A self-confession from me, this isn’t always going to remain a permanent list. I was wondering whether I could really whittle down this list to a top 100 or a top 250 in response to IMDb’s Top 250, but truthfully the amount of films that I watch over the years only keeps this list fluctuating over time. So, I’ve updated this list accordingly to represent my favourite films right this moment. I also do want to give special shoutouts to certain films and miniseries that I initially thought about listing (Satantango, The Decalogue, and Berlin Alexanderplatz) among many, because the lengthy experience that they provide ultimately does not make it seem fair for me to rank these among these.
In the event that there is a film reviewed with a ✯✯✯✯½ or lower rating at the time of the review, I’ll still post the link here! The score at the time is reflective of how I felt then, whereas its listing now (or as you can find on my Letterboxd profile) is reflective of my current standing.
You can already say that this is my personal canon – the films that speak the most to me as I am right now. This is never a permanent list, for as I keep watching more films, titles are to fall and come in at any point. At some point, maybe the limit may increase for as I see more films and my attachment to them grows, the selection can be quite restricting. Because what’s the point in trying to pride yourself a film lover if you always hold yourself at great limits to something you love so greatly?
Without further ado, you can see a list of my favourite movies starting from here:
- Ikiru
- Mulholland Drive
- A Brighter Summer Day
- Persona
- Taxi Driver
- Vertigo
- Nashville
- Don’t Look Now
- The Graduate
- Hiroshima Mon Amour
- Magnolia
- Tokyo Story
- Only Angels Have Wings
- Yi Yi
- Solaris
- Seven Samurai
- Paris, Texas
- In a Lonely Place
- Barry Lyndon
- Spirited Away
- The Human Condition
- A Woman Under the Influence
- The 400 Blows
- Brazil
- 2001: A Space Odyssey
- McCabe & Mrs. Miller
- On the Waterfront
- Casablanca
- The Story of the Last Chrysanthemums
- Singin’ in the Rain
- The Apartment
- The Double Life of Veronique
- Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb
- Do the Right Thing
- Princess Mononoke
- Lawrence of Arabia
- Anatomy of a Murder
- Blade Runner
- In the Mood for Love
- Three Colors Trilogy (Blue, White, Red)
- Woman in the Dunes
- Repulsion
- Short Cuts
- Le Samouraï
- The Passion of Joan of Arc
- High and Low
- All That Jazz
- Chinatown
- The Leopard
- A Touch of Zen
- Army of Shadows
- My Neighbor Totoro
- Raging Bull
- Blue Velvet
- Sullivan’s Travels
- Fanny & Alexander
- Make Way for Tomorrow
- La Dolce Vita
- It’s a Wonderful Life
- Apocalypse Now
- Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind
- The Big Sleep
- Umberto D.
- His Girl Friday
- Wild Strawberries
- West Side Story
- Tess
- Psycho
- The Battle of Algiers
- The Red Shoes
- City Lights
- Stalker
- Paths of Glory
- Sweet Smell of Success
- 8½
- The Big Lebowski
- Jeanne Dielman, 23 Quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles
- The Night of the Hunter
- The Thin Red Line
- Suspiria
- Eraserhead
- Chungking Express
- Cries and Whispers
- The Piano
- Blow Out
- One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest
- Once Upon a Time in America
- Eyes Wide Shut
- Harakiri
- Sansho the Bailiff
- The Searchers
- The Shining
- The Third Man
- Network
- Rashomon
- The Godfather
- Rear Window
- The Apu Trilogy (Pather Panchali, Aparajito, Apur Sansar)
- There Will Be Blood
- Mikey and Nicky
- Children of Men
- Castle in the Sky
- Beau Travail
- The Last Picture Show
- Mirror
- Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown
- Out of the Past
- Late Spring
- Kiss Me Deadly
- Boogie Nights
- The Young Girls of Rochefort
- Vagabond
- Rosemary’s Baby
- Throne of Blood
