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The Pendragon Society’s 1000 Greatest Films (2021) 80-61

Introduction

80. The Deer Hunter (1978) Dir. Michael Cimino, 182 mins.

A little too indulgent and rather heavy on the symbolism, The Deer Hunter, co-written and directed by Mchael Cimino, is set in 1968 and follows a trio of Russian American steelworkers from Pennsylvania whose lives are changed forever after they fight in the Vietnam War.  While it’s deemed far too depressing by some and caused considerable controversy for its depiction of the North Vietnamese as cruel sadists, Cimino mixes gritty realism with stylized visuals to create some truly harrowing and arresting sequences. Despite its supposed flaws, the film is also notable for how the talented  Cimino manages to get under the skin of working class small town America. More…



79. City Lights (1931) Dir. Charles Chaplin, 87 mins.

The story follows the misadventures of Chaplin’s Tramp as he falls in love with a blind girl (Virginia Cherrill) and develops a turbulent friendship with an alcoholic millionaire (Harry Myers). Watch


78. The Dark Knight (2008) Dir. Christopher Nolan, 152 mins.

The second of Christopher Nolan’s Dark Knight trilogy, that redefined the comic book movie, sees Batman (Christian Bale) joining forces with Police Lieutenant James Gordon (Gary Oldman) and District Attorney Harvey Dent (Aaron Eckhart) to combat a new criminal threat from the sinister Joker (Heath Ledger), a criminal mastermind who seeks to undermine the caped crusader and cause chaos in the city of Gotham.  Influenced more by crime dramas, such as Michael Mann’s Heat, rather than superhero movies of the past, the film features a terrific ensemble cast and a particularly outstanding performance by Ledger (who sadly died of a drugs overdose just months after filming was completed and won a posthumous Academy Award). While there are hugely entertaining and technically impressive action sequences, its the bold narrative, complex characterisation and stunning visual work that moves the film far beyond its comic book origins into the darker territory of haunting, tragic and sometimes even poetic art. More…


77. Pather Panchali (1955) Dir. Satyajit Ray, 122 mins.

The first film in the Apu trilogy, Pather Panchali depicts the childhood of the protagonist Apu (Subir Banerjee) and his elder sister Durga (Uma Dasgupta) and the harsh village life of their poor family. Watch



76. One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest (1975) Dir. Milos Forman, 133 mins.

Based on the 1962 novel of the same name by Ken Kesey, the film follows Randle Patrick McMurphy (Jack Nicholson), a petty criminal serving a short sentence for statutory rape, who is transferred to a mental institution after faking insanity to avoid prison hard labour. Brought to life by an outstanding ensemble cast, led by an energized Nicholson (who improvised throughout) and Louise Fletcher’s notable turn as his nemesis, the domineering nurse Ratched, the film provides a powerful portrait of the oppressive nature of such draconian institutions. It’s maybe dated from a moral point of view and treads a fine line between comedy and tragedy, but the film remains one of the strongest examples of New American cinema and was only the second film to win all five major Academy Awards (Best Picture, Actor in Lead Role, Actress in Lead Role, Director, and Screenplay). More…


75. Man With a Movie Camera (1929) Dir. Dziga Vertov, 68 mins.

Vertov’s filmic manifesto, produced by the studio VUFKU, presents a utopian image of urban life in the Soviet cities of Kiev, Kharkov, Moscow and Odessa. Vertov proclaimed the film an experiment, and it is made without actors, intertitles, a script or sets, showing from dawn to dusk, Soviet citizens at work and at play, and interacting with the machinery of modern life. A tour de force in theoretical cinema, the film is only a documentary by material and more a summary of the themes of the ‘kinoki’ movement, the image of the worker perfect as the machine and that of the filmmaker as socially as useful as the factory worker. The culmination of a decade of audacious and controversial work in non fiction filmmaking for Vertov, The Man With the Movie Camera is one of the of the most unusual works in cinema history and was seen as hopelessly out of date on release thanks to its utopian ideals around city living, but for those with an open mind to different filmmaking techniques it can be a memorable viewing experience. For all the criticism and its avant-garde ambitions, it is one of the few silent films that strongly conveys a sense of everyday life in Soviet Russia. More…



74. Gladiator (2000) Dir. Ridley Scott, 155 mins.

Having redefined a number of genres (Horror – Alien, Sci-fi – Blade Runner and the road movie – Thelma and Louise) Ridley Scott turned his hand to reinvigorating the sword and sandal epic with a partial remake of 1964s The Fall of the Roman Empire. Russell Crowe stars as Hispano-Roman general Maximus Decimus Meridius, who is betrayed when Commodus (Joaquin Phoenix), the ambitious son of Emperor Marcus Aurelius (Richard Harris), murders his father and seizes the throne. Reduced to slavery, Maximus rises through the ranks of the gladiatorial arena to avenge the murders of his family and his emperor. Scott used the latest in computer-generated imagery to deliver a technical masterclass (particularly the visceral battle sequence in Germania) which not only won 5 Oscars but also helped rekindled interest in Roman and classical history. Among an excellent cast are terrific swansongs for Harris and Oliver Reed (who passed away before filming was complete). The level of violence and the historical anachronisms will annoy some but the striking imagery, Crowe’s powerful but yet soulful performance and a superb soundtrack from Hans Zimmer make Gladiator a monumental and thrillingly entertaining epic. More…


73. M (1931) Dir. Fritz Lang, 111 mins.

Fritz Lang’s first talkie, which was shot in just six weeks, is set in 1930’s Berlin and revolves around the actions of a serial killer (Peter Lorre), who preys on children. As mass hysteria mounts among the public, a manhunt begins, conducted by both the police and the criminal underworld. Propelled by Lorre’s career best performance (that caused an international sensation) and the fresh use of shadowy imagery and sound, M is both a high point in German expressionism and a huge influence on what would later be called film noir. It’s a visionary masterpiece that even ninety years on still has the power to astound first time viewers. More…



72. Miller’s Crossing (1990) Dir. Joel & Ethan Coen, 120 mins.

The plot concerns a power struggle between two rival gangs (led by Albert Finney and Jon Polito) and how the protagonist, Tom Reagan (Gabriel Byrne), plays both sides off against each other. Watch


71. Late Spring (1949) Dir. Yasujiro Ozu, 108 mins.

Chisu Ryu plays a middle-class widower with a marriageable daughter. Not wishing to see the girl resign herself to spinsterhood, Ryu pretends that he himself is about to be married. The game plan is to convince the daughter that they’ll be no room for her at home, thus forcing her to seek comfort and joy elsewhere. Watch


70. The Red Shoes (1948) Dir. Michael Powell, Emeric Pressburger, 133 mins.

The film is about a ballerina who joins an established ballet company and becomes the lead dancer in a new ballet called The Red Shoes, itself based on the fairy tale “The Red Shoes” by Hans Christian Andersen.



69. Ali: Fear Eats the Soul (1974) Dir. Rainer Werner Fassbinder, 94 mins.

The film revolves around an unlikely relationship which develops between an elderly woman and a Moroccan migrant worker in post-war Germany. Watch



68. The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (2001) Dir. Peter Jackson, 178 mins.

Before he got too carried away with CGI, New Zealander Peter Jackson got the balance just right in the first of his epic fantasy trilogy set in Tolkien’s Middle-earth. The film tells of the Dark Lord Sauron, who is seeking the One Ring, but its found its way to the young hobbit Frodo Baggins (Elijah Wood). To defeat Sauron, Frodo must leave his simple life in the shire and join a quest with a fellowship that includes the wizard Gandalf (Ian McKellen), his faithful friend Sam (Sean Astin) and the mysterious Strider (Viggo Mortenson). Remarkably well crafted and imagined, Jackson and his team create a visually rich mythical universe that’s on a scale that seemed impossible only a few years earlier. The film’s grandeur is enhanced by the sort of powerful emotional intensity and complex characterisation that is perhaps lost behind the ever growing story strands and huge effects in the follow up films. More…


67. Solaris (1972) Dir. Andrei Tarkovsky, 169 mins.

The film is a meditative psychological drama occurring mostly aboard a space station orbiting the fictional planet Solaris. The scientific mission has stalled because the skeleton crew of three scientists have fallen into separate emotional crises. Psychologist Kris Kelvin travels to the Solaris space station to evaluate the situation only to encounter the same mysterious phenomena as the others.



66. Schindler’s List (1993) Dir. Steven Spielberg, 195 mins.

The film that finally earned Spielberg an Academy Award for best director, follows Oskar Schindler (Liam Neeson), a German entrepreneur, who, during the Holocaust, finds himself developing a moral conscience while running an operation to supply the Nazi war effort. This leads to him unexpectedly saving the lives of more than a thousand mostly Polish-Jewish refugees. The film features stunning black and white photography, an emotive score and an almost unbearably brutal realism. Although accused by some as turning one of the most horrific episodes in human history into entertainment, the film also brought commercial titan Spielberg huge critical recognition and perhaps even helped to reconcile the long struggle between Hollywood’s artistic and moral aspirations and the need for box office success. It’s also notable for the tremendous and charismatic performance of Neeson that’s maybe even bettered by Ralph Fiennes’s chilling portrayal of the inhuman German camp commandant, Amon Goeth. More…


65. Casablanca (1942) Dir. Michael Curtiz, 102 mins.

Set during World War II, it focuses on Rick (Humphrey Bogart), a mysterious embittered man leading a lone existence who is confronted by his lost love, Ilsa (Ingrid Bergman) and finds his priorities starting to change. He becomes torn between his love for Ilsa and helping her and her Czech Resistance leader husband escape the Vichy-controlled Moroccan city. While Bogart, with his sardonic style and ambiguous screen image, is very much the hero of the piece, the film was Swedish actress Bergman’s first major Hollywood success and she provides probably her most memorable performance. The sustained close ups of her face, that show her striking beauty and fundamental nobility, explain what the narrative cannot, that she is virtuous in a way that the cynical Rick had not previously considered. An unlikely adaptation of a play never made, the production struggled through frequent script changes and an unknown ending until it was time to shoot the final scenes. Yet, by utilising familiar patterns in Hollywood narrative, an all-star supporting cast of European performers and the two compelling leads, Casablanca became the most popular of World War II movies and a romantically poignant classic. Watch


64. Spirited Away (2001) Dir. Hayao Miyazaki, 125 mins.

The film follows a sullen ten-year-old girl who is in the process of moving to a new town, and chronicles her adventures in a world of spirits and monsters. Buy



63. The Night of the Hunter (1955) Dir. Charles Laughton, 92 mins.

The plot focuses on a corrupt minister-turned-serial killer (Robert Mitchum) who attempts to charm an unsuspecting widow and steal $10,000 hidden by her executed husband. Watch


62. Sunset Blvd. (1950) Dir. Billy Wilder, 110 mins.

Nominated for 11 Academy Awards (including nominations in all four acting categories), the film stars William Holden as a naive and unsuccessful screenwriter and Gloria Swanson as a faded movie star who draws him into her demented fantasy world, in which she dreams of making a return to the screen. While transcending film noir tropes and featuring notable appearances from Erich von Stroheim and Cecil B. DeMille (playing himself), it’s Swanson’s legendary unsettling performance that propels Wilder’s deliciously cynical and melodramatic black comedy to greatness. Still probably the best critique of the inner workings of Hollywood and the destructive melancholy that comes with been trapped in the past. More…


61. Ikiru (1952) Dir. Akira Kurosawa, 143 mins.

The film examines the struggles of a terminally ill Tokyo bureaucrat and his final quest for meaning. Watch

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The Pendragon Society’s 1000 Greatest Films (2020) 80-61

80. Metropolis (1927) Dir. Fritz Lang, 153 mins.

The film is set in the massive, sprawling futuristic mega-city Metropolis, whose society is divided into two classes, one of planners and management, who live high above the Earth in luxurious skyscrapers, and one of workers, who live and toil underground. Watch

79. Jaws (1975) Dir. Steven Spielberg, 124 mins.

In the story, a giant man-eating great white shark attacks beachgoers on Amity Island, a fictional New England summer resort town, prompting the local police chief (Roy Scheider) to hunt it with the help of a marine biologist (Richard Dreyfuss) and a professional shark hunter (Robert Shaw). Watch

