‘Godfather’ director Coppola bags lifetime achievement award

The American filmmaker Francis Ford Coppola lives the fiftieth American Movie Institute (AFI) Life Achievement Award Ceremony on the Dolby Theater in Hollywood, California, 26 April 2025. Coppola is the recipient of the fiftieth Afi Life Achievement Award. (Photograph by Valerie Macon / AFP)

A number of Oscar winner Francis Ford Coppola Picked up a Lifetime Achievement Award on Saturday throughout a stars -littered ceremony that praised his “fearless” angle in direction of filmmaking.

The 86-year-old director of classics, together with ‘The godfather“And” Apocalypse Now “acquired a trophy from fellow movie legends Steven Spielberg and George Lucas, who praised him for combating the system and redefining the American cinema.

“Star Wars” creator Lucas remembered that Coppola instructed him: “Do not be afraid to leap from cliffs”, whereas Spielberg greeted the “fearless” director and mentioned that “The Godfather” “was the best American movie ever made”.

“You’ve gotten taken what got here earlier and re -defined the canon of the American movie, and with that you’ve got impressed a technology of storytellers,” mentioned Spielberg.

The prize was awarded by the distinguished American Movie Institute, which produces annual lists of one of the best movies ever made and is seen as one of the crucial revered our bodies within the trade.

The stage in Hollywood’s Dolby Theater for movie veterans, together with Robert de Niro and Dustin Hoffman, mentioned Coppola that successful the prize felt like coming residence.

“Now I perceive right here, this place that made me, my home, shouldn’t be a spot in any respect, however you, associates, colleagues, lecturers, playmates, household, neighbors, all the attractive faces welcome me again,” Coppola mentioned.

The six-time Academy Award winner was praised by the AFI as a “dreamer”, a “pioneer” and in addition a “maverick”.

Coppola, who threw well-known 5 of his Oscars out of a window in an eruption whereas he made ‘Apocalypse Now’, heard emotional tribute of colleagues, together with the Niro, Al Pacino, Diane Lane, Harrison Ford and Ralph Macchio, who thanked the filmmaker for taking an opportunity.

“When the studio needed stars, you fought for actors,” mentioned “Rain Man” star Hoffman.

He joked that Coppola launched so many careers from younger actors, however solely within the sci-fi drama “Megalopolis” final 12 months when Hoffman was 86.

The impartial AFI has honored in earlier years as Alfred Hitchcock, Martin Scorsese, Jack Nicholson and Al Pacino.

Pacino got here to the Niro to pay tribute to Coppola, who directed them within the second episode of the “The Godfather” trilogy.

Coppola, who fought towards studio -executives to make the movie in accordance with his personal imaginative and prescient, AFP mentioned that there isn’t any artwork with out an journey.

“I believe making artwork with out danger is that if infants with out intercourse. It is attainable, nevertheless it’s not one of the simplest ways to do it,” he mentioned.