{"id":216707,"date":"2021-04-01T20:00:06","date_gmt":"2021-04-01T17:00:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/en.buradabiliyorum.com\/amy-revisited-40-years-later-film\/"},"modified":"2021-04-01T20:00:06","modified_gmt":"2021-04-01T17:00:06","slug":"amy-revisited-40-years-later-film","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/amy-revisited-40-years-later-film\/","title":{"rendered":"#Amy Revisited 40 Years Later \u2013 \/Film"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"ez-toc-container\" class=\"ez-toc-v2_0_85 counter-hierarchy ez-toc-counter ez-toc-custom ez-toc-container-direction\">\n<p class=\"ez-toc-title\" style=\"cursor:inherit\">Table of Contents<\/p>\n<label for=\"ez-toc-cssicon-toggle-item-6a3a743b9ed90\" class=\"ez-toc-cssicon-toggle-label\"><span class=\"\"><span class=\"eztoc-hide\" style=\"display:none;\">Toggle<\/span><span class=\"ez-toc-icon-toggle-span\"><svg style=\"fill: #dd3333;color:#dd3333\" xmlns=\"http:\/\/www.w3.org\/2000\/svg\" class=\"list-377408\" width=\"20px\" height=\"20px\" viewBox=\"0 0 24 24\" fill=\"none\"><path d=\"M6 6H4v2h2V6zm14 0H8v2h12V6zM4 11h2v2H4v-2zm16 0H8v2h12v-2zM4 16h2v2H4v-2zm16 0H8v2h12v-2z\" fill=\"currentColor\"><\/path><\/svg><svg style=\"fill: #dd3333;color:#dd3333\" class=\"arrow-unsorted-368013\" xmlns=\"http:\/\/www.w3.org\/2000\/svg\" width=\"10px\" height=\"10px\" viewBox=\"0 0 24 24\" version=\"1.2\" baseProfile=\"tiny\"><path d=\"M18.2 9.3l-6.2-6.3-6.2 6.3c-.2.2-.3.4-.3.7s.1.5.3.7c.2.2.4.3.7.3h11c.3 0 .5-.1.7-.3.2-.2.3-.5.3-.7s-.1-.5-.3-.7zM5.8 14.7l6.2 6.3 6.2-6.3c.2-.2.3-.5.3-.7s-.1-.5-.3-.7c-.2-.2-.4-.3-.7-.3h-11c-.3 0-.5.1-.7.3-.2.2-.3.5-.3.7s.1.5.3.7z\"\/><\/svg><\/span><\/span><\/label><input type=\"checkbox\"  id=\"ez-toc-cssicon-toggle-item-6a3a743b9ed90\" checked aria-label=\"Toggle\" \/><nav><ul class='ez-toc-list ez-toc-list-level-1 ' ><li class='ez-toc-page-1 ez-toc-heading-level-2'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-1\" href=\"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/amy-revisited-40-years-later-film\/#The_Pitch\" >The Pitch<\/a><\/li><li class='ez-toc-page-1 ez-toc-heading-level-2'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-2\" href=\"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/amy-revisited-40-years-later-film\/#The_Film\" >The Film<\/a><\/li><li class='ez-toc-page-1 ez-toc-heading-level-2'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-3\" href=\"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/amy-revisited-40-years-later-film\/#The_Legacy\" >The Legacy<\/a><\/li><\/ul><\/nav><\/div>\n<p>&#8220;<strong>#Amy Revisited 40 Years Later \u2013 \/Film<\/strong>&#8221;<\/p>\n<div>\n<p>                            <img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-665022 aligncenter\" src=\"https:\/\/d13ezvd6yrslxm.cloudfront.net\/wp\/wp-content\/images\/Amy-Revisited-700x300.jpeg\" alt=\"Amy Revisited\" width=\"700\" height=\"300\" srcset=\"https:\/\/d13ezvd6yrslxm.cloudfront.net\/wp\/wp-content\/images\/Amy-Revisited.jpeg 700w, https:\/\/d13ezvd6yrslxm.cloudfront.net\/wp\/wp-content\/images\/Amy-Revisited-360x154.jpeg 360w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 700px) 100vw, 700px\" \/><\/p>\n<p><i>(Welcome to\u00a0<strong><a rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/slashfilm.com\/tag\/out-of-the-disney-vault\">Out of the Disney Vault<\/a><\/strong>, where we explore the unsung gems and forgotten disasters currently streaming on Disney+.)<\/i><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The 1980s were a very rough time for the Walt Disney Company, at least in the first half of the decade. We may now think of the 1980s as the time when Michael Eisner and Jeffrey Katzenberg joined Disney, steering it to new heights with films like <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The Little Mermaid<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> and with the expansion of the Walt Disney World Resort in Orlando, Florida. And while that\u2019s all true, the two men didn\u2019t arrive until 1984. The first few years of the decade were a bumpy stretch, marked by minimal animated products and only a smattering of live-action films. The flip side is that the <a href=\"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/category\/download-scripts-themes-apps\/\" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c=\"9\" title=\"Download Scripts &amp; Themes &amp; Apps\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">theme<\/a> parks were moving onward, with the 1982 opening of EPCOT Center and the 1983 unveiling of Tokyo Disneyland.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">But the side of the company focused on filmmaking seemed adrift at best. The 1981 film <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The Fox and the Hound<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, turning 40 this summer, does have its fans (and some impressive setpieces), but its production was mired by a huge walkout of young animators and a warring battle between the old guard of Disney animation and newer artists who wanted to steer the studio in new directions. Live-action fare wasn\u2019t much more notable; cult films like <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Tron<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> and <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Return to Oz<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> are well-liked by fans precisely because they stand against so much of what we envision a \u201cDisney movie\u201d as.<\/span><br \/>\n<!-- SlashFilm_300x250_In_Post --><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The same is true for another film that celebrated its 40th anniversary this year, the 1981 melodrama <\/span><strong><i>Amy<\/i><\/strong><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">.