10 Best Thrillers of the 1970s, Ranked

The 1970s presented some of the most iconic thriller movies in film history, and many of them stand up well to anything released this decade. This was the decade that saw some big name directors coming into prominence, including names like Francis Ford Coppola, Martin Scorsese, William Friedkin, Sam Peckinpah, Brian De Palma, George Roy Hill, John Carpenter, and more. These names all approached the thriller genre from different angles, but what they presented was a look at the dark and dangerous cities and men and women who would do anything to achieve their goals. What resulted were action thriller masterpieces.

Here is a look at the 10 best thriller movies of the 1970s, ranked.

10) Assault on Precinct 13

Assault on Precinct 13 was based on a classic Western movie and it was even used as a template for later movies in the thriller genre. Directed by John Carpenter, Assault on Precinct 13 was an urban remake of the John Wayne movie, Rio Bravo, and it followed a police department that found itself under attack by a criminal gang wanting revenge for the LAPD stopping a recent robbery. They then attack the police department, and the officers have to barricade themselves in and defend themselves from the attack until help arrives. Carpenter moved on to horror and sci-fi after this, but he proved here that he was a master of tension and the thriller genre. Carpenter even remade it in the sci-fi movie Ghosts of Mars.

9) Marathon Man

Marathon Man is a thriller movie that not a lot of people talk about, but it is one that deserves a lot more recognition. Written by William Goldman, and based on the screenwriter’s book of the same name, Dustin Hoffman stars as a graduate student and long-distance runner named Babe who is forced into a plot by a Nazi war criminal to retrieve diamonds from a safe deposit box. At the end of the day, this was a movie about bringing down Nazi war criminals in hiding, and it offered a strong look at how far a man would go to defend his honor.

8) Serpico

Al Pacino made his name as the mafia don in the Godfather franchise, but he had several other incredible films in the 1970s, with one of the best being the crime thriller Serpico. This movie had Pacino star as an NYPD detective named Frank Serpico, a good cop who had to deal with the corruption within his own department, as well as his turn as a whistleblower who helped expose the corruption. Based on a true story, it was as tense as it gets, as Serpico has to deal with threats from within his own department and from the outside. Pacino won a Golden Globe for his performance, and it has a 93% fresh Rotten Tomatoes score.

7) Three Days of the Condor

Three Days of the Condor did something impressive with Robert Redford. While he was a legitimate leading man at the time, the movie had him play a bookish analyst for the CIA who is completely unassuming and unprepared for the adventure that lies ahead for him. When the CIA orders the execution of everyone in his department to cover up their wrongdoing, he is the only survivor and goes on the run, with no one there to help him. The film earned one Oscar nomination and proved Redford was one of the most well-rounded stars in Hollywood at the time.

6) Sorcerer

Sorcerer is a thriller movie that has little to do with crime or conspiracies and is instead a lesson in how to build tension and thrills through real-life adventures. Directed by William Friedkin, the movie is based on the novel The Wages of Fear, and is the second adaptation of that book. The plot follows four fugitives who are hired to drive two dilapidated tricks 208 miles through a Latin American jungle road. However, the trucks are loaded with rotting dynamite, and one accident could kill them all. The movie has some of the most intense scenes of terror in any thriller movie, and it is all about the trucks’ journey throughout perilous terrain, and nothing more.

5) All the President’s Men

All the President’s Men is a historical drama, but it is as much a thriller as anything released during that time. Impressively, All the President’s Men was not really a historical drama at the time, since it was released only a few short years after President Richard Nixon was forced to resign after his illegal operations were discovered. The story follows the two reporters who exposed and broke the news of the Watergate scandal. Robert Redford and Dustin Hoffman were spectacular in their performances, and this thriller flew along, exposing the corruption in the U.S. government all while the men at the top tried to bully their way to remain in power.

4) The French Connection

Gene Hackman became a massive star thanks to his performance in the crime thriller The French Connection. Hackman starred as Popeye Doyle in this movie, a tough-as-nails cop who is willing to break the law when needed to bring down the criminals. Seeing a police officer doing some terrible things, and even covering up murders, was shocking at the time, but it helped the movie gain an immense following. It ended up with eight Oscar nominations, and won Best Picture, Best Director (William Friedkin), and Best Actor (Hackman). It has since been added to the National Film Registry for preservation.

3) Taxi Driver

Martin Scorsese released Taxi Driver in 1976, a ne-noir psychological thriller about a Vietnam vet who now works as a cab driver in New York City and has delusions of being a hero. This manifests itself when he meets a campaign worker he develops an attraction for (Cybill Shepherd) and then meets a 12-year-old prostitute he wants to save (Jodie Foster). This leads to very violent moments where Travis might (or might not) have saved the day. The film received four Oscar nominations and remains one of the most iconic thriller movies ever made.

2) Dog Day Afternoon

In some interesting, yet sad trivia, John Cazale was an actor who only appeared in five movies before he died, and every single one of those movies was nominated for Best Picture, with three of them winning the big award. One of the two that didn’t win was just as deserving, and that was the crime thriller Dog Day Afternoon. Al Pacino stars as a crook named Sonny Wortzik who tries to rob a bank with his friends and ends up in a police standoff. Cazale played his friend and ally, Sal. Directed by Sidney Lumet, the movie is a masterclass in tension and stands up as well today as it did five decades ago.

1) The Conversation

While everyone talks about the two Godfather movies and Apocalypse Now when discussing Francis Ford Coppola’s 1970s movies, more people need to remember that he also directed the brilliant mystery thriller The Conversation. This film stars Gene Hackman as a surveillance expert who is hired to eavesdrop on a couple, but this leads him to believe that he has overheard evidence of a murder. This then leads to a series of events that proves that he is not the only person listening, and that his own life is also in danger. A smaller movie that his other 70s films, Coppola proved with The Conversation that no one was better at the time at building tension in a thriller.

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