Hall of Fame

The following is a list of all the **** movies (my highest rating) I've ever seen, as closely as I can recall. All of these are for me bona fide masterworks. All of them I admire; some I both admire and love. But they all exhibit what I consider to be the highest caliber of cinematic expertise. This is an ongoing list that I update from time to time.

SILENT:
Battleship Potemkin (Eisenstein)
The Passion of Joan of Arc (Dreyer)
The Last Laugh (Murnau)
Our Hospitality (Keaton)
Sherlock, Jr. (Keaton)
The General (Keaton)
The Freshman (Lloyd)
For Heaven's Sake (Lloyd)
The Kid Brother (Lloyd)
The Gold Rush (Chaplin)
Sunrise (Murnau)
(The Complete) Metropolis (Lang)
City Lights (Chaplin)
Modern Times (Chaplin)

AMERICAN:
The Front Page (Milestone)
Frankenstein (Whale)
Dr. Jeckyll and Mr. Hyde (Mamoulian)
Love Me Tonight (Mamoulian)
Trouble in Paradise (Lubitsch)
Little Women (Cukor)
Duck Soup (McCarey)
Sons of the Desert (Seiter)
Gold Diggers of 1933 (LeRoy)
The Invisible Man (Whale)
The Thin Man (Van Dyke)
It Happened One Night (Capra)
Twentieth Century (Hawks)
It's a Gift (McLeod)
The Bride of Frankenstein (Whale)
The Informer (Ford)
David Copperfield (Cukor)
Ruggles of Red Gap (McCarey)
My Man Godfrey (LaCava)
Dodsworth (Wyler)
Top Hat (Sandrich)
Swing Time (Stevens)
Camille (Cukor)
The Awful Truth (McCarey)
A Star Is Born (Wellman)
Lost Horizon (Capra)
Stage Door (LaCava)
Bringing Up Baby (Hawks)
Holiday (Cukor)
The Adventures of Robin Hood (Curtiz)
Ninotchka (Lubitsch)
Midnight (Leisen)
Gone With the Wind (Fleming)
Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (Capra)
Destry Rides Again (Marshall)
The Wizard of Oz (Fleming)
Stagecoach (Ford)

The Philadelphia Story (Cukor)
Rebecca (Hitchcock)
Foreign Correspondent (Hitchcock)
The Grapes of Wrath (Ford)
The Shop Around the Corner (Lubitsch)
The Letter (Wyler)
Citizen Kane (Welles)
His Girl Friday (Hawks)
The Maltese Falcon (Huston)
Here Comes Mr. Jordan (Hall)
The Little Foxes (Wyler)
The Magnificent Ambersons (Welles)
Sullivan's Travels (Sturges)
The Palm Beach Story (Sturges)
Casablanca (Curtiz)
To Have and Have Not (Hawks)
Double Indemnity (Wilder)
The Miracle of Morgan's Creek (Sturges)
Meet Me in St. Louis (Minnelli)
Laura (Preminger)
The Lost Weekend (Wilder)
And Then There Were None (Clair)
Mildred Pierce (Curtiz)
The Best Years of Our Lives (Wyler)
The Killers (Siodmak)
The Big Sleep (Hawks)
My Darling Clementine (Ford)
Notorious (Hitchcock)
It's a Wonderful Life (Capra)
Body and Soul (Rossen)
Monsieur Verdoux (Chaplin)
Miracle on 34th Street (Seaton)
Out of the Past (Tourneur)
The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (Huston)
The Snake Pit (Litvak)
Red River (Hawks)
White Heat (Walsh)
The Heiress (Wyler)
Twelve O'Clock High (King)
Adam's Rib (Cukor)
On the Town (Donen/Kelly)

All About Eve (Mankiewizc)
Sunset Boulevard (Wilder)
The Day the Earth Stood Still (Wise)
Father of the Bride (Minnelli)
A Streetcar Named Desire (Kazan)
Strangers on a Train (Hitchcock)
The Asphalt Jungle (Huston)
Singin' in the Rain (Donen/Kelly)
High Noon (Zinneman)
Pickup on South Street (Fuller)
The Band Wagon (Minnelli)
From Here to Eternity (Zinneman)
Roman Holiday (Wyler)
The Naked Spur (Mann)
Shane (Stevens)
On the Waterfront (Kazan)
A Star Is Born (Cukor)
Rear Window (Hitchcock)
Night of the Hunter (Laughton)
Marty (Mann)
Kiss Me Deadly (Aldrich)
East of Eden (Kazan)
Rebel Without a Cause (Ray)
Invasion of the Body Snatchers (Siegel)
The Killing (Kubrick)
Lust for Life (Minnelli)
The Bridge on the River Kwai (Lean)
Paths of Glory (Kubrick)
Funny Face (Donen)
Gigi (Minnelli)
Touch of Evil (Welles)
Vertigo (Hitchcock)
Anatomy of a Murder (Preminger)
North by Northwest (Hitchcock)
Some Like It Hot (Wilder)

