How about a walk down memory lane to take a quick look at what happened at the box office in the U.S. and Canada forty years ago? As it turned out, “Grease” topped the summer box office, making Paramount’s hit musical the box office champion of 1978.
According to Variety, as published in their 73rd Anniversary Edition of January 3, 1979—back then, along with the Hollywood Reporter, the only truly valuable and reliable source for any insider who needed to check the domestic rentals—Steven Spielberg’s continued run of “Close Encounters of the Third Kind” (released in November 1977) came in second and with the unexpected success of “National Lampoon’s Animal House” (directed by John Landis), the top three films of 1978 were all directed by filmmakers from the New Hollywood, a new generation of young filmmakers that came to prominence in the late 1960 and 1970s.
To put those bright film directors, their films, and their success in the right perspective, we prefer to give you first the top ten of Variety’s all-time box office hit films, as the list looked by the end of 1978, with seven of the top ten films directed by New Hollywood filmmakers:
- Star Wars (1977; George Lucas)
CAST Mark Hamill, Harrison Ford, Carrie Fisher, Peter Cushing, Alec Guinness
$164,765,000 - Jaws (1975; Steven Spielberg)
CAST Roy Scheider, Richard Dreyfuss, Robert Shaw, Lorraine Gary
$121,254,000 - The Godfather (1972; Francis Ford Coppola)
CAST Marlon Brando, Al Pacino, James Caan, Robert Duvall, Diane Keaton
$86,275,000 - Grease (1978; Randal Kleiser)
CAST John Travolta, Olivia Newton-John, Stockard Channing, Jeff Conaway, Eve Arden, Frankie Avalon, Joan Blondell
$83,091,000 - The Exorcist (1973; William Friedkin)
CAST Ellen Burstyn, Max von Sydow, Linda Blair, Lee J. Cobb
$82,200,000 - The Sound of Music (1965; Robert Wise)
CAST Julie Andrews, Christopher Plummer, Eleanor Parker, Richard Haydn
$79,000,000 - The Sting (1973; George-Roy Hill)
CAST Paul Newman, Robert Redford, Robert Shaw, Charles Durning
$78,889,000 - Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977; Steven Spielberg)
CAST Richard Dreyfuss, François Truffaut, Teri Garr, Melinda Dillon
$77,000,000 - Gone With the Wind (1939; Victor Fleming)
CAST Clark Gable, Vivien Leigh, Leslie Howard, Olivia de Havilland
$76,700,000 - Saturday Night Fever (1977; John Badham)
CAST John Travolta, Karen Lynn Gorney, Barry Miller, Donna Pescow
$71,463,000
But going back to the 1978 box office is concerned, please note that most of the November-December openings were on the market too sketchily for significance to be included in this list. They will appear in the 1979 overview.
So, for now, why don’t we let the facts and figures speak for themselves? Here it is, 1978, when we were all forty years younger, and the saying was ‘Grease is the word’ (click here for the official 40th anniversary trailer).
- Grease (June; Randal Kleiser)
CAST John Travolta, Olivia Newton-John, Stockard Channing, Jeff Conaway, Eve Arden, Frankie Avalon, Joan Blondell
$83,091,000 - Close Encounters of the Third Kind (November 1977; Steven Spielberg)
CAST Richard Dreyfuss, François Truffaut, Teri Garr, Melinda Dillon
$54,000,000 - National Lampoon’s Animal House (June; John Landis)
CAST John Belushi, Tim Matheson, John Vernon, Thomas Hulce, Donald Sutherland - Jaws 2 (June; Jeannot Szwarc)
