Mer Rouge (Part 36)

Sound asleep in his bottom bunk, Moses shook him awake. “Sumthin’s happenin,” he whispered. Hutch lifted his head groggy eyed. “Sumthin’s always happenin’,” he told his bunk mate. Moses slapped him across the face. “No fool! This is serious! Simpson and Fornier are running around like a bunch of crackheads!”

Hutch threw the covers off him and approached the bars to see what Moses was bitching about. He could hear some commotion towards the front office as other inmates were waking up to listen. “Is this unusual?” he asked Moses. 

“Shhh! Shut the fuck up! I can’t hear!”

A minute or two later, Fornier busted the door open into the cellblock. He was drenched in sweat with stains around his pits and man tits and he was carrying a shotgun. “Alright everyone, listen up,” he announced cordially, “any minute now you might hear a ruckus. Like some gunshots and whatnot. I assure you that it’s nuthin to worry about it and the situation is under control. If a fire breaks out, just sit tight. It’ll get taken care of shortly. Get some rest and we’re gonna have a good day tomorrow. It’ll be Sunday morning. The chaplain will be here and we’ll get extra pudding. Alright, sleep tight fellas.” Then the office door slammed shut.

“What the fuck man!” another inmate shouted down the hall.

Moses scratched his head and furrowed his brow. “Oh lord, this is bad,” he said.

“What do you mean?” Hutch asked.

“What do you mean ‘what do I mean’? Did you not hear what he said?!”

“He said it was under control.”

“You can’t be that dense.”

“What? A few gunshots? They’re probably shooting at some criminals. We’re criminals too! Relax! We’re safe!”

“I should beat some sense into you. Not just gunshots but fires too! Mother fucker, if this place catches on fire, we’re trapped behind these bars! They ain’t comin to rescue us!”

Hutch brushed it off. “Ehh,” he said. “He was just being hyperbolic.”

“I don’t know how the hell you know what that word means. But a fire ain’t nuthin to take lightly. Especially round here.”

“Why? Fires start a lot around here?”

“You’re goddamn right they do!”

Meanwhile, about five hundred yards behind the sheriff’s department, there was a parish road running east to west. Only the intermittent glow of fireflies provided any light. Oren and the Priest cut off the lights to their stolen Toyota Selica Supra. It was dark brown and wasn’t easily seen from the road. Oren was driving. The Priest was looking through a pair of binoculars at the large barren field separating them and the sheriff’s station. “See anything?” asked Oren.

“Nah. Not even a deer turd.”

Oren kept his hands clasped around the steering wheel. He took in the smell of the brand new upholstery. “How did you find this beauty?” he asked the priest.

“You don’t live as long as I do without learning a thing or two,” he told Oren without taking his eyes off the binoculars.

“So what do we do now?”

The priest panned the binoculars off to a thicket of wood just off to the left. “I reckon we outta hide the car,” he said. “Then we hunker down over in that thicket.”

TO BE CONTINUED…

007 First Light II: Second Light

Listen, I know I said that I wouldn’t talk about James Bond again until Denis Villeneuve announced the name and cast of the next film, but there’s a lot at stake here. Despite the talent and resources that Amazon has poured into the 007 franchise, I’m still bearish on its prospects. Disney did the same thing for Star Wars and look at what that got us. And before they got their hands on Star Wars, JJ Abrams and Alex Kurtzman torpedoed Star Trek. So all I’m saying is that we should prepare ourselves for the enshittification of yet another legacy IP. For 60 years prior, The Broccoli name, in addition to being behind the famous vegetable, rested on the quality and success of the James Bond franchise. That is no longer the case. Jeff Bezos’, Denis Villeneuve’s, Steven Knight’s, Amy Pascal’s, and David Heyman’s careers will all go on regardless of the success of the next production. In other words, James Bond is no longer a family operation. It’s now a product that can be bought and traded like any other commodity. So beware.