The Apartment (Wilder)
Psycho (Hitchcock)
A Raisin in the Sun (Petrie)
West Side Story (Wise/Robbins)
The Hustler (Rossen)
Lawrence of Arabia (Lean)
Long Day's Journey into Night (Lumet)
The Miracle Worker (Penn)
Ride the High Country (Peckinpah)
The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance (Ford)
The Trial (Welles)
Hud (Ritt)
America, America (Kazan)
Dr. Strangelove (Kubrick)
Zorba the Greek (Cacoyannis)
Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (Nichols)
A Man for All Seasons (Zinneman)
Bonnie and Clyde (Penn)
Point Blank (Boorman)
Rosemary's Baby (Polanski)

M*A*S*H (Altman)
Five Easy Pieces (Rafelson)
Little Big Man (Penn)
The Last Picture Show (Bogdanovich)
McCabe and Mrs. Miller (Altman)
Cabaret (Fosse)
The Godfather (Coppola)
American Graffiti (Lucas)
Mean Streets (Scorsese)
Chinatown (Polanski)
The Godfather, Part II (Coppola)
The Conversation (Coppola)
Thieves Like Us (Altman)
Nashville (Altman)
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (Forman)
Barry Lyndon (Kubrick)
Taxi Driver (Scorsese)
All the President's Men (Pakula)
Star Wars (Lucas)
Interiors (Allen)
Days of Heaven (Malick)
Manhattan (Allen)
Kramer vs. Kramer (Benton)

Tess (Polanski)
The Elephant Man (Lynch)
Atlantic City (Malle)
E.T. (Spielberg)
Tootsie (Pollack)
Terms of Endearment (Brooks)
The Purple Rose of Cairo (Allen)
Hannah and Her Sisters (Allen)
Blue Velvet (Lynch)
The Last Emperor (Bertolucci)
The Dead (Huston)
Dangerous Liaisons (Frears)

GoodFellas (Scorsese)
The Piano (Campion)
Quiz Show (Redford)
L.A. Confidential (Hansen)
The Thin Red Line (Malick)

Mulholland Dr. (Lynch)
In the Bedroom (Field)
Sideways (Payne)
The New World (Malick)
There Will Be Blood (Anderson)
The Tree of Life (Malick)
Boyhood (Linklater)

BRITISH:
The 39 Steps (Hitchcock)
The Lady Vanishes (Hitchcock)
Pygmalion (Asquith/Howard)
The Thief of Baghdad (Powell et al.)
In Which We Serve (Lean/Coward)
Went the Day Well? (Cavalcanti)
The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp (Powell)
Brief Encounter (Lean)
Blithe Spirit (Lean)
I Know Where I'm Going! (Powell)
Dead of Night (Cavalcanti et al.)
A Matter of Life and Death (Powell)
Odd Man Out (Reed)
Great Expectations (Lean)
Oliver Twist (Lean)
Hamlet (Olivier)
The Fallen Idol (Reed)
The Red Shoes (Powell)
The Third Man (Reed)
Kind Hearts and Coronets (Hamer)
Scrooge (Hurst)
The Magic Box (Boulting)
The River (Renoir)
The Tales of Hoffmann (Powell)
The Importance of Being Earnest (Asquith)
The Ladykillers (Mackendrick)
Room at the Top (Clayton)
Peeping Tom (Powell)
Sons and Lovers (Cardiff)
The Entertainer (Richardson)
The Innocents (Clayton)
Saturday Night and Sunday Morning (Reisz)
Whistle Down the Wind (Forbes)
A Taste of Honey (Richardson)
The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner (Richardson)
The L-Shaped Room (Forbes)
Tom Jones (Richardson)
King and Country (Losey)
The Servant (Losey)
Heavens Above (Boulting)
A Hard Day's Night (Lester)
Repulsion (Polanski)
Darling (Schlesinger)
Romeo and Juliet (Zeffirelli)
Women in Love (Russell)
Sunday Bloody Sunday (Schlesinger)
The Life of Brian (Jones)
Brazil (Gilliam)
Room with a View (Ivory)
Hope and Glory (Boorman)
Howard's End (Ivory)
The Crying Game (Jordan)
Secrets and Lies (Leigh)

