Jon Voight and Dustin Hoffman hustle their way through 1960s New York in this bitter-sweet classic of New Hollywood which remains the only X-rated film to be awarded the Oscar for Best Picture. It was felt at the time that James Leo Herlihy’s explicit and challenging novel was unfilmable, but former blacklisted writer Waldo Salt found a way to adapt it and was awarded an Oscar for his endeavours. In addition, British director John Schlesinger brought an outsider’s eye to Midnight Cowboy’s representation of life on the margins of 1960s New York society and its dissection of the American dream.

Screening as part of Look Who’s Back: The Hollywood Renaissance and the Blacklist. Multi-film pass available.