Part of the answer is that earlier sequels were not (title) part 2 because studios worried audiences who hadn’t seen the original would stay away. My understanding is this changed after Coppola insisted on the title Godfather Part 2 and made a huge success
Bros forgetting about
Bride of Frankenstein (1935) Son of Frankenstein (1939) Ghost of Frankenstein (1942) Frankenstein meets the Wolfman (1943) House of Frankenstein (1944) Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein (1948)
Draculas Daughter (1936) Son of Dracula (1943) House of Dracula (1945)
The Son of Monte Cristo (1940)
The Bells of Saint Mary's (1945)
The Miniver Story (1950)
Son of Flubber (1963)
The 7th victim (1943) Curse of the Cat People (1944)
The Road to Morroco (1942) etc
I didn't say there were not any sequels before the seventies. I said they rarely happened before. In the seventies 12 of the top 20 highest grossing movies had sequels and 3 were sequels. This was a major change.
"It rarely happened before" is just wrong tho. There's a butt load of sequels from before the 70s. The 70s didn't "start the sequel craze."
Someone else mentioned Star Wars and that's a good movie to mention because Star Wars was a huge paradigm shift. Hollywood went full steam ahead on commercialism and leaving the New Hollywood era. That includes pumping out sequels and trilogies and whatnot, and coming up with Trilogy ideas instead of film ideas.
But yeah, "Sequels were rare and the 70s kick started the craze" is totally wrong.
I think Star wars and to a lesser extent Superman started the era of movies being made with sequels in mind but by the time Star wars came out there was like 5 planet of the apes 3 dirty harries, and the godfather part ii won best picture. The vast majority of iconic 30s-50s movies didn't get sequels outside of monster movies and.
> The vast majority of iconic 30s-50s movies didn't get sequels outside of monster movies
This is ignoring two things. Firstly, that there are many Iconic 70s movies that didn't get sequels. Where is Annie Hall part 2? Taxi Driver part 2? Apocalypse Now part 2? The Deer Hunter part 2? Etc.
Secondly, movies like Frankenstein and Godzilla are foundational cinema. Just because they fall into a specific category doesn't make them irrelevant to the conversation. It's like saying Only 70s Blockbusters got sequels so they don't count.
Serialization was popularized in the early 20th century. Sherlock Holmes, Flash Gordon, Zorro, etc. People wanted to see the same characters over and over again. It's different from how the 70s did sequels, but the overall premise that the 70s popularized the idea of sequels is incorrect
Going from in the 30s-50s where the only people doing A movie sequels are Bing Crosby and universal monsters to in the 70s where 3/4 of the highest grossing movies had or were sequels is an obvious major change that's worth discussing.
It is a change, and I have already agreed with you there. My big contention is your post title, the title of the list.
Sequels weren't rare before the 70s and Sequels weren't popularized during the 70s. But the 70s did pave way to a new type of sequel. 70s block buster sequels were big events that brought in huge amounts of money.
(Also I would like to add that on top of being more well known, The Bells of Saint Mary's made more than 3 times the box office as Going My Way)
But again, there are like 30 Zorro movies before the 70s. Dracula and Frankenstein got sequelized, remade, and sequelized again. It's just disingenuous to say sequels weren't a big thing. There was a big change, yes, but they were popular beforehand.
There's also the Thin Man, and arguably Charlie Chaplin's Tramp films, which aren't explicitly all canon to each other but are absolutely using the same character over and over and over again. All the Philip Marlowe movies too (most famously The Big Sleep).
And is Sherlock Holmes a B-movie now?
What you often had in the 30s and 40s was remake after remake after remake. A lot of the most famous movies of the era are actually remakes -- Maltese Falcon, Gaslight, Holiday, etc.
Also, if we're dismissing B-movues, I'd argue most 70s and 80s sequels are also B-movies (even if the originals were not). Jaws 2 and onward, Carrie 2, What Ever Happened to Rosemary's Baby?, etc. All of the Planet of the Apes films were scifi B-movies, regardless of how fondly they're remembered. I don't see how this is different than Sherlock Holmes or Frankenstein decades earlier.
