neither of them included ALL THAT JAZZ so they had some questionable taste in the state of the movie musical that year.
That comic is hilarious.
Manhattan and Tusk were follow-ups that were better than the originals! I often wonder if my favorite Stevie Nicks song is "Storms" or "Sara," but they're both from that same album.
And when it comes to 1979, no one will ever forget Ole Marsha in Chapter Two... wait a sec.
Also, anybody else really enjoy Being There? Such an engrossing performance by Peter Sellers. Haven't seen Kramer vs. Kramer in forever, but I bet I'd be upset it meant Sellers missed an Oscar win.
This was a great time for movies. I concur with your favorites. It is amazing how many of these titles would no longer be green lit by major studios today! I can recall very clearly how Streep went from unknown to super famous in Manhattan and Kramer. She was a babe but would she be a cultural success if she was starting out today? I think not unless it was as a supporting character on Mad Men or House of Cards, and unless she got her nose and teeth fixed like all of today's starlets, no movie roles.
MM - I am intrigued by "Being There" but keep postponing it due to a severe Peter Sellers allergy. I'm on the wrong side of history, but I mainly know him for his mugging, weird accent work, and inspiring most of Mike Myers' and Sascha Baron Cohen's worst impulses.
Wonderful post! So much of it took me back, that's a great question about magazine covers and twenty years from now. They really are/were a snapshot of their time.
Oh my God!! The North Avenue Irregulars! Cloris! Barbara Harris! KAREN VALENTINE!! It's not really a good film but I loved it at the time.
I had no idea JoBeth Williams was president of SAG.
I long for the days when a film like Kramer vs. Kramer could end up at #1 at the box office.
My brother was born in 1979. I was born in 1982. It seems neither of us could escape the relevancy of Streep: Supporting Actress (1979); Actress (1982).
"Time After Time", in which H. G. Wells follows Jack the Ripper from Victorian London to modern day San Francisco via his Time Machine, will be on TCM Thursday night at 645 Pacific Time. It's on Siskel's 10 Best List.
Hair is my personal favorite of 1979, but I would never call it the best* film of the year. And I also remember its mixed reviews, so Siskel & Ebert's rankings are surprising if gratifying.
*The Deer Hunter, Manhattan, The Marriage of Maria Braun, Nosferatu
"She was a babe but would she be a cultural success if she was starting out today?" (asked Jono)
See Chastain, Jessica ('10s); Kidman, Nicole ('00s and on); Blanchett, Cate ('90s and on)...
I *live* for that still from MAD Magazine. Your website never ceases to amaze me.
Now I'm sad about Aaliyah all over again.
1979 Awesome Debut: My Brilliant Career.
Debut of director Gillian Armstrong
Debut of actress Judy Davis
I think the third actress on the Paris Match cover with Adjani and Huppert is Marie-France Pisier.
1979 was indeed a great year. I didn't particularly care for Kramer but it was the year I fell in with Sally Field, Meryl and Bette Midler.
Still haven't seen Being There but it isn't because of any 'allergy' towards Sellers. He was brilliant in Strangelove and the laugh out loud The Party.
And music wise? Well Abba released the brilliant Voule Vous and we got to enjoy Donna Summer, Chic, Gloria Gaynor and Village People.
Such great memories. And what great work researching this.
That Playboy cover featuring Racquel Welch appears to have been scribbled over.
Random thoughts:
*I'm still waiting for another great Diane Lane performance a la Unfaithful.
*Sweeney Tood is one of the rare musicals whose second act I enjoy as much as or more than the first.
*All but one of the year's top-ten songs are those with which I'm familiar, which begs the question of whether or not that will be the case with future generations regarding current pop music. (I have no clue who anyone is anymore.)
*Off the Wall is arguably MJ's best album.
*You just reminded me that I desperately want to see Brandy's take on Roxie Hart in Chicago before she departs.
*My "I just don't get it": Chris Pratt.
Nathaniel, thank you for this awesome writeup! 1979 was one of the happiest of my childhood. So many great memories. My all-time favorite album--Tusk--came out. The music was fast and fun. A flurry of great concerts. I saw The China Syndrome three times at the theater. But I also found such cinematic atrocities as Prophecy and Nightwing entertaining. Summer can make anything great when you're young. And the future Oscar nominees had extraordinary diversity.
And significantly, my beloved Marsha Mason was riding high--Chapter Two and Promises In the Dark resulted in 2 Golden Globe noms.
Also, David Cronenberg's The Brood, his own version of Kramer vs. Kramer. Or so the story goes in retrospect
I love this article! Brings back a flood of memories. I was 12 in 1979 and the movies from these lists I remember seeing in cinema were Amityville Horror, Star Trek and The Muppet Movie. I was obsessed with Amityville. I read the book and I made my mum take me to see it.
My other obsession that year was a young up and coming NIDA graduate American/Australian actor by the name of Mel Gibson. That year he played Max for the first time. I was definately too young to see that, though I did beg mum to take me. Instead we saw him in the adaptation of Colleens McColloughs Tim. Mum and I also saw Gillian Armstrong's My Brilliant Career. I read both these books before seeing the movies. I was a precocious reader :)
Wait... Norma Rae won a golden globe for Best Comedy?!?
Mike -- no. (comedy) was meant to denote the next section just as (drama) before it. The movies with asterisks were the winners in drama & comedy. sorry i guess it reads confusing.
Oh, that makes sense. I misread - and was properly offended there for a bit.
1979 really was a wonderful year for pop culture in general (I was a teenager at the time). This really takes me back! (and it doesn't even mention all the great horror movies that came out then: Alien, Phantasm, & The Brood, as well as less-great but interesting things like the Frank Langella as Dracula).
Comparing the top box office films back then to those of recent years, you really see how the culture has changed, and not for the better. Popcorn movies above all else. It's sad.
That Jobeth Williams Kramer vs. Kramer pic is incorrect she didn't have both of her arms covering both of her privates she had both of her arms only covering her boobs and she left her vagina exposing to the little boy ya people need to repaint the picture how it was with her vagina showing to the kid.