The Three Perfect Diane Keaton Movies, According To Rotten Tomatoes

Movie lovers around the world were shocked and devastated to learn on Saturday, October 11, that legendary American actress Diane Keaton had passed away at the age of 79. 

If you're a fan of Keaton's incredibly diverse and brilliant body of work, you can honor her with a movie marathon of some of her most famous and beloved movies — including her most famous Woody Allen collaborations "Manhattan" and "Annie Hall," the latter of which won her an Oscar for playing the titular role (that was, in fact, based on her). Other must-watches include "Father of the Bride" and its sequel(s), "The First Wives Club," "The Godfather" and "The Godfather Part II," and "Something's Gotta Give," just to name a few. Incredibly, Keaton appeared in three movies that earned perfect scores on the review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes. Even more incredibly, I didn't list any of those three above. Even more incredibly, one of them was Keaton's film debut.

To be clear, I think nearly every single movie in Keaton's expansive oeuvre is improved by her mere presence, and I'm as gutted by the loss of this magnetic, charismatic, and utterly unique actress as anybody else. Still, three perfectly-reviewed films is yet another great accomplishment for Keaton, so let's look at three of her best (and earliest!) films.

Diane Keaton's very first film role, 1970's "Lovers and Other Strangers," is one of the movies that earned a perfect Rotten Tomatoes score. Directed by Cy Howard and written by Joseph Bologna, David Zelag Goodman, and Renée Taylor (based on a stage play of the same name by Bologna and Taylor), "Lovers and Other Strangers" centers around two troubled couples. The soon-to-be-married Mike Vecchio and Susan Henderson (Michael Brandon and Bonnie Bedelia), who have actually been living together already for well over a year, are having problems on their way to the altar, and Mike's brother Richie Vecchio (Joseph Hindy) and his wife, Joan — played by Keaton — are thinking about divorce against the objections of their parents.

"Lovers and Other Strangers" boasts a pretty spectacular supporting cast including Bea Arthur, Cloris Leachman, and Anne Meara, as well as cameos from Meara's equally famous husband Jerry Stiller and future Hollywood legend Sylvester Stallone (the last two of whom didn't even get credits on the film). Keaton is part of a pretty big ensemble here, but she still manages to shine, making Joan relatable, messy, and wholly realized.

Co-written with his collaborator Marshall Brickman, Woody Allen's 1973 sci-fi comedy "Sleeper" is genuinely hilarious and a little prophetic (in a disturbing way) — and I'm sure you'll be shocked to hear that Diane Keaton is fantastic in it. After Miles Monroe (Allen), the owner of a health-food shop in New York in the 1970s, goes to a hospital for a routine procedure that goes wrong, he's cryogenically frozen, only to be revived by two scientists in the year 2173. The scientists who choose to bring him back are part of a resistance effort against the shadowy, anonymous figure known only as "The Leader," who runs a dystopian police state in the wake of a nuclear blast.

So where does Keaton fit in? She plays Luna Schlosser, a socialite and artist in this post-apocalyptic society who ends up receiving a "robot" (Miles in disguise) to help her around the house. After she discovers that Miles is not a robot but an unwitting time traveler, she's ready to turn him in until he kidnaps her and tries to get her help in searching for The Leader's mysterious plan called "The Aries Project." As their story continues, Luna and Miles fall in love, but there's plenty of great banter that preceeds their happy union.

"Sleeper" is a pretty great early entry in Allen's canon, but truthfully, he could never have done it without Keaton. The actress' third and final movie to get a perfect Rotten Tomatoes score was also a collaboration with Allen, and astonishly, it came just two years after "Sleeper."

I have ... issues with Woody Allen just like any sane person does, but far be it from me to pretend that his 1975 spoof of Russian dramas, "Love and Death," isn't one of the funniest movies I've ever seen in my life. After "Sleeper," this is where Diane Keaton really gets to show off her screwball chops. Her character in the preceding film was more of a straight man to Miles' joker, but in "Love and Death," Keaton's Sonja is a volatile, emotional, and rebellious stone-cold weirdo who runs away with every single one of her scenes.

As the cousin of Allen's Boris Grushenko — who's hopelessly in love with her from the jump — Sonja is unfortunately in love with one of Boris' hotter but dumber brothers and frankly never even bothers to fall in love with him, marrying a line of old men before she finally agrees to wed Boris (largely because she thinks he'll get killed in a duel before she has to deal with him). Keaton has too many great lines in this movie to count, but I couldn't resist including this mini-monologue that she delivers to Boris:

"To love is to suffer. To avoid suffering one must not love, but then one suffers from not loving. Therefore, to love is to suffer, not to love is to suffer, to suffer is to suffer. To be happy is to love, to be happy then is to suffer but suffering makes one unhappy; therefore, to be unhappy one must love or love to suffer or suffer from too much happiness. I hope you're getting this down."

Sonja and Boris eventually team up and attempt to work together to take down Napoleon, and when they fail, she escapes, but Boris is sentenced to death. Keaton is, and I cannot stress this enough, incredibly funny in "Love and Death," and if you haven't seen it, go check it out immediately. Keaton has so many great movies to choose from, but if you want to truly work your way through her entire body of work, start with these three, and you won't regret it.