78. Pather Panchali (1955) Dir. Satyajit Ray, 122 mins.

The first film in the Apu trilogy, Pather Panchali depicts the childhood of the protagonist Apu (Subir Banerjee) and his elder sister Durga (Uma Dasgupta) and the harsh village life of their poor family. Watch

77. Annie Hall (1977) Dir. Woody Allen, 93 mins.

A romantic comedy classic from a screenplay Allen co-wrote with Marshall Brickman. Produced by Allen’s manager, Charles H. Joffe, the film stars Allen as Alvy “Max” Singer, who tries to figure out the reasons for the failure of his relationship with the film’s eponymous female lead, played by Diane Keaton in a role written specifically for her. Watch

76. M (1931) Dir. Fritz Lang, 111 mins.

Fritz Lang’s first talkie, which was shot in just six weeks, is set in 1930’s Berlin and revolves around the actions of a serial killer (Peter Lorre), who preys on children. As mass hysteria mounts among the public, a manhunt begins, conducted by both the police and the criminal underworld. Propelled by Lorre’s career best performance (that caused an international sensation) and the fresh use of shadowy imagery and sound, M is both a high point in German expressionism and a huge influence on what would later be called film noir. It’s a visionary masterpiece that even ninety years on still has the power to astound first time viewers. More…

75. Miller’s Crossing (1990) Dir. Joel & Ethan Coen, 120 mins.

The plot concerns a power struggle between two rival gangs (led by Albert Finney and Jon Polito) and how the protagonist, Tom Reagan (Gabriel Byrne), plays both sides off against each other. Watch

74. Children of Paradise (1945) Dir. Marcel Carne, 190 mins.

Set against the Parisian theatre scene of the 1820s and 1830s, it tells the story of a beautiful courtesan, Garance, and the four men who love her in their own ways, a mime artist, an actor, a criminal and an aristocrat. Francois Truffaut stated that he would have given up all his films to have directed this one. Watch

73. The Dark Knight (2008) Dir. Christopher Nolan, 152 mins.

The second of Christopher Nolan’s Dark Knight trilogy, that redefined the comic book movie, sees Batman (Christian Bale) joining forces with Police Lieutenant James Gordon (Gary Oldman) and District Attorney Harvey Dent (Aaron Eckhart) to combat a new criminal threat from the sinister Joker (Heath Ledger), a criminal mastermind who seeks to undermine the caped crusader and cause chaos in the city of Gotham.  Influenced more by crime dramas, such as Michael Mann’s Heat, rather than superhero movies of the past, the film features a terrific ensemble cast and a particularly outstanding performance by Ledger (who sadly died of a drugs overdose just months after filming was completed and won a posthumous Academy Award). While there are hugely entertaining and technically impressive action sequences, its the bold narrative, complex characterisation and stunning visual work that moves the film far beyond its comic book origins into the darker territory of haunting, tragic and sometimes even poetic art. More…

72. The Searchers (1956) Dir. John Ford, 119 mins.

After a break from the genre which had lasted six years, John Ford returned to the western with what many consider to be his masterpiece. The Searchers is Ford’s most psychological film and stars John Wayne, eliciting a monumental performance, as Ethan Edwards, a bitter middle-aged Civil War veteran, who spends seven years obsessively roaming the West, with Martin Pawley (Jeffrey Hunter), his adoptive nephew, to find his niece, who was abducted by Comanches. Achingly poignant, it’s a film where Ford shows off his great skill for humanising the epic and finds a perfection in his measured and assured shooting style and his command of landscape as realised in his extraordinary vistas of his beloved Monument Valley. While reaction was a little muted on release, The Searchers has gone on to be acclaimed as Ford’s most important and influential film. More…

71. Gladiator (2000) Dir. Ridley Scott, 155 mins.

Having redefined a number of genres (Horror – Alien, Sci-fi – Blade Runner and the road movie – Thelma and Louise) Ridley Scott turned his hand to reinvigorating the sword and sandal epic with a partial remake of 1964s The Fall of the Roman Empire. Russell Crowe stars as Hispano-Roman general Maximus Decimus Meridius, who is betrayed when Commodus (Joaquin Phoenix), the ambitious son of Emperor Marcus Aurelius (Richard Harris), murders his father and seizes the throne. Reduced to slavery, Maximus rises through the ranks of the gladiatorial arena to avenge the murders of his family and his emperor. Scott used the latest in computer-generated imagery to deliver a technical masterclass (particularly the visceral battle sequence in Germania) which not only won 5 Oscars but also helped rekindled interest in Roman and classical history. Among an excellent cast are terrific swansongs for Harris and Oliver Reed (who passed away before filming was complete). The level of violence and the historical anachronisms will annoy some but the striking imagery, Crowe’s powerful but yet soulful performance and a superb soundtrack from Hans Zimmer make Gladiator a monumental and thrillingly entertaining epic. More…

70. Ali: Fear Eats the Soul (1974) Dir. Rainer Werner Fassbinder, 94 mins.

The film revolves around an unlikely relationship which develops between an elderly woman and a Moroccan migrant worker in post-war Germany. Watch

69. Rear Window (1954) Dir. Alfred Hitchcock, 112 mins.

Laid up with a broken leg, photojournalist L.B. Jeffries (James Stewart) is confined to his tiny, sweltering courtyard apartment. To pass the time between visits from his nurse (Thelma Ritter) and his fashion model girlfriend Lisa (Grace Kelly), the binocular-wielding Jeffries stares through the rear window of his apartment at the goings-on in the other apartments around his courtyard. Watch

68. Sunset Blvd. (1950) Dir. Billy Wilder, 110 mins.

The film stars William Holden as an unsuccessful screenwriter and Gloria Swanson as a faded movie star who draws him into her fantasy world, in which she dreams of making a return to the screen. Watch

67. Spirited Away (2001) Dir. Hayao Miyazaki, 125 mins.

The film follows a sullen ten-year-old girl who is in the process of moving to a new town, and chronicles her adventures in a world of spirits and monsters. Buy

66. City Lights (1931) Dir. Charles Chaplin, 87 mins.

The story follows the misadventures of Chaplin’s Tramp as he falls in love with a blind girl (Virginia Cherrill) and develops a turbulent friendship with an alcoholic millionaire (Harry Myers). Watch

65. The Shining (1980) Dir. Stanley Kubrick, 142 mins.

The Shining is about Jack Torrance (Jack Nicholson), an aspiring writer and recovering alcoholic, who accepts a position as the off-season caretaker of the isolated historic Overlook Hotel in the Colorado Rockies. Wintering over with Jack is his wife Wendy Torrance (Shelley Duvall) and young son Danny Torrance (Danny Lloyd), who possesses “the shining”, an array of psychic abilities that allow Danny to see the hotel’s horrific past. Watch

64. The Night of the Hunter (1955) Dir. Charles Laughton, 92 mins.

The plot focuses on a corrupt minister-turned-serial killer (Robert Mitchum) who attempts to charm an unsuspecting widow and steal $10,000 hidden by her executed husband. Watch

63. Solaris (1972) Dir. Andrei Tarkovsky, 169 mins.

The film is a meditative psychological drama occurring mostly aboard a space station orbiting the fictional planet Solaris. The scientific mission has stalled because the skeleton crew of three scientists have fallen into separate emotional crises. Psychologist Kris Kelvin travels to the Solaris space station to evaluate the situation only to encounter the same mysterious phenomena as the others.

62. Casablanca (1942) Dir. Michael Curtiz, 102 mins.

Set during World War II, it focuses on Rick (Humphrey Bogart), a mysterious embittered man leading a lone existence who is confronted by his lost love, Ilsa (Ingrid Bergman) and finds his priorities starting to change. He becomes torn between his love for Ilsa and helping her and her Czech Resistance leader husband escape the Vichy-controlled Moroccan city. While Bogart, with his sardonic style and ambiguous screen image, is very much the hero of the piece, the film was Swedish actress Bergman’s first major Hollywood success and she provides probably her most memorable performance. The sustained close ups of her face, that show her striking beauty and fundamental nobility, explain what the narrative cannot, that she is virtuous in a way that the cynical Rick had not previously considered. An unlikely adaptation of a play never made, the production struggled through frequent script changes and an unknown ending until it was time to shoot the final scenes. Yet, by utilising familiar patterns in Hollywood narrative, an all-star supporting cast of European performers and the two compelling leads, Casablanca became the most popular of World War II movies and a romantically poignant classic. Watch

61. Reservoir Dogs (1992) Dir. Quentin Tarantino, 99 mins.

It features Harvey Keitel, Michael Madsen, Steve Buscemi, Chris Penn, Lawrence Tierney, Tim Roth, Tarantino, and criminal-turned-author Edward Bunker as members of a botched diamond heist. The film depicts the events before and after the attempted robbery. Watch

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The Pendragon Society’s 1000 Greatest Films (2019) 60-41

Introduction

60. In the Mood for Love (2000) Dir. Wong Kar-Wai, 98 mins.

Sensual and mood driven, the second part of Wong Kar-Wai’s informal trilogy (the others being Days of Being Wild and 2046), vividly recreates a Shanghaiese enclave in Hong Kong in 1962 and centres on two young couples who rent adjacent rooms in a cramped and crowded tenement. It’s a hypnotically beautiful and moving period peace exploring memory, tradition and the loneliness that comes from unrequited love and features a notably sympathetic performance from Tony Leung (who won best actor at Cannes). More…

59. Reservoir Dogs (1992) Dir. Quentin Tarantino, 99 mins.

It features Harvey Keitel, Michael Madsen, Steve Buscemi, Chris Penn, Lawrence Tierney, Tim Roth, Tarantino, and criminal-turned-author Edward Bunker as members of a botched diamond heist. The film depicts the events before and after the heist. Watch

58. Mulholland Dr. (2001) Dir. David Lynch, 147 mins.

The film tells the story of an aspiring actress named Betty Elms (Naomi Watts), newly arrived in Los Angeles, who meets and befriends an amnesiac hiding in her aunt’s apartment. Watch

57. The Night of the Hunter (1955) Dir. Charles Laughton, 92 mins.

The plot focuses on a corrupt minister-turned-serial killer (Robert Mitchum) who attempts to charm an unsuspecting widow and steal $10,000 hidden by her executed husband. Watch

56. Satantango (1994) Dir. Bela Tarr, 450 mins.

This seven-hour European epic takes place in an abandoned Hungarian farm machinery plant. There live a small band of hobos who will do anything they can to leave the place. A series of events occurs, but the story presents those events from each of the different character’s viewpoints. Buy

55. Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans (1927) Dir. F.W. Murnau, 94 mins.

