Top Five Films of All Time: including Hollywood, British, foreign, independent, documentary, animated, short, whatever

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Gosh, if you put a gun to my head I would say … “Mon Oncle” (Jacques Tati), “Il Sorpasso”(Dino Risi), “Les Quatre Cents Coups” (Truffaut), “Tokyo Monogatari” (Ozu) and “Citizen Kane” (Wells). But that is under serious duress and I’m sure I will have many misgivings.

I want to give honorable mentions to “Le Samourai” (Jean-Pierre Melville) and “Brazil” (Terry Gilliam) though. I demand that right.
 
For a start, I have a top western, The Good The Bad And The Ugly, and a top musical, The Blues Brothers.

Three others, to bring the total up to five:

The Italian Job (the original one with Michael Caine)
The Godfather
The Sting.

The last line of dialogue in The Italian Job is both effective and unforgettable.
Charlie Croker (Michael Caine): “Hang on a minute, chaps. (Pause) I’ve got a great idea.
(Pause) Er …”
 
Wow. Quite a feat but I’ll try.
  1. Au hasard Balthazar
  2. The Mirror (directed by Andrei Tarkovsky; had to clarify since it’s a common title)
  3. Last Year at Marienbad
  4. Vertigo
  5. The Searchers
 
snowgarden said:
My top five movies with young people are:

The Trouble With Angels
A Little Princess
A Tree Grows in Brooklyn
Home Alone 2: Lost In New York
Cheaper By The Dozen
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I’m not quite sure what you mean by “Movies with young people” because four of your five I have never seen, and the only one that I have seen, Home Alone 2, I have to say I found a bit disappointing, though I liked the No. 1.

But if there is one movie with “young people” that I might (almost) have listed in my own top five, it would be Ferris Buehler’s Day Off. Not to your taste?
 
Mary_Gail_36 said:
I’ve been wanting to respond for a few days, but I can’t narrow it down to 5.
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My working list of more than 5…
  1. Le Notti di Cabiria
  2. The Godfather Part 2
  3. Umberto D.
  4. Marriage Italian Style
  5. It’s a Wonderful Life
  6. Gone with the Wind
  7. A Street Car Named Desire
  8. Marty
  9. Come Back Little Sheba
  10. Love with a Proper Stranger
    11: Cinema Paradiso
  11. A Cat on a Hot Tin Roof
  12. 8 1/2
  13. Paper Moon
  14. Love Story
  15. Sedotta e Abbandonata
  16. Lagaan, Once Upon a Time in India
  17. From Here to Eternity
  18. The Triplets of Belleville
 
meltzerboy said:
What are your top five picks, in order of preference if you like? I realize it’s a daunting task, particularly for film buffs. Still working on mine.
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The ‘best’ movies to me are not the most entertaining. The Avengers was great but I doubt it changed anyone’s world view or improved their lives and so it isn’t a truly ‘great’ movie no matter what its box office might suggest.
  1. The Passion of the Christ - great dramatic portrayal of Christ’s suffering
  2. Empire Strikes Back - best depiction of heroism against all odds - to literally leap into the void rather than surrender to evil is admirable
  3. It’s a Wonderful Life - most encouraging movie I have ever seen, reminds me that things are never as bad as they may seem
  4. Schindler’s List - what a person in real life can do against the most powerful evil state ever in human history
  5. Citizen Kane - the things people cherish in the end of their lives says a lot about how they lived their lives and what they then realize was most important - it encourages us to live life more simply and faithfully and dismisses the importance of ambition, power and wealth.
These I think will be discussed 500 years from now and 99.9999% of the rest mere footnotes to an art style no one ever bothers with any more
 
Oh man, It’s so hard to choose.

Rather than pick my top five, I’ll just add five that I haven’t already seen in this thread:

-Rushmore
-True Grit (the new one)
-Shadowlands
-Death at a Funeral (the British one)
-Kung Fu Hustle

Yes, I said Kung Fu Hustle. 😃 It is such a sweet movie, well choreographed, and laugh-out-loud funny. It’s no Life is Beautiful, but it’s an amazing film in its own right. But Death at a Funeral is the hardest I have ever laughed. I actually had to pause it a few times toward the end because I couldn’t control my laughing and couldn’t hear the dialogue.
 
The Best Years of Our Lives
A Tree Grows in Brooklyn
Stella Dallas (Barbara Stanwyck version)
It Happened One Night
Fantasia

I can’t really pick only five movies, though
 
Still working on mine but Peregrinans’ is suspiciously close to what it would look like! :eek:
 
Top Hollywood(in no particular order):
  1. The Godfather
  2. The Godfather II
  3. The King’s Speech
  4. Chinatown
  5. 12 Angry Men
Top British(in no particular order):
  1. Ghandi
  2. The King’s Speech
That’s all I have so far. Lol.

Top Foreign:
  1. Downfall (Der Undertag)
Top Independent(in no particular order):
  1. Little Miss Sunshine
  2. The Life Aquatic
  3. Thank You for Smoking
Top Animation(in no particular order):
  1. Fantasia
  2. Peter Pan
  3. The Sword in the Stone
  4. Who Framed Roger Rabbit?
  5. Toy Story
 
In no particular order:

The Wizard of Oz
It’s a Wonderful Life
The Princess Bride
The Pirates of Penzance

The fifth spot is a three-way tie The Greatest Game Ever Played/Marty/That Thing You Do.

These the the movies that I will drop everything to watch. Or, if someone puts it on when I don’t think I’m in the mood for it, within five minutes I’m spellbound.

