Year by year: 1974
by cafg-0 | created - 28 Jun 2013 | updated - 10 months ago | PublicMy 50 favorite films of 1974.
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1. Chinatown (1974)
R | 130 min | Drama, Mystery, Thriller
A private detective hired to expose an adulterer in 1930s Los Angeles finds himself caught up in a web of deceit, corruption, and murder.
Director: Roman Polanski | Stars: Jack Nicholson, Faye Dunaway, John Huston, Perry Lopez
Votes: 349,693
2. The Godfather Part II (1974)
R | 202 min | Crime, Drama
The early life and career of Vito Corleone in 1920s New York City is portrayed, while his son, Michael, expands and tightens his grip on the family crime syndicate.
Director: Francis Ford Coppola | Stars: Al Pacino, Robert De Niro, Robert Duvall, Diane Keaton
Votes: 1,363,491 | Gross: $57.30M
3. The Conversation (1974)
PG | 113 min | Drama, Mystery, Thriller
A paranoid, secretive surveillance expert has a crisis of conscience when he suspects that the couple he is spying on will be murdered.
Director: Francis Ford Coppola | Stars: Gene Hackman, John Cazale, Allen Garfield, Frederic Forrest
Votes: 121,780 | Gross: $4.42M
4. We All Loved Each Other So Much (1974)
124 min | Comedy, Drama
Three partisans bound by a strong friendship return home after the war, but the clash with everyday reality puts a strain on their bond.
Director: Ettore Scola | Stars: Nino Manfredi, Vittorio Gassman, Stefania Sandrelli, Stefano Satta Flores
Votes: 7,269
5. Scenes from a Marriage (1973)
TV-PG | 283 min | Drama
Ten years within the marriage of Marianne and Johan.
Stars: Liv Ullmann, Erland Josephson, Bibi Andersson, Gunnel Lindblom
Votes: 17,265
6. Amarcord (1973)
R | 123 min | Comedy, Drama
A series of comedic and nostalgic vignettes set in a 1930s Italian coastal town.
Director: Federico Fellini | Stars: Magali Noël, Bruno Zanin, Pupella Maggio, Armando Brancia
Votes: 46,794 | Gross: $0.58M
7. Ali: Fear Eats the Soul (1974)
Not Rated | 92 min | Drama, Romance
A lonely widow meets a much younger Moroccan worker in a bar during a rainstorm. They fall in love, to their own surprise and to the outright shock of their families, colleagues, and drinking buddies.
Director: Rainer Werner Fassbinder | Stars: Brigitte Mira, El Hedi ben Salem, Barbara Valentin, Irm Hermann
Votes: 23,842
8. Lacombe, Lucien (1974)
R | 138 min | Drama, War
In 1944, an 18-year-old boy from small-town France collaborates with the Gestapo and subsequently falls in love with a Jewish girl.
Director: Louis Malle | Stars: Pierre Blaise, Aurore Clément, Holger Löwenadler, Therese Giehse
Votes: 7,711
9. Young Frankenstein (1974)
PG | 106 min | Comedy
An American grandson of the infamous scientist, struggling to prove that his grandfather was not as insane as people believe, is invited to Transylvania, where he discovers the process that reanimates a dead body.
Director: Mel Brooks | Stars: Gene Wilder, Madeline Kahn, Marty Feldman, Peter Boyle
Votes: 168,847 | Gross: $86.30M
10. The Phantom of Liberty (1974)
R | 104 min | Comedy
A series of surreal sequences that critique morality and society in a stream of consciousness style.
Director: Luis Buñuel | Stars: Jean-Claude Brialy, Adolfo Celi, Michel Piccoli, Monica Vitti
Votes: 17,187 | Gross: $0.01M
11. Lenny (1974)
R | 111 min | Biography, Drama
The story of acerbic 1960s comic Lenny Bruce, whose groundbreaking, no-holds-barred style and social commentary was often deemed by the Establishment as too obscene for the public.
Director: Bob Fosse | Stars: Dustin Hoffman, Valerie Perrine, Jan Miner, Stanley Beck
Votes: 17,537 | Gross: $8.43M
12. A Woman Under the Influence (1974)
R | 155 min | Drama, Romance
Although wife and mother Mabel is loved by her husband Nick, her mental illness places a strain on the marriage.
Director: John Cassavetes | Stars: Gena Rowlands, Peter Falk, Fred Draper, Lady Rowlands
Votes: 28,685 | Gross: $13.34M
13. Pastoral: To Die in the Country (1974)
104 min | Drama, Fantasy
A young boys' coming of age tale set in a strange, carnivalesque village becomes the recreation of a memory that the director has twenty years later.