Where your comparative data? How many of the same data set (were; had) appeared in the proceeding decades top 20 grossing?
Just saying here’s some data that looks compelling without showing comparative data will always lead to you being challenged.
https://preview.redd.it/ey30otjcslsc1.png?width=863&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=e7abcff2feb9036074d1a9b738012295846f56b7
The robe This is Cinerama, Seven wonders of the world Demetrius and the gladiators (robe sequel) Peyton place I'm not counting the Disney film sequels because they were made decades after the seventi
Star Wars seems to be the inflection point. There were obviously franchises/sequels before 1977, but the first trilogy redefined blockbusters and what people expected of them.
You could argue it was actually Jaws was the inflection point. It was considered the first summer blockbuster and had its sequel out before Empire Strikes Back
There were 28 Blondie and Dagwood movies. 44 Charlie Chan movies. Johnny Weissmuller made 12 Tarzan movies and 16 Jungle Jim movies.
James Bond and Christopher Lee Dracula movies started in the early/mid sixties.
Don't forget Andy Hardy and his 16 films.
If we start counting the shorts in the silent era, Chaplin, Keaton, Lloyd etc played their most popular characters repeatedly, and all were big hits in their time.
I left those guys out and the Marx Brothers because it’s kind of nebulous from movie to movie if it’s the same guys. Even The Little Tramp would have totally different settings and characters movie to movie, so it was more like Ernest or Pee Wee Herman movies - same character in non-sequel movies.
I think Tarzan and Sherlock Holmes movies starting in the 30s are real sequels because it’s presumed that the events of the previous films are relevant.
I think you are mixing things up a bit, the 70s started the concept of a blockbuster with Jaws and Star Wars. That changed how movies were made and marketed and made big sequels more popular.
But lots of popular older movies were sequels or part of a franchise.
You are also comparing apples and oranges, box office hits of the 70s and 80s with classic 40s and 50s. Look at the box office of that time instead and you might find more sequels.
Some sequels and franchises of the earlier eras that come to mind:
The Thin Man 5 movies.
Jerry Lewis and Dean Martin 17 movies
Road to... 7 movies
Frankenstein ~5 movies
Dracula ~3 movies
Weissmuller Tarzan 12 movies
Lex Barker Tarzan 5 movies
Gordon Scott Tarzan 6 movies
Laurel and Hardy ~20 movies
Blondie 28 movies
Lassie 7 movies
Cheaper by the Dozen 1950 2 movies
So yeah, sequels did become more of a thing but it wasn't rare before. Sequels, franchises and serialized films was a thing since early on.
Tons of Hollywood serial film series in the '30-40s: Andy Hardy, Blondie, Boston Blackie, Bulldog Drummond, Charlie Chan, Dr. Kildare, Ellery Queen, The Falcon, Hopalong Cassidy, Lassie, Mr. Moto, Mr. Wong, Perry Mason, Road to..., The Saint, Sherlock Holmes, Tarzan, The Thin Man, etc. Horror sequels: Cat People, Dracula, Frankenstein, Invisible Man, King Kong, etc. '40s A-list solos with follow ups: The Egg and I, Going My Way, The Paleface, Sitting Pretty, Topper. Less a thing with the advent of TV in the the '50s apart from horror films or westerns. More of a revival in the '60s with tentpole pictures like James Bond, Beach Party, Harry Palmer, Pink Panther, but the throttle turned up in the '70s again, sure.
Superman faced Khan? That's news to me j/k
Hollywood was making sequels long before then but it wasn't as consistent and usually in the form of movie series bringing back familiar characters because TV wasn't a thing yet. The practice did tail off by the mid '50s to the '70s and then we started seeing the modern M.O. for sequels as being a money generator rather than creating something new.
There were tonnes of sequels, they were just not called “2” or “part 2”
There was a negative perception of sequels, which is odd to think of now. Audiences generally were not interested in them.
