Francis Ford Coppola attends the "The Godfather" 50th Anniversary Celebration at Paramount Theatre ... [+]
In its story about Francis Ford Coppola’s struggle to find a distributor for the wildly ambitious (and very pricey) Megalapolis, The Hollywood Reporter quoted an anonymous industry source, who said: “There is just no way to position this movie.”
The cinephile side of the internet basically lost its dang mind from there, letting out a proverbial cackle of utter disbelief. Really? You’re finding it difficult to market a movie made by the five-time Oscar winner responsible for some of the most influential films ever made? All a distributor has to do — as X user Ryan Lee astutely pointed out — is to whip up a poster listing Coppola’s impressive credentials: The Godfather, The Godfather Part II, The Conversation, and Apocalypse Now.
“I realize that I’ve made a mark and some people think I’m a very important film director,” the director remarked to Empire in 2021. “I’ve certainly made a handful of films that are going to be around for a while.”
Who is Francis Ford Coppola? Life and Career Synopsis
Born on April 7, 1939, Francis Ford Coppola was raised in Queens, New York, the son of composer Carmine Coppola. At the age of eight, he was stricken with polio and confined to his room. In an effort to fill the endless hours of lonely boredom, the future filmmaker turned to “puppets and mechanical things and gadgets” for entertainment, he told The New York Times in 1988. “I'm good with gadgets, and I became a tinkerer. I think what I really am is an inventor.'”
Fascinated by storytelling, he originally dreamed of becoming a playwright, but ultimately switched to a career in movies after viewing Sergei Eisenstein’s Ten Days That Shook the World. Coppola began his career in pornography (no joke) and by the late 1960s, he had graduated from UCLA film school and founded his own cinematic banner, American Zoetrope, with a pre-Star Wars George Lucas. Along with Lucas, Martin Scorsese, Steven Spielberg and numerous others, Coppola would become emblematic of Hollywood’s New Wave movement, in which young directors brought a hip new edge (one molded by the turbulent counterculture years) to the old studio system.
Coppola’s legendary hot streak between 1972 and 1979 yielded four of the most critically-acclaimed and culturally impactful motion pictures ever made: The Godfather, The Godfather Part II, The Conversation, and Apocalypse Now. By the start of 1980, Coppola had amassed a total of five Academy Awards, including one for his screenwriting work on Franklin J. Schaffner’s Patton (1970).
He, of course, continued to make movies in the years that followed, but struggled to find the stratospheric success he’d achieved throughout the ‘70s.
In What Order Were Francis Ford Coppola’s Movies Released?
- Dementia 13 (1963)
- You're a Big Boy Now (1966)
- Finian's Rainbow (1968)
- The Rain People (1969)
- The Godfather (1972)
- The Conversation (1974)
- The Godfather Part II (1974)
- Apocalypse Now (1979)
- One from the Heart (1982)
- The Outsiders (1983)
- Rumble Fish (1983)
- The Cotton Club (1984)
- Peggy Sue Got Married (1986)
- Gardens of Stone (1987)
- New York Stories (1989)
- The Godfather Part III (1990)
- Bram Stoker’s Dracula (1992)
- Jack (1996)
- The Rainmaker (1997)
- Youth Without Youth (2007)
- Tetro (2009)
- Twixt (2011)
Francis Ford Coppola Movies, Ranked
Even if you don’t skip to the end of this list, you can probably guess what the top entries will be. It’s universally accepted that Coppola made his best movies in the 1970s, but there are a few underrated gems amongst his subsequent output, including a memorable interpretation of the most famous vampire in pop culture history. For list in particular, I’ll be ranking Coppola’s filmography based on their respective scores on Rotten Tomatoes. Let’s get to it, shall we?
22. Jack (1996)
Arguably the lowest point of Coppola’s career, Jack asks the audience to swallow a bizarre premise about a young boy who ages faster than any other kid (hence the outward appearance of the late Robin Williams). The film was critically panned and grossed only $58 million at the box office. “It’s got adult themes,” co-writer Gary Nadeau told The Telegraph in 2021. “It’s about death. But they sold it as a comedy, so it looked like a kids’ film. As writers, we had a different movie in our head than the one that came out… The early conception of the film was something more tender and heartfelt.”
Jack scored just 17% approval on Rotten Tomatoes and is now streaming on Disney+.
