It’s the 50th Anniversary of Jaws! 🦈
My twenty-something parents took me and my brother to see it at a drive-in on Long Island. There was no way they were missing it just because they had an inconvenient five-year-old and a two-year-old to deal with. After all, that’s what station wagons were made for — back seats turned playgrounds, the tinny speaker hanging on the window, and popcorn in a giant paper bag.
I don’t remember every moment of the film (I mean, I was five), but I do remember the feeling. The size of it. The sound. The tension in the air when the shark finally appeared. It was the first time I felt what a movie could do.
And now, 50 years later, that moment has me thinking about something bigger:
What do Jaws, Nevermind, and Chipotle’s kitchen automation strategy all have in common?
Weird question, maybe. But hear me out…
Each of them was released in 1975, 1991, and 2025 respectively. And each represents a moment — a cultural inflection point — where American taste, technology, and emotion converged, changing their industries forever.
🎬 1975: When Cinema Grew Teeth
Jaws wasn’t just a movie — it was the birth of the blockbuster, a turning point where summer became movie season and theaters became temples. It taught studios that suspense could scale, that wide release could work, and that moviegoing was no longer just about art or escape — it was a shared national moment.
It was also the year of One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, Dog Day Afternoon, Barry Lyndon, Nashville, and Monty Python and the Holy Grail. Art met event. Risk met reward. Stories got bigger — and bolder.
🎸 1991: The Year the Sound Changed
From the opening riff of Smells Like Teen Spirit, we knew something had shifted. Hair metal was out. Grunge was in. So was hip hop (The Low End Theory, Naughty by Nature), experimental pop (Achtung Baby, Dangerous), and guitar-driven alt rock (Ten, Blood Sugar Sex Magik).
It wasn’t just new music. It was a new mood. Authenticity over image. Emotion over polish. And for many of us coming of age, these songs became more than soundtracks — they became identity. The kind of music that tells you who you are.
🥗 2025: The Restaurant as Operating System
Today, restaurants aren’t just places to eat — they’re full-on platforms. AI-powered drive-thrus, loyalty apps with real rewards, robotic kitchen assistants, personalized order flows, predictive prep models, and brand experiences that reach from TikTok to tabletops.
Chains like Chipotle, Sweetgreen, CAVA, Dutch Bros, and Raising Cane’s are reimagining what restaurant scale looks like — without losing flavor or soul. Meanwhile, the legacy giants (McDonald’s, Taco Bell, Domino’s) are reinventing themselves in real-time with technology that feels more like Silicon Valley than 20th-century fast food.
2025 is the year food officially becomes smarter — and more personalized, profitable, and predictive than ever before.
And for me?
Living through all of this — the blockbusters that raised us, the albums that cracked us open, the food that now finds us where we are — makes me deeply proud to be part of the GenX club. We’ve seen analog become digital. Grit become glam. And now, taste itself become tech.
So here’s to the years that changed everything:
1975. 1991. 2025.
Movies. Music. Meals.
Event. Identity. Experience.
That’s not just culture.
That’s a life timeline.
- Paul
