Marlon Brando was in a film.
Apocalypse Now . It stars Marlon Brando , Robert Duvall , Martin Sheen , Frederic Forrest , Albert Hall , Sam Bottoms , Larry Fishburne , and Dennis Hopper . Marlon Brando . He finished out the 1970s with his controversial performance as Colonel Kurtz in another Coppola film , Apocalypse Now , a box-office hit for which he was highly paid and which helped finance his career layoff during the 1980s . The Godfather is a 1972 American crime film directed by Francis Ford Coppola and produced by Albert S. Ruddy , based on Mario Puzo 's best-selling novel of the same name .