Easy Riders and Raging Bulls - New Hollywood

What significant factors contributed to the critical, economic and cultural success of "New Hollywood?" Discuss key actors, directors, producers, films, the audience of cinema.  Explain the attitude of the era.

The new wave of Hollywood began in the mid-1960s, as directors and actors began to take control of the industry and the conventions of the early and inter-war decades were over-ruled. The new wave provided a strong foundation of Hollywood to develop on over the subsequent years and allowed for a more diverse range of films to be produced. The new wave of cinema drew audiences back into films and away from the rise of television, providing a refreshed industry following the downfall of the studio system (in which lots closed, films bombed and became generic and meaningless).
           This wave of cinema began within the release of the 1967 film Bonnie Clyde. Inspired by the popularity of French director Francois Truffaut (the foreign film market's success is arguably a factor for the success of New Hollywood, since directors like Truffaut and Godard inspired the new wave), writers Newman and Benton wrote the script, while Arthur Penn directed. Despite the studio's disapproval, the film grew to experience wide success as star Warren Beatty rebelled against the feebleness of being "just another star" and audiences were drawn in by the fresh, daring take on violence and romance. 
               Many young, intelligent directors began to work in the era, using their knowledge of films and popular culture to target the baby boom generation (as many teenagers began to feel less alienated by the industry) and spur the success of their films during the era. Hollywood began to encourage more of this young talent to come to Hollywood, with names like Robert Altman and Dennis Hopper making their first films within this era (Hopper's success with Easy Rider showed how the generation were using friends and associates to help further their film while also appealing to audiences with fresh names and concepts). Hopper's film also demonstrated the success of the auteur film with a new award at Cannes Film Festival being created just for it (while John Sleisinger's Midnight Cowboys - the first studio film with an X-rating - gathering the approval of the industry with 7 Oscar nominations). 
                 Directors like Sam Peckinpah took advantage of the era, using drugs and alcoholism to fuel his filmmaking and to almost challenge audiences to experience the danger of his lifestyle through his films. These directors also arose controversy, and brought the film industry back to the attention of the media (whereas marketing campaigns around 3D and other technological developments had put audiences off in the past). This speculation reached its peak in 1969, when Charles Manson and his followers killed star (and wife of Roman Polanski) Sharon Tate. For the first time in New Hollywood (in a similar manner to the distrust and horror that arose around the Black Dahlia murder from the previous generation of film), the film industry was damaged with directors using incidences from their own lives to create the mood and tone of their later films (Polanski, for example, went completely mad and cast Keith Chegwin in his Macbeth). 
                    Not only did the films of New Hollywood surge the industry with a newfound popularity, but a new appreciation and understanding from critics. They applauded films from men such as Peter Bogdanovich (specifically The Last Picture Show) finding new found levels of meaning in an exciting and daring medium, influenced by popular culture and the lives of peers and family, while also becoming stars in their own right. Reality was an important factor in the industry's success then, as films began to show real people, with real emotions and situations (with Robert F Kennedy's assassination and later the moon landings, changing taste and need for films and genres). 
                     It was the rise of young, film-buff directors and actors then, that broke away from the dying studio era (in search of less binding contracts and perhaps more money and/or appreciation) that saw the creation of daring, reflective, real, emotive and meaningful films that contributed to the success of the New Hollywood era, which itself saw the invention of the blockbuster (through Steven Spielberg's Jaws) and a surge in critical and commercial success.