100 Films

One thing I'll say for the AFI's big list hoopla - suddenly, everybody's doing it. Maybe it's coincidence in some cases - like this monster list from the Guardian, 1000 Films to see before you die (which with 1000 films to play with manages to leave out City Lights, All Quiet on the Western Front, Fires on the Plain, any Hou Hsiao Hsien, so far... right. Edward Yang made it though! hooray! And Amelie... and, oh yeah - no Blessed Event and Bombshell - any list with 1000 films and no Lee Tracy, ain't worth shit. Maybe Night Mayor will sneak in.) Meanwhile, lists directly inspired by the AFI list, like this one from the Alliance of Women Film Journalists, are turning up, and journalists and bloggers are joining in the fun with a gusto - Anne Thompson at Variety; Edward Copeland (top 100); The Shamus (top 100 not on the AFI list); the Self Styled Siren (top 100 not on the AFI 400 nominees); Thrilling Days of Yesteryear (top 100) - with more lists promised, say, by Damien at Windmills of my Mind. I dropped hints myself the other day, and tonight, my friends, you will see the result.

This is what happened ten years ago - people went round and round for weeks about what should be on the list, what shouldn't - and posted, some of them, their own lists. And not to quote myself again - but composite lists "iron out all the oddball films, the marginal films, the individual tastes" - they may help sketch in what is important, but the conversation always gets more interesting when you see what all us various film geeks like.

And so - here goes. 100 films; all American (I may supplement this with a world wide list in the future); in order, more or less, though it's hard to say how far that should be taken. Art isn't really a competition, so orders of merit are more for fun and as a kind of gauge of - something, a sign of what we value in art, more than a measure of the value of the art. But I do love lists. So here you go.

1) It's a Wonderful Life - 1946 - Frank Capra
2) Mr. Smith Goes to Washington - 1939 - Frank Capra
3) McCabe and Mrs Miller - 1971 - Robert Altman
4) The General - 1925 - Buster Keaton & Clyde Bruckman
5) Vertigo - 1958 - Alfred Hitchcock
6) Maltese Falcon - 1940 - John Huston
7) Duck Soup - 1933 - Leo McCarey
8) His Girl Friday - 1940 - Howard Hawks
9) Blue Velvet - 1986 - David Lynch
10) Woman Under the Influence - 1974 - John Cassavetes.
11) Nashville - 1975 - Robert Altman
12) Touch of Evil - 1958 - Orson Welles
13) Rear Window - 1954 - Alfred Hitchcock
14) Searchers - 1956 - John Ford
15) Rushmore - 1998 - Wes Anderson
16) Big Sleep - 1946 - Howard Hawks
17) Bride of Frankenstein - 1935 - James Whale
18) Sweet Smell of Success - 1959 - Alexander McKendrick
19) Citizen Kane - 1940 - Orson Welles
20) The Gold Rush - 1925 - Charlie Chaplin
21) Killer of Sheep - 1977 - Charles Burnett
22) Fort Apache - 1948 - John Ford
23) Elephant Man - 1980 - David Lynch
24) Night of the Hunter - 1955 - Charles Laughton
25) Rebel without a Cause - 1955 - Nicholas Ray
26) Imitation of Life - 1959 - Douglas Sirk
27) Killing of a Chinese Bookie - 1976 - John Cassavetes
28) The Long Goodbye - 1973 - Robert Altman
29) Inland Empire - 2006 - David Lynch
30) Love Me Tonight - 1932 - Rouben Mamoulian
31) Night at the Opera - 1935 - Sam Wood
32) Doctor Strangelove - 1963 - Stanley Kubrick
33) Trouble in Paradise - 1932 - Ernst Lubitsch
34) Frankenstein - 1931 - James Whale
35) Bringing Up Baby - 1938 - Howard Hawks
36) The Conversation - 1974 - Francis Ford Coppola
37) Some Like it Hot - 1959 - Billy Wilder
38) Saint Jack - 1979 - Peter Bogdanovich
39) Platinum Blonde - 1931 - Frank Capra
40) Top Hat - 1935 - Mark Sandrich
41) The Awful Truth - 1937 - Leo McCarey
42) The Asphalt Jungle - 1950 - John Huston
43) Written on the Wind - 1956 - Douglas Sirk
44) Birth of a Nation - 1915 - DW Griffith
45) Do the Right thing - 1989 - Spike Lee
46) Eraserhead - 1977 - David Lynch
47) Our Hospitality - 1923 - Buster Keaton
48) Broken Blossoms - 1919 - DW Griffith
49) Chelsea Girls - 1966 - Andy Warhol
50) Mean Streets - 1973 - Martin Scorsese
51) Sherlock Jr. - 1924 - Buster Keaton
52) Brazil - 1985 - Terry Gilliam
53) The Lady Eve - 1941 - Preston Sturges
54) Greed - 1925 - Erich von Stroheim
55) Trash - 1970 - Paul Morrissey
56) Treasure of the Sierra Madre - 1948 - John Huston
57) All Quiet on the Western Front - 1930 - Lewis Milestone
58) Big Red One (Restored) - 1982/2004 - Sam Fuller
59) Blessed Event - 1932 - Roy Del Ruth
60) Charlie Verrick - 1973 - Don Siegel
61) Gay Divorcee - 1934 - Mark Sandrich
62) Blade Runner - 1981 - Ridley Scott
63) Dead Man - 1996 - Jim Jarmusch
64) The Godfather - 1972 - Francis Ford Coppola
65) Wizard of Oz - 1939 - Victor Fleming
66) The Killing - 1955 - Stanley Kubrick
67) Tabu - 1931 - FW Murnau & Robert Flaherty
68) African Queen - 1951 - John Huston
69) The Freshman - 1925 - Fred Newmeyer & Sam Taylor
70) Golddiggers of 1933 - 1933 - Mervyn LeRoy
71) Mulholland Drive - 2001 - David Lynch
72) Horsefeathers - 1932 - Norman McLeod
73) The Shop Around the Corner - 1940 - Ernst Lubitsch
74) To Have and Have Not - 1944 - Howard Hawks
75) Palm Beach Story - 1940 - Preston Sturges
76) Chinatown - 1974 - Roman Polanski
77) Dracula - 1931 - Todd Browning
78) Psycho - 1960 - Alfred Hitchcock
79) Lolita - 1962 - Stanley Kubrick
80) Othello - 1955 - Orson Welles
81) Twentieth Century - 1934 - Howard Hawks
82) Sunrise - 1927 - FW Murnau
83) Raiders of the Lost Ark - 1981 - Steven Spielberg
84) The Producers - 1968 - Mel Brooks
85) It Happened One Night - 1934 - Frank Capra
86) Full Metal Jacket - 1987 - Stanley Kubrick
87) Badlands - 1973 - Terrence Malick
88) Notorious - 1944 - Alfred Hitchcock
89) King Kong - 1933 - Merian C Cooper
90) Steamboat Bill Jr. - 1928 - Buster Keaton
91) This is Spinal Tap - 1984 - Rob Reiner
92) Stagecoach - 1939 - John Ford
93) Sunset Boulevard - 1950 - Billy Wilder
94) Taxi Driver - 1976 - Martin Scorsese
95) Pulp Fiction - 1994 - Quentin Tarantino
96) Morocco - 1930 - Josef von Sternberg
97) Bombshell - 1933 - Victor Fleming
98) Groundhog Day - 1993 - Ivan Reitman
99) Letter from an Unknown Woman - 1948 - Max Ophuls
100) Faces - 1968 - John Cassavetes