CAST Roy Scheider, Lorraine Gary, Murray Hamilton, Joseph Mascolo
$49,299,000 - Heaven Can Wait (June; Warren Beatty)
CAST Warren Beatty, Julie Christie, James Mason, Charles Grodin, Dyan Cannon, Jack Warden
$42,517,000 - The Goodbye Girl (November 1977; Herbert Ross)
CAST Richard Dreyfuss, Marsha Mason, Quinn Cummings, Paul Benedict
$41,000,000 - Star Wars (May 1977, reissue; George Lucas)
CAST Mark Hamill, Harrison Ford, Carrie Fisher, Peter Cushing, Alec Guinness
$38,375,000 - Hooper (July; Hal Needham)
CAST Burt Reynolds, Jan-Michael Vincent, Sally Field, Brian Keith
$31,500,000 - Foul Play (July; Colin Higgins)
CAST Goldie Hawn, Chevy Chase, Burgess Meredith, Rachel Roberts, Dudley Moore
$25,065,000 - Revenge of the Pink Panther (June; Blake Edwards)
CAST Peter Sellers, Herbert Lom, Burt Kwouk, Dyan Cannon
$25,000,000 - Up in Smoke (September; Lou Adler)
CAST Cheech Marin, Tommy Chong, Strother Martin, Edie Adams
$21,271,000 - The End (May; Burt Reynolds)
CAST Burt Reynolds, Sally Field, Dom DeLuise, Joanne Woodward
$20,000,000 - The Cheap Detective (May; Robert Moore)
CAST Peter Falk, Ann-Margret, Louise Fletcher, John Houseman, Marsha Mason
$19,500,000 - The Gauntlet (December 1977; Clint Eastwood)
CAST Clint Eastwood, Sondra Locke, Pat Hingle, William Prince
$17,500,000 - High Anxiety (December 1977; Mel Brooks)
CAST Mel Brooks, Madeline Kahn, Cloris Leachman, Harvey Korman
$17,040,000 - Pete’s Dragon (December 1977; Don Chaffey)
CAST Helen Reddy, Jim Dale, Mickey Rooney, Red Buttons, Shelley Winters
$16,100,000 - The Turning Point (November 1977; Herbert Ross)
CAST Anne Bancroft, Shirley MacLaine, Tom Skerritt, Mikhail Baryshnikov
$15,045,000 - House Calls (March; Howard Zieff)
CAST Walter Matthau, Glenda Jackson, Art Carney, Richard Benjamin
$14,859,000 - Coma (February; Michael Crichton)
CAST Genevieve Bujold, Michael Douglas, Elizabeth Ashley, Rip Torn, Richard Widmark
$14,400,000 - Damien: Omen II (June; Don Taylor)
CAST William Holden, Lee Grant, Jonathan Scott-Taylor, Sylvia Sidney
$12,050,000 - Capricorn One (June; Peter Hyams)
CAST Elliott Gould, James Brolin, Brenda Vaccaro, Sam Waterston
$11,500,000 - Julia (October 1977; Fred Zinnemann)
CAST Jane Fonda, Vanessa Redgrave, Jason Robards, Hal Holbrook, Maximilian Schell
$11,300,000 - Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Heart Club’s Band (July; Michael Schultz)
CAST Peter Frampton, The Bee Gees, Steve Martin, Donald Pleasence
$11,070,000 - An Unmarried Woman (March; Paul Mazursky)
CAST Jill Clayburgh, Alan Bates, Michael Murphy, Cliff Gorman
$11,000,000 - The Fury (March; Brian De Palma)
CAST Kirk Douglas, John Cassavetes, Carrie Snodgress, Charles Durning
$10,800,000 - Hot Lead & Cold Feet (July; Robert Butler)
CAST Jim Dale, Karen Valentine, Don Knotts, Jack Elam, Darren McGavin
$10,000,000 - Midnight Express (May; Alan Parker)
CAST Jim Dale, Karen Valentine, Don Knotts, Jack Elam, Darren McGavin
$10,000,000 - The World’s Greatest Lover (December 1977; Gene Wilder)
CAST Gene Wilder, Carol Kane, Dom DeLuise, Fritz Feld
$9,900,000 - Oh, God! (October 1977; Carl Reiner)
CAST George Burns, John Denver, Teri garr, Donald Pleasence, Ralph Bellamy
$9,800,000 - The Late Great Planet Earth (December 1977; Robert Amram, Rolf Forsberg)
CAST Orson Welles (narration)
$9,656,000 - F.I.S.T. (April; Norman Jewison)
