Film Industry in the 1960s

The film industry has always been a booming industry, but the film industry in the 1960s would be one of the most unique and most effected by outside events. "Cinema in the 1960s reflected the decade of fun, fashion, rock 'n' roll, tremendous social changes (i.e., the civil rights era and marches) and transitional cultural values. This was a turbulent decade of monumental changes, tragedies, cultural events, assassinations and deaths, and advancements" (Dirks, 1960s). So all of these changes in not only society, but film as well were affecting everyone. Dirks gives us some examples of what events help trigger the whole shift in change:

• 1959 - Barbie Doll and the Microchip invented
• 1960 - Introduction of the Twist dance by Chubby Checker
• 1962 - Death of Marilyn Monroe
• 1962 - First TV broadcasts in color
• 1962 - Spacewar, the first computer video game, invented
• 1962 - The Cuban Missile Crisis
• 1963 - TouchTone telephones introduced
• 1963 - President John F. Kennedy's assassination
• 1963 - Women's Liberation, signaled by the publication of Betty Friedan's The Feminine Mystique
• 1964 - Beatlemania, the Beatles 'invaded' US
• 1964 - Boxer Cassius Clay joined the Nation of Islam and changed his name to Muhammad Ali
• 1965 - Miniskirt made first appearance
• 1965 - Watts (LA) race riots
• 1965 - Protests of racial stereotyping against 'Amos and Andy' TV show forced it off the air
• 1966- One Million Years BC made Raquel Welch a sex symbol in a two-piece fur bikini
• 1967 - "Hair" opened off-Broadway
• 1967 - Human Be-In (Golden Gate Park), and Summer of Love in San Francisco
• 1967 - First Heart Transplant
• 1967 - Anti-Vietnam War Protests Escalated as War Deaths Multiplied
• 1968- "60 Minutes" debuted on CBS-TV
• 1968 - Martin Luther King, Jr's and Robert Kennedy's assassinations
• 1969 - Woodstock Musical Festival in upper-state New York
• 1969 - Introduction of the indoor-safe NERF ball
• 1969 - "Sesame Street" debuted on TV
• 1969 - Mai Lai
• 1969 - Arpanet (first Internet) invented
• 1969 - The brutal and 'ritualistic' murder of 26 year-old actress Sharon Tate (Roman Polanski's pregnant wife) and others in Los Angeles (Bel Air) by Charlie Manson's hippie 'cultic' family
• 1969 - First Man on the Moon with Apollo 11 space flight
• 1970 - Kent State Massacre
• 1971 - Charlie Manson and three of his female followers in their 20s were convicted of the Tate-LaBianca murders, after the longest murder trial in US history
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•  Each one of these events helped trigger the amount of change experienced in the 1960s. Dirks will also go on to say that this decade was one of the worst decades for film. Especially 1963 where he shows us that there were only about 121 films produced.  Hollywood would be hit the hardest during this decade with the lack of production and the post war movement. Also this would be when the industry would experience financial difficulties and a bigger production spirt in made for TV movies. This is also the era the produced the Megaplex which is now a big player in the film industry. 
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• Film History of the 1960s by Time Dirks http://www.filmsite.org/60sintro.html