Peter Bogdanovich died in Los Angeles at 82. His career, underlines in the title theobituary of the New York Times, can make you think of a Hollywood drama, perhaps photographed in black and white just like his most important films: The last show (1971) e Paper moon (1973). The reasons for this association can be traced back to various considerations. Meanwhile, Bogdanovich’s devotion to old Hollywood, celebrated through his career as a film historian and critic. In the libraries of the good cinephile, his monographs and his interviews with great directors and actors, including Orson Welles, Robert Aldrich, George Cukor, Howard Hawks, Alfred Hitchcock, Fritz Lang, Lauren Bacall, Humphrey Bogart, James Cagney, cannot be missing. John Cassavetes, Charlie Chaplin, Montgomery Clift, Marlene Dietrich, Henry Fonda, Ben Gazzara, Audrey Hepburn and Boris Karloff. Translated into Italian they are Cinema according to Orson Welles (The Assayer) e Who made that movie? (Fandango books).
Then there are his films, which always show a form of devotion to classic Hollywood cinema. His most important film is also his first major feature film, The last show, who at the beginning of the seventies won two Oscars, attributed to the “supporting” actors – Cloris Leachman, who everyone knows as the mythological Frau Blücher of Frankenstein Jr. (who died a little less than a year ago) and Ben Johnson, a veteran of a thousand westerns – and launched him among the most promising directors of the time. Promise initially kept with a couple of successful comedies and then with the magnificent Paper moon, also the one awarded with an Oscar for “supporting” Tatum O’Neal (who at the age of ten was the youngest ever Oscar winner). But then came the failures, a series of films little appreciated by critics and audiences, especially the musical Love finally came (1975), with Burt Reynolds and Cybill Shepard: a sensational flop of those that Hollywood does not forgive easily. The New York Times also reports a significant quote from Billy Wilder: “It is not true that Hollywood is a bitter place, divided by hatred, greed and jealousy. A flop of Peter Bogdanovich is enough to bring the community together ”.
Finally, the real drama. At the end of the seventies Bogdanovich became romantically linked to the model Dorothy Stratten who left her husband, Peter Snider for him. Bogdanovich entrusted her with a small part in his new play, And everyone laughed (1981). But shortly before the film was released, Snider killed Stratten and then took his own life (the story is told by the film Star 80 by Bob Fosse). A personal tragedy not easy for Bogdanovich to overcome. And it usually takes a lot less to bury a film. The fact is that the moving comedy with Audrey Hepburn (in her latest film, apart from the cameo in Always by Steven Spielberg), Ben Gazzara and John Ritter, came out quietly and was coldly received by audiences and critics alike. The following years were studded with economic failures and a much discussed private life (in particular the connection with Dorothy Stratten’s younger sister Louise, whom the director married in 1988, when she was twenty, could hardly be ignored by certain type of printing). All of which kept Bogdanovich at a safe distance from Hollywood.
So, in just over ten years and in a handful of films, can Peter Bogdanovich be archived? Obviously not. More than for his figure as a Hollywood outcast, for his relatively unfortunate biography, for his love / hate relationship with the big Californian studios, Bogdanovich deserves to be remembered for his films. Maybe not all of them, but the most successful ones, generous with elements such as nostalgia, melancholy, fun, humanity, warmth, love, capable of inducing in the spectator that languor that only the cinema of the “dream factory” is able to provoke.
Five films by Peter Bogdanovich:
The last show
Con Timothy Bottoms, Jeff Bridges, Cybill Shepherd, Ben Johnson, Cloris Leachman, Ellen Burstyn. Stati Uniti 1971, 118’
The closure of the cinema in a small town in Texas is the backdrop to the transition from adolescence to adulthood of a group of young people. In the role of one of the boys stands a 20-year-old Jeff Bridges who earned an Oscar nomination for supporting actor.
Paper moon
Con Ryan O’Neal, Tatum O’Neal, Madeline Kahn. Stati Uniti 1973, 102’
In the Kansas of the Great Depression, a small crook finds himself with a dependent orphan. But more than a ballast, the child will prove to be a lifeline for man. From the film was taken a TV series in which the role of Tatum O’Neal was played by Jodie Foster.
Old America
With Ryan O’Neal, Burt Reynolds, Tatum O’Neal, Stella Stevens, Brian Keith. USA / UK 1976, 121 ‘
Funny love letter to the pioneers of the seventh art written by Bogdanovich starting from anecdotes collected directly by the director himself during his interviews with Hollywood greats such as John Ford and Raoul Walsh.
And everyone laughed
With Audrey Hepburn, Ben Gazzara, Patti Hansen, John Ritter, Colleen Camp, Dorothy Stratten. United States 1981, 115 ‘
Detectives at a small NYC detective agency tend to fall in love with women who have to spy on their husbands.
Anything can happen in Hollywood
Con Imogen Poors, Owen Wilson, Katherine Hahn, Jennifer Aniston, Rhys Ifans, Will Forte. Stati Uniti/Germania 2014, 93’
New York comedy of misunderstandings involving an unfaithful director, his wife and a call girl with actress aspirations. In a final cameo appears Quentin Tarantino who in the late nineties hosted Bogdanovich in trouble in his Los Angeles home just as Bogdanovich, in the eighties, had hosted Orson Welles.
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