The British Film Institute’s (BFI) Sight & Sound magazine does a Greatest Films of All Time list every ten years. They poll both critics around the world and directors and create two lists. They have been doing this since 1952 when Bicycle Thieves was voted the greatest film then. The following lists have almost always had Citizen Kane as the top film until this year’s list. Alfred Hitchcock’s Vertigo has bumped Citizen Kane down to the number two spot.
This year’s list was voted on by 846 critics and 358 directors for a total of 2,045 different films that were voted on. The complete list will be released online August 15, after the Sight & Sound magazine has had a chance to sell. But for now here is the director’s top ten list.
Directors:
1. Tokyo Story
2 (tie). 2001: A Space Odyssey
2 (tie). Citizen Kane
4. 8 1/2
5. Taxi Driver
6. Apocalypse Now
7 (tie). The Godfather
7 (tie). Vertigo
9. Mirror
10. Bicycle Thieves
And here’s the critics top 50 list.
Critics:
1. Vertigo
2. Citizen Kane
3. Tokyo Story
4. The Rules of the Game
5. Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans
6. 2001: A Space Odyssey
7. The Searchers
8. Man with a Movie Camera
9. The Passion of Joan of Arc
10. 8 1/2
11. Battleship Potemkin
12. L’Atalante
13. Breathless
14. Apocalypse Now
15. Late Spring
16. Au Hasard Balthazar
17 (tie). Persona
17 (tie). Seven Samurai
19. Mirror
20. Singin’ in the Rain
21 (tie). L’Avventura
21 (tie). Contempt
21 (tie). The Godfather
24 (tie). In the Mood for Love
24 (tie). Ordet
26 (tie). Andrei Rublev
26 (tie). Rashomon
28. Mulhullond Dr.
29 (tie). Shoah
29 (tie). Stalker
31 (tie). The Godfather Part II
31 (tie). Taxi Driver
33. Bicycle Thieves
34. The General
35 (tie). Jeanne Dielman, 23 Quai du commerce Bruxelles
35 (tie). Metropolis
35 (tie). Psycho
35 (tie). Sátántangó
39 (tie). The 400 Blows
39 (tie). La Dolce Vita
41. Journey to Italy
42 (tie). Close-Up
42 (tie). Gertrud
42 (tie). Pather Panchali
42 (tie). Pierrot le fou
42 (tie). Play Time
42 (tie). Some Like it Hot
48 (tie). The Battle for Algiers
48 (tie). Histoire(s) du cinéma
50 (tie). City Lights
50 (tie). La Jetée
50 (tie). Ugetsu Monogatari
It’s interesting to see that Tokyo Story is on the top of director’s list with Vertigo at number 8. But when both lists are combined as the great people at the Home Theater Forum have done here, with the number votes, it’s still Vertigo that comes up on top.
HTF combination of the Sight and Sound Directors and Critics list:
Rank | TITLE | DIRECTOR | YEAR | # of Votes | Country |
1 | Vertigo | Hitchcock, Alfred | 1958 | 222 | USA |
2 | Citizen Kane | Welles, Orson | 1941 | 199 | USA |
3 | Tokyo Story | Ozu, Yasujiro | 1953 | 155 | Japan |
4 | 2001: A Space Odyssey | Kubrick, Stanley | 1968 | 132 | USA |
5 | 8 ½ | Fellini, Federico | 1963 | 104 | Italy |
6 | Rules of the Game | Renoir, Jean | 1939 | 100 | France |
7 | Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans | Murnau, F.W. | 1927 | 93 | USA |
8 | Apocalypse Now | Coppola, Francis Ford | 1979 | 86 | USA |
9 | Searchers, The | Ford, John | 1956 | 78 | USA |
10 | Singin’ in the Rain | Donen, Stanley | 1951 | 76 | USA |
11 | Godfather, The | Coppola, Francis Ford | 1972 | 74 | USA |
12 | Taxi Driver | Scorsese, Martin | 1976 | 72 | USA |
13 | Man With a Movie Camera | Vertov, Dziga | 1929 | 68 | USSR |
14 | Bicycle Thieves | De Sica, Vittorio | 1948 | 66 | Italy |
15 | Passion of Joan of Arc, The | Dreyer, Carl Theodor | 1927 | 65 | France |
16 | Battleship Potemkin | Eisenstein, Sergei | 1925 | 63 | USSR |
17 | Atalante, L’ | Vigo, Jean | 1934 | 58 | France |
18 | Breathless | Godard, Jean Luc | 1960 | 57 | France |
19 | Late Spring | Ozu, Yasujiro | 1949 | 50 | Japan |
20 | Au Hasard Balthazar | Bresson, Robert | 1966 | 49 | France |
21 | Persona | Bergman, Ingmar | 1966 | 48 | Sweden |
21 | Seven Samurai | Kuosawa, Akira | 1954 | 48 | Japan |
23 | Mirror | Tarkovsky, Andrei | 1974 | 47 | USSR |
24 | Avventura, L’ | Antonioni, Michelangelo | 1960 | 43 | Italy |
24 | Contempt | Godard, Jean Luc | 1963 | 43 | France |
26 | In the Mood for Love | Wong, Kar Wai | 2000 | 42 | Hong Kong |
26 | Ordet | Dreyer, Carl Theodor | 1955 | 42 | Denmark |
28 | Andrei Rublev | Tarkovsky, Andrei | 1966 | 41 | USSR |
28 | Rashomon | Kurosawa, Akira | 1950 | 41 | Japan |
30 | Mulholland Dr. | Lynch, David | 2001 | 40 | USA |
31 | Shoah | Lanzmann, Claude | 1985 | 39 | France |
31 | Stalker | Tarkovsky, Andrei | 1979 | 39 | USSR |
33 | Godfather Part II, The | Coppola, Francis Ford | 1974 | 38 | USA |
34 | General, The | Keaton, Buster & Bruckman, Clyde | 1926 | 35 | USA |
35 | Jeanne Dielman, 23 quai du Commerce 1080 Buxelles | Akerman, Chantal | 1975 | 34 | Belgium |
35 | Metropolis | Lang, Fritz | 1927 | 34 | Germany |
35 | Psycho | Hitchcock, Alfred | 1960 | 34 | USA |
35 | Sátántangó | Tarr, Bela | 1994 | 34 | Hungary |
39 | 400 Blows, The | Truffaut, Francois | 1959 | 33 | France |