CAST Sylvester Stallone, Rod Steiger, Peter Boyle, Melinda Dillon
$9,500,000 - Convoy (June; Sam Peckinpah)
CAST Kris Kristofferson, Ali MacGraw, Ernest Borgnine, Burt Young
$9,000,000 - Which Way Is Up? (November 1977; Michael Schultz)
CAST Richard Pryor, Lonette McKee, Margaret Avery, Morgan Woodward
$8,707,000 - Eyes of Laura Mars (July; Irvin Kershner)
CAST Faye Dunaway, Tommy Lee Jones, Brad Dourif, Rene Auberjonois
$8,600,000 - The Cat From Outer Space (July; Norman Tokar)
CAST Ken Berry, Sandy Duncan, Harry Morgan, Roddy McDowall
$8,250,000 - Coming Home (February; Hal Ashby)
CAST Jane Fonda, Jon Voight, Bruce Dern, Penelope Milford
$8,200,000 - Death on the Nile (September; John Guillermin)
CAST Peter Ustinov, Jane Birkin, Lois Chiles, Bette Davis, Mia Farrow, Angela Lansbury, David Niven, Maggie Smith, Jack Warden
$8,134,000 - The Betsy (February; Daniel Petrie)
CAST Laurence Olivier, Robert Duvall, Katharine Ross, Tommy Lee Jones
$7,850,000 - The Boys From Brazil (October; Franklin J. Schaffner)
CAST Gregory Peck, Laurence Olivier, James Mason, Lilli Palmer
$7,628,000 - The Swarm (July; Irwin Allen)
CAST Michael Caine, Katharine Ross, Richard Widmark, Richard Chamberlain, Olivia de Havilland, Lee Grant, Fred MacMurray, Henry Fonda
$7,600,000 - Thank God It’s Friday (May; Robert Klane)
CAST Donna Summer, Valerie Landsburg, Terri Nunn, Chick Vennera
$7,300,000 - The Bad News Bears Go To Japan (June; John Berry)
CAST Tony Curtis, Jackie Earl Haley, Tomisaburô Wakayama
$7,281,000 - The Greek Tycoon (May; J. Lee Thompson)
CAST Anthony Quinn, Jacqueline Bisset, Raf Vallone, Edward Albert
$7,261,000 - Return From Witch Mountain (April; John Hough)
CAST Bette Davis, Christopher Lee, Kim Richards, Ike Eisenmann
$7,250,000 - The Choirboys (December 1977; Robert Aldrich)
CAST Charles Durning, Louis Gossett Jr., Perry King, James Woods
$7,071,000 - Candleshoe (February; Norman Tokar)
CAST David Niven, Helen Hayes, Jodie Foster, Leo McKern
$6,925,000 - The Wiz (October; Sidney Lumet)
CAST Diana Ross, Michael Jackson, Nipsey Russell, Ted Ross
$6,681,000 - The Other Side of the Mountain, Part II (February; Larry Peerce)
CAST Marilyn Hassett, Timothy Bottoms, Nan Martin, Belinda Montgomery
$6,468,000 - Corvette Summer (June; Matthew Robbins)
CAST Mark Hamill, Annie Potts, Eugene Roche, William Bryant
$6,250,000 - Across the Great Divide (December 1977; Stewart Raffill)
CAST Robert Logan, Heather Rattray, Mark Edward Hall, George Flower
$6,053,000 - The Big Fix (October; Jeremy Paul Kagan)
CAST Richard Dreyfuss, Susan Anspach, Bonnie Bedelia, John Lithgow
$5,934,000 - The Buddy Holly Story (May; Steve Rash)
CAST Gary Busey, Don Stroud, Charles Martin Smith, Maria Richwine
$5,900,000 - American Hot Wax (March; Floyd Mutrux)
CAST Tim McIntire, Fran Drescher, Jay Leno, Laraine Newman
$5,082,000 - Who Is Killing the Great Chefs of Europe? (September; Ted Kotcheff)
CAST George Segal, Jacqueline Bisset, Robert Morley, Jean-Pierre Cassel
$5,000,000 - Rabbit Test (February; Joan Rivers)
CAST Billy Crystal, Joan Prather, Alex Rocco, Doris Roberts
$4,700,000 - Goin’ South (October; Jack Nicholson)
CAST Jack Nicholson, Mary Steenburgen, John Belushi, Christopher Lloyd
$4,627,000 - Casey’s Shadow (January; Martin Ritt)
CAST Walter Matthau, Alexis Smith, Robert Webber, Murray Hamilton
$4,300,000 - Telefon (December 1977; Don Siegel)
