With Francis Ford Coppola returning to the director's chair for the first time in about a decade with YOUTH WITHOUT YOUTH (which comes out on DVD next week), it seemed an appropriate time to examine the once acclaimed filmmaker and find out what exactly the hell happened.

Francis Ford Coppola

Genre of choice:
Drama

Filmography:
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)
Tucker: The Man and His Dream (1988)
The Godfather: Part III (1990)
Dracula (1992)
Jack (1996)
The Rainmaker (1997)
Youth Without Youth (2007)

The Best

1. THE GODFATHER / THE GODFATHER: PART II - I'm placing these films together not because they're not worthy of their own individual merit, but because so much has been said about their greatness already that a single summary paragraph for each can in no way do them justice. So I'll just say this: there's a reason why they've earned their respective spots as #1 and #3 on IMDB's Top 250 films of all-time.

2. APOCALYPSE NOW - Not just the war film to end all war films, this picture represents a fascinating descent into the darkness of the human mind, and it is an astounding filmmaking achievement that will continued to be studied for decades to come. The only thing as interesting as the movie itself is its disastrous production history, which can be seen in HEARTS OF DARKNESS: A FILMMAKER'S APOCALYPSE.

3. THE CONVERSATION - A superb, mesmerizing study of a paranoid, cynical, and socially awkward surveillance expert, perfectly played by Gene Hackman, aided by the bleak atmosphere delivered by Coppola's direction.

The Worst

1. JACK - How in the world can the man who made the GODFATHER trilogy be the same person who created this dreck? Watching Robin Williams act like a 10-year-old child may seem like an amusing concept for a "dumb" comedy, but JACK is played completely straight, with all the subtlety of a... er, 10-year-old child being played by Robin Williams. Add to that, it's also painfully melodramatic.

2. YOUTH WITHOUT YOUTH - An overly artistic and pretentious jumbled mess of a film that reeks of trying way too hard, and instead comes across as nearly incomprehensible. It's also really boring. Just when people were asking, "Whatever happened to Francis Ford Coppola?" he answers, "This."

3. DEMENTIA 13 - Francis Ford Coppola does low-budget '60s horror schlock for his feature debut? Sign me up! Only problem: it kind of sucks. There's some solid photography and a lot of inventive filmmaking, but the rest is silly and standard forgettable slasher horror fare.

Hidden Gem(s)

THE RAIN PEOPLE - A brooding, bizarre road movie starring such actors as James Caan and Robert Duvall, who would later re-team with Coppola for THE GODFATHER.

YOU'RE A BIG BOY NOW - A fun-filled and kooky early effort from Coppola that contains the essence of '30s screwball comedies.

Style/Trademarks

Family - Coppola constantly casts his relatives in his movies, from small parts to leading roles.

Re-edits - Coppola has been known to re-edit his films after being released.

Oscar actors - He has directed 12 actors in different Oscar nominated performances.

Author - He often credits his film adaptations with the author's name before the title.

Behind the Camera

Stricken with polio as a child (thus leaving him bedridden), Francis Ford Coppola indulged his imagination at a very young age through puppetry and, later, home movies.

Coppola was working on a fourth GODFATHER movie with Mario Puzo (meant to elaborate on the early lives of Sonny, Fredo, and Michael), but scrapped the project when Puzo passed away.

He was an uncredited director on the much-maligned sci-fi film SUPERNOVA, being called in to "re-edit" the film after the studio was unhappy with the initial cut.

Coppola's nephews include Nicolas Cage (born Nicolas Kim Coppola) and Jason Schwartzman (who starred in RUSHMORE and THE DARJEELING LIMITED). His daughter is Sofia Coppola (director of such films as LOST IN TRANSLATION and THE VIRGIN SUICIDES).

Coppola owns his own winemaking company, called Francis Ford Coppola Presents, and has also produced his own line of specialty foods.

Upcoming Projects

Up next Coppola has a movie titled TETRO, which is currently filming. The plot is said to follow the rivalries of an artistic Italian immigrant family. Vincent Gallo is starring as Tetro.

Also worthy of interest, Coppola has been tinkering with a script since the '90s about "one man's quest to build utopia set in modern-day New York." It has been re-written several times, and has been delayed multiple times due to his insistence on financing the film himself. It is titled MEGALOPOLIS.

Overall

Francis Ford Coppola stunned the nation with four masterpieces in a row, immediately followed by a downward slope of not necessarily bad films, but mostly forgettable and average pictures that in no way showed Coppola at his full potential. It's unfortunate, but one wonders if his catastrophic experience working on APOCALYPSE NOW would ultimately be his undoing.

What are your favorite/least favorite Francis Ford Coppola films? Submit your choices in the Strike Back section below!