Some of my favorite films, by year:
- The Thin Man
(1934, Van Dyke)
- It Happened One Night (1934, Capra) stars Clark Gable in a romantic comedy, of all things.
- The 39 Steps
(1935, Hitchcock) fits nicely in a triple feature with Young and
Innocent (1937) and North by
Northwest (1959).
- My Man Godfrey
(1936, La Cava)
- La Belle Équipe (1936,
Duvivier)
- Young and Innocent
(1937, Hitchcock) is the best Hitchcock film, with no stars and not much plot.
- Bringing Up Baby
(1938, Hawks)
- The Wizard of Oz
(1939; Fleming, Thorpe, Vidor)
- His Girl Friday
(1940, Hawks) is a showcase for the virtuosic verbal talents of vaudeville import Cary Grant.
- The Maltese Falcon
(1941, Huston) is the second-best noir, and better than Citizen Kane (also 1941).
- Casablanca
(1942, Curtiz) is an overrated B-movie, but still one of the greatest ever made.
- The Palm Beach Story
(1942, Sturges), a nonstop ride (via train, yacht, and plane from New York to Palm Beach), is a delightful screwball comedy.
- Shadow of a Doubt
(1943, Hitchcock)
- Arsenic and Old Lace
(1944, Capra)
- Children of [the] Paradise
(1945, Carné) is a long romantic tragedy about a mime, but you will love it anyway.
- The Big Sleep
(1946, Hawks), coscripted by Faulkner, is the best film noir, and my favorite movie.
- Green for Danger
(1946, Gilliat) is a crime story set in WW2 England, and is an enduring testament to the genius of Alistair Sim.
- Out of the Past (1947, Tourneur) is
a strong noir with Bob Mitchum and Kirk Douglas.
- The Bicycle Thief
(1948, DeSica)
- I Was a Male War Bride
(1949, Hawks), starring Cary Grant, is a hilarious comedy of errors based on a true story.
- Harvey
(1950, Koster), adapted from the Pulitzer-Prize-winning play about a doddering lunatic who manages to charm everyone, was Reagan's favorite movie.
- Strangers on a Train
(1951, Hitchcock)
- High Noon
(1952, Zinnemann)
- Narrow Margin
(1952, Fleischer) is a stuck-on-a-train adventure movie, made great through the skills of the editor
(in this case, Swink), though only the writers
were nominated for an Oscar.
- Shane
(1953, Stevens) is the paradigmatic western, often imitated, never surpassed.
- Seven Samurai
(1954, Kurosawa) is a Japanese western, with depth.
- Dial M for Murder
(1954, Hitchcock)
- Night of the Hunter
(1955, Laughton) stars Robert Mitchum as an eerily charismatic stepfather who will do anything to find a cache of
money. Features tatoos referred to in Do the Right Thing
and Punch-Drunk Love, among
other films.
- To Catch a Thief
(1955, Hitchcock) stars Cary Grant and Grace Kelly in the south of France.
- Baby Doll
(1956, Kazan) is a bizarre and hilarious story of a child bride and her husband Karl Malden's xenophobia.
- Nights of Cabiria (1957, Fellini) is a
maddening and heart-breaking story of a kind, half-witted, and indomitable prostitute.
- An Affair to Remember
(1957, McCarey) is a shot-by-shot remake of
Love Story,
and thus another overwrought tearjerker, but Deborah Kerr and Cary Grant are just too good to miss.
- Touch of Evil
(1958, Welles) features Heston as a Mexican policeman who is caught up in the fall of a reknowned policeman (Welles). The long opening tracking shot is the single most famous shot in film history.
- Indiscreet
(1958, Donen) is a delightful farce starring Ingrid Bergman and Cary Grant
in an ambiguously extramarital affair spread in high fashion between Paris and London. Donen wanted to show them
talking in bed together, but the studio wouldn't allow it, so he developed the split-screen technique reused in
When Harry Met Sally, among others.
- North by Northwest
(1959, Hitchcock) is another mistaken-identity offering by Hitchcock, but Cary Grant makes it great.
- Black Orpheus (1959, Camus)
- Tiger Bay (1959, Thompson).
A small girl witnesses a Polish sailor killing his girlfriend, then he pursues her. Riveting.
- Our Man in Havana
(1959, Reed), starring the incomparable Alec Guiness (well, we might compare him to Alistair Sim),
is a perfectly hilarious and suspenseful adaptation of the Graham Greene novel.
