The major starring role in the film, an inspired casting choice, was held by legendary silent film diva Gloria Swanson (Mae West was also a possible choice for the role), who "autobiographically" portrayed Norma Desmond - a deluded, tragic, ambitious actress whose career declined with the coming of the talkies.He was tardy to a classroom of apes (both young and old), where a human Teacher named Abe (Noah Keen) taught reading and writing using the ape's sacred law: "Ape shall never kill ape.It was the last of Lang's silent films.Among Lang's later US films wereFury (1936)with Spencer Tracy, an indictment of lynch mobs,You Only Live Once (1937),Scarlet Street (1945),Rancho Notorious (1952), he great film noirThe Big Heat (1953), andBeyond a Reasonable Doubt (1956).The entireRockyseries was the most successful sports movie franchise of all-time.With ten Academy Awards Oscar nominations and three wins: Best Picture (win), Best Director (John Avildsen) (win), and Best Film Editing (win), also Best Actor (Sylvester Stallone), Best Actress (Talia Shire), Best Supporting Actor (Burgess Meredith), Best Supporting Actor (Burt Young), Best Original Screenplay (Stallone), Best Song ("Gonna Fly Now"), and Best Sound.Others hat swept across movie screens in the late 70's and 80s to illustrate he 'hellish', futile conditions of bloody Vietnam War combat included:the Oscar-winning documentaryHearts and Minds (1974)Francis Ford Coppola'sApocalypse Now (1979)Oliver Stone'sPlatoon (1986)Stanley Kubrick'sFull Metal Jacket (1987)John Irvin'sHamburger Hill (1987)Oliver Stone'sBorn on the Fourth of July (1989)Brian De Palma'sCasualties of War (1989)This film received nine Academy Award nominations (including Best Actor (Robert De Niro), Best Supporting Actress (Meryl Streep), Best Cinematography (by Vilmos Zsigmond - who had just filmed Spielberg'sClose Encounters of the Third Kind (1977)), and Best Original Screenplay), and won five Oscars: Best Picture, Best Supporting Actor (Christopher Walken), Best Director, Best Sound, and Best Film Editing.