21. Twixt, aka B'Twixt Now and Sunrise (2011)
Coppola’s most recent release, Twixt, follows a struggling writer (Val Kilmer), who finds himself caught up in the mystery of a small-town murder case. The horror flick failed to move the needle in terms of enthusiasm from audiences and critics. To quote The Hollywood Reporter: “As a film self-financed and possibly self-distributed with the director accompanying the film on its theatrical journey, there may be elements here to provoke thought or discussions with curious audiences. But as a bona-fide theatrical release, even with Val Kilmer, Elle Fanning and Bruce Dern in the cast, the movie doesn’t stand a ghost of a chance.” Coppola tried again last year with a restored and re-edited version of the film he dubbed “The Authentic Cut.”
Twixt got 30% on Rotten Tomatoes and is available to rent and/or own on YouTube Movies.
20. Youth Without Youth (2007)
Based on the 1976 Mircea Eliade novella of the same name, Youth Without Youth marked Coppola’s return top the world of directing after a decade-long hiatus. The film follows Dominic Matei (Tim Roth), an aging linguistics professor suddenly gifted with a new lease on life. “It had a love story, and it had all sorts of things that I found intriguing, and all sorts of things that I wanted to learn about, like the origins of language and the nature of human consciousness and the concept of time,” Coppola said of his desire to adapt the source material (via Oregon Live).
Youth Without Youth received 33% approval on Rotten Tomatoes, and is now streaming on Tubi.
19. Gardens of Stone (1987)
What could be considered a companion piece to the vastly superior Apocalypse Now, Gardens of Stone approaches the Vietnam War from a domestic point-of-view. The Godfather alum James Caan headlines the project as a sergeant caught between duty to his country and a girlfriend vehemently against the conflict. Speaking with Vulture in 2020, Coppola voiced deep regret over making the film, as his 22-year-old son, Gian-Carlo Coppola, was killed in a boating accident during production.
“There’s one movie I wouldn’t have made because it cost me everything, and that was one of the movies I made at a time when I had to make a movie every year to just keep my house and my household together,” the filmmaker said. “I fantasize having not made Gardens of Stone. I wouldn’t have lost my son.”
Gardens of Stone hit 44% on Rotten Tomatoes, and is now streaming on Tubi.
18. One from the Heart (1982)
Coppola’s Las Vegas-based love story bombed so hard upon its initial release, that the director himself pulled it from theaters, according to this 2012 interview with The Los Angeles Times. In recent years, however, the film has been positively reevaluated as a beautiful homage to the filmmaking style of Golden Age Hollywood. It even received a limited theatrical re-release earlier this year, with The New Yorker proclaiming:
“The movie plays almost like Coppola’s reaction against his previous decade of acclaimed movies — the two Godfather films, The Conversation, and Apocalypse Now. What those works share is realism, and, as great as they are, they had left Coppola no room to explore the aesthetic side of filmmaking. The physical realism of Apocalypse Now, with its grueling location shooting in the Philippines and its real-life explosions and airborne military aircraft, was so extreme that Coppola in effect filmed it like a documentary. Style had to take a back seat. But, in “One from the Heart,” the events onscreen are fabrications; the reality comes from within, from the cinematic painting, from the seemingly thick impasto of light and shadow and the compositional finesse of stylized movement.”
One From the Heart earned 51% on Rotten Tomatoes, and is now available to rent and/or purchase from Prime Video.
17. Finian's Rainbow (1968)
Coppola’s third directorial effort, Finian’s Rainbow is a big screen adaptation of the 1947 stage musical of the same name. Fred Astaire stars as Finian McLonergan, an Irish immigrant who arrives in the American South with his daughter and a magical piece of gold capable of changing lives for the better. While it did receive two Oscar nods for Best Score and Best Sound, Coppola regretted leaving the film’s post-production work in the hands of its producers.
“As it is, I think the movie is fine, but I left it to the producer and others to finish it after I had done a preliminary edit and went off to make The Rain People,” he said in 2007. "Now when I look at Finian’s Rainbow, I think my only dissatisfaction is that I feel I could have greatly improved it if I had done the final postproduction. I might do that someday just for the fun of it—not to ever show it, but just to amuse myself; to see how good I can make it.”
Finian’s Rainbow scored 53% on Rotten Tomatoes, and is available to rent and/or own on YouTube Movies.
16. The Godfather Part III (1990)
Coppola begrudgingly made The Godfather Part III for Paramount, because he was in desperate need of money at the time. Not exactly the most creative conditions under which a film can be made. The end result was an inessential trilogy capper that woefully paled in comparison to its predecessors. Among the sequel’s many shortcomings are the absence of Robert Duvall as consigliere Tom Hagen and the misguided casting of the director’s own daughter, Sofia, in the role of Mary Corleone. Even the story, which sees Michael striking a shady deal with the Vatican, feels somewhat undercooked. Even so, The Godfather III grossed $136 million worldwide and was nominated for seven Academy Awards, including Best Picture.