Thanks to the phenomenal success of German director Murnau’s The Last Laugh, he was invited to Hollywood by William Fox to make an expressionist film and given complete control on Sunrise. While the film is invariably described as silent cinema it was one of the first to be released and widely seen with a Fox Movietone sound-on-film music and effects track. Based on the Hermann Sudermann novel A Trip to Tilsit, it takes place in a colourful farming community, where people from the city regularly take their weekend holidays. Local farmer George O’Brien, happily married to Janet Gaynor, falls under the seductive spell of Margaret Livingston, a femme fatale from The City. He callously ignores his wife and child and strips his farm of its wealth on behalf of Livingston, but even this fails to satisfy her. Shot in Murnau’s accustomed manner, with elaborate stylised sets, complicated location shooting and experimental visual effects, the film’s costs far exceeded its earnings, but the poetic tale of sin and redemption overwhelmed critics with its beautiful visual aesthetics and continues to be regarded as one of the greatest films ever made. More…

54. Touch of Evil (1958) Dir. Orson Welles, 95 mins.

With a screenplay loosely based on the novel Badge of Evil by Whit Masterson, writer/director Orson Welles’s only studio film of the 1950s follows Miguel Vargas (Charlton Heston), a drug enforcement official in the Mexican government. While on honeymoon on the US side of the border a Mexican car bomb explodes and he takes an interest in the investigation. However, he is soon at odds with American police captain Hank Quinlan (Welles) and his shady partner, Menzies (Joseph Calleia) who are attempting to frame an innocent man. Released with four different running times, the original version having been brutally cut by the studio, Welles’s brilliant noir masterpiece was restored to the filmmaker’s true vision in 1998 and its reputation has grown to be deemed not only one of the genre’s best but also one of the greatest films of the 1950s. More…

53. The Dark Knight (2008) Dir. Christopher Nolan, 152 mins.

The second of Christopher Nolan’s Dark Knight trilogy, that redefined the comic book movie, sees Batman (Christian Bale) joining forces with Police Lieutenant James Gordon (Gary Oldman) and District Attorney Harvey Dent (Aaron Eckhart) to combat a new criminal threat from the sinister Joker (Heath Ledger), a criminal mastermind who seeks to undermine the caped crusader and cause chaos in the city of Gotham.  Influenced more by crime dramas, such as Michael Mann’s Heat, rather than superhero movies of the past, the film features a terrific ensemble cast and a particularly outstanding performance by Ledger (who sadly died of a drugs overdose just months after filming was completed and won a posthumous Academy Award). While there are hugely entertaining and technically impressive action sequences, its the bold narrative, complex characterisation and stunning visual work that moves the film far beyond its comic book origins into the darker territory of haunting, tragic and sometimes even poetic art. More…

52. The Third Man (1949) Dir. Carol Reed, 93 mins.

Reed’s visually striking film noir follows American pulp Western writer Holly Martins (Joseph Cotten), who arrives in Vienna seeking an old friend, Harry Lime (Orson Welles), who has offered him the opportunity to work with him after World War II. Watch

51. One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest (1975) Dir. Milos Forman, 133 mins.

Randle Patrick McMurphy (Jack Nicholson), a recidivist criminal serving a short sentence for statutory rape is transferred to a mental institution for evaluation. Buy



50. Stalker (1979) Dir. Andrei Tarkovsky, 163 mins.

The film depicts an expedition led by a figure known as the “Stalker” (Aleksandr Kaidanovsky) to take his two clients, a melancholic writer (Anatoli Solonitsyn) seeking inspiration, and a professor (Nikolai Grinko) seeking scientific discovery, to a mysterious restricted site known simply as the “Zone,” where there is a room which supposedly has the ability to fulfil a person’s innermost desires. Watch

49. The Decalogue (1989) Dir. Krzysztof Kieslowski, 550 mins.

It consists of ten one-hour films, each of which represents one of the Ten Commandments and explores possible meanings of the commandment within a fictional story set in modern Poland. Buy

48. Schindler’s List (1993) Dir. Steven Spielberg, 195 mins.

The film that finally earned Spielberg an Academy Award for best director, follows Oskar Schindler (Liam Neeson), a German entrepreneur, who, during the Holocaust, finds himself developing a moral conscience while running an operation to supply the Nazi war effort. This leads to him unexpectedly saving the lives of more than a thousand mostly Polish-Jewish refugees. The film features stunning black and white photography, an emotive score and an almost unbearably brutal realism. Although accused by some as turning one of the most horrific episodes in human history into entertainment, the film also brought commercial titan Spielberg huge critical recognition and perhaps even helped to reconcile the long struggle between Hollywood’s artistic and moral aspirations and the need for box office success. It’s also notable for the tremendous and charismatic performance of Neeson that’s maybe even bettered by Ralph Fiennes’s chilling portrayal of the inhuman German camp commandant, Amon Goeth. Watch

47. The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (2001) Dir. Peter Jackson, 178 mins.

Before he got too carried away with CGI, New Zealander Peter Jackson got the balance just right in the first of his epic fantasy trilogy set in Tolkien’s Middle-earth. The film tells of the Dark Lord Sauron, who is seeking the One Ring, but its found its way to the young hobbit Frodo Baggins (Elijah Wood). To defeat Sauron, Frodo must leave his simple life in the shire and join a quest with a fellowship that includes the wizard Gandalf (Ian McKellen), his faithful friend Sam (Sean Astin) and the mysterious Strider (Viggo Mortenson). Remarkably well crafted and imagined, Jackson and his team create a visually rich mythical universe that’s on a scale that seemed impossible only a few years earlier. The film’s grandeur is enhanced by the sort of powerful emotional intensity and complex characterisation that is perhaps lost behind the ever growing story strands and huge effects in the follow up films. More…

46. Harakiri (1962) Dir. Masaki Kobayashi, 133 mins.

Kobayshi’s remarkable Japanese drama, set in the 17th century, explores the cult of the samurai as warriors fight each other in their search for a master in the wake of a Shogun-mandated decentralisation. When a young Samurai is forced to perform ritual suicide using a bamboo sword (a scene that brought some notoriety on release), his family tries to cover up his degrading demise. Shot in black and white widescreen, Harakiri is a criminally overlooked epic that’s darker than much of Kurosawa’s work of this period and unflinching in its brilliantly choreographed violence. Watch

45. Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964) Dir. Stanley Kubrick, 93 mins.

Showcasing Kubrick’s uncanny ability to mix drama and the grotesque, Dr. Strangelove is a sharp satire on Cold War paranoia and the pathology of sexual frustration. The story concerns an unhinged US Air Force general (Sterling Hayden) who orders a first strike nuclear attack on the Soviet Union. It also follows the President of the United States, his advisers, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and a Royal Air Force (RAF) officer as they try to recall the bombers to prevent a nuclear apocalypse. It separately follows the crew of one B-52 bomber as they try to deliver their payload. Along with Hayden the film also features great work from George C. Scott and Peter Sellers, who plays three pivotal parts. A radical and provocative gamble, the film is one of Kubrick’s most brilliantly realised productions and still considered one of the greatest comedies ever made. More…

44. City of God (2002) Dir. Fernando Meirelles, 130 mins.

With a plot loosely based on real events, the film depicts the growth of the slum gangs in the Cidade de Deus suburb of Rio, with the closure of the film depicting the war between the drug dealer Li’l Zé and bus driver turned criminal Knockout Ned. With an authentically gritty feel, helped by the use of a mainly amateur cast from local favelas, and brilliant energised story telling, City of God is one of the most compelling studies of the irresistibility of criminality and violence for youths who have little in the way of life choices. While some critics denounced the visceral and shocking violence for being shot with entertainment in mind, it is never without purpose and few could argue that the film is not a remarkable technical achievement. More…

43. Lawrence of Arabia (1962) Dir. David Lean, 227 mins.

Winner of seven Oscars, Lean’s four hour epic depicts T. E. Lawrence’s experiences in Arabia during World War I, in particular his attacks on Aqaba and Damascus and his involvement in the Arab National Council. Propelled by a stunning central performance from Peter O’Toole (a virtual unknown at the time), the film shows Lawrence’s internal struggles with the violence of war and his divided allegiances between Britain and the Arabian desert tribes. With its mammoth scope, stunning cinematography and intelligent screenplay, Lawrence of Arabia remains one of the greatest and most influential films in the history of cinema. More…

42. Casablanca (1942) Dir. Michael Curtiz, 102 mins.

Set during World War II, it focuses on Rick (Humphrey Bogart), a mysterious embittered man leading a lone existence who is confronted by his lost love, Ilsa (Ingrid Bergman) and finds his priorities starting to change. He becomes torn between his love for Ilsa and helping her and her Czech Resistance leader husband escape the Vichy-controlled Moroccan city. While Bogart, with his sardonic style and ambiguous screen image, is very much the hero of the piece, the film was Swedish actress Bergman’s first major Hollywood success and she provides probably her most memorable performance. The sustained close ups of her face, that show her striking beauty and fundamental nobility, explain what the narrative cannot, that she is virtuous in a way that the cynical Rick had not previously considered. An unlikely adaptation of a play never made, the production struggled through frequent script changes and an unknown ending until it was time to shoot the final scenes. Yet, by utilising familiar patterns in Hollywood narrative, an all-star supporting cast of European performers and the two compelling leads, Casablanca became the most popular of World War II movies and a romantically poignant classic. Watch

41. Psycho (1960) Dir. Alfred Hitchcock, 109 mins.

Having just enjoyed spectacular success with the lavishly scaled North by Northwest, with Psycho, Hitchcock surprisingly turned to a shooting schedule and black and white photography that was more commonly used in television. The grisly horror/thriller follows Marion Crane (Janet Leigh), who, while hiding at a motel after embezzling from her employer, encounters the the initially mild mannered motel owner, Norman Bates (Anthony Perkins). Unsettling and strange when compared to the director’s earlier romantic adventures, the film features a mix of brilliant montage, long mobile camera shots, complex characterisation and dramatic narrative shifts that play with the audience’s expectations. It’s here that Hitchcock’s collaboration with composer Bernard Herrmann arguably reaches its peak, particularly with one of cinema’s most acclaimed sequences, the famous shower scene. Derided at the time of release by critics who deemed it to have too much focus on the sort of seedy subject matter they thought was more at home in cheap horror, the film is now seen as one of Hithcock’s major works. Ultimately, while it’s sex and violence may seem tame and even predictable by 21st century standards, the film represents an important turning point in American film history as it brought such excesses into mainstream cinema but it was also such content, and particularly an increased tendency from Hitchcock towards violence against women, that would later cause a decline in his popularity. Watch



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TIFF’s Essential 100

In 2010, the Toronto International Film Festival released its “Essential 100” list of films, which merged one list of the 100 greatest films of all time as determined by an expert panel of TIFF curators with another list determined by TIFF stakeholders. The list reads like a definitive guide to the best of world cinema.

1 THE PASSION OF JOAN OF ARC (Carl Theodor Dreyer)
2 CITIZEN KANE (Orson Welles)
3 L’AVVENTURA (Michaelangelo Antonioni)
4 THE GODFATHER (Francis Ford Coppola)
5 PICKPOCKET (Robert Bresson)
6 SEVEN SAMURAI (Akira Kurosawa)
7 PATHER PANCHALI (Satyajit Ray)
8 CASABLANCA (Michael Curtiz)
9 MAN WITH A MOVIE CAMERA (Dziga Vertov)
10 BICYCLE THIEVES (Vittorio De Sica)
11 ALI: FEAR EATS THE SOUL (Rainer Werner Fassbinder)
12 8 ½ (Federico Fellini)
13 BATTLESHIP POTEMKIN (Sergei Eisenstein)
14 RASHOMON (Akira Kurosawa)
15 TOKYO STORY (Yasujiro Ozu)
16 THE 400 BLOWS (François Truffaut)
17 UGETSU (Kenji Mizoguchi)
18 BREATHLESS (Jean-Luc Godard)
19 L’ATALANTE (Jean Vigo)
20 CINEMA PARADISO (Giuseppe Tornatore)
21 LA GRANDE ILLUSION (Jean Renoir)
22 LAWRENCE OF ARABIA (David Lean)
23 PERSONA (Ingmar Bergman)
24 GONE WITH THE WIND (Victor Fleming)
25 SUNRISE (F.W. Murnau)
26 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY (Stanley Kubrick)
27 VOYAGE IN ITALY (Roberto Rossellini)
28 AMÉLIE (Jean-Pierre Jeunet)
29 CITY LIGHTS (Charlie Chaplin)
30 STAR WARS (George Lucas)
31 SHERLOCK JR. (Buster Keaton)
32 RULES OF THE GAME (Jean Renoir)
33 THE LEOPARD (Luchino Visconti)
34 LA DOLCE VITA (Federico Fellini)
35 L’ARRIVÉE D’UN TRAIN À LA CIOTAT (Frères LumiereLouis Lumière and Auguste Lumière)
36 THE WIZARD OF OZ (Victor Fleming)
37 LA JETÉE (Chris Marker)
38 VERTIGO (Alfred Hitchcock)
39 NIGHT AND FOG (Alain Resnais)
40 PULP FICTION (Quentin Tarantino)
41 THE SEARCHERS (John Ford)
42 SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE (Danny Boyle)
43 THE CONFORMIST (Bernardo Bertolucci)
44 CITY OF GOD (Fernando Meirelles)
45 TAXI DRIVER (Martin Scorsese)
46 APOCALYPSE NOW (Francis Ford Coppola)
47 SALÓ, OR THE 120 DAYS OF SODOM (Pier Paolo Pasolini)
48 THE SEVENTH SEAL (Ingmar Bergman)
49 LE VOYAGE DANS LA LUNE (Georges Méliès)
50 METROPOLIS (Fritz Lang)




