by Mike Ryan – Yahoo Movies
“Star Wars,” which came out in 1977, gets a lot of the credit for shaping the box-office blockbuster landscape that still defines the summer movie season. But 1975′s “Jaws” — which celebrates the 35th anniversary of its release this week — completely changed what a summer film is supposed to represent… for better or for worse. It goes without saying that “Jaws” is great film, but its greatness, in the long run, may be far less important than its influence.
“Jaws” is considered the first “event film.” A film so huge, that, without seeing it, a human being is subject to joining the scrap-heap of popular culture. A lot of films try to be “event films” — for instance, this season’s “The A-Team” and “Robin Hood.” They were not event films. “Toy Story 3″ is an event film; “Avatar” is most definitely an event film. Why did “Avatar” do so well at the box office? Because no one wanted to be the only person alive that had not seen “Avatar.”
How do we know “Jaws” was the first event film? It’s interesting to note the films that topped the box office in the seven years prior to “Jaws’” 1975 release:
1968: “Funny Girl”
1969: “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid”
1970: “Love Story”
1971: “Billy Jack”
1972:”The Godfather”
1973: “The Exorcist”
1974: “Blazing Saddles”
No doubt, some of the greatest films of all time are on that list. But what’s missing is the consistency of the event film. No disrespect to Barbara Streisand, but in no way could a film like “Funny Girl” (again, for better or for worse) be the biggest box-office draw today. It should also be noted that the biggest box-office draw of 1974, “Blazing Saddles,” grossed $119.5 million in the U.S. The next year, “Jaws” more than doubled that take by grossing $260 million to become, at the time, the highest-grossing film of all time (until “Star Wars” came along two years later).
Now, take a look at the highest-grossing films in the seven years after the release of “Jaws”:
1976: “Rocky”
1977: “Star Wars”
1978: “Grease”
1979: “Kramer vs. Kramer”
1980: “The Empire Strikes Back”
1981: “Raiders of the Lost Ark”
1982: “E.T.: the Extra-Terrestrial”
1983: “Return of the Jedi”
This is a seismic shift from what we had seen before. Of those seven years, only the eventual Best Picture winner, 1979′s “Kramer vs. Kramer,” doesn’t qualify as an event film. Number two that year? “Star Trek, The Motion Picture.” And if it weren’t for two “Star Wars” films, “Smokey and the Bandit” and “Smokey and the Bandit Part II” would be on this list, too.
Read the rest of Mike Ryans great article HERE