<\/span><\/p>\n<h2><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"The_Pitch\"><\/span><strong>The Pitch<\/strong><span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Starring Jenny Agutter and Barry Newman, <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Amy<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> is a film focused on a young woman who runs away from her domineering husband, leaving behind a single note as she heads off to teach at a school for the deaf and blind in the Appalachian Mountains, hoping to start a new life for herself as she encourages the school to allow her to teach deaf children to speak as well as sign. Parts of <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Amy<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> might feel right at home with the kind of uplifting emotional arcs that we think of when we think of inspirational-teacher films like <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Dead Poets Society <\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">or <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Mr. Holland\u2019s Opus<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">. And parts of <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Amy<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> are much more focused on self-actualization and the power of a woman learning to stand up for herself. (It\u2019s for that reason why this film fits right in with the other titles in the Female Leads collection on Disney+.)<\/span><\/p>\n<h2><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"The_Film\"><\/span><strong>The Film<\/strong><span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h2>\n<p><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Amy<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> serves as a fascinating footnote on a certain era of Disney filmmaking, if nothing else. Clocking in at just 100 minutes, the screenplay by Noreen Stone arguably bites off much more than it can chew. In another film, the setup of a mysterious woman leaving behind her previous home, lying about her resume, and becoming close with children could be the beginnings of a grim horror film. And there\u2019s intended to be some level of suspense as director Vincent McEveety cuts between Amy becoming closer with her students and her husband enlisting a private detective to locate his seemingly missing wife.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">But in between all of this, there\u2019s a love story (between Agutter and Barry Newman, perhaps best remembered among modern audiences for his supporting roles in <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The Limey <\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">and <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Bowfinger<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">) and also the arc of Amy proving her worth to the skeptical staff that any deaf child could ever hope to say words, and also subplots between some of those deaf children, and also the heartbreak of losing some of the children at the school to sickness due to a lack of medical equipment and funding. It\u2019s not a bad thing that there\u2019s a lot going on in <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Amy<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, but\u2026well, there\u2019s too much going on in <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Amy<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">.<\/span><br \/>\n<!-- SlashFilm_300x250_In_Post_2 --><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Just as there are many plot threads attempting to be woven throughout <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Amy<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, there\u2019s a bit of a tonal mishmash too. (Perhaps the most obvious example of this is the subplot surrounding the children playing in a big football <a href=\"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/category\/game\/\" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c=\"7\" title=\"Game\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">game<\/a> against a group of hearing kids who live nearby, and yes, there is <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">a football section<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> in this movie.) The parts of this film that work the best are the parts that seem as if they were smuggled in. Agutter and Newman have a solid chemistry, starting with his local doctor seeming like a chatty souse but climaxing in a lengthy monologue he delivers to her to express his admiration and love for her. And Agutter sells the heartbreak Amy feels due to her having lost her own deaf son at a young age. (Oh, did I forget to mention that part of the story too? It\u2019s only because <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">there\u2019s a lot going on for a 100-minute movie.<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">)<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Even some of the more familiar-seeming aspects of the plot manage to work thanks to some carefully placed and acted dialogue. To wit: the matron of the school (Nanette Fabray) is most intensely doubtful that Amy\u2019s work can come to any good, doubting the power of a deaf child learning even one word. But as the story goes on, and as the matron sees how far the students (especially a friendly boy named Henry) have come, her doubts fall and she\u2019s able to communicate with a simple \u201cI\u2019m sorry\u201d how much she respects Amy. Other films would spell it out too heavily, but <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Amy<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> sometimes has a deft touch.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The film\u2019s treatment of the blind and deaf\/hard-of-hearing community is somewhat commendable, too. Though there are a handful of recognizable actors in the film, the children themselves appear to be deaf and blind. (The credits, notably, thank a California school of the deaf, implying that at least its students appeared on camera.) Where <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Amy<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> falters is no surprise, considering the film\u2019s title; when you watch a film like this so soon after the remarkable 2020 drama <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Sound of Metal<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, you realize that it stumbles by offering no interior life to its deaf and hard of hearing characters. Though Amy becomes close with a few of the students, there\u2019s no real tangible sense that they have lives of their own as opposed to serving to help her along in her path of gaining self-confidence.