51 THE BATTLE OF ALGIERS (Gillo Pontecorvo)
52 IN THE MOOD FOR LOVE (Wong Kar Wai)
53 VIRIDIANA (Luis Buñuel)
54 LIFE IS BEAUTIFUL (Roberto Benigni)
55 THE SORROW AND THE PITY (Marcel Ophüls)
56 PAN’S LABYRINTH (Guillermo del Toro)
57 THE EARRINGS OF MADAME DE… (Max Ophüls)
58 BLADE RUNNER (Ridley Scott)
59 THROUGH THE OLIVE TREES (Abbas Kiarostami)
60 LES ENFANTS DU PARADIS (Marcel Carné)
61 BRINGING UP BABY (Howard Hawks)
62 SINGIN’ IN THE RAIN (Stanley Donen)
63 JOHNNY GUITAR (Nicholas Ray)
64 A CLOCKWORK ORANGE (Stanley Kubrick)
65 MEMORIES OF UNDERDEVELOPMENT (Tomás Gutiérrez Alea)
66 M (Fritz Lang)
67 SCORPIO RISING (Kenneth Anger)
68 PSYCHO (Alfred Hitchcock)
69 DUST IN THE WIND (Hou Hsiao-Hsien)
70 SCHINDLER’S LIST (Steven Spielberg)
71 NASHVILLE (Robert Altman)
72 CROUCHING TIGER, HIDDEN DRAGON (Ang Lee)
73 WAVELENGTH (Michael Snow)
74 JULES ET JIM (François Truffaut)
75 CHRONIQUE D’UN ÉTÉ (Edgar Morin and Jean Rouch)
76 THE LIVES OF OTHERS (Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck)
77 GREED (Erich von Stroheim)
78 SOME LIKE IT HOT (Billy Wilder)
79 JAWS (Steven Spielberg)
80 ANNIE HALL (Woody Allen)
81 THE BIRTH OF A NATION (D.W. Griffith)
82 CHUNGKING EXPRESS (Wong Kar Wai)
83 LA NOIRE DE… (Ousmane Sembene)
84 RAGING BULL (Martin Scorsese)
85 THE MALTESE FALCON (John Huston)
86 CHINATOWN (Roman Polanski)
87 ANDREI RUBLEV (Andrei Tarkovsky)
88 WINGS OF DESIRE (Wim Wenders)
89 VIDEODROME (David Cronenberg)
90 WRITTEN ON THE WIND (Douglas Sirk)
91 THE THIRD MAN (Carol Reed)
92 BLUE VELVET (David Lynch)
93 THE GOOD, THE BAD AND THE UGLY (Sergio Leone)
94 BREAKING THE WAVES (Lars von Trier)
95 A NOS AMOURS (Maurice Pialat)
96 CLEO DE 5 A 7 (Agnès Varda)
97 ALL ABOUT MY MOTHER (Pedro Almodóvar)
98 EARTH (Aleksandr Dovzhenko)
99 OLDBOY (Park Chan-wook)
100 PLAYTIME (Jacques Tati)




The most important and misappreciated American films since the beginning of the cinema

‘The most important and misappreciated American films since the beginning of the cinema’, is a book of 150 pages published by the Royal Film Archive of Belgium (now known as Cinematek) in 1978 and compiled by Jacques Ledoux. The list in the book came from a survey which polled 203 participants (116 Americans and 87 non-Americans) around the world. Each participant compiled two lists, a list of the most important films (limited to 30 titles) and a list of misappreciated films (not limited in number). The final list is sorted by number of votes (including both important and misappreciated votes). The book lists all 2327 films that received at least 1 vote. This list below includes the films that received at least 5 votes. “Misappreciated” was taken by those with a knowledge of the English language as meaning underrated.

1 Citizen Kane 1941 Orson Welles
2 Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans 1927 F.W. Murnau
3 Greed 1924 Erich von Stroheim
4 Intolerance: Love’s Struggle Throughout the Ages 1916 D.W. Griffith
5 The Birth of a Nation 1915 D.W. Griffith
6 Singin’ in the Rain 1952 Gene Kelly, Stanley Donen
7 Nanook of the North 1922 Robert J. Flaherty
8 The General 1926 Buster Keaton, Clyde Bruckman
9 The Gold Rush 1925 Charles Chaplin
10 The Crowd 1928 King Vidor
11 The Magnificent Ambersons 1942 Robert Wise, Fred Fleck, Orson Welles
12 The Searchers 1956 John Ford
13 Modern Times 1936 Charles Chaplin
14 The Grapes of Wrath 1940 John Ford
15 Scarface 1932 Richard Rosson, Howard Hawks
16 Trouble in Paradise 1932 Ernst Lubitsch
17 Sunset Blvd. 1950 Billy Wilder
18 Vertigo 1958 Alfred Hitchcock
19 Stagecoach 1939 John Ford
20 2001: A Space Odyssey 1968 Stanley Kubrick
21 King Kong 1933 Ernest B. Schoedsack, Merian C. Cooper
22 Psycho 1960 Alfred Hitchcock
23 City Lights 1931 Charles Chaplin
24 Broken Blossoms or The Yellow Man and the Girl 1919 D.W. Griffith
25 Touch of Evil 1958 Orson Welles
26 Casablanca 1942 Michael Curtiz
27 The Wind 1928 Victor Sjöström
28 Duck Soup 1933 Leo McCarey
29 Sullivan’s Travels 1941 Preston Sturges
30 The Scarlet Empress 1934 Josef von Sternberg
31 The Night of the Hunter 1955 Charles Laughton
32 It Happened One Night 1934 Frank Capra
33 Gone with the Wind 1939 Sam Wood, George Cukor, Victor Fleming
34 Nashville 1975 Robert Altman
35 The Big Sleep 1946 Howard Hawks
36 Sherlock Jr. 1924 Buster Keaton
37 On the Waterfront 1954 Elia Kazan
38 The Maltese Falcon 1941 John Huston
39 Monsieur Verdoux 1947 Charles Chaplin
40 Bonnie and Clyde 1967 Arthur Penn
41 To Be or Not to Be 1942 Ernst Lubitsch
42 Letter from an Unknown Woman 1948 Max Ophüls
43 Rear Window 1954 Alfred Hitchcock
44 Foolish Wives 1922 Erich von Stroheim
45 The Best Years of Our Lives 1946 William Wyler
46 The Wedding March 1928 Erich von Stroheim
47 All Quiet on the Western Front 1930 Lewis Milestone
48 You Only Live Once 1937 Fritz Lang
49 The Wild Bunch 1969 Sam Peckinpah
50 I Am a Fugitive from a Chain Gang 1932 Mervyn LeRoy




51 The Treasure of the Sierra Madre 1948 John Huston
52 Paths of Glory 1957 Stanley Kubrick
53 Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb 1964 Stanley Kubrick
54 Young Mr. Lincoln 1939 John Ford
55 White Heat 1949 Raoul Walsh
56 Salt of the Earth 1954 Herbert J. Biberman
57 Rio Bravo 1959 Howard Hawks
58 Red River 1948 Arthur Rosson, Howard Hawks
59 My Darling Clementine 1946 John Ford
60 Underworld 1927 Arthur Rosson, Josef von Sternberg
61 The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance 1962 John Ford
62 High Noon 1952 Fred Zinnemann
63 Bringing Up Baby 1938 Howard Hawks
64 The Great Train Robbery 1903 Edwin S. Porter
65 The Band Wagon 1953 Vincente Minnelli
66 All About Eve 1950 Joseph L. Mankiewicz
67 Tabu: A Story of the South Seas 1931 F.W. Murnau
68 Some Like It Hot 1959 Billy Wilder
69 The Navigator 1924 Donald Crisp, Buster Keaton
70 Mr. Deeds Goes to Town 1936 Frank Capra
71 Love Me Tonight 1932 Rouben Mamoulian
72 A Woman of Paris: A Drama of Fate 1923 Charles Chaplin
73 Meshes of the Afternoon 1943 Alexander Hammid, Maya Deren
74 McCabe & Mrs. Miller 1971 Robert Altman
75 Freaks 1932 Tod Browning
76 Chelsea Girls 1966 Andy Warhol, Paul Morrissey
77 The Big Parade 1925 King Vidor, George W. Hill
78 Morocco 1930 Josef von Sternberg
79 Lonesome 1928 Pál Fejös
80 Fury 1936 Fritz Lang
81 Force of Evil 1948 Abraham Polonsky
82 Written on the Wind 1956 Douglas Sirk
83 Tol’able David 1921 Henry King
84 The Tarnished Angels 1957 Douglas Sirk
85 Scorpio Rising 1963 Kenneth Anger
86 Johnny Guitar 1954 Nicholas Ray
87 The Covered Wagon 1923 James Cruze
88 Wavelength 1967 Michael Snow
89 A Star Is Born 1954 George Cukor
90 Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs 1937 William Cottrell, David Hand, Ben Sharpsteen, Perce Pearce, Wilfred Jackson, Larry Morey
91 North by Northwest 1959 Alfred Hitchcock
92 Ninotchka 1939 Ernst Lubitsch
93 Meet Me in St. Louis 1944 Vincente Minnelli
94 Invasion of the Body Snatchers 1956 Don Siegel
95 The Informer 1935 John Ford
96 How Green Was My Valley 1941 John Ford
97 Easy Rider 1969 Dennis Hopper
98 The Big Heat 1953 Fritz Lang
99 To Have and Have Not 1944 Howard Hawks
100 Shanghai Express 1932 Josef von Sternberg




101 A Place in the Sun 1951 George Stevens
102 Only Angels Have Wings 1939 Howard Hawks
103 Mr. Smith Goes to Washington 1939 Frank Capra
104 Louisiana Story 1948 Robert J. Flaherty
105 Kiss Me Deadly 1955 Robert Aldrich
106 42nd Street 1933 Lloyd Bacon
107 The Docks of New York 1928 Josef von Sternberg
108 Anatahan 1953 Josef von Sternberg
109 Rebel Without a Cause 1955 Nicholas Ray
110 The Jazz Singer 1927 Alan Crosland
111 It’s a Wonderful Life 1946 Frank Capra
112 The Godfather: Part II 1974 Francis Ford Coppola
113 Sylvia Scarlett 1935 George Cukor
114 Shadow of a Doubt 1943 Alfred Hitchcock
115 Safety Last! 1923 Fred C. Newmeyer, Sam Taylor
116 The River 1938 Pare Lorentz
117 Our Hospitality 1923 John G. Blystone, Buster Keaton
118 Make Way for Tomorrow 1937 Leo McCarey
119 Little Caesar 1931 Mervyn LeRoy
120 Hallelujah 1929 King Vidor
121 The Conversation 1974 Francis Ford Coppola
122 The Bitter Tea of General Yen 1932 Frank Capra
123 The Awful Truth 1937 Leo McCarey
124 The Asphalt Jungle 1950 John Huston
125 The Wizard of Oz 1939 Mervyn LeRoy, King Vidor, George Cukor, Norman Taurog, Victor Fleming
126 Way Down East 1920 D.W. Griffith
127 Swing Time 1936 George Stevens
128 The Southerner 1945 Jean Renoir
129 Seven Chances 1925 Buster Keaton
130 A Night at the Opera 1935 Sam Wood, Edmund Goulding
131 The Merry Widow 1934 Ernst Lubitsch
132 The Kid 1921 Charles Chaplin
133 Five Easy Pieces 1970 Bob Rafelson
134 Faces 1968 John Cassavetes
135 America America 1963 Elia Kazan
136 True Heart Susie 1919 D.W. Griffith
137 Top Hat 1935 Mark Sandrich
138 Strangers on a Train 1951 Alfred Hitchcock
139 Shadows 1958 John Cassavetes
140 Out of the Past 1947 Jacques Tourneur
141 Limelight 1952 Charles Chaplin
142 The Lady from Shanghai 1947 Orson Welles
143 East of Eden 1955 Elia Kazan
144 Double Indemnity 1944 Billy Wilder
145 The Birds 1963 Alfred Hitchcock
146 Wild River 1960 Elia Kazan
147 Twentieth Century 1934 Howard Hawks
148 They Live by Night 1948 Nicholas Ray
149 She Wore a Yellow Ribbon 1949 John Ford
150 7 Women 1966 John Ford