But, on a positive note, the first Bond video game in years has been overwhelmingly well received. And it should have. Whoever made it apparently spent $200 million to make it. I watched the first 13 minutes of it on YouTube. I’m not a gamer, so I can’t assess its quality as a game. But I guess the premise is that you play as James Bond, starting as a British SAS operator, on until he receives his license to kill from MI6. From what I saw, it didn’t feel like James Bond, but so what? I suppose the idea is to follow him from being James Bond, common pissant, to becoming James Bond 007.

There’s a lot of speculation over how much this video game is informing us on the future of the film franchise. And it shouldn’t come as a surprise that, in my personal view, watching the “birth” of James Bond 007 might make a good video game, but it would make a disastrous film concept. I’ll reiterate that James Bond has no beginning. He’s more myth than man. While No Time to Die controversially killed him at its conclusion, death is such a connecting theme across all the movies that I thought it was a fitting end to Daniel Craig’s tenure. While Casino Royale did show Bond briefly before he became 007, it was maybe three minutes of the total runtime and it was disconnected from the larger plot. Casino Royale also hinted at Bond being prior SAS, which would make sense, but should that aspect of his career be explored?

There’s a lot of problems with it. First off, Bond is a lone wolf. Being former military (I’m a veteran of World War Two AND One), I can tell you that Bond’s proclivity for winging it and ignoring orders whenever it damn well suits him wouldn’t go over well in any Army. And two, Bond is well educated and has an appreciation for the finer things in life. That alone wouldn’t prevent him being in the Army and/or Royal Navy, but, with all due respect to those who served, his posh lifestyle wouldn’t mesh with military culture. ADDITIONALLY, being Cambridge educated, he probably wouldn’t have been an enlisted grunt. He would have certainly entered military life as a commissioned officer. So James Bond as a troop commander? I mean, it makes more sense than seeing him as an enlisted piss ant. But even then, Bond would likely grow tired of this role, probably not understanding why his troops don’t have the same kill and survival skills that he has. In short, while a great filmmaker can make anything work, I think it’s best if we leave this aspect of James Bond’s life to the video games and not put it on the big screen.

But there’s something here that producers HAVE to get right. While there’s been many interpretations to the character, there’s something they all share: James Bond is a broken man. He’s not a moral man. If the winds have blown slightly differently, he would have been MI6’s enemy and not its hero. The franchise isn’t about tropes and cliches—the tux’s, the martinis, the women, or the gadgets—those are all distractions for both the audience AND for the character himself. Because James Bond at his core, for a lack of a better description, is suicidal. He’s nothing without the mission. Only danger provides any sense of comfort. Long before the SAS and long before MI6, James Bond made a wager on himself: It’s much more interesting to be alive than to be dead.

And whatever caused this gigantic hole in his soul can be hinted at. But it can never, ever, EVER be explored in great detail.

Somebody stop this man

I was having a good day. I had a good clean, 30 minute shit. Had some ice cream. Drank some coffee. Then I had another 30 minute shit. The only thing that could have ruined this day was learning that Niell Blomkamp was going to remake Starship Troopers.

https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/movies/movie-news/new-starship-troopers-movie-in-the-works-1236163598/

I don’t need to remind my audience that Paul Verhoeven went on an unholy terror through Hollywood from the late 80s through the 90s. He arguably made three of the greatest modern sci-fi classics: Robocop, Total Recall and Starship Troopers. Two of those movies have already been remade with iffy results I might add. Do they think the third time’s a charm?

I will say though that Blomkamp does have an it factor despite all his flaws. He understands the language of cinema, even though it has only came together once beautifully. And that was nearly 20 years ago with District 9. So in his defense, I would love to see Niell hit another one out of the park. I just wish it wasn’t Starship Troopers.

I mean, isn’t there another Robert Heinlein book he could make? I’m pretty sure there’s a wealth of material there.

