Without a doubt, one of the most important American filmmakers in the history of the medium is Francis Ford Coppola. A third-generation Italian-American, Coppola studied at UCLA and was one of many directors of the era that came up under B-movie maestro Roger Corman before being embraced by the cinematic establishment after winning an Oscar for co-writing “Patton” and directing megahit “The Godfather,” often named as one of the greatest films ever.
With that achievement, Coppola became the first among the movie brats, which included pals like George Lucas and Steven Spielberg, to go onto great success for the rest of the 1970s, with two Best Picture Oscars (plus another nomination), and two Palme D’or trophies at Cannes. The 1980s were more mixed, and the 1990s even moreso, before Coppola took an extended break from filmmaking (though still stood as the scion of a filmmaking family that includes children Sofia and Roman, nephews Nicolas Cage and Jason Schwartzman, and granddaughter Gia), before returning in the late 2000s with some bold experimental work.
Few directors have had such varied, tumultuous and fascinating careers, and with Coppola turning 75 this year and one of his finest achievements, “The Godfather Part II,” turning 40 next month, it seemed like the perfect time to do something we’ve wanted to do forever: namely, to look back over his work in detail. Below you’ll find our gift to you for the Thanksgiving weekend: our retrospective of the films of Francis Ford Coppola. Let us know your favorites in the comments section.
“Tonight For Sure” (1962)
Every filmmaker needs to start somewhere, and some starts are more ignominious than others: for every “Reservoir Dogs,” there’s a “Piranha 2.” Coppola’s first official directing credit, 1962’s “Tonight For Sure” (made when he was only 22) is firmly in the later category, a creaky hour-long cheapo sexploitation picture that doesn’t even vaguely hint at the filmmaking chops to come. Co-written, produced and directed by Coppola (with his father Carmen scoring and future Tarantino favorite Jack Hill, helmer of “Switchblade Sisters,” serving as DP), it’s an excuse to show as many breasts as possible, framed around a cowboy and a society higher-up who team up to shut down a burlesque club, who tell stories of vice and sin as they sit in the club and wait for the bomb to blow. The framing of a softcore picture around two Moral Majority-type heroes is a reasonably amusing one, but this is definitely a director at the beginning of his career: shots and scenes go on way longer than they should, the photography’s pretty dim, and the budget is minimal at best. Fair play to Coppola for taking advantage of an opportunity and getting something made, but this barely even has any value as a curio for the hardcore Coppola fans. [F]
"One From the Heart" was shot on the Zoetrope studios lot in – no Sanfrancisco. I lived a fewd visited the place freq
Great article! Thank you for your time and talents in putting together a wonderful overview. But as a Coppola fanboy, I wanted to point out one error re One From the Heart "…it was filmed entirely on the American Zoetrope soundstages in San Francisco … "
The Zoetrope stages were actually in Hollywood, the old Hollywood General stages.
i dont really agree whem the article says apocalypse now was the last truly great film he\’s made. Yes its true, the films he made in the 70\’s were some of the best ever made. But he made some seriously great stuff in thr 80\’s and with tetro. It just sounds so official and untrue when you phrase it like that.
Right, because you get the utter completist FFC retrospective and then you complain about a producing credit that he didn\’t even direct? AMAZING.
how about mentioning one of his more infamous producing credits – Hammett?
1: FFC needs to remember how he was during Godfather 1&2,Apocalypse Now and The Conversation and how that contributed to such great works, otherwise I fear more of the same subpar efforts.
2: It needs to be contemporary.
3: no hot generic looking actors (like the above mentioned films)
I adored "Twixt"
Nice breakdown! I\’m currently on a Coppola craze at the moment, re-watching the Godfather trilogy on loop over the last two months while I work, while also searching out his other movies. Just saw Tetro which was nice and The Conversation, which I loved. I tried to watch Jack but couldn\’t make it through it. On The Outsiders right now.
Out of the 7 movies of his I\’ve seen, I would say this is pretty darn spot on. I\’m not sure if I like I or II more, but that\’s like picking between two perfectly prepared pieces of steak, you can\’t go wrong.
I\’m also glad you didn\’t tear III to shreds. There\’s a lot of great things in it. You could tell the parts where Coppola was really interested in it, and the parts where he wasn\’t. The vatican bank stuff, most of the violence isn\’t that interesting, but Michael\’s search for redemption is incredible. Also, the last five minutes of the movie is brilliant tragedy.
Great breakdown. I think Francis has one more masterpiece in him. I\’m hoping that his next film is it!
It\’s supposed to be a multi-generational film about an Italian family that is apparently going to be a big studio film. If anyone can do that, he can. Hopefully the studio stays out of the way and let\’s him work. When Coppola is on, there are very few that hold even a candle to him. Hopefully this is one of those times.
Filmmaker doc can be found on YouTube.
Nice article! Manny Farber was fond of The Rain People, I remember he included it in one of his top 10 lists along Easy Rider and They Shoot Horses, Don\’t They?