The 11 Best Directorial Debuts of the 1970s
Raw, daring first films from a decade that rewrote the rules of American and world cinema. Cast your vote!
1Badlands
Terrence Malick 1973 debut following a young couple on a murderous road trip through the American Midwest.
1000pts
2Halloween
John Carpenter 1978 debut establishing the slasher genre template with Michael Myers stalking a babysitter.
704pts
3American Graffiti
George Lucas 1973 debut capturing one night in the lives of California teenagers in 1962.
487pts
4Saturday Night Fever
John Badham 1977 debut that made John Travolta a star and defined the disco era.
228pts
5The Duellists
Ridley Scott 1977 debut about two officers obsessively dueling across 16 years of Napoleonic France.
228pts
6The Conversation
Francis Ford Coppola 1974 paranoid thriller about a surveillance expert haunted by a conversation he recorded.
228pts
7Mean Streets
Martin Scorsese 1973 debut following young Italian-American men navigating loyalty and violence in Little Italy.
227pts
8Eraserhead
David Lynch 1977 surrealist debut following a man in an industrial wasteland caring for a monstrous infant.
1pts
9Duel
Steven Spielberg 1971 TV-movie debut about a traveling salesman terrorized by a faceless truck driver.
1pts
10Straw Dogs
Sam Peckinpah 1971 controversial debut about an American mathematician forced to defend his home in rural England.
1pts
11Dawn of the Dead
George A. Romero 1978 sequel debut using a zombie-overrun shopping mall to satirize consumer culture.
1pts
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