I feel like “Midnight Cowboy” (released in 1969) really shows the gritty underbelly of New York that was apparently already present in the late 60s (you can watch 1976’s Taxi Driver to see how long New York was apparently terrible for.) “midnight Cowboy” is actually a really interesting film to me because even if I don’t tap into the lgbt themes, I feel like in a weird way it can kind of represent the 60s - people (and by people I’m thinking of the film’s main character) wanted change and were optimistic about it/about their future, only for the grittiness of real life to beat their dreams down. Whilst watching “Midnight Cowboy,” there is absolutely no way you’ll be romanticizing the 60s, even though it is a FANTASTIC film.

I just see a lot of similarities between the late 60s and what we now think of as “the 70s” - after such a tumultuous decade wherein there was a lot of tension and a lot of change, it makes sense that we got “the 70s,” a decade many hated.