CAST Charles Bronson, Lee Remick, Tyne Daly, Donald Pleasence
$4,250,000 - The Boys in Company C (January; Sidney J. Furie)
CAST Stan Shaw, Andrew Stevens, James Canning, Craig Wasson
$4,150,000 - Pretty Baby (April; Louis Malle)
CAST Keith Carradine, Susan Sarandon, Brooke Shields, Diana Scarwid
$4,132,000 - Straight Time (March; Ulu Grosbard)
CAST Dustin Hoffman, Theresa Russell, Harry Dean Stanton, Gary Busey
$4,100,000 - Damnation Alley (October 1977; Jack Smight)
CAST Jan-Michael Vincent, George Peppard, Dominique Sanda, Paul Winfield
$4,000,000 - High-Ballin’ (May; Peter Carter)
CAST Peter Fonda, Jerry Reed, Helen Shaver, Chris Wiggins
$4,000,000 - Interiors (August; Woody Allen)
CAST Diane Keaton, Geraldine Page, Maureen Stapleton, Sam Waterston
$4,000,000 - A Wedding (September; Robert Altman)
CAST Carol Burnett, Geraldine Chaplin, Mia Farrow, Vittorio Gassman, Lillian Gish
$3,600,000 - The Wild Geese (May; Andrew V. McLaglen)
CAST Richard Burton, Roger Moore, Richard Harris, Hardy Krüger, Stewart Granger
$3,500,000 - Gray Lady Down (March; David Greene)
CAST Charlton Heston, David Carradine, Stacy Keach, Ned Beatty
$3,121,000 - Blue Collar (February; Paul Schrader)
CAST Richard Pryor, Harvey Keitel, Yaphet Kotto, Cliff DeYoung
$3,030,000 - Bobby Deerfield (October 1977; Sydney Pollack)
CAST Al Pacino, Marthe Keller, Anny Duperey, Walter McGinn
$3,000,000 - Comes a Horseman (October; Alan J. Pakula)
CAST James Caan, Jane Fonda, Jason Robards, Richard Farnsworth
$3,000,000 - FM (May; John A. Alonzo)
CAST Michael Brandon, Eileen Brennan, Cleavon Little, Linda Ronstadt
$2,924,000 - If I Ever See You Again (May; Joseph Brooks)
CAST Joseph Brooks, Shelley Hack, Jimmy Breslin, Jerry Keller
$2,900,000 - Alice in Wonderland (September 1951, reissue; Clyde Geronimo, Wilfred Jackson, Hamilton Luske)
CAST (animated, voice only) Kathryn Beaumont, Ed Wynn
$2,800,000 - Crossed Swords (June; Richard Fleischer)
CAST Oliver Reed, Raquel Welch, Ernest Borgnine, George C. Scott, Rex Harrison
$2,700,000 - Cinderella (May 1977; Michael Pataki)
CAST Cheryl Smith, Kirk Scott, Brett Smiley, Sy Richardson, Yana Nirvana
$2,600,000 - Almost Summer (April; Martin Davidson)
CAST Bruno Kirby, Lee Purcell, Didi Conn, John Friedrich
$2,599,000 - The Adventures of the Wilderness Family (December 1975, reissue; Stewart Raffill)
CAST Robert F. Logan, Susan Damante Shaw, Hollye Holmes, Ham Larsen
$2,588,000 - Paradise Alley (September; Sylvester Stallone)
CAST Sylvester Stallone, Kevin Conway, Anne Archer, Joe Spinell
$2,556,000 - Watership Down (November; Martin Rosen)
CAST (animated, voice only) John Hurt, Ralph Richardson
$2,550,000 - The Last Waltz (April; Martin Scorsese)
CAST The Band, Eric Clapton, Neil Diamond, Bob Dylan, Joni Mitchell
$2,500,000 - Who’ll Stop the Rain? (August; Karl Reisz)
CAST Nick Nolte, Tuesday Weld, Michael Moriarty, Anthony Zerbe
$2,500,000 - The Driver (July; Walter Hill)
CAST Ryan O’Neal, Bruce Dern, Isabelle Adjani, Ronee Blakley
$2,250,000 - Coach (March; Bud Townsend)
CAST Cathy Lee Crosby, Michael Biehn, Keenan Wynn, Channing Clarkson
$2,200,000 - The Big Sleep (March; Michael Winner)
CAST Robert Mitchum, Sarah Miles, Richard Boone, James Stewart
$2,100,000 - Blazing Saddles (February 1974, reissue; Mel Brooks)
CAST Cleavon Little, Gene Wilder, Slim Pickens, David Huddleston