Director: Shûji Terayama | Stars: Kaoru Yachigusa, Keiko Niitaka, Masumi Harukawa, Kan Mikami
Votes: 2,407
14. The Man Who Sleeps (1974)
77 min | Drama
A 25-year-old male student in Paris becomes indifferent to the world around him, and subsequently feels a strong sense of alienation and hopelessness.
Director: Bernard Queysanne | Stars: Jacques Spiesser, Ludmila Mikaël
Votes: 4,641
15. Blazing Saddles (1974)
R | 93 min | Comedy, Western
In order to ruin a western town, a corrupt politician appoints a black Sheriff, who promptly becomes his most formidable adversary.
Director: Mel Brooks | Stars: Cleavon Little, Gene Wilder, Slim Pickens, Harvey Korman
Votes: 152,405 | Gross: $119.50M
16. Arabian Nights (1974)
X | 130 min | Comedy, Drama, Fantasy
In ancient Arabia, a beautiful slave girl chooses a youth to be her new master, then she is kidnapped and they must search for each other. Stories are told within stories: love, travel and the whims of destiny.
Director: Pier Paolo Pasolini | Stars: Ninetto Davoli, Franco Citti, Franco Merli, Tessa Bouché
Votes: 9,040
17. Swept Away (1974)
R | 114 min | Adventure, Comedy, Drama
A trip into the Mediterranean sea becomes a trip into the discovery of how society's frameworks of the rich and poor are delicate and temporary.
Director: Lina Wertmüller | Stars: Giancarlo Giannini, Mariangela Melato, Riccardo Salvino, Isa Danieli
Votes: 6,781
18. My Little Loves (1974)
123 min | Drama
A boy is left to his own devices when his mother refuses to pay for his schooling.
Director: Jean Eustache | Stars: Martin Loeb, Jacqueline Dufranne, Jacques Romain, Ingrid Caven
Votes: 1,396
19. Conversation Piece (1974)
R | 121 min | Drama, Romance
A reclusive retired professor is faced with confronting modernity when a group of vulgar youths led by an obnoxious marchesa take up residence in his unused upper residence.
Director: Luchino Visconti | Stars: Burt Lancaster, Helmut Berger, Silvana Mangano, Claudia Marsani
Votes: 5,184
20. Cousin Angelica (1974)
107 min | Drama
After being given permission to re-inter his mother's body in their family vault, a middle-aged man who survived the Spanish Civil War as a child returns home and relives old memories.
Director: Carlos Saura | Stars: José Luis López Vázquez, Lina Canalejas, Fernando Delgado, María Clara Fernández de Loaysa
Votes: 1,214
21. The Clockmaker (1974)
105 min | Crime, Drama
A Watchmaker finds out one day that his son has become a murderer. He tries to understand for whom and why.
Director: Bertrand Tavernier | Stars: Philippe Noiret, Jean Rochefort, Jacques Denis, Yves Afonso
Votes: 2,831
22. Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore (1974)
PG | 112 min | Drama, Romance
A recently widowed woman is on the road with her precocious young son, determined to make a new life for herself as a singer.
Director: Martin Scorsese | Stars: Ellen Burstyn, Kris Kristofferson, Mia Bendixsen, Alfred Lutter III
Votes: 27,453 | Gross: $18.60M
23. Hearts and Minds (1974)
R | 112 min | Documentary, History, War
A startling and courageous landmark documentary that unflinchingly confronted the United States' involvement in Vietnam at the height of the controversy that surrounded it.
Director: Peter Davis | Stars: Tin Chan, Chau Diem, Ngo Dinh Diem, John Foster Dulles
Votes: 6,103 | Gross: $0.03M
24. The Deluge (1974)
287 min | Adventure, History, Romance
During the 1655 war between Protestant Sweden and Catholic Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth some Polish-Lithuanian nobles side with Swedish king Charles X Gustav while others side with the Polish king Jan Kazimierz.
Director: Jerzy Hoffman | Stars: Daniel Olbrychski, Malgorzata Braunek, Tadeusz Lomnicki, Kazimierz Wichniarz
Votes: 3,181
25. The Parallax View (1974)
R | 102 min | Drama, Mystery, Thriller
An ambitious reporter gets in way-over-his-head trouble while investigating a senator's assassination which leads to a vast conspiracy involving a multinational corporation behind every event in the world's headlines.
Director: Alan J. Pakula | Stars: Warren Beatty, Paula Prentiss, William Daniels, Walter McGinn
Votes: 21,762 | Gross: $2.15M
26. The Night Porter (1974)
R | 118 min | Drama
A concentration camp survivor rekindles her sadomasochistic relationship with her lover, a former SS officer - now working as a night porter at a Vienna hotel - but his former Nazi associates begin stalking them.