151 The Ox-Bow Incident 1943 William A. Wellman
152 The Nutty Professor 1963 Jerry Lewis
153 Isn’t Life Wonderful 1924 D.W. Griffith
154 Holiday 1938 George Cukor
155 Gold Diggers of 1933 1933 Mervyn LeRoy
156 The Godfather 1972 Francis Ford Coppola
157 Frankenstein 1931 James Whale
158 The Fountainhead 1949 King Vidor
159 Prelude: Dog Star Man 1962 Stan Brakhage
160 Dog Star Man: Part I 1962 Stan Brakhage
161 Dog Star Man: Part II 1963 Stan Brakhage
162 Dog Star Man: Part III 1964 Stan Brakhage
163 Dog Star Man: Part IV 1964 Stan Brakhage
164 Ride the High Country 1962 Sam Peckinpah
165 The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes 1970 Billy Wilder
166 The Pirate 1948 Vincente Minnelli
167 Our Daily Bread 1934 King Vidor
168 One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest 1975 Milos Forman
169 The Marriage Circle 1924 Ernst Lubitsch
170 Marnie 1964 Alfred Hitchcock
171 Laura 1944 Otto Preminger
172 The Lady Eve 1941 Preston Sturges
173 The Hustler 1961 Robert Rossen
174 Heaven Can Wait 1943 Ernst Lubitsch
175 Fantasia 1940 Samuel Armstrong, Ben Sharpsteen, Hamilton Luske, Paul Satterfield, James Algar, Jim Handley, Ford Beebe Jr., David Hand, Wilfred Jackson, T. Hee, Norman Ferguson, Bill Roberts
176 Elmer Gantry 1960 Richard Brooks
177 Dodsworth 1936 William Wyler
178 The Devil Is a Woman 1935 Josef von Sternberg
179 Camille 1936 George Cukor
180 The Cameraman 1928 Buster Keaton, Edward Sedgwick
181 The Apartment 1960 Billy Wilder
182 Wagon Master 1950 John Ford
183 They Shoot Horses, Don’t They? 1969 Sydney Pollack
184 Sweet Smell of Success 1957 Alexander Mackendrick
185 The Struggle 1931 D.W. Griffith
186 Stark Love 1927 Karl Brown
187 Shock Corridor 1963 Samuel Fuller
188 Shane 1953 George Stevens
189 The Public Enemy 1931 William A. Wellman
190 The Philadelphia Story 1940 George Cukor
191 Moonfleet 1955 Fritz Lang
192 The Misfits 1961 John Huston
193 The Manchurian Candidate 1962 John Frankenheimer
194 His Girl Friday 1940 Howard Hawks
195 The Great Dictator 1940 Charles Chaplin
196 The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse 1921 Rex Ingram
197 City Girl 1930 F.W. Murnau
198 The Cheat 1915 Cecil B. DeMille
199 Bride of Frankenstein 1935 James Whale
200 Blonde Venus 1932 Josef von Sternberg




201 The Barefoot Contessa 1954 Joseph L. Mankiewicz
202 Badlands 1973 Terrence Malick
203 The Bad and the Beautiful 1952 Vincente Minnelli
204 Applause 1929 Rouben Mamoulian
205 Angel 1937 Ernst Lubitsch
206 All the King’s Men 1949 Robert Rossen
207 West Side Story 1961 Jerome Robbins, Robert Wise
208 A Walk in the Sun 1945 Lewis Milestone
209 Unfaithfully Yours 1948 Preston Sturges
210 12 Angry Men 1957 Sidney Lumet
211 Tom, Tom, the Piper’s Son 1969 Ken Jacobs
212 Some Came Running 1958 Vincente Minnelli
213 Reflections in a Golden Eye 1967 John Huston
214 Pickup on South Street 1953 Samuel Fuller
215 The Palm Beach Story 1942 Preston Sturges
216 Orphans of the Storm 1921 D.W. Griffith
217 Man’s Castle 1933 Frank Borzage
218 The Long Goodbye 1973 Robert Altman
219 The Last Command 1928 Josef von Sternberg
220 It’s a Gift 1934 Norman Z. McLeod
221 Ice 1970 Robert Kramer
222 Her Man 1930 Tay Garnett
223 The Graduate 1967 Mike Nichols
224 The Freshman 1925 Fred C. Newmeyer, Sam Taylor
225 Fireworks 1947 Kenneth Anger
226 Duel in the Sun 1946 Otto Brower, Sidney Franklin, King Vidor, David O. Selznick, William Dieterle, Josef von Sternberg, William Cameron Menzies
227 The Diary of a Chambermaid 1946 Jean Renoir
228 Cat People 1942 Jacques Tourneur
229 Cabaret 1972 Bob Fosse
230 Brewster McCloud 1970 Robert Altman
231 Bigger Than Life 1956 Nicholas Ray
232 Beggars of Life 1928 William A. Wellman
233 The African Queen 1951 John Huston
234 The Adventures of Robin Hood 1938 Michael Curtiz, William Keighley
235 The Thief of Bagdad 1924 Raoul Walsh
236 The Shanghai Gesture 1941 Josef von Sternberg
237 7th Heaven 1927 Frank Borzage
238 The Salvation Hunters 1925 Josef von Sternberg
239 Ruby Gentry 1952 King Vidor
240 The Red Badge of Courage 1951 John Huston
241 The Quiet One 1948 Sidney Meyers
242 One Way Passage 1932 Tay Garnett
243 One-Eyed Jacks 1961 Marlon Brando
244 Notorious 1946 Alfred Hitchcock
245 Mickey One 1965 Arthur Penn
246 Lolita 1962 Stanley Kubrick
247 Leave Her to Heaven 1945 John M. Stahl
248 The Last Picture Show 1971 Peter Bogdanovich
249 Kiss Me, Stupid 1964 Billy Wilder
250 The King of Marvin Gardens 1972 Bob Rafelson




251 I Walked with a Zombie 1943 Jacques Tourneur
252 Hands Up! 1926 Clarence G. Badger
253 Hallelujah the Hills 1963 Adolfas Mekas
254 The Gunfighter 1950 Henry King
255 Gun Crazy 1950 Joseph H. Lewis
256 Fat City 1972 John Huston
257 A Face in the Crowd 1957 Elia Kazan
258 Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde 1931 Rouben Mamoulian
259 A Corner in Wheat 1909 D.W. Griffith
260 The Art of Vision 1965 Stan Brakhage
261 Anticipation of the Night 1958 Stan Brakhage
262 The Woman in the Window 1944 Fritz Lang
263 Wild Boys of the Road 1933 William A. Wellman
264 Twice a Man 1964 Gregory J. Markopoulos
265 The Trouble with Harry 1955 Alfred Hitchcock
266 They Were Expendable 1945 John Ford, Robert Montgomery
267 Suddenly, Last Summer 1959 Joseph L. Mankiewicz
268 Splendor in the Grass 1961 Elia Kazan
269 The Set-Up 1949 Robert Wise
270 Run of the Arrow 1957 Samuel Fuller
271 Ruggles of Red Gap 1935 Leo McCarey
272 Robin Hood 1922 Allan Dwan
273 The Rise and Fall of Legs Diamond 1960 Budd Boetticher
274 Reminiscences of a Journey to Lithuania 1972 Jonas Mekas
275 Queen Kelly 1929 Erich von Stroheim, Richard Boleslawski
276 Queen Christina 1933 Rouben Mamoulian
277 Primary 1960 Robert Drew
278 The Power and the Glory 1933 William K. Howard
279 On the Town 1949 Gene Kelly, Stanley Donen
280 Moonrise 1948 Frank Borzage
281 Miss Lulu Bett 1921 William C. de Mille
282 The Merry Widow 1925 Erich von Stroheim
283 Mean Streets 1973 Martin Scorsese
284 Lost Horizon 1937 Frank Capra
285 The Little Foxes 1941 William Wyler
286 Lilith 1964 Robert Rossen
287 The Last Detail 1973 Hal Ashby
288 The Killing 1956 Stanley Kubrick
289 Johnny Got His Gun 1971 Dalton Trumbo
290 Jeremiah Johnson 1972 Sydney Pollack
291 Imitation of Life 1959 Douglas Sirk
292 Giant 1956 George Stevens
293 The Ghost and Mrs. Muir 1947 Joseph L. Mankiewicz
294 Gentleman Jim 1942 Raoul Walsh
295 Funny Face 1957 Stanley Donen
296 Flesh and the Devil 1926 Clarence Brown
297 Flaming Creatures 1963 Jack Smith
298 Easy Street 1917 Charles Chaplin
299 Crime Without Passion 1934 Lee Garmes, Ben Hecht, Charles MacArthur
300 Mr. Arkadin 1955 Orson Welles




301 The Brig 1964 Jonas Mekas
302 Big Business 1929 Leo McCarey, James W. Horne
303 All That Money Can Buy 1941 William Dieterle
304 Alice’s Restaurant 1969 Arthur Penn
305 Ace in the Hole 1951 Billy Wilder
306 Zorns Lemma 1970 Hollis Frampton
307 Zoo in Budapest 1933 Rowland V. Lee
308 The Unknown 1927 Tod Browning
309 Two-Lane Blacktop 1971 Monte Hellman
310 Trash 1970 Paul Morrissey
311 Thieves Like Us 1974 Robert Altman
312 The Strong Man 1926 Frank Capra
313 A Streetcar Named Desire 1951 Elia Kazan
314 Street Angel 1928 Frank Borzage
315 Stella Dallas 1925 Henry King
316 Steamboat Bill, Jr. 1928 Charles Reisner, Buster Keaton
317 Smouldering Fires 1925 Clarence Brown
318 The Shop Around the Corner 1940 Ernst Lubitsch
319 Scenes from Under Childhood Section #1 1967 Stan Brakhage
320 Scenes from Under Childhood Section #2 1969 Stan Brakhage
321 Scenes from Under Childhood Section #3 1969 Stan Brakhage
322 Scenes from Under Childhood Section #4 1970 Stan Brakhage
323 Scarlet Street 1945 Fritz Lang
324 Rose Hobart 1936 Joseph Cornell
325 The River 1928 Frank Borzage
326 The Rain People 1969 Francis Ford Coppola
327 The Quiet Man 1952 John Ford
328 Puzzle of a Downfall Child 1970 Jerry Schatzberg
329 Pursued 1947 Raoul Walsh
330 Portrait of Jason 1967 Shirley Clarke
331 Point Blank 1967 John Boorman
332 Pinocchio 1940 Jack Kinney, Ben Sharpsteen, Hamilton Luske, Wilfred Jackson, T. Hee, Norman Ferguson, Bill Roberts
333 Peter Ibbetson 1935 Henry Hathaway
334 The Party 1968 Blake Edwards
335 The Old Dark House 1932 James Whale
336 Native Land 1942 Paul Strand, Leo Hurwitz
337 Murder by Contract 1958 Irving Lerner
338 The Mother and the Law 1919 D.W. Griffith
339 The Most Dangerous Game 1932 Irving Pichel, Ernest B. Schoedsack
340 The Miracle of Morgan’s Creek 1943 Preston Sturges
341 Midnight Cowboy 1969 John Schlesinger
342 Meet John Doe 1941 Frank Capra
343 Man, Woman and Sin 1927 Monta Bell
344 Love Affair 1939 Leo McCarey
345 Long Pants 1927 Frank Capra
346 The Lawless 1950 Joseph Losey
347 The Kremlin Letter 1970 John Huston
348 The Iron Horse 1924 John Ford
349 In the Year of the Pig 1968 Emile de Antonio
350 The Honeymoon Killers 1970 Donald Volkman, Leonard Kastle




