March 15 was a special day for movies in 1972.
First and foremost was the theatrical release of "The Godfather," which ranks second only to "Citizen Kane" on the American Film Institute's list of the top 100 movies of the last 100 years.
Over the years, many of Hollywood's most famous actors appeared in movies with gangster themes — Edward G. Robinson, James Cagney, Humphrey Bogart — but "The Godfather" and its first sequel, "The Godfather Part II," were, far and away, the best, the most realistic depictions of organized crime ever brought to the big screen. I think that is something about which you will encounter no argument.
Perhaps nothing illustrated the brutal nature of the "business" like the scene in which Michael (played by Al Pacino) kills one of his father's rivals and the rival's bodyguard, forcing him to flee the country.
In 1972, an R rating tended to mean that a film contained nudity. Violence alone did not usually lead to an R (for restricted) rating unless it was excessive and graphic. The violence in "The Godfather" was both; hence, the R rating. There was some very brief nudity in "The Godfather" — and, in 1972, that alone might have been enough to earn the R rating it received — but the nudity only amounted to a couple of seconds in a film that was nearly three hours long. I'm sure the violence and profanity in the film played greater roles.
"Slaughterhouse Five," which also was released on this day in 1972, had an anti–war theme and it did, as a result, have some violent scenes, but nothing remotely comparable to "The Godfather." In the early 1970s, "Slaughterhouse Five" was somewhat notorious for its nudity — specifically, the nudity of Valerie Perrine, who played a character named Montana Wildhack and showed her breasts and her butt in what was considered (at the time) quite daring for a mainstream movie.
On March 15, 1972, I was much too young to see either film without an adult, but I saw both of them later. I first saw "The Godfather," as I recall, when I was in college and one of the TV networks ran edited versions of "The Godfather" and "The Godfather Part II" back to back. I was impressed, even though the more graphic scenes were either cut entirely or dramatically toned down.
Later, I saw the unedited versions on home video. They took my breath away.
I actually saw "Slaughterhouse Five," the story of a man who comes "unstuck in time," at a theater. It was showing at an old drive–in theater, which was still clinging to life (but just barely) in my hometown when I got my driver's license, and I persuaded my best friend to see it with me.
That is a night that I doubt that I will ever forget.
Before I proceed, there is something you have to understand about my hometown in Arkansas and its movie theaters — it was not uncommon for any movie, even one that was a hit, to take a couple of years to make its appearance there. When I was growing up, there were two places to see movies in my hometown — the theater downtown (one screen, old–fashioned marquee out front, racially segregated seating) and the drive–in on the outskirts of town. Neither tended to show first–run films. If one wanted to see a first–run film, it was necessary to drive to Little Rock and see it there.
Eventually, my hometown caught up with the rest of the civilized world and a multiple–screen theater ("multiple," in this case, meaning "two") opened, bringing with it first–run films.
But, when I was a new driver and I talked my friend into going to the drive–in with me to see "Slaughterhouse Five," it had been several years since it first appeared on America's movie screens. We were a couple of teenagers who knew little about the movie, other than the fact that we had heard that Valerie Perrine could be seen naked, and we went, primarily in hopes of satisfying our budding sexual curiosities. We also went because we knew we could smoke at the drive–in so, even though it was February, we went to the drive–in on a Saturday night.
The story, in which the protagonist, named Billy Pilgrim, bounces back and forth in time and is abducted by aliens from the planet Tralfamadore, where he and Perrine exist as residents of a celestial zoo, was somewhat hard for us to follow. So we mostly smoked and chatted while we waited for the few (and brief) scenes in which portions of Perrine's anatomy could be seen.
To this day, the smell of lighter fluid instantly transports me back to that night, when we sat shivering in my old secondhand car and watched a movie that neither of us really understood.
In hindsight, the evening might have been more enjoyable if I had read the Kurt Vonnegut book upon which the movie was based. I actually did read the book years later, and I watched the film again, as an adult. Having read the book, I could appreciate the task that director George Roy Hill (who made it between "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid" and "The Sting") had undertaken in bringing Vonnegut's black comedy to the screen.
Movie audiences saw two very different yet influential films for the first time on this day 38 years ago.
