Easy Riders, Raging Bulls

The era tends to get romanticized, but the 1970s really did represent Hollywood's last golden age -- a time when young directors named Coppola, Scorsese, Polanski, Spielberg, and Lucas were rewriting the rule book, adding vibrance and vision, and making it possible to think of American film as art. Kenneth Bowser's BBC documentary, based on Peter Biskind's book, provides an absorbing overview of that brief shining moment, marked by meteoric rises, rapidly inflating egos, runaway budgets, and lots of drugs. Though rich with anecdotes, the film only skims the surface of the scene that Biskind so juicily chronicled. On the other hand, the book didn't come with film clips.

EXTRAS In one of several illuminating mini-docs about individual filmmakers, Peter Bogdanovich recalls being offered ''The Godfather,'' ''The Exorcist,'' ''The Way We Were,'' and ''Chinatown'' -- and admits that, yeah, he probably should have said yes.

You Might Also Like

• Reel World Reel World | Rebecca Ascher-Walsh, William Keck
• DVD Review The Source | Donald Liebenson
• DVD Review American Movie | Laura Morgan