What was the obsession with sad/illness/death movies in the 70's?

[Hawkee]

In the 1970's it seemed that in between the comedies and romance movies that it was a trend to have movies that were sad and had characters have illnesses and die at the end and I have never figured out why people were obsessed with these types of movies during the 70's? Was it because people thought they would be nice movies or was this the start of a new movie genre in Hollywood? Take for example I cannot figure out why people became obsessed with Brian's Song and how it became a popular sad movie? And the same thing with Love Story. It used to be that the movies would have a character with an simple illness such as a broken leg or arm and when the character recovered from the illness the ending was happy but as we saw with Love Story and Brian's Song it seemed like cancer was a popular illness for movies during the 70's and even today it seems that there are still lots of sad movies made that deal with illness and death. What caused this obsession with these types of movies in the 70's?
Bestie

[dakert]

right movies at the right time

[Hawkee]

Why I think the sad movie genre was really huge in the 1970's was because next to romance movies they wanted to add a new image to movies to help them get strong box-office hits so sad/illness/death movies were born as an alternative to romance and comedy movies. I cannot figure out how Brian's Song became a top sad movie in the first place? Because when my mom and I saw it shown on PBS once I thought it wasn't very sad and why people as I mentioned in the first post were obsessed with it i'll never understand why. A second sad movie is the classic Terms Of Endearment from 1983 and I can see why it's such a sad movie and why they call it such a classic movie I can understand. But why did they make a sequel in 1997 titled The Evening Star that featured many of the returning Terms Of Endearment characters? My aunt used to be addicted to sad/illness/death movies like Love Story and my mom never figured it out. But happy romance movies should make a comeback and not focus so much on sad scenes and illnesses

[Torgo]

Originally Posted by Hawkee

But why did they make a sequel in 1997 titled The Evening Star that featured many of the returning Terms Of Endearment characters?

Because the author of the book Terms of Endearment also wrote the book The Evening Star. There are actually six books in the series, Terms of Endearment is actually the third book in the series, and The Evening Star is the sixth and last book.

[Yong Fang]

The 1970’s was the absolute best decade of movies. The censorship was gone and there were new directors with new ideas willing to experiment and thankfully movie studios willing to gamble and the payoff was incredible. The 1980’s continued that wave somewhat but the 1970’s were absolutely epic.

[ThisLittlePiggy]

A few of my favorites movies from the Seventies include The Tenant, Breaking Away, Grey Gardens, The Goodbye Girl, Klute, Grease, American Graffiti, Invasion of the Body Snatchers, Norma Rae, Saturday Night Fever, Paper Moon, Kramer vs. Kramer, Carrie, Serpico, Dog Day Afternoon, Rocky, Halloween, Jaws, Godfather and Godfather 2.