351 Heaven and Earth Magic 1962 Harry Smith
352 The Great McGinty 1940 Preston Sturges
353 Story of G.I. Joe 1945 William A. Wellman
354 From Here to Eternity 1953 Fred Zinnemann
355 David Holzman’s Diary 1967 Jim McBride
356 The Chase 1966 Arthur Penn
357 Caught 1949 Max Ophüls
358 Barry Lyndon 1975 Stanley Kubrick
359 Avanti! 1972 Billy Wilder
360 The Arrangement 1969 Elia Kazan
361 Anatomy of a Murder 1959 Otto Preminger
362 An American in Paris 1951 Vincente Minnelli
363 Adam’s Rib 1949 George Cukor
364 Petulia 1968 Richard Lester
365 The Wrong Man 1956 Alfred Hitchcock
366 Wind Across the Everglades 1958 Budd Schulberg, Nicholas Ray
367 The War Lord 1965 Franklin J. Schaffner
368 Underworld U.S.A. 1961 Samuel Fuller
369 The Ten Commandments 1923 Cecil B. DeMille
370 The Sun Shines Bright 1953 John Ford
371 Song 1 1964 Stan Brakhage
372 The Scarlet Letter 1926 Victor Sjöström
373 Scarecrow 1973 Jerry Schatzberg
374 Rosemary’s Baby 1968 Roman Polanski
375 A Romance of Happy Valley 1919 D.W. Griffith
376 Point of Order! 1964 Emile de Antonio
377 Party Girl 1958 Nicholas Ray
378 Park Row 1952 Samuel Fuller
379 One More River 1934 James Whale
380 The Naked Spur 1953 Anthony Mann
381 The Naked Prey 1965 Cornel Wilde
382 The Naked City 1948 Jules Dassin
383 My Man Godfrey 1936 Gregory La Cava
384 The Musketeers of Pig Alley 1912 D.W. Griffith
385 The Mortal Storm 1940 Frank Borzage
386 Moana 1926 Frances H. Flaherty, Robert J. Flaherty
387 The Marrying Kind 1952 George Cukor
388 Man of the West 1958 Anthony Mann
389 The Love Parade 1929 Ernst Lubitsch
390 The Long Voyage Home 1940 John Ford
391 The Last of the Mohicans 1920 Clarence Brown, Maurice Tourneur
392 Lady Windermere’s Fan 1925 Ernst Lubitsch
393 Judgment at Nuremberg 1961 Stanley Kramer
394 The Italian 1915 Reginald Barker
395 Intruder in the Dust 1949 Clarence Brown
396 The Immigrant 1917 Charles Chaplin
397 I Married a Witch 1942 René Clair
398 Images 1972 Robert Altman
399 He Who Gets Slapped 1924 Victor Sjöström
400 The Haunting 1963 Robert Wise




401 Hatari! 1962 Howard Hawks
402 The Front Page 1931 Lewis Milestone
403 Forty Guns 1957 Samuel Fuller
404 Easter Parade 1948 Charles Walters
405 Diaries Notes and Sketches 1969 Jonas Mekas
406 Design for Living 1933 Ernst Lubitsch
407 The Cool World 1963 Shirley Clarke
408 The Connection 1961 Shirley Clarke
409 Civilization 1915 Thomas H. Ince, Jay Hunt, J. Parker Read Jr., Raymond B. West, Reginald Barker, David Hartford, Walter Edwards
410 City Streets 1931 Rouben Mamoulian
411 The Circus 1928 Charles Chaplin
412 Chinatown 1974 Roman Polanski
413 Campanadas a medianoche 1965 Orson Welles
414 Castro Street 1966 Bruce Baillie
415 Carnal Knowledge 1971 Mike Nichols
416 Boomerang! 1947 Elia Kazan
417 Blood Money 1933 Rowland Brown
418 Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ 1925 Charles Brabin, Christy Cabanne, Rex Ingram, Fred Niblo, J.J. Cohn
419 The Beguiled 1971 Don Siegel
420 Beat the Devil 1953 John Huston
421 San Pietro 1945 John Huston
422 The Ballad of Cable Hogue 1970 Sam Peckinpah
423 An Affair to Remember 1957 Leo McCarey
424 Zabriskie Point 1970 Michelangelo Antonioni
425 Yankee Doodle Dandy 1942 Michael Curtiz
426 Woodstock 1970 Michael Wadleigh
427 The Woman on the Beach 1947 Jean Renoir
428 White Shadows in the South Seas 1928 W.S. Van Dyke, Robert J. Flaherty
429 The White Rose 1923 D.W. Griffith
430 White Gold 1927 William K. Howard
431 Viva Zapata! 1952 Elia Kazan
432 Vanishing Point 1971 Richard C. Sarafian
433 Two for the Road 1967 Stanley Donen
434 Twelve O’Clock High 1949 Henry King
435 Trader Horn 1931 W.S. Van Dyke
436 They Won’t Forget 1937 Mervyn LeRoy
437 Strangers When We Meet 1960 Richard Quine
438 Show Boat 1936 James Whale
439 Shoulder Arms 1918 Charles Chaplin
440 She Done Him Wrong 1933 Lowell Sherman
441 Scaramouche 1952 George Sidney
442 The Savage Eye 1960 Joseph Strick, Sidney Meyers, Ben Maddow
443 Ruthless 1948 Edgar G. Ulmer
444 Ride the Pink Horse 1947 Robert Montgomery
445 Ride Lonesome 1959 Budd Boetticher
446 La région centrale 1971 Michael Snow
447 Rachel, Rachel 1968 Paul Newman
448 Quick Millions 1931 Rowland Brown
449 The Prowler 1951 Joseph Losey
450 The Professionals 1966 Richard Brooks




451 Pretty Poison 1968 Noel Black
452 The Pawnbroker 1964 Sidney Lumet
453 The Patsy 1964 Jerry Lewis
454 The Painted Lady 1912 D.W. Griffith
455 Nothing But a Man 1964 Michael Roemer
456 The Naked Kiss 1964 Samuel Fuller
457 A Movie 1958 Bruce Conner
458 Mother’s Day 1948 James Broughton
459 The Molly Maguires 1970 Martin Ritt
460 The Miracle Worker 1962 Arthur Penn
461 Ministry of Fear 1944 Fritz Lang
462 Midnight 1939 Mitchell Leisen
463 Marty 1955 Delbert Mann
464 Man Hunt 1941 Fritz Lang
465 Life of an American Fireman 1903 Edwin S. Porter, George S. Fleming
466 Laughter 1930 Harry d’Abbadie d’Arrast
467 Land of the Pharaohs 1955 Howard Hawks
468 King-Size Canary 1947 Tex Avery
469 The Kid Brother 1927 Lewis Milestone, Harold Lloyd, J.A. Howe, Ted Wilde
470 It 1927 Clarence G. Badger, Josef von Sternberg
471 High Sierra 1941 Raoul Walsh
472 High School 1969 Frederick Wiseman
473 Heller in Pink Tights 1960 George Cukor
474 The Gypsy Moths 1969 John Frankenheimer
475 Grass: A Nation’s Battle for Life 1925 Ernest B. Schoedsack, Merian C. Cooper
476 The Godless Girl 1929 Cecil B. DeMille
477 The Girl Can’t Help It 1956 Frank Tashlin
478 For Heaven’s Sake 1926 Sam Taylor
479 Footlight Parade 1933 Lloyd Bacon
480 The 5,000 Fingers of Dr. T. 1953 Roy Rowland
481 Dirty Harry 1971 Don Siegel
482 Deliverance 1972 John Boorman
483 The Day the Earth Stood Still 1951 Robert Wise
484 Days of Wine and Roses 1962 Blake Edwards
485 Night of the Demon 1957 Jacques Tourneur
486 A Clockwork Orange 1971 Stanley Kubrick
487 The City 1939 Ralph Steiner, Willard Van Dyke
488 California Split 1974 Robert Altman
489 Bring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia 1974 Sam Peckinpah
490 Bitter Victory 1957 Nicholas Ray
491 The Big Sky 1952 Howard Hawks
492 The Big Combo 1955 Joseph H. Lewis
493 American Madness 1932 Allan Dwan, Roy William Neill, Frank Capra
494 All the President’s Men 1976 Alan J. Pakula
495 All That Heaven Allows 1955 Douglas Sirk
496 Advise & Consent 1962 Otto Preminger



 

The 100 Greatest Movies Ever Made

After a month of polling in 2015, Flicks received votes from 3,000 New Zealanders which were then compiled into the 100 favourite films of all time. The Shawshank Redemption, which was written and directed by Frank Darabont, took the top spot. Max Max: Fury Road was the most recent film to make the top 100.

  • 1. The Shawshank Redemption
  • 2. Star Wars: Episode V – The Empire Strikes Back
  • 3. The Godfather
  • 4. Pulp Fiction
  • 5. The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring
  • 6. The Dark Knight
  • 7. Forrest Gump
  • 8. Star Wars: Episode IV – A New Hope
  • 9. The Matrix
  • 10. Goodfellas
  • 11. 2001: A Space Odyssey
  • 12. Casablanca
  • 13. Gone with the Wind
  • 14. Fight Club
  • 15. Titanic
  • 16. The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King
  • 17. Blade Runner
  • 18. The Princess Bride
  • 19. Jurassic Park
  • 20. Saving Private Ryan
  • 21. Inception
  • 22. Avatar
  • 23. The Sound of Music
  • 24. The Avengers
  • 25. Alien
  • 26. Terminator 2: Judgment Day
  • 27. Back to the Future
  • 28. Raiders of the Lost Ark
  • 29. Up
  • 30. Schindler’s List
  • 31. Jaws
  • 32. Citizen Kane
  • 33. Aliens
  • 34. The Lion King
  • 35. The Godfather: Part II
  • 36. The Green Mile
  • 37. Braveheart
  • 38. The Wizard of Oz
  • 39. Interstellar
  • 40. Life is Beautiful
  • 41. Fargo
  • 42. Lawrence of Arabia
  • 43. Apocalypse Now
  • 44. Love Actually
  • 45. Mad Max: Fury Road
  • 46. Guardians of the Galaxy
  • 47. The Notebook
  • 48. Rear Window
  • 49. One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest
  • 50. Labyrinth



  • 51. Dirty Dancing
  • 52. Top Gun
  • 53. E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial
  • 54. The Departed
  • 55. The Usual Suspects
  • 56. Amélie
  • 57. Pretty Woman
  • 58. Gladiator
  • 59. The Good, The Bad and the Ugly
  • 60. Vertigo
  • 61. Star Wars: Episode VI – Return of the Jedi
  • 62. Se7en
  • 63. Seven Samurai
  • 64. There Will Be Blood
  • 65. Grease
  • 66. Ghost
  • 67. The Silence of the Lambs
  • 68. Pitch Perfect
  • 69. Die Hard
  • 70. Ben-Hur
  • 71. Reservoir Dogs
  • 72. Donnie Darko
  • 73. No Country For Old Men
  • 74. Memento
  • 75. Psycho
  • 76. Toy Story
  • 77. The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas
  • 78. A Clockwork Orange
  • 79. The Terminator
  • 80. Inglourious Basterds
  • 81. Spirited Away
  • 82. The Wolf of Wall Street
  • 83. Once Upon a Time in the West
  • 84. To Kill a Mockingbird
  • 85. Rocky
  • 86. The Shining
  • 87. Boy
  • 88. The Fifth Element
  • 89. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
  • 90. The Blues Brothers
  • 91. Armageddon
  • 92. The Great Escape
  • 93. Boyhood
  • 94. Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb
  • 95. Léon the Professional
  • 96. Monty Python and the Holy Grail
  • 97. Singin’ in the Rain
  • 98. Bridesmaids
  • 99. The Graduate
  • 100. Breakfast at Tiffany’s



BBC’s 100 Greatest American Films

In July 2015 BBC Culture polled 62 film critics from around the world to determine the 100 greatest American movies ever made. There are some surprising results with Gone With the Wind which placed 6th on AFI’s 2007 list only 97th on the BBC poll. This maybe that AFI list comes from the choices of the US industry rather than foreign critics.

For the purposes of the poll, an American film is defined as any movie that received funding from a US source. The directors of these films did not have to be born in the United States nor did the films have to be shot in the US. Each critic who participated submitted a list of 10 films, with their pick for the greatest film receiving 10 points and their number 10 pick receiving one point. The points were added up to produce the final list. 