Try a double feature with The Fallen Idol (1948),
also a good movie, and also written by Greene, but (oddly enough) poorly adapted from
his short story of the same name.
- La Dolce Vita (1960, Fellini)
- L'Avventura
(1960, Antonioni) is an obscure and beautiful study in fickleness.
- The Hustler
(1961, Rossen), with shots by Mosconi, is a Greek tragedy in a seedy pool hall.
- Lawrence of Arabia
(1962, Lean) is cinematography at its best.
- The Birds
(1963, Hitchcock) is a compelling suspense, yet still amusing, especially in retrospect.
- 8½
(1963, Fellini)
- My Fair Lady
(1964, Cukor) is a truly impressive musical with Audrey Hepburn.
- The Train
(1964, Frankenheimer) is a well shot and fastpaced adventure in which the
Resistance tries to stop a Nazi train without damaging its contents.
- Doctor Zhivago
(1965, Cukor) is a heartbreaking epic, starring Julie Christie (c.f.
Afterglow), which is better than the book.
- A Man for All Seasons
(1966, Zinnemann)
- Persona
(1966, Bergman) is a showcase for Liv Ullmann, who steals the movie without speaking.
- The Graduate
(1967, Nichols) is somewhat dated, but still worth watching more than once.
- The Producers
(1968, Brooks) features the best Nazi musical ever made.
- The Damned
(1969, Visconti)
- The Passion of Anna
(1969, Bergman)
- The Conformist
(1970, Bertolucci) is a complex Italian psycho-social thriller.
- Il Giardino dei Finzi-Contini
(1970, De Sica), a Hollywood-style tragedy, is a pre-Holocaust Italian love story.
- Harold and Maude
(1971, Ashby) is a dated but still hilarious and tragic dark comedy.
- The Godfather
(1972, 1974, 1990; Coppola). Goes without saying, really.
- Sleuth
(1972, Mankiewicz), a long-running play, translated to film extremely well.
- The Sting
(1973, Hill) is a charming period piece about con men and gangsters.
- Badlands
(1973, Malick), set in 1959, is the best American serial-killer movie, with superb acting, direction, and cinematography.
- Chinatown
(1974, Polanski) is a technicolor noir with Jack Nicholson.
- Monty Python and the Holy Grail
(1975; Gilliam, Jones) is very silly and painfully funny.
- L'argent de poche
(1976, Truffaut) is a snapshot of childhood comedy and tragedy, well worth seeing 25 times.
- Taxi Driver
(1976, Scorsese) stars Jodie Foster and De Niro as perfect candidates for commitment.
- Star Wars
(1977,1980,1983,1999,2002; Lucas) was good, and the sequels were better. The prequels are only fair.
- Special Delivery
(1978, Eunice Macaulay, John Weldon) is a hilarious animated short that could probably be made into a
feature film.
- Apocalypse Now
(1979, Coppola) is Heart of Darkness in Vietnam, with Ride of the Valkyries and death all around.
- Raging Bull
(1980, Scorsese) stars De Niro as Jake La Motta, perhaps the best boxer ever, in all his squalor.
- Time Bandits
(1981, Gilliam) is a bizarre romp through time with midget thieves, good enough to see 8 times in the
first 3 weeks after release.
- Blade Runner
(1982, Scott) is a great science fiction dystopian romantic thriller.
- Gandhi
(1982, Attenborough) deserved all its accolades, and more.
- The Big Chill
(1983, Kasdan), an improvement on
Return of the Secaucus 7,
puts old friends back together for a long weekend.
- Choose Me
(1984, Rudolph) is a crazy randomized romance.
- Stranger Than Paradise
(1984, Jarmusch) has the best one-track soundtrack ever, and is a slow-paced black-and-white
masterpiece.
- The Big Snit (1985, Condie) is the funniest
animated short of all time, about a couple playing Scrabble.
- Silverado
(1985, Kasdan), a stellar Western, follows familiar formulae but excels. Linda Hunt stands out, as always.
- After Hours
(1985, Scorsese) traps Griffin Dunne in Soho for a very long nerve-wracking and hilarious night.
- Brazil
(1985, Gilliam) is a dark dystopian comedy. Think Kafka and Orwell meet Philip K. Dick.