The Godfather Part III earned 66% on Rotten Tomatoes, and is now streaming on Paramount+.
15. Dementia 13 (1963)
Produced by low-budget auteur Roger Corman, Coppola’s debut feature is as exploitative as they come. “Unaware of an axe-wielding, psychopathic murderer lurking on the family estate, a scheming widow hatches a plan to get her hands on an inheritance,” reads the synopsis. Chatting with Slash Film last year, Coppola recalled how the entire production took shape on the fly: “I went to Ireland, and I didn't even have a script. I had this one page. I had to write a script while I was shooting it. I was writing it during the night on mimeograph masters so that we could roll it off and give it to the cast.
Dementia 13 scored 69% on Rotten Tomatoes, and is now streaming on Tubi.
14. The Outsiders (1983)
Based on S. E. Hinton’s 1967 novel of the same name, The Outsiders is considered to be one of the best coming-of-age films ever made. A tale of two gangs separated by socioeconomic status, the movie features early acting turns from Tom Cruise, Rob Lowe, Emilio Estevez, Ralph Macchio, Matt Dillon, Diane Lane and the late Patrick Swayze. “I read Susan Hinton’s book... and was touched by the level of regard these poor ‘Greaser’ kids had for each other, even though they didn’t have the advantages of their ‘Social’ rivals,” Coppola told The Guardian in 2021. “I’ve always believed that kids have many more feelings than we give them credit for, and I wanted to make the story. When I was about 17, I had been a drama counsellor at a summer camp, and the idea of being with half a dozen kids in the country and making a movie seemed like being a camp counsellor again. I’d forget my troubles and have some laughs.”
The Outsiders got 70% approval on Rotten Tomatoes, and is now streaming on Tubi.
13. Tetro (2009)
Featuring the film debut of Alden Ehrenreich (Solo: A Star Wars Story), Tetro marked Coppola’s first original screenplay since The Conversation. It tells the story of two estranged brothers — Bennie (Ehrenreich) and Tetro (Vincent Gallo) — who reconnect in Argentina. “So much of the story is about a younger brother who idealized an older brother and then the older brother vanished, so he was orphaned by his hero,” the director said during an interview with the Seattle Met. “I have an older brother, and my brother was always good to me from day one. But now that I understand the film, I’ve learned that perhaps I did feel that when he had to go off I really felt like he left me. He left me at a very vulnerable time.”
Tetro scored 71% on Rotten Tomatoes, and is available to rent and/or own on YouTube Movies.
12. The Cotton Club (1984)
Set against the backdrop the Harlem-based jazz hot spot of the 1920s and ‘30s, The Cotton Club is Coppola’s exploration of paradoxical racial divides in early 20th century America.“The club had the most talented Black performers of its day and yet it was segregated and Black people couldn't go see the show. It was the hoi polloi, the real high society people who went and I wanted to try something with two worlds, a Black world and a white world interweaving between each other and of course meeting at the Cotton Club with the numbers and the shows,” he said in 2019. The film ended up scoring two Oscar nods for Art Directing and Editing.
The Cotton Club scored 74% on Rotten Tomatoes, and is now streaming on Tubi.
10. Rumble Fish (1983)
Shot back-to-back with The Outsiders, Rumble Fish (also based on a novel by S.E. Hinton) stars Matt Dillon as Rusty-James, a young hoodlum longing for the halcyon days of a street gang run by his older brother, Motorcycle Boy (Mickey Rourke). "I decided to shoot in black and white because I wanted to make an art film for young people, and black and white gives a quality of poetic realism,” Coppola explained to The Guardian in 2012. “I didn't just leave it to the script to tell the story — I also used camera angles, lighting and soundtrack to stimulate a young audience into loving the form as much as I did. I was disappointed when they didn't rush to see it. But it's pleasing its appeal has endured. It was the film I really wanted to make.”
Rumble Fish got 76% approval on Rotten Tomatoes, and is available to rent and/or own on YouTube Movies.
10. New York Stories (1989)
Coppola’s contribution to this anthology was Life Without Zoë, which he co-wrote with his daughter, Sofia (now an acclaimed filmmaker in her own right). In its review of the segment, The New York Times wrote:
“Its prevailing message, which is more or less Marie Antoinette's, is delivered by the title schoolgirl, who spends her parents' long absences alone in the Sherry-Netherland and is ministered to by an adoring staff. Zoe's antics, which take her from a private school to a costume ball to the Acropolis and feature such characters as the richest little boy in the world, are given a vibrantly colorful look and an utterly vapid feeling, even when she helps to reconcile her long-separated parents. The film seems at its most heartfelt when Zoe declares, '’Let's go shopping!'’”
