A list of films that Roger Ebert, in addition to giving 0 out of 4 stars, described in his reviews as horrible to a life-changing degree. ☞ How we made the Greatest Films of All Time poll ☞ See all our coverage of this poll ☞ See our annual best-films lists and more surveys For example, although "8 1/2" is widely considered Fellini's best film, did the directors vote it higher than the critics because it's about a director? I mean, if "Citizen Kane" were to drop a few slots after 50 years, does that really indicate that its statue as a work of art is declining after 50 years at #1? Anyway, that's just my own speculation. You might choose the ten films you feel are most important to film history, or the ten that represent the aesthetic pinnacles of achievement, or indeed the ten films that have had the biggest impact on your own view of cinema. My guess: He made so many great films that the voted were scattered. Now their value has shot way up with the use of slide shows, a diabolical time-waster designed to boost a web site's page visits. In a field with much competition, Number One on my list of Most Shameless Lists has got to be Time mag's recent list of the "Best 140 Tweeters." Followed by "The General" (#34), "Some Like It Hot" (#42), "PlayTime" (#42), and "City Lights" (#50). Perhaps because his filmmaking has always been secondary to his persona? "The Bicycle Thief" (De Sica) 6. 2) "Citizen Kane" (Orson Welles, 1941) They are flat-out fun (even if they are regarded as "classics"). Vittorio De Sica's "Bicycle Thieves" (1948) topped the first Sight & Sound critics' poll in 1952, only four years after it was first released, dropped to #7 in 1962, and then disappeared from the top ten never to be seen again. I guess it's possible, but if it happened, would that indicate that the movie's reputation had increased significantly between 2002 and 2012? A big question: Where is Ozu? I think Roger Ebert is the best movie reviewer that we have ever had. You can submit up to 50 titles yourself, just by going here and checking out a list of titles that, unbelievably, still aren't on the registry. You will notice "Gates of Heaven" is no longer there. The order does not matter to the voting system - we will allot one vote only to each of your ten films. US. In 2002, the critics as a group voted for: 1. Ingmar Bergman 9. Time Bandits (1981) For what it's worth, here's my list from 2002, in alphabetical order. 2) "2001: A Space Odyssey" (Kubrick, 1968), "Citizen Kane" (Welles, 1941) [tie] Held for the first time in 1952, this poll has been conducted ever since ("The Bicycle Thief," "City Lights," "The Gold Rush," "The Battleship Potemkin," "Louisiana Story," "Intolerance," "Greed," "Le Jour se Leve," "The Passion of Joan of Arc" and a tie involving "Brief Encounter," "Le Million" and "The Rules of the Game"). ", "Au Hasard, Balthazar" (Robert Bresson," 1966) -- formerly "Pickpocket. "Citizen Kane" (Welles) 2. 1." And families need movies too! 10) "8 1/2" (Federico Fellini, 1963), 1) "Tokyo Story" (Ozu, 1953) Nashville (Altman) considers the inevitable fluctuations inherent in constructing such hierarchical love-rankings: It's strange to think that this accountants'-reflex, oligarchical canon-building phenomenon had never occurred to anyone before Elizabeth became queen - not regarding any cultural product, at least. Having gained the honor of being on the list, each title could be retired, and a whole new set concocted ten years later. 21. So, why not treat them as such, and vote your passion? Has it fallen in my estimation? "Vertigo" (Hitchcock) 9. For the magazine's decade-by-decade breakdown of its famous poll, click here. Now, however, it is that time in the Wheel of the Decades when I make out the one single list of interest to me. One of the footnotes is that they keep jiggering the rules. Some years they poll critics and directors, and combine the results. 5) "Sunrise" (F.W. Akira Kurosawa 4. Roger Ebert, Actor: Siskel & Ebert & the Movies. [...]. "The Seven Samurai" (Kurosawa). If anything, I'd say the hype has cooled since the 1990s (how could it have gotten any hotter?). George Lucas • Starring: Mark Hamill, Harrison Ford, Carrie Fisher. "The General" (Buster Keaton & Clyde Bruckman, 1926) -- #34 critics. It is the greatest cinematic expression of the torture of jealousy--his "Othello." ... "Roger Ebert loved movies." 7) "The Searchers" (John Ford, 1956) Roger Ebert Critic, Chicago Sun-Times. We like good movies, and we like to be equipped to participate in the cultural conversation, so we like to discover movies that experts recommend, and that may broaden our horizons. This year, a whopping 846 top-ten ballots (mentioning 2,045 different titles) were counted, solicited from international "critics, programmers, academics, distributors, writers and other cinephiles" -- including bloggers and other online-only writers. Some of these reviews are available to see again on YouTube, but for the record, here are the 23 films that the team loved the best. ", "Pather Panchali" (Satyajit Ray, 1955) -- first film in the "Apu Trilogy. He was the first Movie Critic to win a Pulitzer Prize for Criticism. The pandemic led families to spend more time together in 2020 than usual, unable to leave the house. In 1975, Ebert became the first film critic to win the Pulitzer Prize for Criticism. I was teaching a film course in the University of Chicago's Fine Arts Program, and taught classes of the top ten films in 1972, 1982 and 1992. ", "The 400 Blows" (Francois Truffaut, 1959) -- not "Jules & Jim" or "Day for Night.". The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie (Buñuel) (2) Propagandistic votes, selecting a film no one else may vote for, with the hope of drawing attention to it. (In 2002 only five of the 145 participating critics voted for it.) I will discuss my 2012 list once Sight & Sound publishes it: Chinatown (Polanski) Or are these kinds of variations just built into the nature of these kinds of polls? Inspired probably by its 1958 re-release (that was the first time I saw it), Welles' film jumped to the #1 spot in 1962, and has remained on top ever since. Sight & Sound has announced it will live-tweet the 2012 "Top 50 Greatest Films of All Time" (@SightSoundmag #sightsoundpoll) August 1, and as I write this the night before, I of course don't know the results. I saw someone predict that Quentin Tarantino's "Pulp Fiction" would make it into the all-time top 10 this time around. Long-suffering readers will have read many times about my dislike of lists, especially lists of the best or worst movies in this or that category. In our biggest ever film critics’ poll, the list of best movies ever made has a new top film, ending the 50-year reign of Citizen Kane. In 2006, complications from thyroid cancer treatment resulted in the loss of his ability to eat, drink, or speak. But don't forget about the National Film Registry. The list is in alphabetical order. "Sunrise" (Murnau) 9. "8 1/2" (Fellini) 4. By 2002, its glamour had already worn off, and its stock dropped once again. The 136-page issue features the critics' Top 100, a new essay on the top film, short essays on every film in our top 10, an essay on changing critical tastes in our poll, top 10s by decade, nationality and genre, the directors' Top Ten, the critics' top directors and directors' top directors, and individual top-ten entries from 100 critics and 100 directors, from Woody Allen to Edgar Wright. "The Godfather" and "The Godfather, Part II"  3. There have been some other great ones but to me Roger stands out above the rest. Roger Ebert's 10 greatest films of all time Robert Duvall in "Apocalpse Now," directed by Francis Ford Coppola. Should I include Altman's "McCabe and Mrs. Miller," which after all I described as "a perfect film?". Eric Rohmer's 1962 ballot (image courtesty BFI): More poll-related releases and dates from Sight & Sound: 3-4 August: our redesigned and expanded September 2012 special poll issue is sent to subscribers, and should be available on newsstands (on Friday 3rd in London, and across the UK by Saturday 4th). Action • … Notice that Bergman is included, and yet none of his films is in the director's top ten. ", So I stare at these titles and recall transcendent experiences. Zoetrope "Apocalypse Now" (1979) directed by Francis Ford Coppola Only Mizoguchi in the Top 50, ahead of "Sansho Dayu," "The Life of Oharu," "The Story of the Last Chrysanthemum"... "2001: A Space Odyssey" (Kubrick, 1968) -- still light-years ahead of "Dr. Strangelove," "Barry Lyndon"... "Vertigo" and "Psycho" (Hitchcock, 1958 & 1960) made the critics' Top 50 -- but no "Rear Window," "Notorious," "NxNW," "Shadow of a Doubt"... "L'Avventura" (Michelangelo Antonioni, 1960) -- not "L'Eclisse," "La Notte," "Red Desert. Last spring, Kristin Thompson suggested a poll method a little more like the National Film Registry (or, for that matter, the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame): I think this business of polls and lists for the greatest films of all times would be much more interesting if each film could only appear once. Spike Lee Receives American Cinematheque Award, America Has to Come to a Reckoning: Director Sam Pollard on MLK/FBI, The TV Homages of WandaVision are an Amusing, Unfulfilling Distraction. Kristin Thompson wrote last spring of its place in the S&S poll: "Ozu's first film to became well known in the west didn't make the list until decades later, in 1992, and yet despite the discovery of 'Late Spring' and 'Early Summer' and 'An Autumn Afternoon,' 'Tokyo Story' remains the Ozu film.". He has been reviewing films for the Chicago Sun-Times since 1967, and was the first film critic ever to win a Pulitzer Prize. 4) "8 ½" (Fellini, 1963) These are the best family films of 2020, determined by the weekly reviews on this site. Why do I value this poll more than others? 8) "Man with a Movie Camera" (Dziga Vertov, 1929) Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives, Spike Lee Receives American Cinematheque Award, America Has to Come to a Reckoning: Director Sam Pollard on MLK/FBI, The TV Homages of WandaVision are an Amusing, Unfulfilling Distraction. There may be no underestimating the difference between being disappointed by a classic viewed in a shabby repertory cinema on a beat-up print in the 1970s, and being awakened to it today on your state-of-the-art home screen, after a good digital shave-and-haircut restoration. At least " Sunrise ," " 2001: A Space Odyssey " and " 8 1/2 " have healthy senses of humor, but "Kane" and "Rules of the Game" are the only movies in the top 10 with the propulsive vitality of (screwball) comedy. Michael Atkinson ("Listomania!") You can spend hours on that list, and all of the decade lists, by clicking here. In that year, "Citizen Kane" was a main runner-up. You can play with these lists. When it comes to grouped films, such as the "Godfather" series, please choose by individual film alone ("The Godfather" or "Godfather II" etc.) Here are Roger Ebert's most hardcore disses and most brutal movie reviews of all time. 2001: A Space Odyssey (Kubrick) "Rashomon" (Kurosawa) 9. 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