Allen
Stewart is the webmaster and statistical analyst of the Phi-Phenomenon (where he analyzes
lists of great films and combines them in to a master list of the greatest
films of all time. He has idiosyncratic tastes in films.
I strongly question whether it is possible to get a sense of a person's taste in films using just a top-ten list like Sight & Sound uses. Therefore I am glad that this poll is looking at top-100 lists. Of course, no limit can ever be completely satisfying. On a top-ten film ballot, I would have and eleventh choice that I desperately want to add. On a top-100 film ballot, I would have a 101st choice that I want to add. I just have to learn to live with limitations.
I strongly question whether it is possible to get a sense of a person's taste in films using just a top-ten list like Sight & Sound uses. Therefore I am glad that this poll is looking at top-100 lists. Of course, no limit can ever be completely satisfying. On a top-ten film ballot, I would have and eleventh choice that I desperately want to add. On a top-100 film ballot, I would have a 101st choice that I want to add. I just have to learn to live with limitations.
The
films in the list below are presented in clumps. They are ranked within
the clumps, including within the clump of films that I have not seen yet.
The
following seven films are the only films in Sight & Sound's top-100 films
that overlap my top-100 films.
6. Citizen Kane
| Orson WELLES | 1941 | Sight & Sound's choice of Vertigo over Citizen Kane does not match my
opinion. I have Citizen Kane near the
top and Vertigo down the list-well down the list.
7. L'Atalante
| Jean VIGO | 1934
The
following films are not in my top 100, but they are close enough to my top 100
to be worthy picks.
14. Sunrise:
A Song of Two Humans | F.W. MURNAU | 1927
I
like the following films a lot, but they are clearly below my top 100.
15. Psycho | Alfred HITCHCOCK | 1960
15. Psycho | Alfred HITCHCOCK | 1960
16. Imitation
of Life | Douglas SIRK | 1959 | I
slightly prefer the 1934 version by John M. Stahl, but I like this version as
well.
17. North
by Northwest | Alfred HITCHCOCK | 1959 | For
some reason, I prefer black and white Hitchcock films to Hitchcock films in
color. Two color films are
exceptions. This is one of them.
21. Rear Window
| Alfred HITCHCOCK | 1954 | This
is the other exception to my rule about preferring black and white Hitchcock
films to color films.
22. Bicycle
Thieves | Vittorio DE SICA | 1948 | I
prefer Umberto D to this film, but both are very good.
The
following films are clearly better than the typical film that I see, even
though I rarely watch films that are not critically acclaimed.
24. Wild
Strawberries | Ingmar BERGMAN | 1957 | This
film ranks high mostly because of Victor Sjöström's performance.
30. Nashville |
Robert ALTMAN | 1975
There
are many good films available and my time is limited, so I try to watch only
good films. This means that I tend to
have high standards for what I watch.
The following films comfortably meet those standards.
33. Intolerance
| D.W. GRIFFITH | 1916 | I
like this film even though it spawned one of my least favorite genres, the
collection of loosely short films edited together. I have not seen either The Fall of Babylon
(1919) or The Mother and the Law (1919) versions. My guess is that The Fall of Babylon would
probably fall about 12 to 15 slots higher on this list, and The Mother and the
Law would fall about the same distance lower on this list. The other two sequences were too incomplete
for me to know how I would rate them if they were expanded to their own films.
35. Greed | Erich
VON STROHEIM | 1924 | I
have seen only the 140-minute version. I
know that the full eight-hour version is a holy grail among film
enthusiasts. I would be interested in
seeing this version if it were ever found, but I do not know if I would like
it. Often, films are very long because
the director got self-indulgent and included material that would have better
been left on the cutting room floor.
51. Stalker | Andrei
TARKOVSKY | 1979 | I
consider Tarkovsky to be one of the most overrated directors of all time. His films are often the epitome of the
self-indulgence that I talked about above with Greed. I understand that he includes slow sequences
so that the audience can think about what is being presented. I think that he needs to give the audience
more credit. If a film presents me with
interesting things to think about, I will think about them on my way home from
the theater and later that day. I do not
need to endure a pointless sequence during the film in order to think about
something that took place earlier.
Still, I find Stalker to be Tarkovsky's best and most thought-provoking
film.
52. Partie
de Campagne | Jean RENOIR | 1936
The
following films are better than most films available, but I can find ways to
nitpick them.