But judging the politics of Blomkamp’s other films, I don’t suspect he’ll be embracing some of Heinlein’s more “fascistic” undertones. Yet that was the genius of Verhoeven’s satirical take. He didn’t really make us “judge” the morality of Heinlein’s work. He wanted us to either laugh at or be utterly horrified by it in the way that only the director of Robocop can do. It is, at face value, a reactionary film told from a reactionary perspective, except the audience is in on the joke. It was the correct take and Verhoeven threaded that needle perfectly.

Blomkamp, I fear, might go a little heavy handed with it. While I think he’s great with visuals and pacing, his weak spot is screenwriting. That’s a big one. Chappie and Elysium could have been great. But there was something lacking there that could have delivered an emotional punch had the script been cleaned up a bit. My hope is that he won’t overcomplicate things. Blomkamp is pretty damn good at giving us a fulfilling meal in an under two hour runtime. He doesn’t need to change that up now. Just keep it simple. No interwoven narratives; A leads to B which leads to C and so on, and it all culminates in a satisfying and emotional climax.

You’ve done it before, Neill. You can do it again.

Mer Rouge (Part 35)

The priest tossed the cigarette butt into the grass. Only the faded blue hues of the night sky lingered above. It was a bright crescent moon. “I reckon we outta head out soon,” the priest said. 

“Tonight?” asked Oren.

“Yup.”

“Well what’s the plan, Jack?”

He looked up to the sky to see the stars speckled against the black void as he stroked his beard. “I don’t suppose I have much of one,” the priest said. “Them two boys are slippery as a snake. It don’t do to make a plan. Just stay one step ahead of em’”

“Any ideas?”

“Just one. We scope out the sheriff’s department. That’s where you’re brother and Fornier probably are. The Nine certainly know that. If there’s a time to strike, it would be tonight.”

Oren nodded. “You think we can get him outta there?”

“Who?”

“My brother.”

“Well, if them boys fuck enough shit up, we could probably bust him out without anyone noticing.”

“Will he be a fugitive?”

“Dunno. He’ll be either that or presumed dead, especially if they burn the place down. Either way, he’ll be better out here than in there.”

“What are you gonna do after you kill em?”

“They ain’t whom I’m after.”

“Castor?”

“Yup.”

The sound of crickets filled the long pause. Oren was still holding the .38 in his hand. He held it up and looked at it. “I ain’t never killed anyone,” he said.

“Don’t worry about it,” the priest told him. “They haven’t been alive for a long time. They’ve only been delaying the inevitable.”

“And what about you?”

The priest said nothing to that. He checked his 12 gauge Mossberg and slung a satchel of ammunition over his shoulder. Oren didn’t know what to do with the .38. “So I’ve been wondering,” he said. “If I shot you, you wouldn’t die?”

“Is that what you’ve been thinking about all day?” the priest asked him.

Oren only replied with a smirk.

“There’s only one way to find out for sure,” the priest said. He faced Oren head on and spread his arms out like an open target. Oren froze. “If you want to know what it’s like to shoot someone, here’s your chance,” the priest taunted.

Oren lifted and aimed the pistol. He squeezed the trigger the bullet whizzed past the Priest’s head. It was exhilarating. The priest checked himself to make sure he wasn’t hit. “You know what,” he said, “maybe you should take the shotgun.”

They exchanged weapons and as the priest turned around and walked back towards the church, Oren lifted the shotgun and blasted one round in his direction. The priest winced and grabbed the back of his neck where a few pieces of shrapnel hit him. “Jesus Christ!” he screeched. Oren was momentarily stunned. He ran up to the priest. “Oh fuck! I’m sorry!”. But the priest looked at his blood covered hand and cursed. “Bullets can’t kill me but they certainly hurt like shit, you fuckin asshole!”