New York Stories scored 76% on Rotten Tomatoes, and is now available to rent and/or purchase from Prime Video.
9. Bram Stoker’s Dracula (1992)
Widely considered one of the best screen adaptations of Bram Stoker’s seminal vampire novel, Coppola’s take on the world’s most famous bloodsucker is buoyed by lush production design, lavish costumes and a very game Gary Oldman as the Count himself. The film, which also starred Keanu Reeves, Winona Ryder and Anthony Hopkins, grossed over $215 million worldwide and nabbed three Oscar wins (out of 4 nominations) for Costume Design, Sound Editing, and Makeup.
Bram Stoker’s Dracula was approved of by 77% of Rotten Tomatoes users, and is currently streaming on Pluto TV.
7. You're a Big Boy Now (1966)
Like numerous films on this list, Coppola’s second-ever feature was adapted from an existing novel (this one written by David Benedictus). The sexual coming-of-age comedy received a three-star rating from Roger Ebert, who described the director as “a boy wonder fresh out of UCLA whose only previous efforts were skin flicks.” Cast member Geraldine Page nabbed an Oscar nod for Best Supporting Actress.
You’re a Big Boy Now won 82% approval on Rotten Tomatoes, and is available to purchase from Amazon.
7. The Rainmaker (1997)
Based on John Grisham’s 1995 novel of the same name, The Rainmaker is very much an underdog story. Matt Damon plays Rudy Baylor, a novice attorney going up against the lawyers of a well-funded insurance company. "I'd never read a Grisham novel before,” Coppola told Roger Ebert in 1997. “I saw The Rainmaker in an airport. I got it and enjoyed it. It had a lot of humor. In some ways it sort of reminded me of The Godfather. People like the idea that if injustice has happened, they can go to somebody and get it remedied.”
The Rainmaker earned 82% on Rotten Tomatoes, and is now streaming on Paramount+ with a Showtime subscription.
6. The Rain People (1969)
The first production to be released via American Zoetrope, The Rain People centers around a frustrated and pregnant housewife (Shirley Knight) in desperate search of freedom. “It’s the first film I’ve made that wasn’t a comedy,” Coppola said in a 1969 interview. “I think the most important reaction I’ve gotten, was the fact that people are very interested and think a lot about it, even after they’ve seen it. They’re coming up to me and saying, ‘Well, I don’t think she went back’ or something. And that’s wonderful. If it stimulates thought about these things, maybe some husband will think about his wife in a way that he didn’t before and maybe they can build something more effectively because of it.” The Rain People also features pre-Godfather turns from James Caan and Robert Duvall.
The Rain People won 85% approval on Rotten Tomatoes, and is available to rent and/or purchase from Prime Video.
5. Peggy Sue Got Married (1986)
A precursor to timey-wimey comedies like 17 Again and Hot Tub Time Machine, Peggy Sue Got Married stars Kathleen Turner as a housewife on the verge of divorce, who gets a chance to relive her senior year of high school, circa 1960. The film also features early acting turns from Nicolas Cage (Coppola’s real-world nephew) and Jim Carrey. Peggy Sue was well-received by critics (Roger Ebert dubbed it “one of the best movies” of 1986) and scored three Oscar nominations for Best Actress, Cinematography, and Costume Design.
Peggy Sue Got Married scored 87% on Rotten Tomatoes, and is available to rent and/or purchase from Prime Video.
4. The Godfather Part II (1974)
Many fans consider The Godfather Part II to be superior to its predecessor, and that is a very fair assessment to make. Grander in both scope and storytelling, the film presents parallel narratives, comparing Michael’s merciless rise to power to that of his own father, Vito (played as a young man by Robert De Niro). The film boasts an undeniable sense of grandeur, helped along by the inspiration of real-world events like the Cuban Revolution and the Valachi hearings. While not as financially successful as the original, Part II was hailed by critics as a breathtaking masterpiece. It took home six Academy Awards, becoming the first of two sequels to win Best Picture (the second, of course, being The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King).
The Godfather Part II won 96% approval on Rotten Tomatoes, and is currently streaming on Paramount+.
1. The Conversation (1974)
While it may seem like an on-the-nose reaction to the Watergate scandal, The Conversation was actually written long before the implosion of Richard Nixon’s presidency. Even so, the eerie timeliness of Coppola’s slow-burn mystery centered around obsessive surveillance expert Harry Call (played to neurotic perfection by Gene Hackman) still hits hard half a century later, making it one of the greatest paranoia thrillers to come out of the ‘70s. The film wasn’t a box office success, only grossing grossing around $5 million globally, but it was critically acclaimed and received three Oscar nods, including one for Best Picture.