- The Good, the Bad and the Ugly
- Last Year at Marienbad
- GoodFellas
- Bicycle Thieves
- The Matrix
- Day for Night
- Sunset Boulevard
- Being There
- Malcolm X
- Johnny Guitar
- Brief Encounter
- Once Upon a Time in the West
- The Player
- A Matter of Life and Death
- Alien
- The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance
- Exotica
- 12 Angry Men
- The General
- All About Eve
- Marketa Lazarová
- Dead Ringers
- The Conformist
- Paris is Burning
- Time of the Gypsies
- Mishima: A Life in Four Chapters
- Harold and Maude
- Cléo from 5 to 7
- Napoleon
- 3 Women
- The Emigrants, The New Land
- Picnic at Hanging Rock
- Weekend
- Funeral Parade of Roses
- Days of Heaven
- Pierrot le Fou
- A Clockwork Orange
- Ran
- Heat
- The Virgin Suicides
- The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp
- Daisies
- Bergman’s Reduction Trilogy (Winter Light, Through a Glass Darkly, The Silence)
- Tampopo
- Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
- Memories of Murder
- The Umbrellas of Cherbourg
- The Cranes Are Flying
- The Before Trilogy (Before Sunrise, Before Sunset, Before Midnight)
- Safe
- Elevator to the Gallows
- Broadcast News
- Videodrome
- Opening Night
- Pan’s Labyrinth
- Kwaidan
- Toy Story
- Rio Bravo
- Perfect Blue
- Band of Outsiders
- The Thing
- Kiki’s Delivery Service
- Annie Hall
- Vivre sa vie
- Double Indemnity
- M
- Los Olvidados
- The Seventh Seal
- The Long Day Closes
- Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?
- The Cook, the Thief, His Wife & Her Lover
- My Dinner with André
- The Rules of the Game
- Pulp Fiction
- Fargo
- Naked
- The Exterminating Angel
- Rififi
- Hedwig and the Angry Inch
- The Long Goodbye
- My Darling Clementine
- Mildred Pierce
- RoboCop
- All That Heaven Allows
- Some Like It Hot
- The Godfather Part II
- Ghost in the Shell
- Belle de Jour
- Raiders of the Lost Ark
- Manila in the Claws of Light
- The Philadelphia Story
- Stop Making Sense
- The Treasure of the Sierra Madre
- Betty Blue
- The Texas Chain Saw Massacre
- The Sweet Hereafter
- Amadeus
- The Hidden Fortress
- Punch-Drunk Love
- Jules and Jim
- It Happened One Night
- Z
- Manhattan
- Canoa: A Shameful Memory
- In the Realm of the Senses
- The Saragossa Manuscript
- Grave of the Fireflies
- Antonioni’s Alienation Trilogy (L’avventura, La notte, L’eclisse)
- Au Revoir Les Enfants
- Halloween
- sex, lies, and videotape
- Oasis
- Farewell My Concubine
- The Piano Teacher
- Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans
- The Silence of the Lambs
- Dog Day Afternoon
- Close-Up
- The Tree of Life
- Old Joy
- Love Streams
- Jaws
- Red River
- Aguirre, the Wrath of God
- The Fisher King
- Yojimbo
- The Deer Hunter
- The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie
- The Truman Show
- Bigger Than Life
- Beauty and the Beast
- Autumn Sonata
- Millennium Actress
- The Exorcist
- Rebel Without a Cause
- Y Tu Mamá También
- The Wild Bunch
- Valerie and Her Week of Wonders
- The Great Silence
- Drifting Clouds
- The Devils
- Pickup on South Street
- Metropolis
- Pauline at the Beach
- The Shop Around the Corner
- After Life
- Rushmore
- Election
- Possession
- Raise the Red Lantern
- The Best Years of Our Lives
- The Insider
- The Innocents
- The Hustler
- Close Encounters of the Third Kind
- All About My Mother
- Roman Holiday
- Hannah and Her Sisters
- The Ascent
- The French Connection
- Seconds
- Wings of Desire
- The Palm Beach Story
- Sans Soleil
- El sur
- Onibaba
- Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me
- To Be or Not to Be
- The Earrings of Madame de…
- Ugetsu
- La Haine
- Wild at Heart
- Out of Sight
- My Own Private Idaho
- An Autumn Afternoon
- A Star is Born
- The King of Comedy
- The Fly
- Trust
- Boyfriends and Girlfriends
- The Master
- Cure
- Parasite
- Ratcatcher
- Klute
- Le Cercle Rouge
Cinema from the Spectrum 