The '70s

If you're in the right age bracket to remember the '70s fondly, you'll enjoy the music that permeates this cinematic travesty. Apart from that, you'll probably find yourself watching this 4-hour hodgepodge of cliches with your mouth hanging open in horror. It's astonishingly bad.

For those who have no idea what the 70's were all about, this is a good try to a good insight. Not totally accurate because of the limitations of the story, the movie manages to give an overall view of the era but does not accomplishes its purpose.

I certainly hope no one took this movie as history. Music and events were chronologically incorrect throughout the entire 4 hours. It seems that the picture was made entirely to sell advertising time to record companies to advertise their re-released music of the 70s as if you couldn't hear every one of these songs on any given "Classic Rock" station in any given city at any given time. Events and moods were captured well but not chronologically correct - for example: How could 'Whatever Gets you Though the Night' be playing during the 1972 Presidential campaign when the song wasn't released until 1974? How did they get a clip of Jack Benny on the Tonight Show they were watching at Christmas 1975 when Benny died in December of 1974? Why was there a streaker at the 1972 Presidential election party when the streaking fad took place in winter/spring 1974? It seems today, as far as TV writers are concerned, the 1970s were just one year and everything happened during it! I was there for the 1970s and I can assure you that 1971 was very different from 1978 but you'd never know it based on this pseudo-restrospective. Obviously the makers of this film were not as concerned about historical accuracy, as they were with portraying every event they could remember that occurred in the 1970s. It didn't matter when or where in the 1970s, just fit it in where you can, the order doesn't matter. If history were taught this way, we'd never know the truth about anything.

Compared to The 60's (1999), The 70's was a piece of television genius. Although there were some historical innacuracies, I was impressed overall at the way that the film makers were able to portray the heartache and disbelif felt within the USA and around the world during the decade that shaped the way the world looked at itself.

I am, however, concerned about the fact that the next mini-series to be produced, in order, will be The 80's :)

I'll be honest. I enjoyed this mini-series. Maybe because I didn't live through the real thing. I was born in the glorious eighties, so this may be the reason that I am the ONLY person who found this series 'watchable.'

I can't comment on the history too much, so that just leaves the acting, music, and writing. The acting was a little touchy but still good. Touchy because the four main characters are somewhat newcomers to acting, but they still did a nice job. Smart, Rowe, Torry, and Shaw worked well as a team and were good overall. Other supporting actors and characters were alright.

Hooray for the music! I love music from the sixties and seventies, so this worked out well. Nothing better than listening to disco for four hours. (What is the runtime?) Seriously, the mixture of some of the greatest songs were nicely put together.

The writing was okay and the story lines that followed the four college students were well thought out. Quite a few twists and turns for Smart's character but I could still handle it. Rowe's role with the Watergate scandal was a little hard to take. It briefly covered it but after a while into it, it became really dull. Torry's performance as Dexter was nothing great, nothing terrible. He buys a theatre, ends up in the hospital, and so on. There could have been a little more effort put into this character but no more screen time. I'm liking it, so don't bore me. And Shaw's Eileen was the best of the four. I liked the problems dealing with her parent's divorce, the lawsuit against what's-his-name, and her ups and downs with Byron.

Like I said, I can't comment too much on the era itself, but I will say that the settings and props were well put together. I love the wardrobe. Also, the added in little actions referring to the seventies was kind of funny. (streakers, masks of Nixon, reference to Mary Tyler Moore, and the list goes on)

After watching non-stop promotional ads on NBC for this mini-series, I looked forward to watching it. I didn't expect anything too big, since what the outcome of 'The '60s' was. But I was still happy and content with how it started and how it ended. (I definitely enjoyed this more than 'The '60s'.)