Them's My French Fries: The Peter Yates Poll

OK, I see Bullitt and Eddie Coyle - which is supposed to be the third good one?

The whole 1972-1981 run pretty good, actually.

(xpost) The one that gets my vote: Breaking Away.

(I'm not saying those are the only good ones, though--just that they'll finish 1-2-3 by some margin.)

Eddie Coyle is incredible, quite legitimately. I'm voting for that.

Though I think Bullitt is actually maybe a bit underrated -- culturally there's too much easy received wisdom emphasis on it as an action film and on the car chase, too little on the rest of the film's use of its SF location and peculiarly compelling late-'60s era, as well as the low-key quiet police investigation parts. I like virtually all the supporting turns too, Norman Fell and Simon Oakland are a couple of good stern cop authority figures, Don Gordon is outstanding in a very small role, and Robert Vaughn is a perfectly oily politician asshole. I think the setup is pretty interesting, leading up to the shooting in the hotel.

And SPOILER it's interesting how they completely show their hand up front -- the guy in the opening scene who escapes a mob hit is in retrospect obviously not the guy who's holed up (and then shot) in the hotel, but it's done without subterfuge so you don't even notice it whatsoever.

i hear decent things about The Hot Rock and a couple of those '80s flicks too.

John and Mary is pretty good. Hot Rock is not a patch on the novel and Redford totally miscast. The Dresser is great. Trying to recall Mother, Jugs and Speed...

I always confuse Peter Yates and Peter Medak.

I've seen three of those, not The Dresser. Actually surprised by how many I've seen--taking out the TV films, one shy of half.

Four of those, I mean.

Breaking Away over Coyle

Bullitt, The Hot Rock, and The Friends of Eddie Coyle are solid. Breaking Away is better than that.

Eddie Coyle is fantastic. I kinda hate cycling as a sport so I've never given Breaking Away a fair shake.

Hope you can get over that, cause Breaking Away is such a good and funny film. And it's really not about cycling, of course.

Breaking Away is about class in America, meeting your parents' expectations (or not), male bonding, and Dennis Quaid's abs.

Yeah I will get round to it based on the recommendations of the good judges in this thread

Pauline Kael, 1980:

"Peter Yates spent between 5 and 7 years getting financing to do Breaking Away. If he had not made The Deep, a horrendously sleazy movie, he probably would never have had the opportunity to do it. That kind of man does not get a job as an executive. So the war between the directors and the executives goes on."

For Pete's Sake (1974) is a dud. It was, however, filmed in my neighborhood and I can walk from my apartment to Barbra Streisand's apartment in the movie in about four minutes.

Omar otm re Bullitt. Also worth mentioning is the climactic airport scene, which would be impossible to do nowadays because of modern boarding procedures.

Someone page in JCLC to make the case for Krull

The Hot Rock is full of funny performances, esp Paul Sand and George Segal.

Breaking Away also a great I-fell-in-love-with-the-actress movie (Robyn Douglass--The Lonely Guy looks like the only other thing of any note that she did).

http://www.dvdizzy.com/images/b/breakingaway-04.jpg

Was just musing about the fact that in '67-'69 you have this run of Brit directors making films that get at the distinct vibe or essence of three different American cities, with John Boorman doing LA in Point Blank, Peter Yates doing San Francisco in Bullitt, and John Schlesinger doing New York in Midnight Cowboy.

Richard Lester's Petulia in there too.

I was gonna say... til i remembered Lester was born American.

I did see The Dresser, which was probably a play that didn't need to be filmed.

John and Mary not very good at all.

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