That’s the title of a talk I’ll give on July 31 at the James V. Brown Library. Needless to say, for movie-lovers in that hallowed era, it was a very good year indeed.

1975’s vast and varied cinematic landscape is marked by two watershed events:

First, Jaws became the highest-grossing movie up to that year, single-handedly establishing the phenomenon of a “summer blockbuster.” At the same time, it introduced the world to a young Steven Spielberg, whose output till then had been limited to the largely overlooked Sugarland Express and a terrific little TV movie called Duel — with Dennis Weaver battling a lunatic trucker over lonely desert roads.

Jaws went on to spawn three sequels and a seemingly ceaseless sea of shark-movie imitators — though nothing has matched its raw terror, or its flawless melding of all the elements that make a great film.

Meanwhile, the second-highest-grossing movie that year — One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest — notched a similarly impressive distinction: It was only the second film ever to win all five top Oscars: picture, director, screenplay, actor and actress. (One additional film has done it since — for a total of three; can you name the other two?)

The year’s top 10 were rounded out by Shampoo, Dog Day Afternoon, The Return of the Pink Panther, Three Days of the Condor, Funny Lady, The Other Side of the Mountain and the rock-opera Tommy.

But that’s only seven — because I left out the third-highest grosser from 1975. Can you guess it? Are you shivering with anticip … ation?

OK, so some of you got it: the cult-fave Rocky Horror Picture Show, raking in a then-startling $50 million — though Dr. Frank-N-Furter proved so enduring that the movie’s total haul now stands at $116 million (per Boxofficemojo).

In future columns I’ll talk more about some of these individual titles — especially that fourth Pink Panther film, a personal favorite that revived a dying franchise.

For now, we can note that 1975 likewise offered such critical darlings as Swept Away, Picnic at Hanging Rock and The Man Who Would Be King — along with cult-fave nuggets The Great Waldo Pepper, Night Moves and of course, Monty Python and the Holy Grail.

But one 1975 title has somehow managed to achieve both critical plaudits and cult status.

That would be Robert Altman’s Nashville — the star-studded, Oscar-winning, 160-minute musical satire that is generally considered the director’s greatest work. Though it didn’t land in the top 10 at the box-office, Nashville remains the movie with the most-ever Golden Globe nominations (11) — and it bears a cool connection to one fellow-film that year:

Nashville nailed a rare two supporting actress noms for a single film: Ronee Blakely and Lily Tomlin, the latter receiving widespread praise for her role as a mom with a pair of deaf children. Cuckoo’s Nest Best Actress Louise Fletcher famously used sign language in her Oscar-acceptance speech — thanking her parents, who were both deaf. As it turns out, Tomlin had actually been hired for the role Fletcher eventually played (the evil Nurse Ratched); but Lily lost to Louise after Cuckoo’s Nest director Milos Forman saw the latter in a movie called Thieves Like Us. And the director of that 1974 film?

Robert Altman.

Clearly, there is lots more to cover from 1975; so we’ll do that here in the next two weeks — and at my talk! Registration starts Thursday at jvbrown.edu.