MOVIES - SUMMER 1977

Just for kicks, and since the end of summer looms, I decided to look back at some of the movies that played at local (Chicago-area) theaters during the summer of 1977, right before entering my senior year in high school.

Like today, many of the movies in '77 were horror shlock, sci-fi, melodramas and action. The biggest difference wasn't in the films themselves but where you watched them. Most of the movies you saw in 1977 were at stand-alone theaters as opposed to seeing them at massive strip mall cineplexes.

STAR WARS garnered the biggest box office dollars in 1977 and it played for the better part of the year rather than only at theaters for a short run like now where movies show for (at maximum) a couple months before hitting DVD.

In 1977, videotape players weren't on most consumers' radar (although consumer players were available at a very high premium). So, if you wanted to see a new movie, you had to go to the theater. You simply didn't have the "I'll just wait until it hits video" mindset.

During the summer of '77, much of my time was spent at the Skylark Drive-In Theater located off of Eola Road and New York Street in Aurora, IL. The Skylark is long gone and the grounds are now home to townhouses and strip malls.

This list (which is not definitive) includes movies that played at indoor theaters as well as double features that played at the Skylark or other drive-in theaters.

At indoor theaters in 1977:

• WELCOME TO L.A.
• THE LATE SHOW
• MAN ON THE ROOF
• STAR WARS
• THE HOUSE BY THE LAKE
• THE FARMER
• IN THE REALM OF THE SENSES
• THE LITTLE GIRL WHO LIVES DOWN THE LANE
• THE WHITE BUFFALO
• BAD
• ANNIE HALL
• CROSS OF IRON
• SUSPIRIA
• ONE ON ONE
• BLACK AND WHITE IN COLOR
• ALLEGRO
• CAR WASH
• ASSAULT ON PRECINCT 13
• KID VENGEANCE
• AIRPORT 77
• SMOKEY AND THE BANDIT
• THE SPY WHO LOVED ME
• FIRE SALE
• THE OTHER SIDE OF MIDNIGHT
• THE LAST REMAKE OF BEAU GESTE
• MARCH OR DIE
• RAINBOW BRIDGE

At the Skylark (or other area drive-in theaters):

• RUBY and THE BEAST MUST DIE
• RUBY and THE LEGEND OF HELLHOUSE
• RUBY and A BOY AND HIS DOG
• THE CAR and TWO MINUTE WARNING
• AUDREY ROSE and CARRIE
• RABID and GOD TOLD ME TO
• THE VAN and THE POM POM GIRLS
• THE LITTLE GIRL WHO LIVED DOWN THE LANE and BREAKER! BREAKER!