Chip Shots: Old TV Shows And Movies – Rewatch Or Toss?
April 30, 2022 at 3:30 a.m.
Chip Shots: Old TV Shows And Movies – Rewatch Or Toss?
By Chip Davenport-
Some things don’t age well in movies and television, but this doesn’t mean you don’t have to feel guilty about rewatching them. I’m the person in our house who evaluates what food gets kept or tossed. My family seems to value me for how well I determine how the food has aged. I do the same with viewing old shows and movies appearing – it seems – more often on my channel guide menu.
There are some particular movies chock-full of cringe in present day conventions. Some good examples are the adult women-minor male movies including Private Lessons, My Tutor, Risky Business, and Class. Each film has a premise as far back as 40 years ago of something now likely to put the leading ladies behind bars in an orange jump suit.
These movies have not aged well, and they aren’t worth watching again unless you wanted to host a podcast called “50 Shades of… What’s Wrong With This?”
Those of you currently in your teens and 20s even cringe at genre like this, understandably. Bear in mind, you’ll very likely be watching shows and movies now that you’ll be sorting between toss and rewatch lists.
I’m politically moderate, and equally annoyed by the extremum of liberals and conservatives. Today I’ll grouse about something liberals do.
Although people my age evolve over time – moving away from things we watched then that are cringeworthy now – some – not all –liberals still want to punish people who have evolved for what they did in the context of their past.
I’m not talking about the heinous stuff. I’m talking about entertainment’s evolution, and things we joked about as teenagers and young adults.
There are even impersonations many of us pulled we would likely not do in the manner today that we did in 1975, 1980 or even 1985. There even are things from the turn of the century/millennium currently not aging well in 2022.
I still believe Don Rickles still ranks among the funniest comedians ever, nonetheless. I also believe Norman Lear shows like “All In The Family,” “Good Times,” and “The Jeffersons” all had lead actors with strong opinions about race and ethnicity at levels now understandably considered intolerable in our current culture. These shows, when I re-watch them, are still entertaining, and I hope they are always available for people to watch, though.
Archie Bunker, the blue-collar, white patriarch from Queens, George Jefferson, the African American entrepreneur expanding his laundry business vaulting him to a move to the East side of Manhattan, and James Evans, a blue-collar African American in the projects all had strong opinions, and made sweeping generalizations about people different from them.
If these characters evolved in real time a few decades later, would we demonize them in the present because of what they said in the 1970s?
Even former President Barack Obama was against gay marriage in his first term. Would any sensible person come after him in 2022 for taking that position he eventually evolved from about a decade ago?
These television characters, and their supporting cast members, had their share of concurrent and conflicting opinions about work, race, gender, and other morals and values. Again, I still watch these shows when I am channel surfing.
I don’t wax nostalgic for being able to resuscitate throwing around racial and ethnic epithets. Instead, it is interesting to see how dealing with strong differences among people within the same family about politics, war, relationships, and making ends meet played out on the screen for us viewers.
Norman Lear gave us some of TV’s best characters. I’ll start with All In The Family’s Edith Bunker. Archie called his doting spouse “dingbat”, and there were times she seemed to unwittingly embarrass Archie, but Edith had moments of strength throughout her seven seasons with the series.
Would I call my wife “dingbat”? Certainly not, and Archie could have been much sweeter, but All In The Family is still watchable television if you take its context and frame of reference in consideration with the time it was broadcast.
Bob Newhart is another 1970s television series written and performed better than most of what is serve to us on network television.
I’ll lighten it up a bit.
Let’s talk about Arthur Fonzarelli… Fonzie… the Fonz! Aaaayyyy!
Happy Days producer Garry Marshal and his writers made him America’s most beloved hoodlum, who eventually ski-jumped a shark, and went toe-to-toe with Satan.
None of us ever asked ourselves (the next day at school), how come we don’t have a Fonzie here? Where’s our 20-ish leather-jacket clad motorcyclist hanging out among our older high school siblings. I don’t remember a “Fonzie” coming around to hang out with my older sister and their friends.
You can look a little deeper into older television shows and movies to dig up latels full of cringe from just about any decade. Instead, don’t throw it all in the unwatchable bin. Some of it, as you grit your teeth listening to things you wouldn’t say to yourself under your breath in this day and age, still have some entertainment value, and they’ll re-teach you a thing or two.
