Dylan Cave

I’ve found it almost impossible to whittle my longlist down to the ten greatest (didn’t the 1952 critics have it so much easier with only 50-odd years of cinema to consider?) and I’m slightly surprised that my final list doesn’t include any Almodóvar, Buñuel, Denis, Dreyer, Godard, Hawks, Herzog, Kubrick, Lynch, Ozu, Peckinpah, Powell, Scorsese or, indeed, Welles – but just one from each of these would take me over ten yet again. Instead I’ve settled on a list of films that I feel have ambition, albeit in different forms, for what cinema can be. Crucially, I think each film is largely successful in achieving what it sets out to do – isn’t that the biggest challenge in filmmaking? A couple of notes: To the nine full-length heavyweights I add Chuck Jones’ Road Runner movie Beep Beep – a clichéd contrast perhaps, but I find it hard to consider nearly 120 years of cinema without acknowledging animation. Beep Beep features an extended sequence where the Road Runner and Wile E. Coyote enter a tunnel wearing miners’ helmets and continue their perennial chase as onscreen dots of light. Jones manages to wring out the gags from these two dots – a great instance of pure cinema. Also, I must slightly pedantically point to Playtime’s gauge – 70mm – to signify that the full scale and ambition of Tati’s film is best appreciated on that size or equivalent theatrical projection.