In 1974 -- this was a "Summer Movie"

Movie going experiences were very different back then. I was a 70s child and vaguely remember the Saturday Matinee most theaters practiced and they use to show popular movies that were over 10 - 20 years old. Today, only art house theaters, if you're lucky enough to have one in your neighborhood, show old popular movies.

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Most all of this disappeared as first VHS, and then DVD, and now, streaming came in.

But it was great while it lasted.

Studios re-released their movies over the years, again and again. And there were "second run" houses(cheaper to get in, double bills, possibly more "worn out" prints) and "revival" houses(playing a different movie each day, usually a double bill of older films.) I was/am a Hitchcock fan, but it was more fun back then when a revival house might run a week of Hitchcock double bills. (Like North by Northwest AND Psycho on the same bill.)

I think what we're missing is the idea that these movies kept on running in THEATERS, on big screens, so you could see them the way they were meant to be seen.

But now things are on our TVs on our computer screens and on our phones.

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I got to see Chinatown in '79 in a theater at a matinee showing and again in 1980 as it was being shown with The Shining, thanks to Jack Nicholson being the lead role. You'd never see that type of movie scheduling today.

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I guess that's true that a particular star might found his older movies paired up with his newer movies. In his prime, Jack sure was in a lot of good movies. Chinatown and The Shining, for two.

Still, its true: Chinatown on first release was a summer movie. It made good money , but not huge money(it was too cerebral and adult for a teen crowd) but it played through the summer and generated a lot of articles.

Come to think of it, Chinatown may have been the LAST summer movie that wasn't a summer movie. Jaws came the next summer. Star Wars two summers after that. Then Animal House('78). Then Alien ('79.)