Some things don’t age well in movies and television, but this doesn’t mean you don’t have to feel guilty about rewatching them. I’m the person in our house who evaluates what food gets kept or tossed. My family seems to value me for how well I determine how the food has aged. I do the same with viewing old shows and movies appearing – it seems – more often on my channel guide menu.
There are some particular movies chock-full of cringe in present day conventions. Some good examples are the adult women-minor male movies including Private Lessons, My Tutor, Risky Business, and Class. Each film has a premise as far back as 40 years ago of something now likely to put the leading ladies behind bars in an orange jump suit.
These movies have not aged well, and they aren’t worth watching again unless you wanted to host a podcast called “50 Shades of… What’s Wrong With This?”
Those of you currently in your teens and 20s even cringe at genre like this, understandably. Bear in mind, you’ll very likely be watching shows and movies now that you’ll be sorting between toss and rewatch lists.
I’m politically moderate, and equally annoyed by the extremum of liberals and conservatives. Today I’ll grouse about something liberals do.
Although people my age evolve over time – moving away from things we watched then that are cringeworthy now – some – not all –liberals still want to punish people who have evolved for what they did in the context of their past.
I’m not talking about the heinous stuff. I’m talking about entertainment’s evolution, and things we joked about as teenagers and young adults.
There are even impersonations many of us pulled we would likely not do in the manner today that we did in 1975, 1980 or even 1985. There even are things from the turn of the century/millennium currently not aging well in 2022.
I still believe Don Rickles still ranks among the funniest comedians ever, nonetheless. I also believe Norman Lear shows like “All In The Family,” “Good Times,” and “The Jeffersons” all had lead actors with strong opinions about race and ethnicity at levels now understandably considered intolerable in our current culture. These shows, when I re-watch them, are still entertaining, and I hope they are always available for people to watch, though.
Archie Bunker, the blue-collar, white patriarch from Queens, George Jefferson, the African American entrepreneur expanding his laundry business vaulting him to a move to the East side of Manhattan, and James Evans, a blue-collar African American in the projects all had strong opinions, and made sweeping generalizations about people different from them.
If these characters evolved in real time a few decades later, would we demonize them in the present because of what they said in the 1970s?
Even former President Barack Obama was against gay marriage in his first term. Would any sensible person come after him in 2022 for taking that position he eventually evolved from about a decade ago?
These television characters, and their supporting cast members, had their share of concurrent and conflicting opinions about work, race, gender, and other morals and values. Again, I still watch these shows when I am channel surfing.
I don’t wax nostalgic for being able to resuscitate throwing around racial and ethnic epithets. Instead, it is interesting to see how dealing with strong differences among people within the same family about politics, war, relationships, and making ends meet played out on the screen for us viewers.
Norman Lear gave us some of TV’s best characters. I’ll start with All In The Family’s Edith Bunker. Archie called his doting spouse “dingbat”, and there were times she seemed to unwittingly embarrass Archie, but Edith had moments of strength throughout her seven seasons with the series.
Would I call my wife “dingbat”? Certainly not, and Archie could have been much sweeter, but All In The Family is still watchable television if you take its context and frame of reference in consideration with the time it was broadcast.
Bob Newhart is another 1970s television series written and performed better than most of what is serve to us on network television.
I’ll lighten it up a bit.
Let’s talk about Arthur Fonzarelli… Fonzie… the Fonz! Aaaayyyy!
Happy Days producer Garry Marshal and his writers made him America’s most beloved hoodlum, who eventually ski-jumped a shark, and went toe-to-toe with Satan.
None of us ever asked ourselves (the next day at school), how come we don’t have a Fonzie here? Where’s our 20-ish leather-jacket clad motorcyclist hanging out among our older high school siblings. I don’t remember a “Fonzie” coming around to hang out with my older sister and their friends.
You can look a little deeper into older television shows and movies to dig up latels full of cringe from just about any decade. Instead, don’t throw it all in the unwatchable bin. Some of it, as you grit your teeth listening to things you wouldn’t say to yourself under your breath in this day and age, still have some entertainment value, and they’ll re-teach you a thing or two.
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