AWARDS & HONORS

Paper Moon opened in New York City on May 16, 1973, to rave reviews and crowds at the box office; it made $16.5 million in rentals. It was director Peter Bogdanovich's third hit film in a row - it would also be his last commercial success for many years. Following Paper Moon, his reputation suffered a major decline due to a string of flops - Daisy Miller (1974), At Long Last Love (1975) and Nickelodeon (1976). The talented director would never again achieve the heights of commercial and critical success he enjoyed with Paper Moon, although he did enjoy a brief comback in 1985 with the acclaimed drama, Mask starring Cher.

Paper Moon fared quite well at the 1974 Academy Awards ceremony. While Tatum O'Neal walked off with the Oscar® for Best Supporting Actress, Madeline Kahn (also a Best Supporting Actress nominee), Alvin Sargent (Best Adapted Screenplay), and Les Fresholtz and Richard Portman (Best Sound) had to settle for the honor of being nominated.

The Golden Globes recognized the merits of Paper Moon when the film was nominated for Best Director, Best Musical/Comedy, Best Actor (Ryan O'Neal), Best Actress (Tatum O'Neal), and Best Supporting Actress (Madeline Kahn). The film won a single Golden Globe, for Most Promising Newcomer - Female (Tatum O'Neal).

The Critics' Corner: PAPER MOON

The filmmaking industry bible, Variety, wrote: "Paper Moon is a film for families, teenagers, young adults and older generations. Its heart-warming aspects are conveyed without treacle, and its grittier suggestions of vagabond living are transmitted without vulgarity or tastelessness. Bogdanovich once again has revived another film form, without patronizing and minus pandering, but with innovative original work based upon respectful admiration of the screen's past."

Peter Buckley of Films and Filming praised the film in appropriate fashion when he assumed the voice of a 1930s-era carnival hawker: "I was tellin you'all to bring in the whole family an' have a good time. I ain't had such a good time myself since the last Preston Sturges film. Come to think of it, this is the last Preston Sturges film."

Influential critic and author John Baxter wrote Paper Moon is "one of the shapeliest comedies of the seventies, trading on nostalgia but undercutting it with sly character playing and dead wit," with the two O'Neals achieving a "stylish ensemble performance."

In his book A Biographical Dictionary of Film, British critic David Thomson called Paper Moon "perilously slight and charming, but sustained by its re-creation of 1930s John Ford and by its affectionate recollection of rural America." Thomson also thought that Bogdanovich's "boyish love for cinema" permeates the picture, as evidenced by the scene where the two leads are in a diner while, across the street, director John Ford's Steamboat 'Round the Bend (1935) can be seen on the marquee at the local movie house.

Film critic John Simon was not enchanted with Paper Moon either, according to his June 11th, 1973 review. He begins his scathing editorial by calling the film another opportunity for Peter Bogdanovich to retreat into "the past of trashy old movies that he religiously lapped up as a buff and now proudly regurgitates as a director." Simon deemed the film "claptrap," mostly because "(Addie) is much too clever for her age, and (Moses) is rather too dumb for a man supposedly living by his wits."

Compiled by Scott McGee