TO BE CONTINUED…

I need to formally apologize

It appears that my man Paul “Shreddin” Schrader, the greatest screenwriter of all time, has crossed over into the technological abyss. First he discussed his “AI girlfriend”, which, honestly, if you know anything about Schrader, it doesn’t shock me that he had one. But now he has seemingly embarrassed the writing community by embracing AI use in the craft of screenwriting. For neo-Luddites like myself, this is a sad day. Paul might as well have been the last soldier to cross the Rubicon. So the die is cast, folks. It’s now you, me, and the human soul versus Hollywood and the billionaire-technological complex.

Of course my opinions have evolved over time regarding AI. If you recall, my initial reaction to it was kinda ambivalent. To be more precise, I actually found it humorous. I simply chalked it up to a dumb computer program designed to say stupid shit for our amusement exclusively. I never thought that people would use it for legitimate purposes like research, brain storming, and for real and honest creativity. But that’s what The Man wants. They want to slowly chip away at our god-given capacity for reasoning and creative thought. They want to eradicate the soul itself and replace it with a far more malleable software to replace human ingenuity. In short, They want you dumb and under their thumb. Sadly, this was apparent to me when ChatGPT arrived, but I woefully underestimated how aggressively this technology would be promoted and deployed.

The sad part is that even if AI never fully rivals human intelligence, its damage will leave a very real scar. Data centers and their tyrannical demand for land, power, and water will only pile on to the ecological disaster that is the 21st century. So think about that the next time you ask Claude to write a Mad Men script where Don Draper pitches armed robbery while COMMITTING armed robbery. Think about the water you’re wasting.

We, as writers and artists, have a moral imperative to reject artificial intelligence. Save creative integrity. Save the earth. And for god sake, save the human soul.

Mer Rouge (Part 34)

At the abandoned St. Chyrsostom Church, the Priest witnessed the sun descend below the thicket of trees which were aligned along the bayou horizon. Behind the church, Oren held the .38 service revolver and aimed it at a full can of baked beans resting on top of a tree stump roughly 20 yards in front of him. He squinted his right eye and pulled the trigger. The bullet nicked the right side and tomato beans oozed out of the can. He adjusted and tried again. The next bullet struck the top surface of the stump and ricocheted onto the can and knocked it into the weeds. Oren nodded. “I’m not such a bad shot after all.”

“It’s gonna take more than bullets to kill the Nine,” the priest said as he rounded the corner.

“You mean those two guys?”

“Precisely. A gun might stop them momentarily. But it will take the harnessing of flames to defeat them.”

“So, you mean fire?”

“Yes. They’re an ancient breed—made immortal by the unholy water of a forsaken god. Water is indeed a powerful and sacred force. But its only rival is the flame, tapped into and harnessed by mankind as an affront to the spirit realm. This triggered a holy war between man and the gods. A war which persists to this day.”

“So you’re saying I need to light them on fire?”

“To put it bluntly, yes.”

“And how do you suggest I do that?”

“With great difficulty I must say. But it has been done. There’s a reason why there’s only two of them left, ya know? Though these two have persisted for a long time. A long, long time.”

“Since you know all of this, have you partaken in the drinking of this so-called unholy water?”

The priest smirked and looked away from Oren. “I was hopin you wouldn’t ask that,” he said.

“It was the only logical question, sir, whatever your name is.”

The priest gazed off to that deep sunset like gazing off into a faded memory. Then he dug into his fourth pack of cigarettes for the day and put one to his lips. “Shit’s gettin’ old,” he said as a plume of smoke rose before his eyes. “Supposedly mankind is to evolve into a higher state of being, like angels walking the earth. That’s what history has told us. But insofar as I can tell, man has been cursed and wretched since the day I first met one many years ago. Ain’t nothing changed. We’re just trading one field of shit for another. You see, the thing they don’t tell you about forever is that forever is a lonely place. You see one generation pass only to be replaced by another doomed cohort. It kinda makes you wonder what we’re clinging onto. But the worst part is the days pass into seconds and your friends become nothing more to your memory than a stranger passing in the night.”

