best film:  Inception. Inception is one of the great films of the decade thus far—a sonic-boom of a filmmaking achievement from Christopher Nolan. I’ve cooled on The Departed a little in the last decade but

best film:  The Seventh Seal. Wild Strawberries is a film many critics argue is superior to The Seventh Seal but I on team Seventh Seal for the time being at least. The Exorcist is also

best film:  Out of the Past. Most would say Night of the Hunter but I still find some weaknesses in Charles Laughton’s only film as director that I can’t find in Out of the Past.

best film:  The Tree of Life. I’ve seen it twice. I was mesmerized but perplexed the first time and then blown away the second time. It has some of the greatest imagery in the art

best film:  Magnolia. While recent viewings of Punch-Drunk Love and The Master have complicated things I’m not yet ready to yield the mantle of best PT Anderson film to either of them (the closest contender

best film:  The Leopard  and The Sweet Smell of Success are 1-2 in both of the big categories. I ended up, untentionally splitting them. Lancaster is very close to equal in both, but Mackendrick’s wonderfully

best film:  Breathless is the 16th best film of all-time and Pierrot le Fou is currently at #55 on my list. They’re the two highest rated Godard films and certainly more than worthy to be

best film:  The General is still the best Keaton film even if Sherlock Jr. may have the best singular Keaton moment with the changing landscape background sequence. The General is Keaton standing way back—and making

best film:  Red River is an all-time great western and all-time great Howard Hawks film so that’s enough in it of itself. However, I also think it’s an all-time great and landmark film as far

best film:  In the Mood For Love is a film that gets better with each viewing. It’s almost too cinematically and stylistically rich for one viewing. It’s grown on me over the years, cracked my

best film:  Magnolia is the answer.  As much as I love the entirety of Cruise’s filmography (only 43 IMDB credits to date) this is a two-horse race here between Cruise’s gigantic achievements in 1999 (Magnolia

best film:  The Grand Illusion though I’m really close to saying Ophuls’ Le Plaisir. I’ve only seen Le Plaisir once (I was blown away) so I hope to revisit and confirm soon. Still, for the