Al Pacino calls turning down Terrence Malick "the biggest mistake of my career"

The role that got away

He keeps a running tally of the jobs he didn’t take—a personal “museum of mistakes.” At the top: the day Al Pacino said no to Terrence Malick.

It was the mid-1970s. Pacino had just scorched the screen as Michael Corleone in The Godfather films and as Sonny Wortzik in Dog Day Afternoon. At the same time, Malick had become Hollywood’s quiet storm after Badlands, a debut so confident it felt like a director skipping the learning curve. When Malick moved on to Days of Heaven, he sounded out Pacino. Pacino passed. Decades later, he still calls that decision one of the biggest mistakes of his career.

Days of Heaven (1978) became the film people still whisper about for its images alone. A love triangle set in the early 1900s—migrant workers, a wind-swept farm, a plan that spirals—shot in golden-hour light on the prairies. Richard Gere took the lead role that Pacino once considered. The movie won the Oscar for Best Cinematography for Nestor Almendros, with Haskell Wexler contributing additional photography. Linda Manz’s narration gave it a haunted, diary-like voice. And then Malick vanished from features for 20 years, not returning until The Thin Red Line in 1998. That long silence only deepened the myth around the one Pacino didn’t make.

Pacino has talked about it with a mix of humor and sting. He’s said he wishes he’d said yes to Malick. He’s also joked that his museum of mistakes is crowded with scripts he turned down that later became classics. It’s not self-flagellation, more a candid review from someone who’s seen how choices ripple through a career.

One of those ripples? Star Wars. Pacino has said that skipping a role there—Han Solo—was his “first big mistake.” The reason he’s given is disarmingly simple: he didn’t understand the script at the time. Harrison Ford stepped in, and the rest is pop-culture religion.

None of this means Pacino stews over it. He’s been clear he doesn’t live in regret. He’s framed mistakes as part of the work: sometimes you chase the wrong movie, miss a character, or pick the wrong moment. But every experience, even the misfires, leaves a mark and teaches you how to move forward. That mindset has likely kept him sharp through six decades of shifting tastes and eras.

So what would Pacino in Days of Heaven have looked like? Gere was in his late 20s; Pacino was nearly a decade older and carried a heavier, street-hardened intensity after Serpico and Dog Day Afternoon. His presence might have tilted the drifter Bill toward something darker, more fatalistic. Malick’s film works like a moving painting—soft lines, hard fate—so the tone could have changed with a more combustible lead. Would it have been better? Different is the honest answer. Malick’s singular style tends to bend everything, including stars, to his rhythm. But the what‑if remains irresistible.

Context matters here. Pacino’s 1970s schedule was a sprint: The Godfather (1972), Serpico (1973), The Godfather Part II (1974), Dog Day Afternoon (1975), then ...And Justice for All (1979). In that run he juggled film and stage, fielded a mountain of scripts, and guarded his choices. Saying no is part of survival at that level. The side effect is that some no’s age badly.

And yet, his path worked. After that stretch came Cruising (1980), Scarface (1983), Sea of Love (1989), Scent of a Woman (1992, an Oscar win), Heat (1995), The Insider (1999), and later The Irishman (2019). That is not the résumé of a man undone by missed chances. It’s the résumé of someone who kept betting on challenging material, took bruises when the bets didn’t land, and kept going.

Malick, for his part, kept evolving too. After returning with The Thin Red Line, he made The New World, The Tree of Life, To the Wonder, and beyond. He’s remained cinema’s great minimalist maximalist—few words, wide skies, big ideas. He and Pacino never crossed paths again on a feature. It’s a pairing film fans still imagine: a director who strips dialogue to bone and an actor who can express a whole life with a flicker of doubt in his eyes.

Why does this one still fascinate? Because Days of Heaven sits in that rare zone where craft, timing, and sensibility fuse. It’s also a reminder of how careers hinge on invisible doors. An offer on a Tuesday changes a life; a pass on a Thursday changes it another way. We only see the clean version later, after awards, after anniversaries, after critics build a canon. Inside the moment, it’s just a script and a gut check.

Pacino’s “museum of mistakes” isn’t unique, either. Hollywood is full of legends who zigged when history later said zag:

• Will Smith turned down The Matrix and took Wild Wild West instead; Keanu Reeves became Neo.
• Sean Connery passed on playing Gandalf in The Lord of the Rings; Ian McKellen took the staff.
• Tom Selleck couldn’t do Raiders of the Lost Ark due to TV commitments; Harrison Ford grabbed the fedora.

The lesson isn’t “pick better.” It’s that even the greats can’t predict which stories will catch fire. You read a script in a tired hotel room, picture yourself inside it, ask if the world needs this movie with you in it, and then choose. Sometimes you miss a masterpiece. Sometimes you dodge a bullet. The only constant is the work.

Pacino has said as much. He’s candid about the misses but resists the trap of regret. Every choice, even the wrong ones, gave him something—another tool, another instinct, another line in the map he’s still drawing. That’s why the Malick near‑miss lingers more as a fascinating turning point than a wound.

Would a Pacino-Malick collaboration still be possible? Never say never, but time moves fast. Pacino, now in his 80s, is selective, picking spots like The Irishman, House of Gucci, and TV’s Hunters. Malick keeps chasing transcendence at his own pace. If they ever do lock in, it’ll be because a script makes both of them lean forward at the same time. That’s always been the only way.

Until then, Days of Heaven stands where it has stood for decades: a prairie dream with a hard edge, the film that slipped from one of the era’s defining actors to another. And Pacino’s museum gets one more fascinated visitor, standing in front of a glass case labeled “What If,” wondering how different the light might have looked.

Regret, perspective, and the what‑if

There’s a simple human beat under the headline. A star admits a miss, laughs at himself, and moves on. For fans, it’s a peek behind the curtain at how fragile even a storied career can feel from the inside. For the industry, it’s a case study in timing: Malick at the dawn of a legend, Pacino at the height of a run, a single choice, and two careers that still ended up towering.