AFI's 100 Greatest American Movies of All Time, 51 - 75

51. 
    

    West Side Story, 1961 This musical sets the tragedy of Romeo and Juliet against a backdrop of the rivalry of two street gangs, the Sharks and the Jets, in New York of the 1950s. ( back to top )

52. 
    

    Taxi Driver, 1976 A New York cab driver is driven to obsession when he attempts to save a teenage prostitute and embarks on a violent rampage against a world of filth and corruption. ( back to top )

53. 
    

    The Deer Hunter, 1978 Tracks a group of steelworker pals from a Pennsylvania blast furnace to the coal hunting grounds of the Alleghenies to the lethal cauldron of Vietnam. It is a drama of friendship and courage and of what happens to these qualities under stress. ( back to top )

54. 
    

    M*A*S*H, 1970 Highlights the outrageous antics of three skilled young surgeons drafted from civilian life and assigned to a unit of the Mobile Army Surgical Hospital (MASH) during the Korean War. ( back to top )

55. 
    

    North by Northwest, 1959 Roger O. Thornhill is a victim of mistaken identity and is forced to embark on a run for his life by train, plane and automobile. ( back to top )

56. 
    

    Jaws, 1975 A man-eating shark causes havoc off the Long Island coast and three men join together to hunt and destroy it. ( back to top )

57. 
    

    Rocky, 1976 Rocky Balboa, the underdog, gets his million-to-one shot at love, self-respect and the world heavyweight boxing crown and comes out a winner. ( back to top )

58. 
    

    The Gold Rush, 1925 A lone prospector braves the cold during the 1890 Alaskan Gold Rush and has some slapstick comic adventures in the process. ( back to top )

59. 
    

    Nashville, 1975 Set in Tennessee, Nashville interweaves the stories of 24 characters during five days in the capital of country music. More than a portrait of these 24 people, the film is a penetrating commentary on America at a particular time. ( back to top )

60. 
    

    Duck Soup, 1933 As Prime Minister Firefly of Freedonia, Groucho Marx soon reduces the kingdom to shambles. Harpo and Chico are secret agents disguised as peanut vendors and Zeppo is Firefly's secretary. ( back to top )

61. 
    

    Sullivan's Travels, 1941 A successful Hollywood director disguises himself as a bum and sets off to see America from the bottom up. In the midst of the brutality and despair, he makes a valuable discovery--that what the downtrodden need most is laughter. ( back to top )

62. 
    

    American Graffiti, 1973 Four teenagers come of age on their last summer night before college in 1962. ( back to top )

63. 
    

    Cabaret, 1972 Sally Bowles, an American cabaret singer in 1930s Berlin, becomes involved in the rise of the Nazi party. ( back to top )

64. 
    

    Network, 1976 A satirical look at the politics and power struggles of television executives as a network news anchorman turns the tables on the "ratings." ( back to top )

65. 
    

    The African Queen, 1951 Thrown together at the outset of World War I, the spinster sister of a British missionary and the derelict captain of the launch, The African Queen, determine to pilot the boat down an unchartered river in an effort to destroy a German gunboat which prevents invasion by British forces. ( back to top )

66. 
    

    Raiders of the Lost Ark, 1981 Indiana Jones is a bullwhip-cracking archeologist assigned by the U.S. Government to find the mystically empowered Ark of the Convenant before the Nazis can obtain it for their own evil use. ( back to top )

67. 
    

    Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, 1966 Two couples get together for an evening of bitter conversation. ( back to top )

68. 
    

    Unforgiven, 1992 Two retired outlaws take up their guns one last time to collect a bounty offered by a group of prostitutes seeking revenge, and run up against the sadistic sheriff of Big Whiskey Montana. ( back to top )

69. 
    

    Tootsie, 1982 Michael Dorsey is an out-of-work actor who makes himself up as a woman to get a job. When his girlfriend, Sandy, fails an audition for a soap opera, Michael dresses up as "Dorothy Michaels" and lands the part. ( back to top )

70. 
    

    A Clockwork Orange, 1971 Depicts a harrowing journey through a near-future world of decaying cities, murderous adolescents and nightmarish technologies of punishment and crime. ( back to top )

71. 
    

    Saving Private Ryan, 1998 Tells the story of a squad of young soldiers led by Captain John Miller who set out in the midst of the chaos of D-Day to find Private Ryan, a soldier whose three brothers had already been lost in the war. ( back to top )

72. 
    

    The Shawshank Redemption, 1994 Two convicts, one white and one black, never give up the dream of freedom, and together they turn hope and friendship into an uplifting bond no prison can ever take away. ( back to top )

73. 
    

    Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, 1969 Blends adventure, romance and comedy to tell the story of the West's most likeable outlaws, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, as they set out for Bolivia with the law on their heels. ( back to top )

74. 
    

    The Silence of the Lambs, 1991 A young female FBI agent is sent to interview notorious killer, Dr. Hannibal Lecter, in hope of obtaining information that will help the Bureau catch another killer. ( back to top )

75. 
    

    In the Heat of the Night, 1967 A small town Southern sheriff finds himself in an uneasy alliance with a big-city black homicide detective as they investigate a murder. ( back to top )

Back to Movies 26 - 50   -  Continue to Movies 76 - 100