Director: Liliana Cavani | Stars: Dirk Bogarde, Charlotte Rampling, Philippe Leroy, Gabriele Ferzetti
Votes: 14,710 | Gross: $0.63M
27. Bread and Chocolate (1974)
100 min | Comedy, Drama
Italian immigrant Nino steadfastly tries to become a member of Swiss Society no matter how awful his situation becomes.
Director: Franco Brusati | Stars: Nino Manfredi, Anna Karina, Paolo Turco, Ugo D'Alessio
Votes: 1,972
28. Murder on the Orient Express (1974)
PG | 128 min | Crime, Drama, Mystery
In December 1935, when his transcontinental luxury train is stranded by deep snow, detective Hercule Poirot is called on to solve a murder that occurred in his car the night before, with a multitude of suspects.
Director: Sidney Lumet | Stars: Albert Finney, Lauren Bacall, Ingrid Bergman, Sean Connery
Votes: 69,105 | Gross: $0.07M
29. The Three Musketeers (1973)
PG | 106 min | Action, Adventure, Romance
A young swordsman comes to Paris and faces villains, romance, adventure and intrigue with three Musketeer friends.
Director: Richard Lester | Stars: Oliver Reed, Raquel Welch, Richard Chamberlain, Michael York
Votes: 20,129 | Gross: $22.02M
30. Celine and Julie Go Boating (1974)
Unrated | 193 min | Comedy, Drama, Fantasy
A mysteriously linked pair of young women find their daily lives preempted by a strange boudoir melodrama that plays itself out in a hallucinatory parallel reality.
Director: Jacques Rivette | Stars: Juliet Berto, Dominique Labourier, Bulle Ogier, Marie-France Pisier
Votes: 6,354 | Gross: $0.03M
31. Boquitas pintadas (1974)
R | 120 min | Drama
The life and the lovers of a few young women in a provincial town.
Director: Leopoldo Torre Nilsson | Stars: Alfredo Alcón, Marta González, Luisina Brando, Raúl Lavié
Votes: 286
32. Stavisky (1974)
PG | 120 min | Biography, Crime, Drama
A swindler's activity indirectly caused a political crisis in France in the last years before World War II.
Director: Alain Resnais | Stars: Jean-Paul Belmondo, Charles Boyer, François Périer, Anny Duperey
Votes: 2,492 | Gross: $0.01M
33. Female Trouble (1974)
NC-17 | 89 min | Comedy, Crime
A spoiled schoolgirl runs away from home, gets pregnant while hitch-hiking, and ends up as a fashion model for a pair of beauticians who like to photograph women committing crimes.
Director: John Waters | Stars: Divine, David Lochary, Mary Vivian Pearce, Mink Stole
Votes: 10,455
34. Phantom of the Paradise (1974)
PG | 91 min | Comedy, Drama, Fantasy
A disfigured composer sells his soul for the woman he loves so that she will perform his music. However, an evil record tycoon betrays him and steals his music to open his rock palace, The Paradise.
Director: Brian De Palma | Stars: Paul Williams, William Finley, Jessica Harper, Gerrit Graham
Votes: 22,381 | Gross: $0.16M
35. Bring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia (1974)
R | 112 min | Action, Crime, Drama
An American barroom pianist and his prostitute girlfriend go on a trip through the Mexican underworld to collect the bounty on the head of a dead gigolo.
Director: Sam Peckinpah | Stars: Warren Oates, Isela Vega, Robert Webber, Gig Young
Votes: 21,520 | Gross: $0.58M
36. The Longest Yard (1974)
R | 121 min | Comedy, Crime, Drama
A sadistic warden asks a former pro quarterback, now serving time in his prison, to put together a team of inmates to take on (and get pummeled by) the guards.
Director: Robert Aldrich | Stars: Burt Reynolds, Eddie Albert, Ed Lauter, Michael Conrad
Votes: 21,417 | Gross: $7.13M
37. Black Christmas (1974)
R | 98 min | Horror, Mystery, Thriller
During their Christmas break, a group of sorority girls are stalked by a stranger.
Director: Bob Clark | Stars: Olivia Hussey, Keir Dullea, Margot Kidder, John Saxon
Votes: 48,329 | Gross: $4.05M
38. The Front Page (1974)
PG | 105 min | Comedy, Drama, Romance
A ruthless editor tries to get his top reporter to cover one more crime story before retirement.
Director: Billy Wilder | Stars: Jack Lemmon, Walter Matthau, Susan Sarandon, Vincent Gardenia
Votes: 15,288 | Gross: $17.30M
39. The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (1974)
R | 83 min | Horror
Five friends head out to rural Texas to visit the grave of a grandfather. On the way they stumble across what appears to be a deserted house, only to discover something sinister within. Something armed with a chainsaw.