55. The General
| Clyde BRUCKMAN & Buster KEATON | 1927 | I
appreciate the parts of this film that other people like. However, I cannot get past the fact that
Keaton's character sided with those who were fighting to perpetuate a system of
chattel slavery. As a result, I rooted
for the antagonists in this film. Das
Boot did a much better job at getting me to identify with people fighting for
an evil cause.
59. L'Avventura
| Michelangelo ANTONIONI | 1960 | My
interest in this film when watching it was roughly equal to the interest the
main characters had in finding their lost companion. In other words, as their interest waned, so
did mine.
60. Tokyo Story
| OZU Yasujirō | 1953 | I
prefer I Was Born, but. to the two Ozu films that Sight & Sound voters
preferred.
61. The
Passion of Joan of Arc | Carl Th. DREYER | 1928 | There
are genres that lend themselves to silent film.
The courtroom drama is not one of them.
64. Late Spring
| OZU Yasujirō | 1949 | My
rating of this film was probably not helped by the fact that I saw this film
and another Ozu film with almost exactly the same plot (An Autumn Afternoon)
nearly back-to-back.
One
issue in creating this list is what to do about films that I have not
seen. The obvious answer would be to
skip them. After all, how would I know
where a film would rate if I have not seen it?
This would create two problems based on the scoring scheme used for this
project. First, it would mean that I
would be giving more points to a film that I have seen and dislike than to a
film that I have not seen but might like if I saw it. Second, the overall rankings would measure
how widely a film is seen as much as how much the film is liked by people who
have seen it. I decided to rank unseen
films but rank them conservatively. That
is, I suspect that most of the films below would rank higher than they rank on
this list if I were to see them. Within
the category below, I ranked the films based on how interested I am in seeing
each of them.
65. Shoah | Claude
LANZMANN | 1985 | Often,
long films mean a lot of self-indulgent garbage. However, this film covers such a broad topic
that it may justify its length.
66. Histoire(s)
du Cinéma | Jean-Luc GODARD | 1998 | This
series sounds fascinating, but, as someone who consolidates lists of great
films, I get annoyed every time I see this listed. It is a series of made-for-television
specials, not a film.
67. Beau Travail
| Claire DENIS | 1999 | Unless
I missed something, Claire Denis and Chantal Akerman are the only two female
directors on the Sight & Sound list.
My first film in the Alternative-100 list has two female directors. I just wish that there were more than two on
rest of my list.
75. Close-Up | Abbas
KIAROSTAMI | 1990
I
found the following films to be disappointing.
As a result, I rank them below films that I have not even seen yet.
76. Ordet | Carl
Th. DREYER | 1955
I
would have been OK if the one brother was simply believed that he was
Jesus. However, the miracles at the end
suggested that he might have been divine.
Regardless of whether one believes that the real Jesus was divine or
simply a man, one has to recognize that Jesus must have been incredibly
charismatic to attract the following that he had. Jesus did not go around whining about people
not respecting him the way that the brother did in this film.
77. A
Matter of Life and Death | P&P | 1946 | A
man dies during World War II and claims that he deserves a second chance because
he just fell in love. Tens of millions
of people died during World War II. Many
of them fell in love before dying. What
makes the main character in this film so special?
79. 2001:
A Space Odyssey | Stanley KUBRICK | 1968 | I
had to go down this far on Sight & Sound's list before listing my first
Kubrick film. Believe it or not, I
actually consider Kubrick to be one of my favorite filmmakers. Like with Hitchcock, I prefer Kubrick's black
and white films to his color films with a couple of exceptions. Unlike with Hitchcock, Sight & Sound
chose not to include the two exceptions (A Clockwork Orange and The Shining) on
it top-100 list and did not include any of Kubrick's black and white films.
80. The
Magnificent Ambersons | Orson WELLES | 1942 | It
is likely that the film that Welles intended to make would rank higher on this
list. I have to rank the film that I
saw.
82. Andrei
Rublev | Andrei TARKOVSKY | 1966 | I do
remember liking the bell-making segment of this film. I do not have much to say about any other
part of the film.
85. Barry Lyndon
| Stanley KUBRICK | 1975 | The
fact that I could not care less about the main character drove this film well
down the list.
88. Vertigo | Alfred
HITCHCOCK | 1958 | Sight
& Sound's #1 film of all time is not my least favorite film on its top-100
list, but it is much closer to the bottom than to the top. I noted earlier that I prefer black and white
Hitchcock films to color Hitchcock films with two exceptions. This is decidedly not one of them. I spent most of the film wanting to shout at
James Stewart to just get over his stupid obsession.