“Sorry I asked,” Oren said.

TO BE CONTINUED…

Mer Rouge (Part 33)

Lines formed on his forehead as he chewed on his thumbnail. “Uh, when did this happen?”

“A couple of days ago. In downtown Vicksburg. Since you haven’t been by the house in a few days, I hadn’t had the chance to tell ya.”

“Okay, well, did they catch the guy who did it?”

“No. It was two men apparently.”

“Two men? No mention of a priest?”

“No. Why would a priest be involved?”

“Forget it. I don’t suppose they got a good look at the two men, did they?”

“I don’t think so.”

“Shit.”

“Also Jerry, a couple of Oak Ridge officers stopped by the house looking for you.”

It was all beginning to click. His heart sank to his feet and he struggled to get out his words. “Oak Ridge, eh? So uh, what do they want with me?”

“They said they was just needin to talk to ya.”

“What did you tell em?”

“I said I hadn’t seen you in a couple of days. I told em you’re usually at the jail on Saturday nights.”

Fornier’s hands began to shake. He opened the flask and emptied it into his mouth. Then he cleared his throat and attempted to end the conversation. “Alright, thanks Ma. Talk to you later..”

“Wait! Your father wanted me to tell you…,” but the phone was already nestled in its cradle. The deputy jumped to his feet, took out his keys, and unlocked the line of shotguns aligned along the office backwall. He took one out, dug through the cabinets, and loaded it with buckshots. Then he called Deputy Simpson in. “Take one of these,” he said to him, offering a shotgun.

“What the hell is going on?!” Simpson yelled.

“I just received a uh, terroristic threat to the jailhouse.”

“Well shouldn’t we call Dirk?”

“No!” Fornier shouted with an unexpected ferocity. Seeing the shocked expression on his partner’s face, Fornier took a breather. “It’s alright Simpson,” he explained calmly, “I can effectively neutralize the situation on my own. I just need you to sit up and be on the lookout.”

“For what exactly?”

“Anything suspicious. Radio me if you see sumthin. I’m gonna head out to the tool crib for a few minutes, okay? I won’t be long.”

Fornier bolted for the rear entrance, past the basketball court, and out towards the shed just beyond the gate. Once inside, he looked for anything flammable and threw all he could find into an undersized wheelbarrow. When he was finished, he rushed the wheelbarrow to the front of the jailhouse and as he did, crap would occasionally fall out of it. But once on the front porch, he dug through his gatherings.  He attempted to recall some tricks he learned from his ordinance days in Vietnam. Simpson stepped out onto the porch, shotgun in hand, and watched his fellow deputy move manically. “What the hell are you doing?” he asked him.

“Go back inside!” ordered Fornier. “Get me whatever munitions you can find!”

TO BE CONTINUED…

Mer Rouge (Part 32)

As evening settled in, Moses laid in his top bunk, hands clasped over his stomach and eyes closed. Below him, Hutch tossed and turned. Tears quietly flooded down his cheeks. Moses could feel his bunk mate’s anguish and tried to disregard it. Hutch watched the sun slowly settle through the barred windows that aligned the top wall and wiped away the tears on his sleeve. When the light completely faded, he called for his bunk mate. “Moses, you awake?” he softly called.

“Yeah.”

“What happened to you today?”

“Same ol bullshit.”

“They fuckin tortured me.”

“I know.”

“Are you from around here?”

“Mer Rouge?”

“Yeah.”

“Shit naw man.”

“Where do you come from?”

“All over.”

“Well where do you come from originally?”

Moses unclasped his hands and rubbed his face. “West Africa,” he said.

“West Africa? How the hell did you get to the states?”

“It’s a long goddamn story.”

“How long have you been here?”

“Why you asking so many questions man?”

Hutch rolled over to his side and placed his pillow under his head. “I’m just trying to forget where I am. That’s all.”

