Sight & Sound has released their decennial poll of movie critics naming the best films of all time. For the first time in many decades Citizen Kane is knocked off the roost, replaced by Alfred Hitchcock's Vertigo. It also includes a bevy of silent classics such as Man With a Movie Camera, The Passion of Joan of Arc (which we screened in 2009 with live organ score at Christ Church Cathedral), and Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans.
Here is the complete top 10:
1. Vertigo, Hitchcock, 1958
2. Citizen Kane, Welles, 1941
3. Tokyo Story, Ozu, 1953
4. The Rules of the Game, Renoir, 1939
5. Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans, Murnau, 1927
6. 2001: A Space Odyssey, Kubrick, 1967
7. The Searchers, Ford, 1956
8. Man With a Movie Camera, Vertov, 1929
9. The Passion of Joan of Arc, Dreyer 1927
10. 8 1/2, Fellini, 1963
I'm sad to see Singin' In the Rain drop off the list, but I love The Passion of Joan of Arc and 8 1/2 both being on the list, simply for the fact that on one really great day, I saw the two of them back to back. It was a little emotionally overwhelming, but completely worth it.
What do you think is missing from the list, or do you think it's perfect? Or do you just think lists are silly?
