Everyone likes to compile a list of the best films ever made, and the results are all over the internet. Some, like Time magazine's All Time 100 Movies list (time.com/time/2005/100movies/), are personal selections chosen by film critics. Others, like the American Film Institute (AFI)'s 100 Greatest American Movies of all Time list (afi.com/tvevents/100years/movies.aspx) are voted on by a cross-section of film professionals. Still others, like the Internet Movie Database's Top 250 list (imdb.com/chart/top), aggregate votes from visitors to the site. Then there are the multifarious list sites made by individual film buffs.
Lists that limit their field of inquiry are probably more trustworthy than those that claim to consider every strip of celluloid that's been produced. The AFI's list sticks to American films and but it ignores art-house filmmakers such as John Cassavetes.
The Time list is compiled by critics Richard Corliss and Richard Schickel. Corliss points out that between them they have 80 years reviewing films, but also adds the list can really be nothing more than an illustration of their own personal prejudices. Sensibly, the films are listed in alphabetical order rather than hierarchically. Again, it's an uncontroversial list highlighting the Time critics' tastes - generally American, with a smattering of European and Asian films. Citizen Kane and The Searchers are on it but Hitchcock's Vertigo is absent. The people's choice is quite different. Professionals and the public alike are susceptible to the fashionable film of the moment, but these show up more frequently in the public lists. That explains how District 9 makes an appearance in the top 50 of the IMDB list. Oddly, the IMDB best film of all time is 1994's The Shawshank Redemption. It seems shocking that this mundane work could beat the classics of cinema, until one remembers that it has, for unknown reasons, a huge following among Net-nerd users of Web cinema sites.
Foreign-language films - whether they be French, Chinese or Italian - are more difficult to see, and are consequently heavily under-represented on most lists. All in all, as best film lists consist of subjective choices they should probably be referred to as favourite film lists.