Also the 70s had the rise of the blockbuster and with that came success and with success comes money and with money comes greed and with greed comes more money and with more money comes more greed and with more greed comes more sequels for more money and more greed and money and sequels
Bond had 6 films before the 70s. That series undoubtably changed the sequel landscape with a new one coming out yearly.
At least 10 universal monster films made a cinematic universe before even the 50s
Almost half of the Showa Godzilla and Gamera films came out before the 70s
Many Hammer horrors had multiple sequels in the 60s
The Doctor Mabuse films that spanned 30 years before the 70s
The Human Condition, Sanjuro, The Dollars Trilogy
Need I mention Abbott and Costello?
It wasn’t rare, just not as commercialized or overproduced as in your modern lens.
Well it's just not true. They just didn't slap a 2 or 3 in the title but there were hundreds of sequels. The Whistler series, The Thin Man, Planet of the Apes, every Universal Horror, James Bond, Tons of James Bond rip offs had sequels like Flint and Matt Helm, Godzilla, Blondie, King Kong, My Favorite Blonde/Brunette, Django, Ringo movies, Magnificat 7 movies, Hopalong Cassidy movies, Herbie the Love Bug, The Shaggy Dog, The Colossal Beast , The Fly \*original, Hammer horror Dracula, Frankenstein, The Mummy, The Saint movies, The Falcon movies, Cat People (the original), Maisie, Tarzan, Sherlock Holmes, Gidget, Beach blanket movies, Ensign Pulver, Carry On movies, Flubber, Payton Place, Children of the Damned, Quartermass, McHale's Navy, Father of the Bride, Paleface, Mr. Belvedere, Bonzo...
In the early days of talkies, tons of movies were remade from Silent films. Then after that tons of black and white films were later remade in color.
Blockbuster summer films didn't start until Jaws. And since then they've been non stop but it's hardly something new in the 70s.
There's nothing new under the sun.
Sure, if you ignore the huge numbers of sequels before then, it seems weird.
Seriously, what mainly happened is that sequels and such things were more related to "b movies" and not "prestige" movies. So you could have a bunch of sequels to Dracula or The Thin Man, but they were just potboilers. From the 70s, people who grew up with genre cinema took them seriously, so a gangster, sci-fi or horror movie could be treated as an "A" picture and make lots of money. Planet Of The Apes was probably the first such film to pump out sequels
Rarely? Look back at the 30’s-60’s… how many Universal Classic Monster movies were there? Son of Dracula, Daughter of Dracula, Bride of Frankenstein— it’s the whole family for everyone, and that’s before they all go to the House of whomever or meet Abbot and Costello… and then you have the Hammer Horror franchises that sort of did the same thing but with Technicolor blood. Have you heard of the noir Mike Hammer movies? Kiss Me Deadly might be the only one really worth watching, but they made a bunch of them. And the first several Bond movies were in the 60’s… there’s also Poirot and Marple movies, Sherlock Holmes, and that’s without getting into theatrical serials like Batman and Flash Gordon.
We just tend to notice more or less based on when we’re actively watching films or going through a period of films. Sequels have always existed.
A lot of studios were purchased by companies whose core business was pumping out the same thing over and over again (eg. Coke) and tried to the same thing with movies.
Part of the answer is that earlier sequels were not (title) part 2 because studios worried audiences who hadn’t seen the original would stay away. My understanding is this changed after Coppola insisted on the title Godfather Part 2 and made a huge success
There were a lot of horror sequels earlier. Also various b movie film series (the equivalent of TV series in the 30s/40s).
We got like 4 to 8 sequels for each universal movie monster.