Director: Tobe Hooper | Stars: Marilyn Burns, Edwin Neal, Allen Danziger, Paul A. Partain
Votes: 183,495 | Gross: $30.86M
40. Nada (1974)
110 min | Thriller
A group of anarchist leftist called "Nada" and led by the terrorist Buenaventura Diaz abducts American ambassador Richard Poindexter in a brothel in Paris and takes him to a farm in the ... See full summary »
Director: Claude Chabrol | Stars: Fabio Testi, Maurice Garrel, Lou Castel, Mariangela Melato
Votes: 1,127
41. Harry and Tonto (1974)
R | 115 min | Adventure, Comedy, Drama
When his apartment building is torn down, a retired lifelong New Yorker goes on a cross-country odyssey with his beloved cat Tonto.
Director: Paul Mazursky | Stars: Art Carney, Ellen Burstyn, René Enríquez, Herbert Berghof
Votes: 6,215 | Gross: $1.26M
42. The Sugarland Express (1974)
PG | 110 min | Crime, Drama
A woman attempts to reunite her family by helping her husband escape prison and together kidnapping their son. But things don't go as planned when they are forced to take a police hostage on the road.
Director: Steven Spielberg | Stars: Goldie Hawn, Ben Johnson, Michael Sacks, William Atherton
Votes: 19,078 | Gross: $7.50M
43. The Holy Inquisition (1974)
127 min | Drama
A gripping, shocking story of the Spanish Inquisition hunting Jews, believed to be the cause of a plague spreading in 16th century colonial Mexico. A monk reports a family practicing Jewish burial rites bringing devastating consequences.
Director: Arturo Ripstein | Stars: Jorge Luke, Diana Bracho, Claudio Brook, Ana Mérida
Votes: 372
44. Lancelot of the Lake (1974)
85 min | Drama, Fantasy, Romance
King Arthur learns that his wife, Queen Guinevere, has been having an affair with Lancelot, who at the same time remains loyal to the king, particularly after Arthur's traitorous nephew Mordred commits an attempt on his life.
Director: Robert Bresson | Stars: Luc Simon, Laura Duke Condominas, Humbert Balsan, Vladimir Antolek-Oresek
Votes: 4,240
45. The Truce (1974)
Not Rated | 108 min | Drama, Romance
A man has to come to terms with his wasted youth, estranged family and grim prospects for the future.
Director: Sergio Renán | Stars: Héctor Alterio, Luis Brandoni, Ana María Picchio, Marilina Ross
Votes: 699
46. The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz (1974)
PG | 120 min | Comedy, Drama
In a bid to gain respect, the neglected younger son of a working class Jewish family in Montréal embarks on a series of get-rich-quick schemes to buy land surrounding a lake.
Director: Ted Kotcheff | Stars: Richard Dreyfuss, Micheline Lanctôt, Jack Warden, Randy Quaid
Votes: 2,697 | Gross: $0.85M
47. Claudine (1974)
PG | 92 min | Comedy, Drama, Romance
In the 1970s Harlem, garbage collector Roop feels intimidated by the idea of dating Claudine who is a single mother of six on welfare.
Director: John Berry | Stars: Diahann Carroll, James Earl Jones, Lawrence Hilton-Jacobs, Tamu Blackwell
Votes: 2,509 | Gross: $3.51M
48. Effi Briest (1974)
Not Rated | 135 min | Drama, History
In the nineteenth century, seventeen year old Effi Briest is married to the older Baron von Instetten and moves into a house, that she believes has a ghost, in a small isolated Baltic town.... See full summary »
Director: Rainer Werner Fassbinder | Stars: Hanna Schygulla, Wolfgang Schenck, Ulli Lommel, Karlheinz Böhm
Votes: 2,695
49. El amor del capitán Brando (1974)
93 min | Drama
Former students reunite years later to honor their school's headmistress. Reminiscing sparks an idea to reenact a cherished tradition, but only 9 out of 40 committed show up, leaving them unsure of what's to come.
Director: Jaime de Armiñán | Stars: Fernando Fernán Gómez, Ana Belén, Jaime Gamboa, Julieta Serrano
Votes: 150
50. Rebellion in Patagonia (1974)
Not Rated | 110 min | Drama, History, Western
In 1920, some workers of Patagonia, grouped in anarchist and socialist societies, decide to make a strike demanding better working conditions. The situation becomes unsustainable and the government sends the order is restored.
Director: Héctor Olivera | Stars: Pedro Aleandro, Héctor Alterio, Luis Brandoni, Franklin Caicedo
Votes: 1,285
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