89. La Règle
du Jeu | Jean RENOIR | 1939 | I
found this film to be quite dated.
However, I could say the same for La Grande Illusion, but I liked that
film a lot. I have given up any attempt
to find consistency in what I like in films and just accept that I have
idiosyncratic tastes.
97. The
Colour of Pomegranates | Sergei PARAJANOV | 1968 | There
are various media that one can use to tell a story. Each medium lends itself to different
stories. It quickly became clear to me
that film was the wrong medium for what Parajanov was trying to do. This should not have been a film. This should have been a coffee-table book.
Alternative
100
- Across the Universe | Julie TAYMOR | 2007 | A cult film for Beatles fans. I am a Beatles fan, so I like it.
- Adam's Rib | George CUKOR | 1949
- The African Queen | John HUSTON | 1951
- AI: Artificial Intelligence | Steven SPIELBERG | 2001
- All About Eve | Joseph L. MANKIEWICZ | 1950
- All Quiet on the Western Front | Lewis MILESTONE | 1930
- American History X | Tony KAYE | 1998
- Annie Hall | Woody ALLEN | 1977 | I rate this film with Casablanca as one of the greatest screenplays of all time.
- Arsenic and Old Lace | Frank CAPRA | 1944
- Before Sunset | Richard LINKLATER | 2004
- Before the Rain | Milcho MANCHEVSKI | 1994 | I like the way that this film uses a circular plot rather than a linear plot as a way to show how events of the past will repeat themselves.
- Being John Malkovich | Spike JONZE | 1999
- Black Hawk Down | Ridley SCOTT | 2001
- Das Boot | Wolfgang PETERSEN | 1981 | As I noted above, this film does a good job at getting me to identify with people fighting for an evil cause.
- Boys Don't Cry | Kimberly PEIRCE | 1999
- Bringing Up Baby | Howard HAWKS | 1938
- Broadway Danny Rose | Woody ALLEN | 1984 | The helium-influenced shootout is one of the funniest scenes in any Woody Allen film.
- Bubba Ho-tep | Don COSCARELLI | 2002 | Who could resist an elderly Elvis and an elderly John F. Kennedy (with a skin pigment augmentation) fighting an Egyptian mummy in a nursing home?
- Bull Durham | Ron SHELTON | 1988
- A Clockwork Orange | Stanley KUBRICK | 1971 | I cannot say that I enjoyed watching this film, but it was very thought provoking.
- Crimes and Misdemeanors | Woody ALLEN | 1989
- The Day the Earth Stood Still | Robert WISE | 1951 | Perhaps the finest example of the use of science fiction to make a statement that one could not otherwise get away with saying in any other context.
- Dead Again | Kenneth BRANAGH | 1991
- Dead Man Walking | Tim ROBBINS | 1995
- Diva | Jean-Jacques BEINEIX | 1981
- Do the Right Thing | Spike LEE | 1989
- Dr. Strangelove | Stanley KUBRICK | 1964 | Much better than the two Kubrick films on Sight & Sound's list.
- Dogma | Kevin SMITH | 1999
- Duck Soup | Leo MCCAREY | 1933
- 11'09''01 – September 11 | various | 2002
- The Emperor and the Assassin | CHEN Kaige | 1998
- Fail-Safe |
Sidney LUMET | 1964
I have to admire the audacity of the ending. - Field of Dreams | Phil Alden ROBINSON | 1989
- Gallipoli | Peter WEIR | 1981 | Narrowly beats Breaker Morant as the best film in the "Australians upset at British treatment of Australian soldiers fighting British wars" genre.
- Gentleman's Agreement | Elia KAZAN | 1947 | People tend to underrate this film. It does beat the viewer over the head with its "Anti-Semitism is bad" theme, but it also shows how prejudice is perpetrated by good people who remain silent.
- Good Will Hunting | Gus VAN SANT | 1997
- GoodFellas | Martin SCORSESE | 1990
- The Grapes of Wrath | John FORD | 1940
- The Great Dictator | Charles CHAPLIN | 1940 | I prefer this film to the Chaplin films that made Sight & Sound's list even though this film gets a little preachy at the end.
- Hamlet | Kenneth BRANAGH | 1996
- Hannah and Her Sisters | Woody ALLEN | 1986
- Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2 | David YATES | 2011
- High Fidelity | Stephen FREARS | 2000
- Ikiru | KUROSAWA Akira | 1952
- In the Name of the Father | Jim SHERIDAN | 1993 | An always timely warning against overreacting without taking the time to think after a tragic event.
