To get a sense as to how much of a commercial, and perhaps a societal, impact these challenging, art-house films (by today's standards) made, I went to the-numbers.com to see what the box office results were prior to the SFX take over.
I’ve highlighted some of the more subversive, challenging, and controversial pictures made during this time (year of release and box office ranking appear below each movie poster). Sure, special-effects-powered films like Jaws and Star Wars made more than these listed pictures, but these films were absolutely financially competitve in their time. These films often reaped more financial success than their family-friendly or teen-driven counterparts.
These complex and dark films run the gamut of difficult subject matters such as conformity, authority, counter culture, race, gender, political corruption, emerging technology, sex workers, drug addiction, mental health, personal isolation, national media, the Vietnam War, economic/cultural shifts/transitions, layered issues resulting from the death of a family member, and much more.
These films are all very specific and individual. The performances timeless.
What has changed?