- Mona Lisa
(1986, Jordan)
- Wings of Desire
(1987, Wenders) stars the brilliant Bruno Ganz as an angel who falls in love with a mortal. The pseudosequel
Faraway So Close is also good. The American remake
City of Angels is crap.
- Pathfinder
(1987, Gaup) is a Star-Wars-style epic set in medieval Lappland, and filmed in the Lapp
language.
- House of Games
(1987, Mamet)
- Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown
(1988, Almodóvar)
- Do the Right Thing
(1989, Spike Lee). I stayed for two showings the day I first saw it.
- The Cook, the Thief, His Wife, & Her Lover
(1989, Greenaway) is a stunningly beautiful and violent film centered on a secret love triangle that leads to
multiple revenge killings. A large screen and good sound system are required.
- Say Anything
(1989, Crowe)
- Life is Sweet
(1990, Leigh) is a shockingly good and slow-paced ensemble piece with much improv in a strong English accent.
- Miller's Crossing
(1990, Coen)
- The Grifters
(1990, Frears) is a gut-wrenching tale about con men. Makes a good triple feature with
House of Games and The Sting.
- Mo' Better Blues
(1990, Spike Lee)
- La Femme Nikita
(1990, Besson) is a thrilling story of a junkie turned assassin.
- Zentropa (1991, von Trier) is not for the faint of heart,
though not nearly so hard on the psyche as Breaking the Waves.
- Silence of the Lambs
(1991, Demme) features an overrated performance by Hopkins, and an underrated one by Ted Levine.
- LA Story
(1991, Jackson) is Steve Martin at his best and worst, in a flawed movie worth watching 100 times.
- The Player
(1992, Altman)
- The Last Days of Chez Nous
(1992, Armstrong)
- The Piano
(1993, Campion) is a heart-wrenching and beautiful love-triangle period piece.
- Naked
(1993, Leigh)
- Groundhog Day
(1993, Ramis) is a brilliantly written must-see comedy with mediocre acting.
- The Fugitive (1993, Davis)
is a predictable thriller that is huge fun, especially with surround sound.
- Burnt by the Sun
(1994, Mikhalkov) is the story of a Russian general whose family is torn apart by a Stalinist purge.
- The Professional
(1994, Besson) is a violent masterpiece with Natalie Portman in her first and still best role.
- Persuasion
(1995, Michell) is the best of the fin-de-siècle run of Jane Austen adaptations.
- Sense and Sensibility
(1995, Ang Lee) features superb acting and direction, and is almost as good as
Persuasion.
- Kicking and Screaming
(1995, Baumbach)
- Twelve Monkeys
(1995, Gilliam)
- Get Shorty
(1995, Sonnenfeld)
- Bottle Rocket
(1996, W. Anderson)
- Flirting with Disaster
(1996, Russell)
- Breaking the Waves
(1996, von Trier) is slow and tortuous and torturous, but breathtakingly good.
- Afterglow
(1997, Rudolph)
- Smilla's Sense of Snow
(1997, August), a masterpiece of cinematography, loses much in translation to video.
- The Ice Storm
(1997, Ang Lee)
- Rushmore
(1998, W. Anderson)
- Three Kings (1999, Russell) is a brilliant war heist movie, using some of the same tricks as The Matrix to much better effect.
- The Matrix (1999, Wachowski) is a derivative
science fiction melange, with elements of The Terminator
and the writing of William Gibson, which is nonetheless astonishingly well-made.
- American Beauty
(1999, Mendes) is an ironic and utterly mad comic tragedy.
- Being John Malkovich (1999)
- Magnolia
(1999, P. T. Anderson)
- Memento
(2000, Nolan) is a masterpiece of screenwriting, in which a man with no capacity to form new memories hunts his wife's killer.
- Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
(2000, Ang Lee) is a clever and perfectly executed hommage to the balletic kung-fu genre. It is fitting that the pioneer Yuen Wo Ping, responsible for the seminal Drunken Master, choreographs.
- Lord of the Rings:
Fellowship of the Ring (2001, Jackson), and
The Two Towers
(2002 Jackson), are both better than the books, which were in need of synopsis.
- The Good Girl
(2002, Arteta) embodies love and squalor in a small-town strip-mall five-and-dime, with superb
performances all around.
- Punch-Drunk Love
(2002, P. T. Anderson) is based on a true news item, with Magnolia-style weirdness and brilliant comic moments.
- Eternal
Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004, Gondry; Kaufman)