<\/span><\/p>\n<h2><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"The_Legacy\"><\/span><strong>The Legacy<\/strong><span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Maybe it\u2019s more accurate to ask if this film <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">has<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> a legacy, which is no comment on its quality. <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Amy<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> is a strange beast, having arrived at a time in the history of the Walt Disney Company when the main filmmaking studio struggled with deciding if it was going to make edgier, more mature fare that would appeal to teenagers and adults as well as to kids. Some of the results of that potential notion are darker films like <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The Watcher in The Woods<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> and <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Something Wicked This Way Comes <\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(neither of which, it should be noted, are currently available to stream on Disney+ for\u2026reasons, probably?) Some are cult fare that\u2019s got enough of an audience to have wound up on Disney+.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And then there are films like <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Amy<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, which must have been a mild box-office performer at best. (Having arrived just a little while before websites like The Numbers and Box Office Mojo tallied weekly historical box-office results means that it\u2019s not easy to find out exactly how much <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Amy<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> made in the spring of 1981.) Though the movie is decent, and an effectively low-key story, it likely wasn\u2019t a huge hit. The film has been released on DVD as part of the Disney Generations collection, but it\u2019s never been the kind of title you hear often about from 80s-era children. A throwback to dramas like <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The Miracle Worker<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> is impressive enough, but perhaps not the kind of thing to garner people\u2019s attention over the span of four decades.<\/span><br \/>\n<!-- SlashFilm_300x250_In_Post_3 --><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">But here\u2019s the thing. If you are in the mood for something that <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">isn\u2019t<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> driven by intellectual property and you\u2019re on Disney+, films like <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Amy<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> exist. There\u2019s not nearly enough content from the 1970s or 1980s on Disney+, specifically from the fallow period when the studio was adrift after the loss of Walt Disney and before the arrival of Michael Eisner and Jeffrey Katzenberg. Films like <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Amy<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> almost seem like happy accidents, then; imperfect, perhaps, but the kind of thing you wish studios made now. You\u2019ve been stuck at home for a while, maybe. You\u2019ve seen all the Marvel and Lucasfilm stuff. You want something different. Try <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Amy<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>                            <strong>Cool Posts From Around the Web:<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>                            <!-- \/post -->\n                        <\/div>\n<blockquote><p><strong><span style=\"color: #ff6600;\">If you liked the article, do not forget to share it with your friends. Follow us on\u00a0<span style=\"color: #ff0000;\"><a style=\"color: #ff0000;\" href=\"https:\/\/news.google.com\/publications\/CAAqBwgKMLG0nwswvr63Aw\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\">Google News<\/a><\/span>\u00a0too, click on the star and choose us from your favorites.<\/span><\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<blockquote>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\">For forums sites go to <span style=\"color: #ff9900;\"><a style=\"color: #ff9900;\" href=\"https:\/\/forum.buradabiliyorum.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Forum.BuradaBiliyorum.Com<\/a><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<blockquote>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><strong>If you want to read more Like this articles, you can visit our <span style=\"color: #ff9900;\"><a style=\"color: #ff9900;\" href=\"https:\/\/en.buradabiliyorum.com\/social-media\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Social Media category.<\/a><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p><span style=\"color: black;\"><a style=\"color: #ff9900;\" href=\"https:\/\/www.slashfilm.com\/amy-revisited\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Source<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>&#8220;#Amy Revisited 40 Years Later \u2013 \/Film&#8221; (Welcome to\u00a0Out of the Disney Vault, where we explore the unsung gems and forgotten disasters currently streaming on Disney+.) The 1980s were a very rough time for the Walt Disney Company, at least in the first half of the decade. We may now think of the 1980s as&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":216708,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/d13ezvd6yrslxm.cloudfront.net\/wp\/wp-content\/images\/Amy-Revisited.jpeg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[1568,100426,1569,1570,1572],"class_list":["post-216707","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-social-mediaa","tag-featured-stories-sidebar","tag-amy","tag-disney","tag-features","tag-out-of-the-disney-vault"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/216707","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=216707"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/216707\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/216708"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=216707"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=216707"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=216707"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}