Special effects will always be an important part of the film industry.  In the 1970’s, progress was being made pertaining to special effects.  It wasn’t until later, in the 70’s, when Star Wars came out and wowed their audience with the advanced technology that took place in the film.  Then, in the 1980’s, there were large improvements being made with visual effects.  A lot of the films in this time took place in the future.  Films such as Blade Runner, E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, and Clash of Titans were what showed the advancements in visual effects.  In addition, the 70’s were a time when the strict requirements on content in films such as language, adult content, sexuality, and violence became looser.  Then, once it transitioned into the 80’s, there were no major advancements made, just refining what was already there.

In 1972, Solaris by Andrei Tarkovsky was produced.  Tarkovsky had a tragic childhood that deeply affected him.  The childhood he had has been shown through his films, one being Mirror.  His mother wanted him to be educated in the field of art and music, so he got into one of the highest Universities in Russia and put into the program for film directing.  When Andrei was in school, “The early Khrushchev era offered new opportunities for young film directors. Before 1953, annual film production was low. After 1953, more films were produced, many of them by new directors. The Khrushchev Thaw opened Soviet society and allowed, to some degree, Western literature, films and music. It gave to Tarkovsky the chance to see films of the Italian neorealists, French New Wave, and of directors such as Kurosawa, Buñuel, Bergman, Bresson. These directors became a very important influence for Andrei” (Biography). This was extremely beneficial for Andrei and his development as a director.  So, in 1972, when he created Solaris, he did not focus on the same aspect the novel took, but on man and his conscience.  In the video below, the film, Solaris, is pulled apart and examined.  It focuses on the ideas of the past, present, and reflection.  Another source, Roger Ebert, also wrote a critique on the film.  He speaks of his experience with the film, “I saw his 1972 film ‘Solaris’ at the Chicago Film Festival that year. It was my first experience of Tarkovsky, and at first I balked. It was long and slow and the dialogue seemed deliberately dry. But then the overall shape of the film floated into view, there were images of startling beauty, then developments that questioned the fundamental being of the characters themselves, and finally an ending that teasingly suggested that everything in the film needed to be seen in a new light. There was so much to think about afterwards, and so much that remained in my memory.”  There has been many movies about space, but, at the time, Tarkovsky remade Solaris after 2001: A Space Odyssey was produced in 1968, “Kubrick’s film is outward, charting man’s next step in the universe, while Tarkovsky’s is inward, asking about the nature and reality of the human personality” (Ebert).  This also shows a change with time as the type of approach directors choose to take when looking into the future, or space.   Lastly, William Carroll spoke on the film’s behalf as well, “Tarkovsky regularly takes us to task on such fundamentally upsetting ideas, challenging the fact that we may not be the centre of everything after all. We may not even be the edges, but rather some subatomic notion of everything. Solaris is a film that doesn’t just stagger and confound with its visual beauty and striking set design, but the ideas behind every frame add up to far more than the constituent parts. It is not simply the magnum opus of an acclaimed director, but the benchmark against which all sci-fi should be held accountable. No film before or since has placed such devastatingly human ideas into a place so devoid of life.”  As shown, this article also talks of the big picture this film paints, broadening your perspective on human life” (Little White Lies).

Then, in 1986, Blue Velvet, was directed by David Lynch.  This neo-noir film got its name from the famous song Blue Velvet, that was covered by Bobby Vinton.  This song is also sung for a scene in the film as well.  Lynch attended college at the Corcoran School of Art in Washington, D.C where he took art classes.  He then went abroad to further his education.  David then began to study film in the late 60’s.  When first directing Blue Velvet, the budget was $10 million, but David chose to cut his salary and budget in order to have “complete artistic control” (20 facts on Blue Velvet).  In addition, for him to have complete control, the film was not allowed to be longer than two hours.  The budget ended up becoming $6 million and 120 minutes long.  Blue Velvet does not take the same approach as Solaris.  Instead, this film focuses on solving crime.  The story line of this film, like Solaris, is quite intricate, in addition to the cinematographer and producer’s design.  One source is from Paul Attanasio, who gives his take on the film, “When the calm is shattered, it’s broken by daring images. Jeffrey’s father has a seizure on the front lawn, and the camera not only follows him down, it tunnels into the grass for an insect’s-eye view of chaos; when Jeffrey finds the ear, Lynch has his camera travel into the ear, as the sound, magnified as well, crashes and echoes like a conch shell as big as the Ritz” (Washington Post).  This echoes the point made earlier, that the 80’s refined what was already given to them.  Another source, from The New York Times, was written by Ben Brantley.  Brantley talked of how the film made him feel the first time seeing it, “I can still feel the excitement of its darkness wrapping around me, like a blanket at bedtime on a night you just know your dreams are going to take you someplace new. I had walked into the theater a naïf, and left bruised and confused and elated. And how I would love to feel that way again about a movie, and to see it in the same state of unsullied expectation.”  I believe being able to connect with your audience is extremely important.  You want to be able to make them feel something while watching a movie because the audience is what makes a film successful.  So, if, as a director, you are able to make somebody feel deeply toward your film, then you are successful.   David Lynch was also interviewed on behalf of his film, starting off with his successes and other films directed by him.  As the interview goes on, Lynch speaks about why he chose the strange sickness to show in Blue Velvet and how it relates to his own life.  He wanted to expose the real world that was hidden.  This idea is also seen in Solaris.

Although Solaris and Blue Velvet do not go hand and hand with one another, they still have similar points.  Blue Velvet focuses on the crime aspect while Solaris focuses on the human mind and goes about it in a way that makes the viewers think a lot.  Watching these two movies, and seeing the extreme differences in the themes makes me wonder if the changes in movies, such as these, are due to ‘internal’ developments, by changes in business practices, by ‘external shocks’, or by changes in society and politics which movies may reflect or hide.