The trade magazine Sight & Sound has provided its decennial update of the ranking of the best films of all time
Do you know what is the best film ever according to film directors and critics? Sight & Sound will take care of providing you with the answer. The magazine is in fact a point of reference in this sense, a British magazine born in 1932 which every ten years asks directors and critics to draw up a ranking of the best films ever. Two lists have been compiled, one from the point of view of the critics and the other from the directors.
Today, 90 years after the founding of the magazine, the ten-year update has arrived punctually, which sees the film take first place in the critics’ rankings Jeanne Dielman, 23 quai du Commerce, 1080 Brussels1975 film made by the Belgian director Chantal Akerman. This film is considered one of the first masterpieces made by a female director in the history of cinema and tells three days in the life of a housewife who lives with her son and occasionally becomes a prostitute. Exceptionally long, 225 minutes in duration, Jeanne Dielman had reached the maximum thirty-first place in this ranking before today and now, with a big leap forward, she places herself in front of everyone.
Behind the Belgian masterpiece were placed two milestones in the history of cinema such as Hitchcock’s Vertigo and Orson Welles’ Citizen Poter. This the top ten of the best films ever compiled by critics:
Jeanne Dielman, 23 Quai du Commerce, 1080 Brussels di Chantal Akerman
Vertigo di Alfred Hitchcock
Citizen Kane (Citizen Kane) by Orson Welles
Tokyo Story by Yasujirō Ozu
In the Mood for Love di Wong Kar Wai
2001 A Space Odyssey by Stanley Kubrick
Nice work by Claire Denis
Mulholland Dr. at David Lynch
Man with a Movie Camera by Dziga Vertov
Singin’ in the Rain di Gene Kelly e Stanley Donen
Sight & Sound: the directors ranking
The ranking drawn up by the directors is different, even if we find some similarities with that of the critics. In first place is Stanley Kubrick’s masterpiece 2001: A Space Odissey, which took sixth place in the critics’ rankings. The only film capable of obtaining the podium in both lists is Citizen Kane, capable of placing second here, while the Godfather is third, not awarded by the critics. The other films in both lists are Tokyo Story, Jeanne Dielman and Vertigo, the rest of the films instead appear in the directors’ classification and not in the critics’ classification.
Here she is top ten of the ranking compiled by directors for Sight & Sound:
2001: A Space Odyssey by Stanley Kubrick
Citizen Kane di Orson Welles
The Godfather by Francis Ford Coppola
Tokyo Story by Yasujirō Ozu
Jeanne Dielman, 23 Quai du Commerce, 1080 Brussels di Chantal Akerman
Vertigo di Alfred Hitchcock
8½ by Federico Fellini
Mirror by Andrei Tarkovsky
Personas at Ingmar Bergman
In the Mood for Love di Wong Kar Wai
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