1970 film by Franklin J. Schaffner
Patton is a 1970 American epic biographical war film about U.S. General George S. Patton during World War II. It stars George C. Scott as Patton and Karl Malden as General Omar Bradley. The film was directed by Franklin J. Schaffner from a script by Francis Ford Coppola and Edmund H. North, who based their screenplay on Patton: Ordeal and Triumph by Ladislas Farago and Bradley's memoir, A Soldier's Story.
Patton grossed $61.7 million against a budget of $12 million. It won seven Academy Awards, including Best Picture, Best Director and Best Original Screenplay. Scott also won the Best Actor for his performance, though he declined the award.
The opening monologue, delivered by Scott as General Patton with an enormous American flag behind him, remains an iconic and often quoted image in film. In 2003, Patton was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically or aesthetically significant". The Academy Film Archive also preserved Patton in 2003.
Plot summary adapted from Wikipedia, licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.