39 | Dolce Vita, La | Fellini, Federico | 1960 | 33 | Italy |
41 | Journey to Italy | Rossellini, Roberto | 1954 | 32 | Italy |
42 | Close-Up | Kiarostami, Abbas | 1990 | 31 | Iran |
42 | Gertrud | Dreyer, Carl Theodor | 1964 | 31 | Denmark |
42 | Pather Panchali | Ray, Satyajit | 1955 | 31 | India |
42 | Pierrot le fou | Godard, Jean Luc | 1965 | 31 | France |
42 | Play Time | Tati, Jacques | 1967 | 31 | France |
42 | Some Like it Hot | Wilder, Billy | 1959 | 31 | USA |
48 | Battle of Algiers, The | Potecorvo, Gillo | 1966 | 30 | Italy |
48 | Histoire(s) du cinéma | Godard, Jean Luc | 1998 | 30 | France |
50 | City Lights | Chaplin, Charles | 1931 | 29 | USA |
50 | Jetée, La | Marker, Christopher | 1962 | 29 | France |
50 | Ugetsu monogatari | Mizoguchi, Kenji | 1953 | 29 | Japan |
“Mullholland Drive” over “Chinatown”. Seriously?
Mulholland
Not to agree or disagree with the BFI’s assessment, but I’d say that “Chinatown”‘s primary virtue is the quality of its screenplay, but its execution as a film (as skillful as it may be) is not particularly innovative. Arguably one of the greatest screenplays in American cinema, but not necessarily one of the greatest films in the canon if the criterion is pushing forward the medium.
Thanks, anonymusses. “Mulholland” it is.
It’d be interesting to see what the criteria are; I’m guessing that the article will/may give some indication.
When did The Bicycle Thief become Bicycle Thieves?
Emmet:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bicycle_Thieves#Translated_title
What blindness!
Um, any of these people heard of “Space Chimps”?
Seriously, it’s always interesting that the vast majority of these films are pre-1980. Do they also show the average age for the groups of voters? What a disconnect with popular opinion.
That’s actually kind of the point. You can have your Rotten Tomatoes and IMDB ratings, but this is something different.
@Bronymous #8: as the lists were apparently compiled by directors and film critics, I’m guessing that popular opinion wasn’t among the criteria for list placement.
There’s also nothing before 1925, which cuts out pioneers like D.W. Griffith. I’m surprised, too, to see that no mention of Abel Gance’s work. And “City Lights”? Please. “Modern Times” would get my vote.
The thing about popular opinion is that it flows and ebbs around what’s in the public consciousness from year to year, with much of it shaped by marketing, media saturation etc. There is a reason why the Sight & Sound list is labelled as “Greatest”, rather than “Popular”, and it would have to do more with promoting films that are critically recognized as advancing the medium, which isn’t necessarily popular with a mass audience (see: Bela Tarr). A “canon” that comes from critical consensus typically takes years to formulate, which is why you see so many so-called “older” films on the list. The IMDB Top 250 would be a list more suitable to evaluating what is currently popular.
Barb: “City Lights” was always more of a critics’ and filmmakers’ darling (the first Sight & Sound poll in 1952 had “City Lights” in the #2 slot). Personally, I don’t think you can go wrong with either “City Lights” or “Modern Times”.
D.W. Griffith is problematic for a lot of critics, as his most technically accomplished and influential film – “The Birth of a Nation” – of course was one of his most controversial. Similarly, despite its profound technical and stylistic influences, it would be impolitic (to say the least) to have Leni Riefenstahl’s “Triumph of the Will” similarly noted. It would probably be more fair and acceptable to cite Griffith and Riefenstahl on a “most influential directors” list rather than citing their films as “great”, but I suspect even that designation would generate controversy.
@anonymusses #12: no doubt the criteria will be at least touched upon in the magazine article. Your suggestion that a “most influential directors” list might lift a couple of great film-makers up out of the realm of political correctness is a sound one; after all, we acknowledge Neitzsche as a must-read philosopher, and Karl Marx as a must-read political economist, and look at what their influence has wrought. On a somewhat smaller scale, I give you Ezra Pound, recognized as a very influential poet and editor (of T.S. Eliot, for one), but also a traitor and a notorious anti-Semite.
Yes, always the eternal difficulty in separating the artist from the work: to bring it full circle, Polanski, and “Chinatown”.
Not to mention Woody Allen and every post-Soon-Yi Previn film.
And yes, I did appreciate the full circle.
Silent Running
Alfie 196?
Dirty Mary Crazy Larry
Yes, I get all that, it’s just interesting how much this list differs from the popular public opinion, that is all. No judgment, just an observation.
There’s nothing like a “best/worst” list to generate discussion, is there?
Yes, especially because taste is unique to each individual. “Bloodsport” not being on this list is a tragedy.