The Ten Greatest Films and Directors

[Dino Velvet]

Yep narrowing it down to 10 is way too hard and leaves out so many ground breaking films/directors, where is Buster Keaton (The General, Sherlock Jr), Nic Roeg (Bad Timing, Performance, Walkabout), Ken Loach (Cathy Come Home, Kes), Eric Rohmer (The Green Ray), Sidney Lumet (12 Angry Men, The Hill, Network), Robert Altman (Nashville, McCabe And Miss Miller), Ingmar Bergman (The Seventh Seal, Persona) or perhaps even less mainstream directors like Jodorosky, Argento, Passolini, Noe, Heneke, Cassavetes.

I think most of the films on the list are worthy of the acclaim but there's also so many great, inspirational films missing too.

Re Vertigo, having spent time at film school i can tell you Vertigo is a much admired work from a technical perspective, it, along with stuff like Truffaut's Day For Night and Welles' Citizen Kane are considered perfect examples of how camera movement and placement, lighting, set design and score can add depth and character to a film merely by virtue of it's technicalities.

Yes on Jodorowsky and Argento.

Most directors make films with their eyes. I make films with my balls. Alejandro Jodorowsky

[Dino Velvet]

This will blow your mind. Jodorowsky

Movie is also OOP.

Get El Topo and The Holy Mountain.

[Stavros]

Yep narrowing it down to 10 is way too hard and leaves out so many ground breaking films/directors, where is Buster Keaton (The General, Sherlock Jr), Nic Roeg (Bad Timing, Performance, Walkabout), Ken Loach (Cathy Come Home, Kes), Eric Rohmer (The Green Ray), Sidney Lumet (12 Angry Men, The Hill, Network), Robert Altman (Nashville, McCabe And Miss Miller), Ingmar Bergman (The Seventh Seal, Persona) or perhaps even less mainstream directors like Jodorosky, Argento, Passolini, Noe, Heneke, Cassavetes.

I think most of the films on the list are worthy of the acclaim but there's also so many great, inspirational films missing too.

Re Vertigo, having spent time at film school i can tell you Vertigo is a much admired work from a technical perspective, it, along with stuff like Truffaut's Day For Night and Welles' Citizen Kane are considered perfect examples of how camera movement and placement, lighting, set design and score can add depth and character to a film merely by virtue of it's technicalities.

I think this reaches the core of the issue: a list compiled by people who spend most of their profession life, every day seeing and making films, whereas most of us watch films in the evening, or on a weekend afternoon. It would be the same problem if it was the 10 Best Painters of all time, which list if compiled by artists and critics/historians would include Titian and Poussin, two artists whose work is seen by millions in the world's great galleries, but whose works are not popular. I simply cannot understand the reputation Fellini acquired and retains, to me his films are self-indulgent and often badly made; but I can see why eight and a half appeals to film-makers and critics, for the same reason as the Vertov classic, which is the most light-hearted film in the list. Again, Mulholland Drive makes it to the Director's list because it is a film about a small-town girl who wants to make her name in Hollywood and in spite of her talent is eaten up and spit out of the system ending up a drug addict -the kind of Republican moralising about good and evil you would expect from a flashy hack like David Lynch.

The problem with some of the films Hitchcock made -Vertigo, Psycho, Marnie and The Birds, is that to me the central theme is that a man's desire for a woman will drive him and the world mad -these films are so saturated with misogyny I am dismayed they appear on any kind of positive list -even if, as Leather points out they have technical skills that film-makers admire. Close Encounters has technical skills after all.

Lists by country would allow more recognition for the best of Nic Roeg in the UK, give L'Atalante its due in the pantheon of great French films; while a list by genre would give recognition, for example in westerns, to Sergio Leone and Sergio Corbucci as well as the more obvious American classics.

The BFI website seems to be inaccessible at the moment as it will have a more detailed breakdown of the results as well as the list of directors.