He did "The Case Against Paul Ryker" for "Kraft Suspense Theatre." For director Don Siegel, Marvin appeared in "The Killers" (1964) playing an efficient professional assassin alongside Clu Gulager. "The Killers" was also the first film in which Marvin received top billing. He guest starred on "Bob Hope Presents the Chrysler Theatre". Marvin finally became a star for his comic role in the offbeat Western "Cat Ballou" starring Jane Fonda. This was a surprise hit and Marvin won the 1965 Academy Award for Best Actor. He also won the 1965 Silver Bear for Best Actor at the 15th Berlin International Film Festival. Playing alongside Vivien Leigh and Simone Signoret, Marvin won the 1966 National Board of Review Award for male actors for his role in "Ship of Fools" (1965) directed by Kramer. Marvin next performed in the hit Western "The Professionals" (1966), in which he played the leader of a small band of skilled mercenaries (Burt Lancaster, Robert Ryan, and Woody Strode) rescuing a kidnap victim (Claudia Cardinale) shortly after the Mexican Revolution. He followed that film with the hugely successful World War II epic "The Dirty Dozen" (1967) in which top-billed Marvin again portrayed an intrepid commander of a colorful group (future stars John Cassavetes, Charles Bronson, Telly Savalas, Jim Brown, and Donald Sutherland) performing an almost impossible mission. Robert Aldrich directed. In the wake of these two films and after having received an Oscar, Marvin was a huge star, given enormous control over his next film "Point Blank". In "Point Blank", an influential film for director John Boorman, he portrayed a hard-nosed criminal bent on revenge. Marvin, who had selected Boorman for the director's slot, had a central role in the film's development, plot, and staging. In 1968, Marvin also appeared in another Boorman film, the critically acclaimed but commercially unsuccessful World War II character study "Hell in the Pacific", also starring famed Japanese actor Toshiro Mifune. Boorman recounted his work with Lee Marvin on these two films and Marvin's influence on his career in the 1998 documentary "". "Paul Ryker", which Marvin shot for TV in 1963 was released theatrically as "Sergeant Ryker". Marvin was originally cast as Pike Bishop (later played by William Holden) in "The Wild Bunch" (1969), but fell out with director Sam Peckinpah and pulled out to star in the Western musical "Paint Your Wagon" (1969), in which he was top-billed over a singing Clint Eastwood.