The 100 greatest American films

100. Ace in the Hole (Billy Wilder, 1951)
99. 12 Years a Slave (Steve McQueen, 2013)
98. Heaven’s Gate (Michael Cimino, 1980)
97. Gone With the Wind (Victor Fleming, 1939)
96. The Dark Knight (Christopher Nolan, 2008)
95. Duck Soup (Leo McCarey, 1933)
94. 25th Hour (Spike Lee, 2002)
93. Mean Streets (Martin Scorsese, 1973)
92. The Night of the Hunter (Charles Laughton, 1955)
91. ET: The Extra-Terrestrial (Steven Spielberg, 1982)
90. Apocalypse Now (Francis Ford Coppola, 1979)
89. In a Lonely Place (Nicholas Ray, 1950)
88. West Side Story (Robert Wise and Jerome Robbins, 1961)
87. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (Michel Gondry, 2004)
86. The Lion King (Roger Allers and Rob Minkoff, 1994)
85. Night of the Living Dead (George A Romero, 1968)
84. Deliverance (John Boorman, 1972)
83. Bringing Up Baby (Howard Hawks, 1938)
82. Raiders of the Lost Ark (Steven Spielberg, 1981)
81. Thelma & Louise (Ridley Scott, 1991)
80. Meet Me in St Louis (Vincente Minnelli, 1944)
79. The Tree of Life (Terrence Malick, 2011)
78. Schindler’s List (Steven Spielberg, 1993)
77. Stagecoach (John Ford, 1939)
76. The Empire Strikes Back (Irvin Kershner, 1980)
75. Close Encounters of the Third Kind (Steven Spielberg, 1977)
74. Forrest Gump (Robert Zemeckis, 1994)
73. Network (Sidney Lumet, 1976)
72. The Shanghai Gesture (Josef von Sternberg, 1941)
71. Groundhog Day (Harold Ramis, 1993)
70. The Band Wagon (Vincente Minnelli, 1953)
69. Koyaanisqatsi (Godfrey Reggio, 1982)
68. Notorious (Alfred Hitchcock, 1946)
67. Modern Times (Charlie Chaplin, 1936)
66. Red River (Howard Hawks, 1948)
65. The Right Stuff (Philip Kaufman, 1983)
64. Johnny Guitar (Nicholas Ray, 1954)
63. Love Streams (John Cassavetes, 1984)
62. The Shining (Stanley Kubrick, 1980)
61. Eyes Wide Shut (Stanley Kubrick, 1999)
60. Blue Velvet (David Lynch, 1986)
59. One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest (Miloš Forman, 1975)
58. The Shop Around the Corner (Ernst Lubitsch, 1940)
57. Crimes and Misdemeanors (Woody Allen, 1989)
56. Back to the Future (Robert Zemeckis, 1985)
55. The Graduate (Mike Nichols, 1967)
54. Sunset Boulevard (Billy Wilder, 1950)
53. Grey Gardens (Albert and David Maysles, Ellen Hovde and Muffie Meyer, 1975)
52. The Wild Bunch (Sam Peckinpah, 1969)
51. Touch of Evil (Orson Welles, 1958)




50. His Girl Friday (Howard Hawks, 1940)
49. Days of Heaven (Terrence Malick, 1978)
48. A Place in the Sun (George Stevens, 1951)
47. Marnie (Alfred Hitchcock, 1964)
46. It’s a Wonderful Life (Frank Capra, 1946)
45. The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance (John Ford, 1962)
44. Sherlock Jr (Buster Keaton, 1924)
43. Letter from an Unknown Woman (Max Ophüls, 1948)
42. Dr Strangelove (Stanley Kubrick, 1964)
41. Rio Bravo (Howard Hawks, 1959)
40. Meshes of the Afternoon (Maya Deren and Alexander Hammid, 1943)
39. The Birth of a Nation (DW Griffith, 1915)
38. Jaws (Steven Spielberg, 1975)
37. Imitation of Life (Douglas Sirk, 1959)
36. Star Wars (George Lucas, 1977)
35. Double Indemnity (Billy Wilder, 1944)
34. The Wizard of Oz (Victor Fleming, 1939)
33. The Conversation (Francis Ford Coppola, 1974)
32. The Lady Eve (Preston Sturges, 1941)
31. A Woman Under the Influence (John Cassavetes, 1974)
30. Some Like It Hot (Billy Wilder, 1959)
29. Raging Bull (Martin Scorsese, 1980)
28. Pulp Fiction (Quentin Tarantino, 1994)
27. Barry Lyndon (Stanley Kubrick, 1975)
26. Killer of Sheep (Charles Burnett, 1978)
25. Do the Right Thing (Spike Lee, 1989)
24. The Apartment (Billy Wilder, 1960)
23. Annie Hall (Woody Allen, 1977)
22. Greed (Erich von Stroheim, 1924)
21. Mulholland Drive (David Lynch, 2001)
20. Goodfellas (Martin Scorsese, 1990)
19. Taxi Driver (Martin Scorsese, 1976)
18. City Lights (Charlie Chaplin, 1931)
17. The Gold Rush (Charlie Chaplin, 1925)
16. McCabe & Mrs Miller (Robert Altman, 1971)
15. The Best Years of Our Lives (William Wyler, 1946)
14. Nashville (Robert Altman, 1975)
13. North by Northwest (Alfred Hitchcock, 1959)
12. Chinatown (Roman Polanski, 1974)
11. The Magnificent Ambersons (Orson Welles, 1942)
10. The Godfather Part II (Francis Ford Coppola, 1974)
9. Casablanca (Michael Curtiz, 1942)
8. Psycho (Alfred Hitchcock, 1960)
7. Singin’ in the Rain (Stanley Donen and Gene Kelly, 1952)
6. Sunrise (FW Murnau, 1927)
5. The Searchers (John Ford, 1956)
4. 2001: A Space Odyssey (Stanley Kubrick, 1968)
3. Vertigo (Alfred Hitchcock, 1958)
2. The Godfather (Francis Ford Coppola, 1972)
1. Citizen Kane (Orson Welles, 1941)



Best in Film: The Greatest Movies of Our Time

Best in Film: The Greatest Movies of Our Time was a two-hour television special that aired on March 22, 2011, on ABC in the United States. Hosted by Tom Bergeron and Cynthia McFadden, it was a collaboration between ABC News and People magazine that gave American film fans the chance to choose their favourite movies of all time. The results were presented on the program, which included interviews with some of the stars and directors of the chosen films including Harrison Ford, Anthony Hopkins, and Olivia Newton-John. The categories for the special were Best Film, Best Sci-Fi Film, Best Musical, Best Action Film, Greatest Film Character, Best Horror Film, Best Chick Flick, Greatest Screen Kiss, Best Comedy, Best Animated Film, Best Suspense/Thriller, Most Romantic Screen Couple, Greatest Line, Best Western Film and Best Political/Historical Film.

To vote for their favourite films, movie fans went online at abcnews.com and people.com to select the winners from a list of nominees created by a group of film industry experts. Online voting was open from late November 2010 to January 2011. The televised special counted down the top five films in 10 of the 15 categories: Best Comedy, Best Sci-Fi Film, Best Musical, Greatest Screen Kiss, Greatest Line, Best Action Film, Best Suspense/Thriller, Best Animated Film, Greatest Film Character and Best Film. The results in the remaining five categories (Best Horror Film, Best Chick Flick, Most Romantic Screen Couple, Best Western Film and Best Political/Historical Film) were revealed online.

Television Results

Best Comedy

  1. Airplane! (1980)
  2. Monty Python And The Holy Grail (1975)
  3. Some Like It Hot (1959)
  4. Young Frankenstein (1974)
  5. Tootsie (1982)

Best Sci-fi film

  1. Star Wars: Episode IV – A New Hope (1977)
  2. E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial (1982)
  3. Avatar (2009)
  4. The Matrix (1999)
  5. Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977)

Best Musical

  1. The Sound of Music (1965)
  2. Grease (1978)
  3. The Wizard of Oz (1939)
  4. Singin’ in the Rain (1952)
  5. West Side Story (1961)

Greatest On Screen Kiss

  1. Gone with the Wind (1939)
  2. From Here to Eternity (1953)
  3. Lady and the Tramp (1955)
  4. An Officer and a Gentleman (1982)
  5. Casablanca (1942)

Greatest Line

  1. “Frankly, my dear, I don’t give a damn.” – Gone with the Wind (1939)
  2. “Go ahead, make my day!” – Sudden Impact (1983)
  3. “I’m gonna make him an offer he can’t refuse.” – The Godfather (1972)
  4. “I’ll have what she’s having.” – When Harry Met Sally… (1989)
  5. “Here’s looking at you, kid.” – Casablanca (1942)

Best Action Film

  1. Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981)
  2. The Dark Knight (2008)
  3. The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003)
  4. Die Hard (1988)
  5. Gladiator (2000)

Best Suspense/Thriller

  1. The Silence of the Lambs (1991)
  2. Jaws (1975)
  3. Psycho (1960)
  4. The Shining (1980)
  5. Pulp Fiction (1994)

Best Animated Film

  1. The Lion King (1994)
  2. Toy Story (1995)
  3. Beauty and the Beast (1991)
  4. Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937)
  5. Fantasia (1940)

Greatest Film Character

  1. Forrest Gump in Forrest Gump (1994)
  2. James Bond in the James Bond films
  3. Scarlett O’Hara in Gone with the Wind (1939)
  4. Dr. Hannibal Lecter in The Silence of the Lambs (1991)
  5. Indiana Jones in the Indiana Jones films

Best Film

  1. Gone with the Wind (1939)
  2. The Wizard of Oz (1939)
  3. The Godfather (1972)
  4. Casablanca (1942)
  5. E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial (1982)



Online Results

Most Romantic On Screen Couple

  1. Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet – Titanic (1997)
  2. Clark Gable and Vivien Leigh – Gone with the Wind (1939)
  3. Richard Gere and Julia Roberts – Pretty Woman (1990)
  4. Humphrey Bogart and Ingrid Bergman – Casablanca (1942)
  5. Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn – Adam’s Rib (1949)

Best Horror Film

  1. The Exorcist (1973)
  2. Halloween (1978)
  3. Poltergeist (1982)
  4. Carrie (1976)
  5. A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984)

Best Western Film

  1. Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969)
  2. Dances with Wolves (1990)
  3. The Good, the Bad and the Ugly (1966)
  4. Unforgiven (1992)
  5. The Magnificent Seven (1960)

Best Chick Flick

  1. The Notebook (2004)
  2. Dirty Dancing (1987)
  3. Pretty Woman (1990)
  4. Sleepless in Seattle (1993)
  5. The Way We Were (1973)

Best Political/Historical Film

  1. Schindler’s List (1993)
  2. Doctor Zhivago (1965)
  3. 12 Angry Men (1957)
  4. All the President’s Men (1976)
  5. Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (1939)



Empire’s The 100 Greatest Movie Characters of All Time (2008)

Following on from the October 2008 release of Empire Magazine’s list of the 500 Greatest Movies of All Time, they released their list of the 100 Greatest Movie Characters of All Time.  Tyler Durden from David Fincher’s Fight Club topped the list while Indiana Jones, so often number 1 in these sorts of polls, is placed 6th. A new list by Empire was released in 2015.

