Jack Nicholson and the 70's

I loved going to see Jack Nicholson movies in the 1970's. He was in many classics. I had only been out of the Navy a month or so when I saw The Last Detail at a theater in downtown Philly. It was a very funny, interesting and tragic story of a particular aspect of Navy life. A liberty adventure. Buddhist chanting "damnedest thing I ever heard".

I had read the Daryll Ponicsan novel a couple of years earlier and had been looking forward to the release of the film. Seeing him in his earlier 60's films did really prepare me for how good he was going to be during the next decade although 1969's Easy Rider certainly was a big hint.

I really liked Five Easy Pieces especially with Karen Black in it. She was also one of my favorite actors of the 1970's and starred with Nicholson in Easy Rider and Drive, He Said too.

Speaking of Drive, He Said. I thought that was a very fascinating movie about a college basketball player and the draft during the Vietnam War which was also the first film directed by Jack Nicholson. Two other great movies of his from that time was Chinatown and One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest. Both are worth seeing repeatedly. 

I read the novel One Flew Over The Cuckoo's by Ken Kesey in July 1974 which was about a year and a half before the film was released.

Some of my favorites of that time:

• Five Easy Pieces, 1970
• Carnal Knowledge, 1971
• Drive, He Said, 1971
• The King of Marvin Gardens, 1972
• The Last Detail, 1973
• Chinatown, 1974
• The Passenger, 1975
• One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest, 1975
• The Missouri Breaks, 1976