Reminisces of a Journey to Lithuania (Jonas Mekas, 1972)

6.5/10
A quasi-documentary directed by Jonas Mekas as part of a retrospective of his work, the film features footage from the 50's, 60's and 70's as shot by Mekas and detailing his life in the turmoil of Lithuania, his exile to America, and the return to his home country. It has more of a "home movie" feel than a documentary feel and, coupled with Mekas' slow, halting English voiceover, it can be a struggle to keep your attention held, but it had its interesting moments. Jonas attended the screening and gave a cool Q&A afterward, which was very impressive considering he's 90 years old!

The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie (Luis Bunuel, 1972)

8/10
Not his most visually attractive film, and maybe not even his most incisive, it's still classic Bunuel from top to bottom. Instead of one giant wallop (like in Viridiana) it's more like a death by a thousand cuts - multiple scenes pile up of our bourgeois, dinner party seeking friends experiencing (and brushing off) humiliations and absurdities from the minor to the outrageous...it almost feels like a collection of skits at times. The ending is deliciously insane as is most of the movie; I enjoyed it a good deal.

Last Tango in Paris (Bernardo Bertolucci, 1972)

7/10
Pretty funny that this drummed up such hysteria on release. It seems tame by today's standards. I enjoyed the movie well enough but wasn't really blown away by anything. Brando's an amazing actor but it's easy to see he was going through the motions here...although maybe that's what made him amazing, I don't know.

The King of Marvin Gardens (Bob Rafelson, 1972)

6/10
"Nothing happens" in much of the BBS films but even less so here. Jack Nicholson and Bruce Dern play a couple of brothers, Nicholson the younger, straight-laced, depressed one and Dern the older, scheming extrovert. Ellen Burstyn and Julia Anne Robinson are the women in the middle. Dern summons Nicholson to Atlantic City where he's hatching a doomed plan to develop real estate on an island in Hawaii. The film is bookended by a couple of great, sad monologues by Nicholson and it's always watchable due to the acting of the leads, but it's just not terribly interesting. I did find it nailed the curious dynamic between all brothers close in age quite well, and the ending threw me for a bit of a loop. And it had Scatman Crothers! But that wasn't quite enough to get me too excited about it at any point.

Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex * But Were Afraid to Ask (Woody Allen, 1972)

7/10
I've never seen a Woody Allen movie before...this may not have been the best place to start (as it's not so much a movie as a series of skits) but there were still some really funny moments. The skits are all based upon taking questions from the book of the same title, taken to ludicrous extremes. The last and best skit, "what happens during ejaculation?", featuring a bunch of workers inside the body's pleasure zones, stomach, brain, eyes, etc, is a scream. Others don't work so well, but I was rarely bored.

Joe Kidd (John Sturges, 1972)

5/10
Wasn't a big fan of this other Eastwood Western...the plot wasn't all that interesting, Eastwood's character wasn't as badass as he usually is, and overall there was nothing really memorable or unique about it.

Solaris (Andrei Tarkovsky, 1972)

8/10
Liked it a lot for the most part, only gripe was that it was a little needlessly slow at times...still a beautiful, harrowing film and I never saw the ending coming. No real interest in seeing the remake with Clooney, though I hear it isn't half-bad in its own right.