British Films of the 1970’s

During the 1970’s movies experienced a recession, this hit both the American and British film industry. American studios tightened their production budgets state side. They also held a tighter grip on their financing of British films. Quality films were still produced during the 1970’s, movies such as Anne of a Thousand Days (although this was actually made in 1969), Billy Wilder’s The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes (1970) and Ryan’s Daughter (1970) but as the 1970’s progressed financing became harder to come by and big budget movies were still created but they seemed old fashioned by comparison to the American movies of that time.

Agatha Christie moves such as Murder on the Orient Express (1974) and the Death on the Nile (1978) were extremely popular. Other movies of the 1970’s gained notoriety and were noteworthy was The Clockwork Orange with Stanley Kubrick as the producer, screen writer and director. It received nominations for best picture, best director, best editing and best screenplay. This movie was classed as controversial along with Quadrophenia released at the end of the 1970’s. This probably contributed to their success. The Day of The Jackal which was released in 1973 qualifies as one of the best in its genre. It was nominated for an Oscar for Best Film Editing.

By the middle of the 1970’s the success that hammer horror movies had experienced in the sixties came to a close, newer American movies mad e the hammer movies seemed lame and old fashioned. There were attempts to make more competitive horror movies such as Captain Kronos, vampire Hunter and The Wicker Man, but were unsuccessful. As television became more popular some British producers moved to television production, they were able to take successful films such as Steptoe and Son and On the Buses and turn them into popular television series. Monty Python having a big success in television produced commercially successful movies in the 1970’s Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1975) and Monty Pythons Life of Brian (1979).

British Movies of the 1970’s also experienced some notoriety with the production of some low budget sex comedies, due to censorship rules relaxing; amongst these were the popular Confessions of series, which started with Confessions of a Window Cleaner which starred Robin Askwith. Toward the late 1970’s the movie industry saw the return of the Bond series, which continued to be very successful and eventually some American productions also returned to Britain, most notably Star Wars at Elstree Studios and the production of Superman at Pinewood Studios and then Aliens at Shepperton Studio proving that the British movie industry had made it through the recession of the 1970’s.