An impressive 97% of Rotten Tomatoes users approved of The Conversation, which is available to rent and/or purchase from Prime Video.
1. Apocalypse Now (1979)
When someone says they poured their “blood, sweat, and tears” into something, they’re usually aiming for hyperbole. Apocalypse Now, on the other hand, is worthy of the phrase, owing to the fact that Coppola and his cast nearly killed themselves trying to get the damn thing made. The production was so arduous, that it was chronicled in the 1991 documentary Hearts of Darkness: A Filmmaker's Apocalypse. All of the misery did pay off with one of the greatest cinematic indictments of America’s military actions in Southeast Asia. Lines of dialogue — such as “I love the smell of napalm in the morning!” — and the iconic scene of Huey copters flying in formation to Wagner’s “Ride of the Valkyries” have become an indelible fixtures of our popular moviegoing culture. Apocalypse Now grossed over $100 million worldwide and won two Oscars (out of eight nominations) for Sound and Cinematography.
Apocalypse Now Redux earned 97% on Rotten Tomatoes, and is currently streaming on Prime Video.
1. The Godfather (1972)
Is The Godfather the greatest crime movie ever made? I’ll leave that question for you to answer. Based on the bestselling Mario Puzo novel of the same, the Mafia-inspired saga of the Corleone family makes an offer no audience member can refuse: an opportunity to explore the dark side of the American Dream. Everything about the movie is perfect — from the ensemble cast to the music to the underlying themes of family, loyalty, loss, and sacrifice. And yet again, the behind-the-scenes story of how the film came together is just as captivating as the finished film itself. A box office and critical smash, The Godfather grossed over $250 million worldwide and nabbed three Oscars, including the coveted prize for Best Picture. What else is there to say except: “Leave the gun, take the cannoli.”
The Godfather wowed audiences with a 97% on Rotten Tomatoes, and is currently streaming on Paramount+.
Upcoming Francis Ford Coppola Movies
Megalopolis (TBD)
A long-gestating passion project, Megalopolis languished in development hell for over 40 years before cameras finally got rolling in late 2022. With no one interested in financing the movie, Coppola decided to front the $100 million necessary to make his ambitious vision a reality.
According to Deadline, Megalopolis follows an “ambitious architectural idealist” named Cesar (Adam Driver), who goes up against Mayor Frank Cicero (Giancarlo Esposito) in a dystopian version of New York City decimated by disaster. The two characters butt heads over “whether to embrace the future and build a utopia with renewable materials, or take a business-as-usual rebuild strategy, replete with concrete, corruption and power brokering at the expense of a restless underclass.” Caught between the two is Cicero’s daughter, Julia (Nathalie Emmanuel).
“It's a love story,” Coppola said during a 2022 interview with GQ. “A woman is divided between loyalties to two men. But not only two men. Each man comes with a philosophical principle. One is her father who raised her, who taught her Latin on his lap and is devoted to a much more classical view of society, the Marcus Aurelius kind of view. The other one, who is the lover, is the enemy of the father but is dedicated to a much more progressive ‘Let's leap into the future, let's leap over all of this garbage that has contaminated humanity for 10,000 years. Let's find what we really are, which are an enlightened, friendly, joyous species.’”
Jon Voight, Laurence Fishburne, Shia LaBeouf, Talia Shire, Jason Schwartzman, Chloe Fineman, Kathryn Hunter, Dustin Hoffman, D.B. Sweeney, Aubrey Plaza, Baily Ives, Grace VanderWaal, Talia Shire and James Remar round out the cast.
The film will hold its world premiere at the Cannes Film Festival in May of 2024, and may receive wider distribution via French company Le Pacte (Anatomy of a Fall).
Bottom Line
While not every single one of his movies has been a certified hit, Francis Ford Coppola continues to stand as an unwavering barrier between cinema treated as a hallowed art-form and cinema treated as a way to make a quick buck.
“The cinema language happened by experimentation — by people not knowing what to do,” he said in a 2012 interview. “But unfortunately, after 15-20 years, it became a commercial industry. People made money in the cinema, and then they began to say to the pioneers, “Don’t experiment. We want to make money. We don’t want to take chances.” An essential element of any art is risk. If you don’t take a risk then how are you going to make something really beautiful, that hasn’t been seen before? I always like to say that cinema without risk is like having no sex and expecting to have a baby. You have to take a risk.”