Regretting his tone, Moses took a deep breath. “I’ve wandered all over,” he said. “Egypt. The Middle East. Now how the hell did you make it to this shithole?”

“Well first, I clogged a shitter in Arkansas…”

Hutch’s explanation was rudely interrupted by a loud clanging from Deputy Fornier’s baton against the cell bars. “It’s dark out ladies!” he shouted. “You know what that means?! Lights out! So shut yur goddamn face hole and go to sleep!”. Hutch and Moses lifted the blankets over their heads and Fornier raised a flask to his lips as he wandered out of the cell block. Back in his office, he sat his fat ass down in the rolling chair. As he leaned back, he lowered his Stetson over his eyes. But right before he nodded off, the phone loudly sounded and he cursed as he lifted the hat back on his head. “Hello? Who the hell is this?” he shouted into the receiver. 

The voice on the other end shouted back with equal fervor. “Jerry! This is your mother!” 

“Ma! Why are you calling me here?”

“I’ve been trying to reach you for the last couple of days! Your cousin is dead, Jerry! They shot him all to hell and burned him up!”

TO BE CONTINUED…

All hornt up and no place to go (part I)

Folks, we are at a strange impasse in human affairs. All of us are in a state-of-emergency level of horniness and no one wants to fuck (except me, of course. I’ve never been horny in my life). This is not the future that any of us had envisioned. If Gene Roddenberry knew what was going on, he’d be rolling over in his grave. Personally, I find sex disgusting. Moreover, I think you should feel deep shame for desiring it. But this isn’t my problem to fix. That’s a burden that falls squarely on your shoulders, bucko. There are, of course, many reasons behind this phenomenon. Internet pornography, sedentary lifestyles, poor diets, being overworked, over stressed, etc etc which has led to a breakdown in social relationships between men and women. Which is why my solution is to shut down everything, fire everyone, and put the gays in charge because as of right now, only they have any sense of moral clarity. But naturally this breakdown has had its political repercussions. Of course, I’m talking about incels here, but I’m also speaking about young men being pushed into right wing spaces more broadly.

I’m not gonna rehash that bullshit here. Plenty of digital ink has been spilled on the subject. Instead, I wish to draw attention to an overlooked microcosm of this breakdown, and perhaps an unexpected one. I’m speaking, of course, of the YouTube ASMR community. For those who don’t know, well —one, listen up grandpa—but two, ASMR is those soft, gentle noises that helps one relax and often provides those inexplicable tingles that go up your back. People who provide these sounds, more often than not via YouTube, call themselves “ASMRtists”. Is it weird? On its surface, yes. And both ASMRtists and consumers are aware of that. To some degree or another, that’s part of its charm. HOWEVER, from my perspective, it’s mostly an innocent community DESPITE being just a hair away from being overtly sexual. It’s like an auditory massage where the masseuse can demonstrate their personality more freely. Can it be sexual? If you want it to be. But if you achieve an erection while listening, much like with getting a massage, than more than likely it’s due to a natural response rather than being totally aroused.

NOW, because this is an internet phenomenon, it was only a matter of time before this community became “pornified”, for lack of a better description. Did all the innocent material vanish from the interwebs? No. In fact ASMR, at least on YouTube, is still overwhelmingly innocent things like tapping, hair brushing, gum chewing, rambling, etc. But there are a number of creators, some popular, who tend to “push the boundaries”, so to speak. Personally, I don’t give a shit. But others believe this to be an abomination. Here’s one such fella:

https://youtu.be/NSncdClbX34?si=vvDfyoRh1fDFlzRN

If you can’t see the video, that’s a you problem. Just click the link.

First off, I respect this gentleman’s reverence for the ASMR community. Additionally, he has at least one good point. ASMR creators who break YouTube guidelines often end up harming other rule-abiding creators in the process. This was a huge problem at least a year ago. And he raises concerns about age and parental involvement. All valid points. Yet in my view, those aren’t his main concerns. His main concern is maintaining the purity of ASMR and the sanctity of YouTube as a platform.

