Favorite Movies

Introduction

I have been maintaining a list of my favorite movies since my childhood in the 1980s. I can remember diligently scribbling my favourite movies on a piece of paper, and not much has changed since then. It's a list of movies that I love and that are close to my heart and my brain. Sadly, I have failed to record the changes over the decades and to keep the early papers. All those memories are lost in time, like tears in rain1.

This is the latest 2025 edition.

Definition

It's a case of I know it when I see it2. It's certainly not a list of the best movies, but there are overlaps, and it's clearly subjective in nature. Even the best movies may lack that certain something that favorites have, a certain warmth of heart or sense of home, a quality that touches emotionally, evokes memories, is inspiring in form and content, and simply keeps my love of cinema alive.

Featured

Shanghai Express (1932)
Directed by Josef von Sternberg
For a Few Dollars More (1965)
Directed by Sergio Leone
Mad Max: Fury Road (2015)
Directed by George Miller

Favorites

M (1931)
Directed by Fritz Lang
Shanghai Express (1932)
Directed by Josef von Sternberg
Citizen Kane (1941)
Directed by Orson Welles
Double Indemnity (1944)
Directed by Billy Wilder
Detour (1945)
Directed by Edgar G. Ulmer
Out of the Past (1947)
Directed by Jacques Tourneur
Ace in the Hole (1951)
Directed by Billy Wilder
Pickup on South Street (1953)
Directed by Samuel Fuller
Seven Samurai (1954)
Directed by Akira Kurosawa
Diabolique (1955)
Directed by Henri-Georges Clouzot
Kiss Me Deadly (1955)
Directed by Robert Aldrich
The Killing (1956)
Directed by Stanley Kubrick
12 Angry Men (1957)
Directed by Sidney Lumet
Paths of Glory (1957)
Directed by Stanley Kubrick
Rio Bravo (1959)
Directed by Howard Hawks
The Apartment (1960)
Directed by Billy Wilder
Psycho (1960)
Directed by Alfred Hitchcock
Yojimbo (1961)
Directed by Akira Kurosawa
Jules and Jim (1962)
Directed by François Truffaut
High and Low (1963)
Directed by Akira Kurosawa
For a Few Dollars More (1965)
Directed by Sergio Leone
The Good, the Bad and the Ugly (1966)
Directed by Sergio Leone
The Graduate (1967)
Directed by Mike Nichols
2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)
Directed by Stanley Kubrick
Once Upon a Time in the West (1968)
Directed by Sergio Leone
The Wild Bunch (1969)
Directed by Sam Peckinpah
Midnight Cowboy (1969)
Directed by John Schlesinger
Vanishing Point (1971)
Directed by Richard C. Sarafian
The French Connection (1971)
Directed by William Friedkin
The Godfather (1972)
Directed by Francis Ford Coppola
Fat City (1972)
Directed by John Huston
Hickey & Boggs (1972)
Directed by Robert Culp
Paper Moon (1973)
Directed by Peter Bogdanovich
The Conversation (1974)
Directed by Francis Ford Coppola
Chinatown (1974)
Directed by Roman Polanski
Mr. Majestyk (1974)
Directed by Richard Fleischer
The Godfather Part II (1974)
Directed by Francis Ford Coppola
Jaws (1975)
Directed by Steven Spielberg
Dog Day Afternoon (1975)
Directed by Sidney Lumet
Taxi Driver (1976)
Directed by Martin Scorsese
All the President's Men (1976)
Directed by Alan J. Pakula
Mikey and Nicky (1976)
Directed by Elaine May
Sorcerer (1977)
Directed by William Friedkin
Days of Heaven (1978)
Directed by Terrence Malick
Apocalypse Now (1979)
Directed by Francis Ford Coppola
Stalker (1979)
Directed by Andrei Tarkovsky
The Shining (1980)
Directed by Stanley Kubrick
Thief (1981)
Directed by Michael Mann
Possession (1981)
Directed by Andrzej Żuławski
Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981)
Directed by Steven Spielberg
Blade Runner (1982)
Directed by Ridley Scott
The Thing (1982)
Directed by John Carpenter
Scarface (1983)
Directed by Brian De Palma
Mishima: A Life in Four Chapters (1985)
Directed by Paul Schrader
Come and See (1985)
Directed by Elem Klimov
To Live and Die in L.A. (1985)
Directed by William Friedkin
Manhunter (1986)
Directed by Michael Mann
Predator (1986)
Directed by John McTiernan
Die Hard (1988)
Directed by John McTiernan
Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (1989)
Directed by Steven Spielberg
The Hunt for Red October (1990)
Directed by John McTiernan
Miller's Crossing (1990)
Directed by Ethan Coen, Joel Coen
Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991)
Directed by James Cameron
Heat (1995)
Directed by Michael Mann
Fargo (1996)
Directed by Joel Coen
L.A. Confidential (1997)
Directed by Curtis Hanson
Out of Sight (1998)
Directed by Steven Soderbergh
The Thin Red Line (1998)
Directed by Terrence Malick
Memento (2000)
Directed by Christopher Nolan
Mulholland Drive (2000)
Directed by David Lynch
Lost in Translation (2003)
Directed by Sofia Coppola
No Country for Old Men (2007)
Directed by Joel Coen
There Will Be Blood (2007)
Directed by Paul Thomas Anderson
The Dark Knight (2008)
Directed by Christopher Nolan
Inglourious Basterds (2009)
Directed by Quentin Tarantino
Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans (2009)
Directed by Werner Herzog
Drive (2011)
Directed by Nicolas Winding Refn
Dredd (2012)
Directed by Pete Travis
Mad Max: Fury Road (2015)
Directed by George Miller
Blade Runner 2049 (2017)
Directed by Denis Villeneuve

