It's a '70s icon smackdown! Francis Ford Coppola recently told GQ magazine that Al Pacino, Robert De Niro, and Jack Nicholson have gotten lazy and complacent as they've gotten older and richer.

"They were young and insecure (in the old days)," he said. "I don't know what any of them want anymore... I don't feel that kind of passion ... coming from those guys, because if it was there, they would do it."

Excuse me, Mr. Kettle? There's a Mr. Pot on the line. He says it's regarding your blackness. Shall I put him through?

Coppola may have a point about Pacino, De Niro, and Nicholson not challenging themselves anymore. Let's go to the tape:

PACINO: The Godfather. Dog Day Afternoon. Scarface. I'll even give you Scent of a Woman. Heck, Insomnia wasn't bad. Since then? One loud, yell-y role after another. He was in Gigli, for crying out loud!

DE NIRO: Remember how great it was for him to do Analyze This and put a comedic twist on his famous tough guy persona? What about the subsequent 11,000 movies where he also put a comedic twist on his famous tough guy persona? Not so cute anymore, is it? Now he does that kind of self-parody almost exclusively, and he's been doing it so long that people are starting to forget what, exactly, he's parodying.

NICHOLSON: Jack actually hasn't done too badly. Apart from Anger Management, most of his credits in the last decade have been fairly respectable. On the other hand, he hasn't done anything very challenging, either. He gets a front-row seat at the Oscars every year. He grins and waggles his eyebrows at people. He sleeps with beautiful women on top of huge piles of money. The end.

But for Francis Ford Coppola to criticize these guys takes some serious nerve. After almost 50 years in the business, Coppola has directed the Godfather films, The Conversation, Apocalypse Now, and ... pretty much nothing else worth noting. Oh, there are some decent films here and there, like The Outsiders and The Cotton Club, but those could have been made by anyone. And check out his most recent credits:

1992: Bram Stoker's Dracula, in which Keanu Reeves gives the worst performance of his career. Can you imagine the shame of directing Keanu Reeves' worst performance? That's like overseeing Jack the Ripper's ghastliest murder.

1996: Jack, a sappy comedy-drama starring Robin Williams as a 10-year-old boy with a disease that makes him age too fast. Surprisingly, it's actually worse than it sounds.

1997: The Rainmaker, a competent but completely forgettable, John Grisham adaptation. In fact, it's so forgettable that if you walked up to John Grisham on the street and said you loved his book "The Rainmaker," he would say, "Oh, thank you! I'm hoping it gets made into a movie someday."

And that's it. Coppola has done nothing in the last decade, good or bad. Nicholson, De Niro, and Pacino, though -- they're the lazy ones. Whatever you say, Coppola. I'm starting to think the only one with brains in that family is Nicolas Cage.

Eric D. Snider (website) hasn't made a movie in 10 years, either.

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