Legendary director Steven Spielberg recently named one classic crime movie from 1972 “the greatest American film ever made,” but it curiously made him want to quit directing. The list of Steven Spielberg’s movies has a lot of overlap with the list of the best movies ever made. From timeless classics like Raiders of the Lost Ark and Jaws to modern masterpieces like Lincoln and Schindler’s List, Spielberg is easily one of the most prominent filmmakers in American history. There are plenty of people who aspire to be Spielberg, but even he has his own role models that he strives to be like.

There are also plenty of options Steven Spielberg could have chosen as “the greatest American film ever made,” even discounting his own work. From Old Hollywood masterpieces like Casablanca or Vertigo to more modern blockbusters, America has produced an endless fount of great cinema. The movie Spielberg chose to recognize, however, was so good that it actually discouraged him from directing entirely when he first saw it. Given how legendary Spielberg is now, that couldn’t have been an easy feat, but it makes sense that The Godfather was the film to do it.

Steven Spielberg’s Comments On The Godfather Explained

Spielberg Thinks The Godfather Is “The Greatest American Movie” & Thought He Would Never Be As Confident A Storyteller As Coppola

While Francis Ford Coppola was being awarded the AFI Life Achievement Award, Steven Spielberg called The Godfather the best American movie ever made. Spielberg was oozing with praise for Coppola’s crime epic, and he even said that Coppola was “peerless,” and that he “redefined the canon of American film,” (via Variety). That wasn’t even the first time Spielberg gave The Godfather and Coppola heavy praise, either. In the DVD restoration of The Godfather, Spielberg said that it was so good it demoralized him and made him lose confidence in his own filmmaking abilities (via Collider).

“I was pulverized by the story and by the effect it had on me, and I also felt that I should quit. There was no reason to continue directing because I would never achieve that level of confidence in the ability to tell a story such as the one I had just experienced. So, in a way, it shattered my confidence.”

Spielberg wasn’t directly involved in the making of The Godfather, but it did come at a very pivotal moment in his directorial career. Spielberg’s first feature-length film, Duel, came out just a year before The Godfather. The young director was still finding his way, and seeing Francis Ford Coppola’s magnum opus convinced him, however briefly, that there was no way he would ever surpᴀss The Godfather. It makes sense that Spielberg would be discouraged: The Godfather is widely considered one of – if not the – best movies ever made, and arguably no other movie has surpᴀssed it.

The Godfather Helped Make Spielberg A Better Filmmaker

Striving To Make Coppola Proud Pushed Spielberg To New Heights & Encouraged Him To Take More Risks

Even though Steven Spielberg believed he would never do anything better than The Godfather, that didn’t stop him from trying. Spielberg is part of a group of filmmakers that made “New Hollywood” movies; directors, writers, and producers who changed the face of filmmaking forever. Spielberg, Coppola, and other legendary directors like Martin Scorsese, George Lucas, Stanley Kubrick, and many others, were all part of the same movement. They were all contemporaries and – contrary to Spielberg’s belief – peers, and they all pushed each other to new heights.

Each time a New Hollywood director had a major success, like The Godfather, it encouraged the rest of them to do better. Rather than being discouraged by Coppola’s confidence in his story and the risks he took, Spielberg ended up mimicking his approach. He started taking more and bolder risks, started being fully confident in the stories he was telling, and it quickly paid off. Just three years after The Godfather, Spielberg directed Jaws, and his career took off. The Godfather, at least partially, gave Spielberg the confidence to take a gamble on a shark movie where you barely see the shark, and it paid off in dividends.

Steven Spielberg & Francis Ford Coppola Both Redefined Cinema

Spielberg, Coppola, & Other New Hollywood Directors Invented The Modern Blockbuster, The Modern Epic, & The Modern Movie

The Godfather had a big hand in making Steven Spielberg the legend he is today, but both Spielberg and Francis Ford Coppola did much more than that. As previously mentioned, the era of New Hollywood saw the emergence of some mythical figures in filmmaking. Coppola, Spielberg, Lucas, Kubrick, Scorsese, and more changed the very fabric of American cinema in the 1960s, 70s, and 80s. Those directors basically invented the idea of a modern blockbuster, they redefined character-driven film in American cinema, and they revolutionized everything behind and in front of the camera in a way that can still be seen today.

While the far-reaching effects of the New Hollywood era can’t all be directly attributed to The Godfather, it was a salient moment in the era. Once again, it pushed the other directors and filmmakers of the New Hollywood era to new heights, and it was a mᴀssive moment for the crime and gangster genres in particular. The Godfather was almost a turning point for New Hollywood, where the movement became more well-defined and more confident in its ability to change cinema, and it’s easy to see why Steven Spielberg has such a high opinion of Francis Ford Coppola’s work.