1978 was the year when Annie Hallwon the best movie Oscar yet Saturday Night Feverdid not receive a nomination for best soundtrack.
Nevertheless, the John Travolta movie could lay claim to the best-selling musical soundtrack for 20 years.
A little-known Dublin band called U2, who changed their name from The Hype, were getting some airplay for their new song Street Missionwhile the Boomtown Rats were singing about the Rat Trapand the Undertones were making a name for themselves with Teenage Kicks.
It was also the year when Dublin-born Iris Murdoch won the Booker Prize for The Sea, The Sea. On the other end of the scale, Israel won the Eurovision Song Contest for A-Ba-Ni-Bi.
The One Love Peace Concert was held in Kingston, Jamaica and Bob Marley brought two opposing political leaders together, calming tensions in the city.
Artistic reaction to the Vietnam War began to get some prominence with the release of The Deer Hunterstarring Robert de Niro and Coming Home with Jon Voight and Jane Fonda.
Belgium's popular troubadour Jacques Brel died in October, aged just 49.
His songs have been covered by hundreds of artists since. There are more than 400 versions of his most frequently covered song Ne Me Quitte Pas including ones by Marlene Dietrich, Nina Simone and Sting.
It was a controversial year for some movie moguls, artists and musicians. In February, Hollywood director Roman Polanski skipped bail and fled to France after pleading guilty to charges of engaging in sex with a 13-year-old girl.
In March the American porn publisher Larry Flynt was shot and paralysed in Georgia after testifying at his trial on obscenity charges.
And in October, punk rocker Sid Vicious was arrested on suspicion of murder after the body of his girlfriend Nancy Spungen was found in their New York hotel room.
The Sex Pistols bass player pleaded not guilty to murder and was bailed for £50,000. He overdosed on heroin and died in February 1979, before a trial was held. He was 21.
Charlie Chaplin's coffin was stolen from its grave in Corsier-sur-Vevey in Switzerland in March. The comic performer had died on Christmas Day 1977, aged 88. The coffin was found in a field on May 17th, about 10 miles away, near Lake Geneva.
Mechanics Roman Wardas and Gantscho Ganev were convicted in December 1978 of stealing the coffin and trying to extort £400,000 in ransom money from the Chaplin family. Chaplin's coffin was reburied in a theft-proof concrete grave.
Alison Healy