In the early 1970s little did anyone expect that any movie will get so popular and become an instant hit at the box office.
So much did the popularity of the movie increased that it became a phenomenon and was one of the highest grossing films at that time.
It does not require any guesses to know the name of the movie - it surely is "Star Wars".
Created by George Lucas, this movie was released in May of 1977.
Till date, the movie has been a hit with people and it's only worth to take a look at the history of such a film.
George Lucas made American Graffiti financed by Universal Studios in 1970s, which was a successful movie.
Post this; he drafted "Star Wars", which was rejected by most production houses as it was supposed to be too long and needed to be divided into two trilogies.
Later this decision of the studios cost them lost in profits.
Finally the film was released by 20th Century Fox and had two sequels released at 3-yr interval.
The Star Wars movie ran in around 32 theatres, however the sales of the tickets were amazing on the day of release and it became the most successful film in North America grossing over $250 million.
Lucas made a deal with Fox and received rights to all future sequels, merchandise rights and 40% of gross profit.
With this deal, he became a billionaire.
The next sequel, "The Empire Strikes Back" was released in the year 1980 and grossed over $220 million at the box office.
"Return of Jedi", the next sequel hit the theatres in 1983 and grossed around $265 million in North America.
Tentatively in 1994, George Lucas announced that he had entered into an agreement with Pepsico for movie tie-ins and to film new trilogies and that a new sequel trilogy will be probably be released in the year 1998.
Episode 1 named "The Phantom of Menace" was released in 1999 followed by the Episode 2, "The Attack of the clones" in 2002.
Episode 3,"Revenge of the Sith" was later released in the year 2005.
The original movie was later renamed as "Episode IV: A new hope" to distinguish it from prequel and sequels.
Similarly the next sequels of the original trilogy were episodes V & VI.
Thus, next series was the prequel trilogy and was named Episode 1: The Phantom Menace, Episode 2: Attack of the Clones and Episode III: Revenge of the Sith.