Golden oldies: the greatest films ever made

Published on Wednesday 18 June 2008 22:04

EPICS from the golden age of cinema have eclipsed more modern movies in the definitive list of the greatest films ever made.

Masterpieces from the 1950s and 1960s, including The Searchers, Vertigo, Lawrence of Arabia and To Kill a Mockingbird, topped the poll, while the most recent offering to make the top 50 was the first of the Lord of the Rings trilogy from 2001.

A panel of 1,500 experts from the American Film Institute – including film-makers, critics and historians – came together to name the top ten American films in genres including western, sci-fi, rom-com and animation.

Charlie Chaplin's City Lights was judged the best romantic comedy, and Walt Disney's Snow White and The Seven Dwarfs was named the favourite animated movie.

More modern classics like James Cameron's 1997 film Titanic and Quentin Tarantino's 1994 hit Pulp Fiction, just scraped in near the bottom of the epic and gangster movie categories respectively.

Although the announcement has been welcomed by critics who feel the list is more balanced than most, some purists felt the genres were too restrictive.

Christine Geraghty, professor of film and television studies at Glasgow University, said: "It's good to see so many classical films in lists like this. Often they tend to be dominated by the most recently made films.

"But it's very restrictive to limit it to American releases and shows the strength of Hollywood in the industry.

"It's interesting that they have found no room for adaptations or costume dramas. It feels incomplete without a mention of Wallace and Gromit, Bend It Like Beckham, no Ealing comedies – and where is Dambusters?"

Julian Petley, the editor of the Journal of British Cinema and Television, said: "The films are actually a good balance of old and new. but I do not think they have got enough genres in there. Where is the comedy or the horror?"

The professor of film and television at Brunel University added: "There is no musical genre either, which is hugely popular, and the inclusion of epic means that that list is mainly confined to films from the past. Mystery strikes me as a rather a soggy category, and so does sport."

Prof Petley said he also felt that epics were too restrictive to the past, despite a resurgence of gladiatorial and Roman themes in recent cinema releases.

"We all know that when new films come out they are given a massive amount of hype, and it is absurd when you hear critics saying in February that this is the best film of the year."

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