Monday
May142018
Smackdown '70 Companion Podcast Pt 1: "MASH" and "Airport"
Monday, May 14, 2018 at 9:10AM 
Nathaniel R welcomes Mark Blankenship, Dan Callahan, Denise Grayson, Lena Houst, and Bobby Rivers to talk 1970 at the movies
Pt 1 (35 minutes)
You've read our takes on the five Supporting Actress nominees of 1970, now let's talk the movies they're in. On the first half of the podcast we discuss "cheese with wings" Airport (1970) and what it wrought at the movies and the Oscars. Who was the MVP among its actresses: Helen Hayes? Maureen Stapleton? Jean Seberg? Jacqueline Bisset? We then turn our attention to another smash hit M*A*S*H (1970) and both its modern filmmaking and its misogyny.
You can listen to the podcast here at the bottom of the post or download from iTunes. Continue the conversations in the comments, won't you?
Reader Comments (8)
Nathaniel, tweet the Smackdown link with the 5 faces togerther so we can RT!!!
Got it! FAV + RT. This Smackdown was the best!
Thanks for this - I'm not a huge fan of either of these films but these panelists provided so many thoughtful insights, and I greatly enjoyed the mention of so many things that reminded me of this or that bit of film-related history (Jean Seberg, Susan Anspach's son, etc.).
Btw, while none of the Airports are great films, I'll always be a fan of Airport '77 for the sheer number of classic forms/devices they wrote into one suspense/disaster movie (air disaster + sea disaster + heist film + plus the they're all trapped together thing + almost everyone gets their own entrance, as they board the plane - and I could go on and on) + Olivia de Haviland + Lee Grant memorably playing I don't know how many boozy, loud, sad cliches simultaneously. I'm not saying it's good - but it's kind of a wonder.
Poor Jean Seberg! She battled depression for so long. At least she had the best hair cut ever in a movie (yes, I mean À bout de souffle).
Curious no one mentioned the 80's as a decade with many elderly actors wining Oscars at the very end of their careers. Some very deservedly and others....
Poor Jean Seberg is right. Listening to this podcast (not to mention Karina Longworth's brilliant You Must Remember This podcast season, Jean & Jane), it is sad to think for Jean Seberg that Airport was the swan song of her big-time Hollywood film career. She looked lovely in Airport and in Paint Your Wagon from the year before, but was already deeply troubled by the late '60s and reportedly only did this movie because of the money it afforded her to indulge her causes. She would not survive the '70s sad to say.
Terrific discussion of two films I have very different feelings about.
I LOVE Airport-I know that much of it is "cheese with wings" but I could care less about that. It's got a star of some magnitude in virtually every role (some that weren't even planned-keep an eye out and you'll see Marion Ross as one of the random passengers-she's the one asking for a blanket after the bomb goes off). True they give performances of varying degrees of quality but no one is flat out bad-Jean Seberg did it for the money and hated both the movie and her part but she isn't hopelessly awful and Lancaster is phoning it in for much of the picture but he's very present in his scene with Dana Wynter-a nice little vignette of a troubled marriage and is delightful in his scene with Helen Hayes. Most of all it has the great Stapleton (along with Van Heflin getting deep into their characters as the hard luck Guerreros) and a wonderfully chic Jacqueline Bisset who also finds more in her character than would have seemed to be on the page. It's certainly better than any of the sequels though as ScottC said Airport '77 has that everything but the kitchen sink quality and Lee Grant having a blast as a total bitch.
On the other hand my revisit to M*A*S*H was a disappointment. Some of that surely comes from having watched the TV show on a regular basis so the characters came across as sketchy and under-formed and then its very leering and demeaning view of women. After having seen it now I doubt that I'll ever return to it.
I think because I so dreaded watching Airport that the lower expectations lead to be pleasantly surprised. I mean, it's not GOOD, but it was entertaining from the time-capsule angle. Those split screens! At one point they divided the screen into five sections! Hilarious. The clothes, the hair, the ridiculous plotlines - it all worked for me. But I wouldn't see it again.
Glad there's a strong consensus on the misogyny of MASH. I was worried it would barely be mentioned by only a few people. The whole movie isn't really my thing, so even without that aspect I wouldn't have liked it, but that really soured me on it. And god, could that stupid football game go on any longer?
Always enjoy an Oscar podcast, but I was dismayed at how dismissive you were of the Best Song nominees especially since you didn't bother to listen to them. "For All We Know", the winner, was recorded by the Carpenters and went to #3 on the charts. Barbara Streisand (and others) went on to record "Pieces of Dreams", Shirley Bassey recorded a great version of "Till Love Touches Your Life" and "Whistling Away the Dark" was the best thing about "Darling Lili". "Thank Your Very Much" is fun in the context of the movie.