M*A*S*H
With Donald Sutherland, Elliott Gould, Tom Skerritt.
US, 1970, 35mm, color, 116 min.
Print source: HFA
M*A*S*H remains a landmark of Hollywood’s attempt to reach out to the counterculture, a gesture that helped make the film so financially successful that Altman was able to get funding from one studio or another for the rest of the 1970s. The tale of US Army medics near the front lines during the Korean War eschewed the action of the battlefield for the black-and-blue humor of the medical corps assigned to try to patch up those casualties still alive. With its large cast and loose, episodic structure, the screenplay—by formerly blacklisted writer Ring Lardner, Jr.—was rejected by most of the important directors of the time before it was offered to Altman. Of course, both of these aspects were precisely what drew Altman to the script, which gave him a forum to express his own anti-establishment and anti-war views in a manner both indirect and savage.
PRECEDED BY
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Ebb Tide
Directed by Robert Altman.
With Lili St. Cyr.
US, 1966, digital video, color, 4 min.
In 1966, Altman made a few short films set to music and designed to be shown on movie jukeboxes in bars and roadhouses. Ebb Tide is one of the racier ones, featuring stripper Lili St. Cyr.
Part of film series
Screenings from this program
Buffalo Bill and the Indians, or Sitting Bull's History Lesson
Vincent & Theo
Fool for Love
Prêt-à-porter
California Split
Thieves Like Us
A Perfect Couple
A Prairie Home Companion
O.C. and Stiggs
That Cold Day in the Park
Corn's-A-Poppin'
McCabe & Mrs. Miller
The Gingerbread Man
Dr. T and the Women
Come Back to the 5 and Dime, Jimmy Dean, Jimmy Dean
