Private Benjamin (1980)

Losing everything you thought you wanted can be the first step toward discovering who you really are. Howard Zieff's "Private Benjamin," written by Nancy Meyers, Charles Shyer and Harvey Miller, stars Goldie Hawn in an Oscar-nominated role as Judy Benjamin, a pampered young Jewish woman from a wealthy family whose second husband (Albert Brooks) dies on their wedding night. Lost and grieving, she's lured by a smooth-talking recruiter (Harry Dean Stanton) who promises that today's "new Army" offers private rooms and yacht clubs, and she enlists on the spot. Instead, she finds herself enduring the rigors of basic training under a tough, no-nonsense captain (Eileen Brennan, also Oscar-nominated). When her horrified parents come to bring her home, Judy surprises everyone, herself included, by deciding to stay. Leading her ragtag platoon of misfits to an unexpected victory in war games, she earns a coveted spot in an elite paratrooper unit, only to face the unwanted advances of a lecherous colonel, which lands her a transfer to Europe. There she falls for Henri (Armand Assante), a charming French doctor, but as their wedding approaches, she begins to realize that trading one controlling man for another may not be the life she wants. It earned three Oscar nominations, including one for its screenplay, and spawned a TV series.