$2,000,000 - Good Guys Wear Black (May; Ted Post)
CAST Chuck Norris, Anne Archer, Lloyd Haynes, Dana Andrews
$2,000,000 - You Light Up My Life (August 1977, reissue; Joseph Brooks)
CAST Didi Conn, Joe Silver, Michael Zaslow, Stephen Nathan
$1,900,000 - Somebody Killed Her Husband (September; Lamont Johnson)
CAST Farrah Fawcett-Majors, Jeff Bridges, John Wood, Tammy Grimes
$1,850,000 - Malibu Beach (May; Robert J. Rosenthal)
CAST Kim Lankford, James Daughton, Susan Player Jarreau
$1,750,000 - La vie devant soi, a.k.a. Madame Rosa (April; Moshé Mizrahi)
CAST Simone Signoret, Samy Ben Youb, Michael Bat-Adam
$1,680,000 - Warlords of Atlantis (July, Kevin Connor)
CAST Doug McClure, Peter Gilmore, Cyd Charisse, Daniel Massey
$1,600,000 - It Lives Again (May; Larry Cohen)
CAST Frederic Forrest, Kathleen Lloyd, John Marley, John P. Ryan
$1,500,000 - Jason and the Argonauts (June 1963, reissue; Don Chaffey)
CAST Todd Armstrong, Nancy Kovack, Gary Raymond, Laurence Naismith
$1,500,000 - The Manitou (February; William Girdler)
CAST Tony Curtis, Susan Strasberg, Stella Stevens, Ann Sothern
$1,500,000 - The Next Man (November 1976, reissue; Richard C. Sarafian)
CAST Sean Connery, Cornelia Sharpe, Albert Paulsen, Adolfo Celi
$1,450,000 - Big Wednesday (May; John Milius)
CAST Jan-Michael Vincent, William Katt, Gary Busey, Patti D’Arbanville
$1,400,000 - The Chicken Chronicles (October 1977: Francis Simon)
CAST Phil Silvers, Steve Guttenberg, Ed Lauter, Lisa Reeves
$1,350,000 - Hollywood High (July; Patrick Wright)
CAST Marcy Albrecht, Sherry Hardin, Rae Sperling, Susanne
$1,251,000 - Goin’ Coconuts (October; Howard Morris)
CAST Donny Osmond, Marie Osmond, Kenneth Mars, Ted Cassidy
$1,234,648 - A Piece of the Action (October 1977; Sidney Poitier)
CAST Sidney Poitier, Bill Cosby, James Earl Jones, Denise Nicholas
$1,200,000 - The Sea Gypsies (April; Stewart Raffill)
CAST Robert Logan, Mikki Jamison, Heather Rattray
$1,200,000 - I Wanna Hold Your Hand (April; Robert Zemeckis)
CAST Nancy Allen, Bobby DiCicco, Marc McClure, Susan Kendall Newman
$1,170,000 - Ode to Billy Joe (June 1976, reissue; Max Baer)
CAST Robby Benson, Glynnis O’Connor, Joan Hotchkins, Sandy McPeak
$1,100,000 - Stingray (June; Richard Taylor)
CAST Christopher Mitchum, Les Lannom, William Watson, Sherry Jackson
$1,100,000 - Alice Sweet Alice, a.k.a. Communion (September 1977; Alfred Sole)
CAST Linda Miller, Mildred Clinton, Paula E. Sheppard, Brooke Shields
$1,090,000 - Girl Friends (May; Claudia Weill)
CAST Melanie Mayron, Eli Wallach, Adam Cohen, Anita Skinner
$1,000,000 - Here Come the Tigers (April; Sean S. Cunningham)
CAST Richard Lincoln, James Zvanut, Samantha Grey, Manny Lieberman
$1,000,000 - Jennifer (February; Brice Mack)
CAST Lisa Pelikan, Bert Convy, Nina Foch, John Gavin
$1,000,000 - The Medusa Touch (February; Jack Gold)
CAST Richard Burton, Lino Ventura, Lee Remick, Harry Andrews
$1,000,000 - The Norseman (June; Charles B. Pierce)
CAST Lee Majors, Cornel Wilde, Mel Ferrer, Jack Elam
$1,000,000 - Our Winning Season (June; Joseph Ruben)
CAST Scott Jacoby, Deborah Benson, Dennis Quaid, Robert Wahler
$1,000,000 - The Pack (September 1977; Robert Clouse)
CAST Joe Don Baker, Hope Alexander-Willis, Richard B. Shull
$1,000,000 - Youngblood (February; Noel Nosseck)
CAST Lawrence-Hilton Jacobs, Bryan O’Dell, Ren Woods
$1,000,000