FOREIGN LANGUAGE (BY COUNTRY):
L'Atalante (Vigo)
Le Million (Clair)
A Nous la Liberté (Clair)
Pépé le Moko (Duvivier)
Quai des Brûmes (Carné)
Le Jour se Lève (Carné)
La Grande Illusion (Renoir)
La Règle du Jeu (Renoir)
Les Enfants du Paradis (Carné)
The Beauty and the Beast (Cocteau/Clément)
Jour de Fête (Tati)
La Ronde (Ophuls)
Madame de (Ophuls)
The Golden Coach (Renoir)
Forbidden Games (Clément)
Casque d'Or (Becker)
The Wages of Fear (Clouzot)
Les Vacances de Monsieur Hulot (Tati)
Touchez Pas au Grisbi (Becker)
Les Diaboliques (Clouzot)
Bob le Flambeur (Melville)
Lola Montès (Ophuls)
Rififi (Dassin)
A Man Escaped (Bresson)
Mon Oncle (Tati)
Hiroshima, Mon Amour (Resnais)
The 400 Blows (Truffaut)
Shoot the Piano Player (Truffaut)
Jules and Jim (Truffaut)
The Fire Within (Malle)
The Umbrellas of Cherbourg (Demy)
Yoyo (Étaix)
Play Time (Tati)
Le Deuxième Souffle (Melville)
Le Samouraï (Melville)
Army of Shadows (Melville)
The Wild Child (Truffaut)
Le Boucher (Chabrol)
Chloe in the Afternoon (Rohmer)
Lacombe, Lucien (Malle)
The Story of Adèle H. (Truffaut)
A Sunday in the Country (Tavernier)
Au Revoir, les Enfants (Malle)
Life and Nothing But (Tavernier)
Wild Reeds (Téchiné)
The Pianist (Polanski)
The Diving Bell and the Butterfly (Schnabel)

Late Spring (Ozu)
Rashomon (Kurosawa)
The Life of Oharu (Mizoguchi)
Ugetsu (Mizoguchi)
Sansho the Bailiff (Mizoguchi)
Tokyo Story (Ozu)
Ikiru (Kurosawa)
The Seven Samurai (Kurosawa)
Twenty-four Eyes (Kinoshita)
The Burmese Harp (Ichikawa)
Throne of Blood (Kurosawa)
Fires on the Plain (Ichikawa)
Floating Weeds (Ozu)
Late Autumn (Ozu)
The End of Summer (Ozu)
High and Low (Kurosawa)
An Autumn Afternoon (Ozu)
Yojimbo (Kurosawa)
Woman in the Dunes (Teshigahara)
The Face of Another (Teshigahara)
Kwaidan (Kobayashi)
Dersu Uzala (Kurosawa)
Kagemusha (Kurosawa)
Ran (Kurosawa)

Los Olvidados (Buñuel)
Viridiana (Buñuel)
Nazarín (Buñuel)
The Exterminating Angel (Buñuel)
The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie (Buñuel)
Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown (Almodòvar)
Talk to Her (Almodòvar)
Pan's Labyrinth (del Toro)

Open City (Rossellini)
La Terra Trema (Visconti)
Shoeshine (de Sica)
The Bicycle Thieves (de Sica)
Umberto D. (de Sica)
I Vitelloni (Fellini)
La Strada (Fellini)
The Nights of Cabiria (Fellini)
L'Avventura (Antonioni)
Two Women (de Sica)
The Four Days of Naples (Nanni)
La Dolce Vita (Fellini)
L'Eclisse (Antonioni)
The Organizer (Monicelli)
8½ (Fellini)
The Leopard (Visconti)
The Gospel According to St. Matthew (Pasolini)
The Battle of Algiers (Pontecorvo)
The Garden of the Finzi Continis (de Sica)
The Comformist (Bertolucci)
Amarcord (Fellini)
The Innocent (Visconti)
The Tree of Wooden Clogs (Olmi)
The Night of the Shooting Stars (Taviani)
La Traviata (Zeffirelli)
The Best of Youth (Giordana)
Gomorrah (Garrone)

Sawdust and Tinsel (Bergman)
Smiles of a Summer Night (Bergman)
The Seventh Seal (Bergman)
Wild Strawberries (Bergman)
Through a Glass Darkly (Bergman)
Persona (Bergman)
Hunger (Carlsen)
Shame (Bergman)
The Passion of Anna (Bergman)
Cries and Whispers (Bergman)
Scenes from a Marriage (Bergman)
The Magic Flute (Bergman)
Fanny and Alexander (Bergman)
Babette's Feast (Axel)
Pelle the Conqueror (August)

M (Lang)
The Enigma of Kaspar Hauser (Herzog)
Aguirre the Wrath of God (Herzog)
Fox and His Friends (Fassbinder)
The Marriage of Maria Braun (Fassbinder)
The Tin Drum (Schlöndorff)
The Lives of Others (von Donnersmarck)

Knife in the Water (Polanski)
Marketa Lazarova (Vlacil)

Alexander Nevsky (Eisenstein)
Ivan the Terrible, Part 1 (Eisenstein)
The Cranes Are Flying (Kalatozov)
Ballad of a Soldier (Chukhray)
Andrei Rublev (Tarkovsky)
The Mirror (Tarkovsky)

Pather Panchali (Ray)
Aparajito (Ray)
The Music Room (Ray)
The World of Apu (Ray)
Charulata (Ray)

Pixote (Babenco)
Central Station (Salles)
City of God (Mireilles)

Spring in a Small Town (Mu Fei)
Raise the Red Lantern (Zhang Yimou)

In the Mood for Love (Wong Kar-Wai)

LAST UPDATED: 23 SEPTEMBER 2024