He states that YouTubers who have sexualized ASMR have distorted the original purpose of ASMR. This is a common logical pitfall that falls apart immediately upon inspection. First off, who wrote the rules? Secondly, if parameters were ever established for ASMR, what’s the governing authority that decides the guidelines? Do ASMRtists have to be licensed? And thirdly, most importantly, what the fuck is ASMR? I know it’s an acronym that means something. But really, what is it? Is it a form of therapy? Is it performance art of some sort? We can’t even categorically define what ASMR is, let alone ascertain any sort of purpose. In short, there is no right or wrong way to do ASMR, other than provide some vague notion of relaxation, however defined by the individual consuming it.

Now onto YouTube itself. I get it. Some people spoil all the fun for others. As for protecting minors, it’s the same story. Parents should closely monitor what their kids view and share on the internet. I’m not fully up to date on YouTube guidelines, but perhaps there needs to be more stringent age verification measures. I dunno. Regardless, I fail to see any criminal intent on behalf of YouTubers putting heavy hints of sex in their videos. It’s funny how we get up in arms over the possibility of nudity and depictions of sex but hardly bat an eye when violent images come across our screen. But this fella goes on to state that if you’re looking to goon, you should go to a porn site. Fair enough but it honestly makes little difference. YouTube may be a “public space” on the internet, but it is not a public space in the real world. It’s not a bar. YouTube streams onto our devices, wherever we may be. We don’t stream onto it (unless you’re a creator). If me and another guy on the other side of the world are watching a video simultaneously—me with my pants on, and he with his pants off and dick out—him stroking his cock to the same thing I’m watching doesn’t affect me one iota. But if we were in a movie theater, it would be a way different story. And that’s a big difference. Masturbating in public is crime and it makes people uncomfortable, as where masturbating in the privacy of your own home to legal material is not. It only becomes weird if you start telling people what you’re jerking it to, either in person or on the internet, without being solicited.

Does that make sense?

(Continues in part II)

The 1970s All-Hollywood Team

After I tripped down a flight of stairs and hit my head, I suddenly wondered: what if filmmaking was more like the NFL?

Think about it. Fall down a flight of stairs if you have to. I know they say that art is subjective, unlike, say, NFL stats. But to that, I say poppycock! We know who the all-time greats are! So I thought it would be fun to create an all-time roster for the 1970s, using the all-decade template the NFL uses, switching out offensive and defensive positions for Oscar categories. Unfortunately, I’m not attuned enough to assess categories like “film editing,” “sound editing”, and “costume and production.” They will be left out. Also, like the NFL template, there will be a “First Team” and a “Second Team”.

Let’s get started!

The criteria for selection is a combination of Oscar wins/nominations+legacy. The latter, of course, is subjective (subject to my tastes specifically)

Cinematographer

First team-Vilmos Zsigmond (2x nomination. 1x winner). Notable works: McCabe and Ms. Miller, Deliverance, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, The Deer Hunter. A pioneer in naturalistic lighting. Widely recognized as one of the greatest cinematographers of all time.

Second Team- Owen Roizman. (3x nomination). Notable works: The French Connection, The Exorcist, The Taking of Pelham One Two Three, Network. Perhaps the greatest cinematographer to never win an Oscar. His work exemplified the gritty, documentarian style that defined the 1970s.

Film Composer

First Team: John Williams (13x nominated. 3x winner). Notable works: Fiddler on the Roof, Jaws, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Star Wars, Superman. Needs no introduction. Unquestionably the greatest film composer of all time.

Second Team: Jerry Goldsmith (8x nominated. 1x winner). Notable works: Patton, Chinatown, The Omen, Alien, Star Trek: The Motion Picture. Often considered the poor man’s John Williams, Goldsmith might’ve had a shot at being the GOAT hadn’t he and Williams’ careers blossomed simultaneously.