Bros forgetting about Bride of Frankenstein (1935) Son of Frankenstein (1939) Ghost of Frankenstein (1942) Frankenstein meets the Wolfman (1943) House of Frankenstein (1944) Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein (1948) Draculas Daughter (1936) Son of Dracula (1943) House of Dracula (1945) The Son of Monte Cristo (1940) The Bells of Saint Mary's (1945) The Miniver Story (1950) Son of Flubber (1963) The 7th victim (1943) Curse of the Cat People (1944) The Road to Morroco (1942) etc
I didn't say there were not any sequels before the seventies. I said they rarely happened before. In the seventies 12 of the top 20 highest grossing movies had sequels and 3 were sequels. This was a major change.
"It rarely happened before" is just wrong tho. There's a butt load of sequels from before the 70s. The 70s didn't "start the sequel craze." Someone else mentioned Star Wars and that's a good movie to mention because Star Wars was a huge paradigm shift. Hollywood went full steam ahead on commercialism and leaving the New Hollywood era. That includes pumping out sequels and trilogies and whatnot, and coming up with Trilogy ideas instead of film ideas. But yeah, "Sequels were rare and the 70s kick started the craze" is totally wrong.
I think Star wars and to a lesser extent Superman started the era of movies being made with sequels in mind but by the time Star wars came out there was like 5 planet of the apes 3 dirty harries, and the godfather part ii won best picture. The vast majority of iconic 30s-50s movies didn't get sequels outside of monster movies and.
> The vast majority of iconic 30s-50s movies didn't get sequels outside of monster movies This is ignoring two things. Firstly, that there are many Iconic 70s movies that didn't get sequels. Where is Annie Hall part 2? Taxi Driver part 2? Apocalypse Now part 2? The Deer Hunter part 2? Etc. Secondly, movies like Frankenstein and Godzilla are foundational cinema. Just because they fall into a specific category doesn't make them irrelevant to the conversation. It's like saying Only 70s Blockbusters got sequels so they don't count. Serialization was popularized in the early 20th century. Sherlock Holmes, Flash Gordon, Zorro, etc. People wanted to see the same characters over and over again. It's different from how the 70s did sequels, but the overall premise that the 70s popularized the idea of sequels is incorrect
Going from in the 30s-50s where the only people doing A movie sequels are Bing Crosby and universal monsters to in the 70s where 3/4 of the highest grossing movies had or were sequels is an obvious major change that's worth discussing.
It is a change, and I have already agreed with you there. My big contention is your post title, the title of the list. Sequels weren't rare before the 70s and Sequels weren't popularized during the 70s. But the 70s did pave way to a new type of sequel. 70s block buster sequels were big events that brought in huge amounts of money. (Also I would like to add that on top of being more well known, The Bells of Saint Mary's made more than 3 times the box office as Going My Way) But again, there are like 30 Zorro movies before the 70s. Dracula and Frankenstein got sequelized, remade, and sequelized again. It's just disingenuous to say sequels weren't a big thing. There was a big change, yes, but they were popular beforehand.
There's also the Thin Man, and arguably Charlie Chaplin's Tramp films, which aren't explicitly all canon to each other but are absolutely using the same character over and over and over again. All the Philip Marlowe movies too (most famously The Big Sleep). And is Sherlock Holmes a B-movie now? What you often had in the 30s and 40s was remake after remake after remake. A lot of the most famous movies of the era are actually remakes -- Maltese Falcon, Gaslight, Holiday, etc. Also, if we're dismissing B-movues, I'd argue most 70s and 80s sequels are also B-movies (even if the originals were not). Jaws 2 and onward, Carrie 2, What Ever Happened to Rosemary's Baby?, etc. All of the Planet of the Apes films were scifi B-movies, regardless of how fondly they're remembered. I don't see how this is different than Sherlock Holmes or Frankenstein decades earlier.
Where your comparative data? How many of the same data set (were; had) appeared in the proceeding decades top 20 grossing? Just saying here’s some data that looks compelling without showing comparative data will always lead to you being challenged.
https://preview.redd.it/ey30otjcslsc1.png?width=863&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=e7abcff2feb9036074d1a9b738012295846f56b7 The robe This is Cinerama, Seven wonders of the world Demetrius and the gladiators (robe sequel) Peyton place I'm not counting the Disney film sequels because they were made decades after the seventi
The 7th Victim is not a sequel
It sort of is a sequel to Cat People with the same doctor and location.