- An Inconvenient Truth | Davis GUGGENHEIM | 2006 | One of the most important films of the last decade.
- The Insider | Michael MANN | 1999
- It's a Wonderful Life | Frank CAPRA | 1946
- Jean de Florette | Claude BERRI | 1986 | I like the fact that this film dares us to root for two despicable characters.
- Kagemusha | KUROSAWA Akira | 1980
- The Kid Brother | Ted WILDE | 1927
- Laputa: Castle in the Sky | MIYAZAKI Hayao | 1986
- Life Is Beautiful | Roberto BENIGNI | 1997
- Lone Star | John SAYLES | 1996
- The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance | John FORD | 1962
- The Manchurian Candidate | John FRANKENHEIMER | 1962
- Manhattan | Woody ALLEN | 1979
- Memento | Christopher NOLAN | 2000 | Showing scenes in reverse order may seem like a gimmick, but it helped the audience understand what life was like for the main character.
- Menace II Society | HUGHES Brothers | 1993
- Million Dollar Baby | Clint EASTWOOD | 2004
- Les Misérables | Claude LELOUCH | 1995
- Much Ado About Nothing | Kenneth BRANAGH | 1993
- My Beautiful Laundrette | Stephen FREARS | 1985
- Nausicaä – Of the Valley of the Wind | MIYAZAKI Hayao | 1984
- Ninotchka | Ernst LUBITSCH | 1939
- Nixon | Oliver STONE | 1995
- Notorious | Alfred HITCHCOCK | 1946
- This is my favorite Hitchcock film.
- Of Mice and Men | Lewis MILESTONE | 1939
- Open Your Eyes | Alejandro AMENÁBAR | 1997
- Paths of Glory | Stanley KUBRICK | 1957 | I would have been a lot happier if Sight & Sound chose to include this film, Dr. Strangelove, and A Clockwork Orange on its Top-100 films list instead of the two Kubrick films that it did include. The Killing did not miss the Alternative 100 by much.
- Platoon | Oliver STONE | 1986
- Pleasantville | Gary ROSS | 1998
- Princess Mononoke | MIYAZAKI Hayao | 1997
- The Producers | Mel BROOKS | 1968
- Ran | KUROSAWA Akira | 1985
- The Remains of the Day | James IVORY | 1993
- Requiem for a Dream | Darren ARONOFSKY | 2000
- The Return of Martin Guerre | Daniel VIGNE | 1982
- Richard III | Richard LONCRAINE | 1995
- Run Lola Run | Tom TYKWER | 1998
- Sanjuro | KUROSAWA Akira | 1962
- Schindler's List | Steven SPIELBERG | 1993
- The Secret of Roan Inish | John SAYLES | 1994
- Shakespeare in Love | John MADDEN | 1998
- The Shawshank Redemption | Frank DARABONT | 1994
- Sicko | Michael MOORE | 2007 | Probably has the most emotional resonance of any Michael Moore film.
- The Sixth Sense | M. Night SHYAMALAN | 1999
- Sleeper | Woody ALLEN | 1973
- Sling Blade | Billy Bob THORNTON | 1996
- Spirited Away | MIYAZAKI Hayao | 2001 | I consider Hayao Miyazaki to be one of the greatest active filmmakers if not the greatest. I have four of his films in the Alternative 100, and My Neighbor Totoro came close to making the list.
- Sweet Smell of Success | Alexander MACKENDRICK | 1957
- Synecdoche, New York | Charlie KAUFMAN | 2008
- Toy Story 3 | Lee UNKRICH | 2010
- The Truman Show | Peter WEIR | 1998
- Ulee's Gold | Victor NUNEZ | 1997
- Umberto D. | Vittorio DE SICA | 1952
- Up | Pete DOCTER | 2009 | When I voted in the Beyond the Canon poll, I included (500) Days of Summer as because it was the best 2009 film I had seen up to that point. A few days later, I saw Up, and (500) Days of Summer ceased to be my favorite film of 2009. (500) Days of Summer would make an Alternative 150.
- Wages of Fear | Henri-Georges CLOUZOT | 1953
- Yojimbo | KUROSAWA Akira | 1961 | I not only heartily agree with Sight & Sound including Seven Samurai and Rashomon in its top-100 films, but I have proposed five additional Kurosawa films in my Alternative 100. Furthermore, I Live in Fear did not miss by Alternative 100 by much.
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