New York City’s venerable Paris Theater is presenting a series that celebrates the 50th anniversary of unforgettable films released in 1974. The year is ripe for the picking. Over the course of a week, the theater is screening Roman Polanski’s Chinatown, Francis Ford Coppola & Walter Murch’s The Conversation, Robert Altman’s California Split, and Federico Fellini’s Amarcord. For some levity, one can choose between John Waters’s Female Trouble or Mel Brooks’s Blazing Saddles. The Paris Theater’s selections make a strong statement. In a decade of legendary movies, the year 1974 was something special. —Jack Sullivan