Other honorable mentions: This is Spinal Tap (which is darn close to making into a four-way tie; Raiders of the Lost Ark/Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, Romancing the Stone, That’s Entertainment series (all the music of the musicals without the repetitive plots).
 
Mary_Gail_36 said:
My working list of more than 5…
  1. Le Notti di Cabiria
  2. The Godfather Part 2
  3. Umberto D.
  4. Marriage Italian Style
  5. It’s a Wonderful Life
  6. Gone with the Wind
  7. A Street Car Named Desire
  8. Marty
  9. Come Back Little Sheba
  10. Love with a Proper Stranger
    11: Cinema Paradiso
  11. A Cat on a Hot Tin Roof
  12. 8 1/2
  13. Paper Moon
  14. Love Story
  15. Sedotta e Abbandonata
  16. Lagaan, Once Upon a Time in India
  17. From Here to Eternity
  18. The Triplets of Belleville
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I’m going to add *Traffic *and A Raisin in the Sun

An I think I will remove Love Story

Anyone suggest what else I can remove?
 
Mary_Gail_36 said:
Anyone suggest what else I can remove?
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Cat on a Hot Tin Roof. You’ve already got one Tennessee Williams play in there, A Streetcar Named Desire. And if you want a Paul Newman movie, there are at least three better ones: The Sting, Butch Cassidy, and Cool Hand Luke. Or if it’s Elizabeth Taylor you’re after, why not Cleopatra?

8 1/2. I remember liking it – along with other Fellini pictures – on first release, but I find them all a bit tiresome now. Too self-centered, if you see what I mean.
 
BartholomewB said:
Cat on a Hot Tin Roof. You’ve already got one Tennessee Williams play in there, A Streetcar Named Desire. And if you want a Paul Newman movie, there are at least three better ones: The Sting, Butch Cassidy, and Cool Hand Luke. Or if it’s Elizabeth Taylor you’re after, why not Cleopatra?
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No way should Cleopatra make anyone’s top 5 movies of all time. I thought she was better in “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf” or even “Butterfield 8.”
8 1/2. I remember liking it – along with other Fellini pictures – on first release, but I find them all a bit tiresome now. Too self-centered, if you see what I mean.
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“I Vitelloni” is a movie of his I can watch again and again and it never fails to engage me as much as the first time I saw it. I think it’s his best, although he has made many fine movies.

Ultimately I find these “best of” lists a little forced. I think in this case it might be more fair to expand this to different decades: the best 5 of the sixties, seventies, etc. (Although there’s such an abundance of great films in those two decades and so little afterward it would still be hard to narrow down one’s choices.)
 
BartholomewB said:
Cat on a Hot Tin Roof. You’ve already got one Tennessee Williams play in there, A Streetcar Named Desire. And if you want a Paul Newman movie, there are at least three better ones: The Sting, Butch Cassidy, and Cool Hand Luke. Or if it’s Elizabeth Taylor you’re after, why not Cleopatra?

8 1/2. I remember liking it – along with other Fellini pictures – on first release, but I find them all a bit tiresome now. Too self-centered, if you see what I mean.
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Ok Streetcar is a better film than* Cat on a Hot Tin Roof*. I’ve never seen Cleopatra. I have seen Suddenly Last Summer but it isn’t very well known. Katherine Hepburn is a villain in it.
tomarin said:
No way should Cleopatra make anyone’s top 5 movies of all time. I thought she was better in “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf” or even “Butterfield 8.”

“I Vitelloni” is a movie of his I can watch again and again and it never fails to engage me as much as the first time I saw it. I think it’s his best, although he has made many fine movies.

Ultimately I find these “best of” lists a little forced. I think in this case it might be more fair to expand this to different decades: the best 5 of the sixties, seventies, etc. (Although there’s such an abundance of great films in those two decades and so little afterward it would still be hard to narrow down one’s choices.)
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I love * I Vitelloni* I can watch that many times as well. Have you seen The White Sheik? It’s Fellini’s first movie. It’s a comedy where a newly wed wife sneaks ou to meet her favorite actor. The husband cannot find her and is too proud to admit it to his family members. So he convinces them she is not feeling well.

It’s not his best, but a fun movie to watch.
 
Mary_Gail_36 said:
My working list of more than 5…
  1. Le Notti di Cabiria
  2. The Godfather Part 2
  3. Umberto D.
  4. Marriage Italian Style
  5. It’s a Wonderful Life
  6. Gone with the Wind
  7. A Street Car Named Desire
  8. Marty
  9. Come Back Little Sheba
  10. Love with a Proper Stranger
    11: Cinema Paradiso
  11. A Raisin in the Sun
  12. 8 1/2
  13. Paper Moon
  14. Traffic
  15. Sedotta e Abbandonata
  16. Lagaan, Once Upon a Time in India
  17. From Here to Eternity
  18. The Triplets of Belleville
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Updated list…
Still have 19.
 
Mary_Gail_36 said:
I love * I Vitelloni* I can watch that many times as well. Have you seen The White Sheik? It’s Fellini’s first movie. It’s a comedy where a newly wed wife sneaks ou to meet her favorite actor. The husband cannot find her and is too proud to admit it to his family members. So he convinces them she is not feeling well.

It’s not his best, but a fun movie to watch.
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No, I’ve never seen it.

I think I’ve seen I Vitelloni more often than any of Fellini’s other films. For some reason it was always playing on television in France when i was a student there. It has a bittersweet quality.
 
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