Once upon a time

At one time or another in my life, among my favorites movies were The General (1926) • Metropolis (1927) • Scarface (1932) • His Girl Friday (1940) • The Magnificent Ambersons (1942) • Casablanca (1942) • The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1948) • Bicycle Thieves (1948) • The Third Man (1949) • All About Eve (1950) • The Night of the Hunter (1955) • Touch of Evil (1958) • Vertigo (1958) • North by Northwest (1959) • A Woman Is a Woman (1961) • 8½ (1963) • Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964) • Bonnie and Clyde (1967) • They Shoot Horses, Don't They? (1969) • MASH (1970) • Catch-22 (1970) • Duel (1971) • Bring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia (1974) • Flatfoot in Hong Kong (1975) • Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1975) • Star Wars (1977) • Smokey and the Bandid (1977) • Flatfoot in Africa (1978) • Escape from Alcatraz (1979) • The Empire Strikes Back (1980) • Raging Bull (1980) • The Cannonball Run (1981) • Das Boot (1981) • White Dog (1982) • Return of the Jedi (1983) • Blood Simple (1984) • The Philadelphia Experiment (1984) • Runaway Train (1985) • Ferris Bueller's Day Off (1986) • Full Metal Jacket (1987) • Planes, Trains and Automobiles (1987) • The Naked Gun: From the Files of Police Squad! (1988) • A Fish Called Wanda (1988) • Twins (1988) • The 'Burbs (1989) • National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation (1989) • Tremors (1990) • Total Recall (1990) • The Silence of the Lambs (1991) • Pappa ante portas (1991) • Barton Fink (1991) • Army of Darkness (1992) • Groundhog Day (1993) • Kalifornia (1993) • Pulp Fiction (1994) • Léon: The Professional (1994) • The Usual Suspects (1995) • Grosse Pointe Blank (1997) • Princess Mononoke (1997) • The Big Lebowski (1998) • Run Lola Run (1998) • Go (1999) • Fight Club (1999) • Magnolia (1999) • Requiem for a Dream (2000) • Traffic (2000) • Donnie Darko (2001) • Heist (2001) • 28 Days Later (2002) • Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004) • Garden State (2004) • Shaun of the Dead (2004) • Pan's Labyrinth (2006) • The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford (2007) • Before the Devil Knows You're Dead (2007) • (500) Days of Summer (2009) • Moon (2009) • Batman: The Dark Knight Returns, Part 2 (2013), and many more of my childhood that I cannot remember :'-(