My Top 30 Films From 1950-1974 (third of four in a series)

The Last Picture Show

Regular readers of this blog (I'm looking at you Gwendolyn Crustacean of Comptche, California) will recall that two months ago I published a list of my top thirty films from the first quarter of this century. I followed that last month with my top thirty from the preceding twenty-five year period (1975-1999). Next month I'll list my top thirty from 1925-1949. This month I offer my top thirty from 1950-1974. You're welcome. Not surprisingly it was much more difficult to narrow down the many films I love for this list than the previous two, in large part because the time period includes the first five years of the Seventies, my favorite decade of films and the fifties and sixties were a golden time for foreign films. You will note there are five films on the list directed by Ingmar Bergman and four from Federico Fellini. You will also note that I include an honorable mention category at the end. This was because even after listing thirty pictures there were still five greats that deserved a mention. Finally, seventeen of the thirty films listed are in foreign languages as are three of the honorable mentions.

1. The Last Picture Show (1971) Bogdanovich

2. The Godfather (1972) F. Coppola/The Godfather 2 (1974)

3. Winter Light (1963) Bergman

4. Chinatown (1974) Polanski

5. The Searchers (1956) Ford

6. The Seventh Seal (1957) Bergman

7. La Dolce Vita (1960) Fellini

8. A Clockwork Orange (1971) Kubrick

9. Sunset Blvd. (1950) Wilder

10. Cabaret (1972) Fosse

11. Nights of Cabiria (1957) Fellini

12. 8 1/2 (1963) Fellini

13. The Emigrants (1971)/The New Land (1972) Troell

14. Amarcord (1973) Fellini

15. Umberto D. (1952) DeSica

16. Aguirre: The Wrath of God (1972) Herzog

17. Through a Glass Darkly (1961) Bergman

18. 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) Kubrick

19. If….(1968) L. Anderson

20. L’Eclisse (1962) Antonioni

21. A Woman Under the Influence (1974) Cassavetes

22. The Flowers of St. Francis (1950) Rossellini

23. Psycho (1960) Hitchcock

24. Shame (1968) Bergman

25. The Burmese Harp (1956) Ichikawa

26. On the Waterfront (1954) Kazan

27. Persona (1966) Bergman

28. Vivre sa Vie (1962) Godard

29. The Great Escape (1963) J. Sturges

30. The Apu Trilogy: Pather Panchali (1955)/Aparjito (1956)/The World of Apu (1959) Ray

Honorable Mention:

The Last Detail (1971) Ashby

Red Desert (1964) Antonioni

Night of the Hunter (1955) Laughton

Rashomon(1950) Kurosawa 

Closely Watched Trains (1966) Menzel