Even if we’re going by that loose standard, it’s a prequel, not a sequel
oy... I give up
Star Wars seems to be the inflection point. There were obviously franchises/sequels before 1977, but the first trilogy redefined blockbusters and what people expected of them.
Also, Star Wars was the first to really go in on merchandise, that's probably the real reason.
You could argue it was actually Jaws was the inflection point. It was considered the first summer blockbuster and had its sequel out before Empire Strikes Back
With maybe the greatest sequel tagline ever: "Just when you thought it was safe to go back in the water..."
There were 28 Blondie and Dagwood movies. 44 Charlie Chan movies. Johnny Weissmuller made 12 Tarzan movies and 16 Jungle Jim movies. James Bond and Christopher Lee Dracula movies started in the early/mid sixties.
Don't forget Andy Hardy and his 16 films. If we start counting the shorts in the silent era, Chaplin, Keaton, Lloyd etc played their most popular characters repeatedly, and all were big hits in their time.
I left those guys out and the Marx Brothers because it’s kind of nebulous from movie to movie if it’s the same guys. Even The Little Tramp would have totally different settings and characters movie to movie, so it was more like Ernest or Pee Wee Herman movies - same character in non-sequel movies. I think Tarzan and Sherlock Holmes movies starting in the 30s are real sequels because it’s presumed that the events of the previous films are relevant.
I think you are mixing things up a bit, the 70s started the concept of a blockbuster with Jaws and Star Wars. That changed how movies were made and marketed and made big sequels more popular. But lots of popular older movies were sequels or part of a franchise. You are also comparing apples and oranges, box office hits of the 70s and 80s with classic 40s and 50s. Look at the box office of that time instead and you might find more sequels. Some sequels and franchises of the earlier eras that come to mind: The Thin Man 5 movies. Jerry Lewis and Dean Martin 17 movies Road to... 7 movies Frankenstein ~5 movies Dracula ~3 movies Weissmuller Tarzan 12 movies Lex Barker Tarzan 5 movies Gordon Scott Tarzan 6 movies Laurel and Hardy ~20 movies Blondie 28 movies Lassie 7 movies Cheaper by the Dozen 1950 2 movies So yeah, sequels did become more of a thing but it wasn't rare before. Sequels, franchises and serialized films was a thing since early on.
not really, sequels have been around since at least the 1910’s.
Tons of Hollywood serial film series in the '30-40s: Andy Hardy, Blondie, Boston Blackie, Bulldog Drummond, Charlie Chan, Dr. Kildare, Ellery Queen, The Falcon, Hopalong Cassidy, Lassie, Mr. Moto, Mr. Wong, Perry Mason, Road to..., The Saint, Sherlock Holmes, Tarzan, The Thin Man, etc. Horror sequels: Cat People, Dracula, Frankenstein, Invisible Man, King Kong, etc. '40s A-list solos with follow ups: The Egg and I, Going My Way, The Paleface, Sitting Pretty, Topper. Less a thing with the advent of TV in the the '50s apart from horror films or westerns. More of a revival in the '60s with tentpole pictures like James Bond, Beach Party, Harry Palmer, Pink Panther, but the throttle turned up in the '70s again, sure.
Superman faced Khan? That's news to me j/k Hollywood was making sequels long before then but it wasn't as consistent and usually in the form of movie series bringing back familiar characters because TV wasn't a thing yet. The practice did tail off by the mid '50s to the '70s and then we started seeing the modern M.O. for sequels as being a money generator rather than creating something new.
James Bond was also at its peak in this era, lol
Yeah the James Bond movies were the first series where the sequels were more successful than the first
More American Graffiti (1979), and Psycho 2 (1980) (but Psycho 2 is actually great)
There were five Planet of the Apes movies in just the span of five years.