Screenwriter

First Team– Robert Towne (3x nominated. 1x winner). Notable works: The Last Detail, Chinatown, Shampoo (credited). The Godfather, Marathon Man, Heaven Can Wait (uncredited). The premier screenwriter and script doctor of the 1970s.

Second Team: John Milius (1x nominated) Notable works: Jeremiah Johnson, Magnum Force, Apocalypse Now (credited). Dirty Harry, Jaws (uncredited). Where he lacked in accolades, he made up for by writing the greatest lines of the 1970s, including the “Do I feel lucky, punk?” from Dirty Harry, the USS Indianapolis monologue in Jaws, and “I love the smell of napalm in the morning,” in Apocalypse Now.

Supporting Actress

*note: much like special teams in the NFL, being a supporting actor/actress play a key role in clinching a game or movie. While not as flashy as being in the starting lineup on offense or defense, a supporting actor has a special set of skills needed to make a film work. Sometimes they need to steal a scene. Sometimes they need to just read the lines. It’s for that reason why I’m including this as a separate category from Leading Actor/Actress.

First Team: Karen Black (1x nominated). Notable works: Five Easy Pieces, Airport 1975, Nashville, The Day of the Locusts. One of the great unsung actresses of her time. Could easily hold her own against some heavy hitters.

Second Team: Meryl Streep (2x nominated. 1x win). Notable works: Julia, The Deer Hunter, Manhattan, Kramer Vs. Kramer. Streep was only in five films during the 1970s, but her arrival on the big screen went off like a nuclear bomb. It was a sign of things to come.

Supporting Actor

First Team: Robert Duvall (2x nominated). Notable works: MASH, The Godfather Parts I and II, Network, Apocalypse Now. Bobby Duvall was slingin em in the 70s. The ultimate best supporting actor.

Second Team: Jason Robards (2x nominated. 2x wins). Notable works: The Ballad of Cable Hogue, Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid, All the President’s Men, Julia. Hey, he wouldn’t be the first I’d put on this list. But when you when back-to-back Oscars for supporting actor, that’s enough to get you on any team.

Actress

First Team: Jane Fonda (4x nominated. 2x winner) Notable works: Klute, Julia, Coming Home, The China Syndrome. Combined with her “Hanoi Jane” reputation, Jane Fonda is the undisputed champion of actresses for this decade.

Second Team: Faye Dunaway (2x nominated. 1x winner) Notable works: Little Big Man, Chinatown, The Towering Inferno, Three Days of the Condor, Network. A lot of actresses could have claimed this spot, but to me, the two marquee performances of the decade came from Dunaway in Chinatown and Network.

Actor

First Team: Jack Nicholson (4x nominated. 1x winner). Notable works: Five Easy Pieces, The Last Detail, Chinatown, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest. His Cheshire grin alone defined the decade.

Second Team: Al Pacino (5x nominated) Notable works: Godfather Parts I and II, Serpico, Dog Day Afternoon, …And Justice For All. The biggest mistake that the Academy made was not awarding Pacino an Oscar during the 1970s.

Director

First team: Francis Ford Coppola (3x nominated. 1x winner). Notable works: The Godfather Parts I and II, The Conversation, Apocalypse Now. Coppola absolutely DOMINATED this decade. No other auteur came close to matching his success.

Second Team: George Lucas (2x nominated). Notable works: THX 1138, American Graffiti, Star Wars. Hear me out. Only a handful of directors were nominated more than once in 1970s, among them are Coppola, Stanley Kubrick, Sidney Lumet, William Friedkin, and, against all reason, George Lucas. Not even Steven Spielberg and Martin Scorsese achieved that. Additionally, Star Wars essentially reshaped cinema. We are still living in its shadow. And it’s for that reason alone why George Lucas made the team.