1. Tyler Durden (Fight Club)
2. Darth Vader (Star Wars Trilogy)
3. The Joker (The Dark Knight)
4. Han Solo (Star Wars Trilogy)
5. Hannibal Lecter (Silence of the Lambs)
6. Indiana Jones
7. The Dude (The Big Lebowski)
8. Captain Jack Sparrow (Pirates of the Caribbean Trilogy)
9. Ellen Ripley (Alien Quadrology)
10. Vito Corleone (The Godfather)
11. James Bond
12. John McClane (Die Hard)
13. Gollum (The Lord of the Rings)
14. The Terminator
15. Ferris Bueller (Ferris Bueller’s Day Off)
16. Neo (The Matrix trilogy)
17. Hans Gruber (Die Hard)
18. Travis Bickle (Taxi Driver)
19. Jules Winnfield (Pulp Fiction)
20. Forrest Gump (Forrest Gump)
21. Michael Corleone (The Godfather)
22. Ellis “Red” Redding (The Shawshank Redemption)
23. Harry Callahan (Dirty Harry)
24. Ash (Evil Dead)
25. Yoda (The Empire Strikes Back)
26. Ron Burgundy – Anchorman
27. Tony Montana – Scarface
28. Gandalf – the Lord of the Rings trilogy
29. Daniel Plainview – There Will Be Blood
30. Jigsaw – the Saw series
31. Aragorn – the Lord of the Rings trilogy
32. Jason Bourne – the Bourne trilogy
33. Tequila – Hardboiled
34. Rocky Balboa
35. Maximus Decimus Meridius – Gladiator
36. Harry Potter
37. Edward Scissorhands
38. Donnie Darko
39. Marty McFly – Back To The Future
40. Patrick Bateman – American Psycho
41. Mary Poppins
42. Alex DeLarge – A Clockwork Orange
43. The Man With No Name – spaghetti western trilogy
44. Peter Venkman – Ghostbusters
45. Amelie Poulain – Amelie
46. Anton Chigurh – No Country For Old Men
47. Blade
48. Tony Stark – Iron Man
49. Walter Sobchak – The Big Lebowski
50. Quint – Jaws




51. Serenity – Mal Reynolds
52. It’s a Wonderful Life – George Bailey
53. Cool Hand Luke – Luke
54. Star Wars: Episode V – The Empire Strikes Back (1980)… – Luke Skywalker
55. The Naked Gun: From the Files of Police Squad! (1988)… – Lt. Frank Drebin
56. Juno (2007) – Juno MacGuff
57. Wake-Up Ron Burgundy – Brick Tamland
58. Casablanca (1942) – Rick Blaine
59. GoodFellas (1990) – Tommy DeVito
60. Ace Ventura: Pet Detective – Ace Ventura
61. One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest – R.P. McMurphy
62. Léon: The Professional – Mathilda
63. WALL·E – Wall-E
64. Withnail & I – Withnail
65. Dodgeball – White Goodman
66. Kill Bill: Vol. 1 – The Bride
67. Blue Velvet (1986)… – Frank Booth
68. Napoleon Dynamite – Napolean Dynamite
69. The Usual Suspects – Keyser Soze
70. To Kill a Mockingbird (1962) – Atticus Finch
71. Escape from New York (1981) – Snake Plisskin
72. V for Vendetta (2005) – V
73. The Shining (1980) – Jack Torrance
74. E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial – E.T.
75. Fargo (1996)… – Marge Gunderson
76. Back to the Future Part III (1990) – Dr. Emmett Brown
77. Shaun of the Dead (2004)… – Ed
78. Beverly Hills Cop – Axel Foley
79. Star Wars: Episode VI – Return of the Jedi (1983)… – Boba Fett
80. Psycho – Norman Bates
81. X-Men (2000) – Wolverine
82. Sin City – Marv
83. Reservoir Dogs – Mr. Blonde
84. The Matrix – Agent Smith
85. True Romance (1993) – Vincenzo Coccotti
86. Blade Runner (1982)… – Roy Batty
87. Dracula (1931)… – Dracula
88. Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988) – Jessica Rabbit
89. Star Wars – Princess Leia Organa
90. The Wizard of Oz – The Wicked Witch of the West
91. Gone with the Wind – Scarlett O’Hara
92. Clerks – Randall Graves
93. Grosse Pointe Blank (1997)… – Martin Q. Blank
94. Toy Story – Buzz Lightyear
95. A Nightmare on Elm Street – Freddy Krueger
96. The Searchers (1956)… – Ethan Edwards
97. The Silence of the Lambs – Clarice Starling
98. Citizen Kane (1941) – Charles Foster Kane
99. 2001: A Space Odyssey – Hal-9000
100. Lethal Weapon (1987) – Martin Riggs

Empire Magazine (May, 2019) Avengers Endgame

Empire – England (subscription)

Empire Magazine (March 2019) Captain Marvel Cover

Empire Australasia (subscription)

Empire Magazine (December 2018) Review of the Year 2018 Featuring Infinity War




The 100 Greatest Movie Characters

In June 2015 Empire Magazine published a list of the 100 Greatest movie characters as voted for by their readers. Interesting to see Walker from John Boorman’s hugely underrated Point Blank making such a list while Norman Bates of Psycho fame is only placed 97th.

  • 100. Edna Mode – The Incredibles (2004)
  • 99. Randle McMurphy – One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest (1975)
  • 98. Optimus Prime – The Transformers series (2007-)
  • 97. Norman Bates – The Psycho films (1960-1990), Psycho remake (1998)
  • 96. The Minions – Despicable Me movies (2010-2013), the Minions movie (2015)
  • 95. Maximus – Gladiator (2000)
  • 94. Legolas –  The Lord Of The Rings and The Hobbit trilogies (2001-2014)
  • 93. Wednesday Addams – The Addams Family films (1991-1993)
  • 92. Inspector Clouseau – The Pink Panther films (1963-2009)
  • 91. Inigo Montoya – The Princess Bride (1987)
  • 90. Hal – 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)
  • 89. Groot – Guardians Of The Galaxy (2014)
  • 88. Gromit – Wallace & Gromit: The Curse Of The Were-Rabbit (2005)
  • 87. Ethan Hunt – The Mission: Impossible series (1996–)
  • 86. Red – The Shawshank Redemption (1994)
  • 85. Walker – Point Blank (1967)
  • 84. Corporal Hicks – Aliens (1986)
  • 83. Bane – Batman & Robin (1997), The Dark Knight Rises (2012)
  • 82. Woody – The Toy Story series (1995–)
  • 81. Withnail – Withnail & I (1987)
  • 80. V – V For Vendetta (2005)
  • 79. Roy Batty – Blade Runner (1982)
  • 78. Martin Blank – Grosse Pointe Blank (1997)
  • 77. Samwise Gamgee – The Lord Of The Rings trilogy (2001-2003)
  • 76. Private William Hudson – Aliens (1986)
  • 75. Lisbeth Salander – The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo trilogy (2009), The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo remake (2011)
  • 74. Frank Drebin – The Naked Gun series (1988-1994)
  • 73. Donnie Darko – Donnie Darko (2001)
  • 72. Captain Kirk – The Star Trek series (1966–)
  • 71. Star-Lord – Guardians Of The Galaxy (2014)
  • 70. Tony Montana – Scarface (1983)
  • 69. Marge Gunderson – Fargo (1996)
  • 68. Neo – The Matrix trilogy (1999-2003)
  • 67. Harry Potter – The Harry Potter series (2001-2011)
  • 66. Gollum / Sméagol – The Lord Of The Rings trilogy (2001-2003) and The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey (2012)
  • 65. Hans Landa – Inglourious Basterds (2009)
  • 64. George Bailey – It’s A Wonderful Life (1946)
  • 63. Wolverine – The X-Men series (2000–)
  • 62. E.T. – E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial (1982)
  • 61. Bilbo Baggins – The Lord Of The Rings and The Hobbit trilogies (2001-2014)
  • 60. Dr. King Schultz – Django Unchained (2012)
  • 59. Ace Ventura – Ace Ventura: Pet Detective (1994), When Nature Calls (1995)
  • 58. Sarah Connor – The Terminator series (1984–)
  • 57. Katniss Everdeen – The Hunger Games series (2012-2015)
  • 56. Jack Burton – Big Trouble In Little China (1986)
  • 55. Axel Foley – The Beverly Hills Cop trilogy (1984-1994)
  • 54. Amélie Poulain – Amélie (2001)
  • 53. Vito Corleone – The Godfather (1972), The Godfather: Part II (1974)
  • 52. Shaun Riley – Shaun Of The Dead (2004)
  • 51. Obi-Wan Kenobi – The Star Wars series (1977-2005)



  • 50. Luke Skywalker – The Star Wars series (1977-2015)
  • 49. Harry Callahan – The Dirty Harry series (1971-1988)
  • 48. Lester Burnham – American Beauty (1999)
  • 47. Rick Deckard – Blade Runner
  • 46. Captain America – Marvel Cinematic Universe (2011–)
  • 45. Tommy DeVito – Goodfellas (1990)
  • 44. Anton Chigurh – No Country For Old Men (2007)
  • 43. Amy Dunne – Gone Girl (2014)
  • 42. Lou Bloom – Nightcrawler (2014)
  • 41. Keyser Söze – The Usual Suspects
  • 40. Ferris Bueller – Ferris Bueller’s Day Off (1986)
  • 39. Driver – Drive (2011)
  • 38. Yoda – The Star Wars series (1980-2005)
  • 37. Walter Sobchak – The Big Lebowski (1998)
  • 36. Rocky Balboa – The Rocky series (1976-2015)
  • 35. Atticus Finch – To Kill A Mockingbird (1962)
  • 34. Captain Mal Reynolds – Serenity (2005)
  • 33. The Man With No Name – A Fistful Of Dollars (1964), For A Few Dollars More (1965), The Good, The Bad And The Ugly (1966)
  • 32. Jules Winnfield – Pulp Fiction (1994)
  • 31. Peter Venkman – Ghostbusters (1984), Ghostbusters II (1989)
  • 30. Gandalf – The Lord Of The Rings and The Hobbit trilogies (2001-2014)
  • 29. Snake Plissken – Escape From New York (1981), Escape From L.A. (1996)
  • 28. The Terminator (T-800) – The Terminator series (1984–)
  • 27. Forrest Gump – Forrest Gump (1994)
  • 26. Patrick Bateman – American Psycho (2000)
  • 25. Ash – The Evil Dead trilogy (1981-1992)
  • 24. Daniel Plainview – There Will Be Blood (2007)
  • 23. The Bride – Kill Bill: Vol. 1 (2003), Kill Bill: Vol. 2 (2004)
  • 22. Travis Bickle – Taxi Driver (1976)
  • 21. Hannibal Lecter – The Hannibal Lecter films (1986-2007)
  • 20. Doc Brown – The Back To The Future trilogy (1985-1990), A Million Ways To Die In The West (2014)
  • 19. Loki – The Marvel Cinematic Universe (2011–)
  • 18. Rick Blaine – Casablanca (1942)
  • 17. M. Gustave – The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014)
  • 16. Ron Burgundy – Anchorman: The Legend Of Ron Burgundy (2004), Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues (2013)
  • 15. Aragorn – The Lord Of The Rings trilogy (2001-2003)
  • 14. Captain Jack Sparrow – The Pirates Of The Caribbean series (2003–)
  • 13. Iron Man – The Marvel Cinematic Universe (2008–)
  • 12. Marty McFly – Back To The Future trilogy (1985-1990)
  • 11. Michael Corleone – The Godfather trilogy (1972-1990)
  • 10. The Dude – The Big Lebowski (1998)
  • 9. Darth Vader – Star Wars: Episodes III-VI (1977-2005)
  • 8. Tyler Durden – Fight Club (1999)
  • 7. John McClane – The Die Hard films (1988-2013), National Lampoon’s Loaded Weapon 1 (1993)
  • 6. The Joker – Batman The Movie (1966), Batman (1989), The Dark Knight (2008), Suicide Squad (2016)
  • 5. Ellen Ripley – The Alien series (1979-1997)
  • 4. Batman – Batman The Movie (1966), Batman (1989), Batman Returns (1992), Batman Forever (1995), Batman & Robin (1997), Batman Begins (2005), The Dark Knight (2008), The Dark Knight Rises (2012)
  • 3. Han Solo – The Star Wars series (1977–2015)
  • 2. James Bond – The James Bond series (1962–)
  • 1. Indiana Jones – All four Indiana Jones adventures (1981-2008)

Empire – England (1 year subscription)
Empire Magazine (June, 2019) John Wick Chapter 3 Keanu Reeves Cover
Empire Australasia (kindle edition)
Empire Magazine (Summer, 2019) Spider-Man Far From Home Cover
Empire Magazine (December 2018) Review of the Year 2018 Featuring Infinity War
Empire Magazine (April, 2016) Iron Man vs. Captain America Cover




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