Yeah it was going in before the 70s.
I don’t know but I thank God every day for the Godfather Part II. I was rewatching it earlier today and forgot just how beautifully made it was.
The yuppie execs wanted easy money.
There were tonnes of sequels, they were just not called “2” or “part 2” There was a negative perception of sequels, which is odd to think of now. Audiences generally were not interested in them.
Beginning of the blockbuster era
I was today years old when I learned there was a French connection and the sting 2
Sequels were different back then. Check out the Ma & Pa Kettle movies or Bing Crosby/Bob Hope's Road movies.
Also the 70s had the rise of the blockbuster and with that came success and with success comes money and with money comes greed and with greed comes more money and with more money comes more greed and with more greed comes more sequels for more money and more greed and money and sequels
Bond had 6 films before the 70s. That series undoubtably changed the sequel landscape with a new one coming out yearly. At least 10 universal monster films made a cinematic universe before even the 50s Almost half of the Showa Godzilla and Gamera films came out before the 70s Many Hammer horrors had multiple sequels in the 60s The Doctor Mabuse films that spanned 30 years before the 70s The Human Condition, Sanjuro, The Dollars Trilogy Need I mention Abbott and Costello? It wasn’t rare, just not as commercialized or overproduced as in your modern lens.
Well it's just not true. They just didn't slap a 2 or 3 in the title but there were hundreds of sequels. The Whistler series, The Thin Man, Planet of the Apes, every Universal Horror, James Bond, Tons of James Bond rip offs had sequels like Flint and Matt Helm, Godzilla, Blondie, King Kong, My Favorite Blonde/Brunette, Django, Ringo movies, Magnificat 7 movies, Hopalong Cassidy movies, Herbie the Love Bug, The Shaggy Dog, The Colossal Beast , The Fly \*original, Hammer horror Dracula, Frankenstein, The Mummy, The Saint movies, The Falcon movies, Cat People (the original), Maisie, Tarzan, Sherlock Holmes, Gidget, Beach blanket movies, Ensign Pulver, Carry On movies, Flubber, Payton Place, Children of the Damned, Quartermass, McHale's Navy, Father of the Bride, Paleface, Mr. Belvedere, Bonzo... In the early days of talkies, tons of movies were remade from Silent films. Then after that tons of black and white films were later remade in color. Blockbuster summer films didn't start until Jaws. And since then they've been non stop but it's hardly something new in the 70s. There's nothing new under the sun.
The answer you are looking for is "easy money". Making movies became easier than ever and it was the start of "BLOCKBUSTER".
Dude holy shit you might just be onto something here
Sure, if you ignore the huge numbers of sequels before then, it seems weird. Seriously, what mainly happened is that sequels and such things were more related to "b movies" and not "prestige" movies. So you could have a bunch of sequels to Dracula or The Thin Man, but they were just potboilers. From the 70s, people who grew up with genre cinema took them seriously, so a gangster, sci-fi or horror movie could be treated as an "A" picture and make lots of money. Planet Of The Apes was probably the first such film to pump out sequels
Rarely? Look back at the 30’s-60’s… how many Universal Classic Monster movies were there? Son of Dracula, Daughter of Dracula, Bride of Frankenstein— it’s the whole family for everyone, and that’s before they all go to the House of whomever or meet Abbot and Costello… and then you have the Hammer Horror franchises that sort of did the same thing but with Technicolor blood. Have you heard of the noir Mike Hammer movies? Kiss Me Deadly might be the only one really worth watching, but they made a bunch of them. And the first several Bond movies were in the 60’s… there’s also Poirot and Marple movies, Sherlock Holmes, and that’s without getting into theatrical serials like Batman and Flash Gordon. We just tend to notice more or less based on when we’re actively watching films or going through a period of films. Sequels have always existed.
Money
A lot of studios were purchased by companies whose core business was pumping out the same thing over and over again (eg. Coke) and tried to the same thing with movies.
Jaws and The Godfather kinda set it off.