Roger Ebert’s 10 favourite movies of all time: “A towering achievement”
Roger Ebert will always remain one of the most authoritative voices in cinema. The first film critic to win the coveted Pulitzer Prize Award, Ebert imparted his undying passion for films to millions of people all over the world who were moved by his infectious enthusiasm for great cinema.
Moving away from the esoteric tradition of scholarly criticism, Ebert found a way to speak directly and effectively to his readers without any academic posturing. While so many critics seemed to enjoy the view when peering down their nose at the creators of the world, Ebert approached almost all of his criticisms with the unabashed joy of a cinema-goer and movie-lover. Ebert was, like most would hope, a fan before anything else.
In 2012, a year before Ebert passed away, he made a list of the ten greatest movies of all time, as is tradition for the famous Sight & Sound poll conducted by the British Film Institute. Every decade, some of the most influential scholars and filmmakers would send in their entries for their personal preferences, and the 2012 edition would feature Ebert’s final and definitive selection of his top ten cinematic masterpieces of all time.
“Why do I value this poll more than others?” Ebert asked. It’s a good question. As one of the leading movie reviewers of all time, the critic was likely posed similar questions at every networking event, dinner party or chance subway meeting. For Ebert, though, this was different: “It has sentimental value. The first time I saw it in the magazine, I was much impressed by the names of the voters, and felt a thrill to think that I might someday be invited to join their numbers. I was teaching a film course in the University of Chicago’s Fine Arts Program, and taught classes of the top ten films in 1972, 1982 and 1992.”
While talking about his relationship with Federico Fellini’s La Strada (an entry in the list), Ebert said: “That movie has been a touchstone for me, because when I saw it in 1960, there was this 30-year-old journalist in Rome leading this unbelievably glamorous life with all these celebrities and staying up all night and going to orgies and having all of his philosophical friends around him and his wives and his mistresses and miracles and stories to cover.”
He also commented on how his perception of the film changes every time he revisits it after an extended hiatus: “When I saw it again – and I’ve seen it every ten years – in 1970, it was somebody about my age, only he was leading a more interesting life than I was, I thought. And when I saw it again in 1980, it was somebody ten years younger than I was, and he had a lot of problems that I had outgrown.” It is perhaps the greatest mark of recommendation that Ebert would so often return to the picture and use it, somewhat at least, as a marker on his own life, a reminder that growth and evolution happen as time passes and that even a creation apparently stuck in its own timeline can morph with it. This is perhaps cinema’s greatest exploit.
It’s fair to say that Ebert’s preferences were not exactly modern. Instead of pitching his list towards high-budget productions, he aimed his top ten at the more artistic areas of the 20th century. For his only pick from the 21st century, Ebert chose Terrence Malick’s The Tree of Life even though he was conflicted between Malick’s masterpiece and Charlie Kaufman’s enigmatic Synecdoche, New York: “Like the Herzog, the Kubrick and the Coppola, they are films of almost foolhardy ambition. Like many of the films on my list, they were directed by the artist who wrote them.
“Like several of them, they attempt no less than to tell the story of an entire life. [ … ] I could have chosen either film — I chose The Tree of Life because it’s more affirmative and hopeful. I realise that isn’t a defensible reason for choosing one film over the other, but it is my reason, and making this list is essentially impossible, anyway.”
Throughout his career, Ebert maintained that the greatest film he had ever seen was Orson Welles’ magnum opus. He reflected: “Reading the many accounts of Citizen Kane is a little like seeing the movie: The witnesses all have opinions, but often they disagree, and sometimes they simply throw up their hands in exasperation.” The picture is well-regarded as the greatest ever made, despite what a toy bear from Peru may argue. Ebert seems willing to agree with that recommendation.
He notes: “And the movie stands there before them, a towering achievement that cannot be explained yet cannot be ignored. Fifty years later, it is as fresh, as provoking, as entertaining, as funny, as sad, as brilliant as it ever was. Many agree it is the greatest film of all time. Those who differ cannot seem to agree on their candidate.”
Elsewhere in the list are nods to some of cinema’s greatest filmmakers and the movies that rocketed them into such high esteem. Werner Herzog’s Aguirre, the Wrath of God, Francis Ford Coppola’s magnificent Apocalypse, Now and Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey are all given their spot on perhaps the most esteemed top ten list of all time. Such is the prowess of the list’s creator and the movies featured on it, that it is almost impossible to argue against the notion that this might be the only essential movie list you might ever require, and completing its viewing would likely garner you a better education in the subject than any school could ever afford you.
Roger Ebert’s 10 favourite films:
- 2001: A Space Odyssey (Stanley Kubrick — 1968)
- Aguirre, the Wrath of God (Werner Herzog — 1972)
- Apocalypse Now (Francis Ford Coppola — 1979)
- Citizen Kane (Orson Welles — 1941)
- La dolce vita (Federico Fellini — 1960)
- The General (Buster Keaton — 1926)
- Raging Bull (Martin Scorsese — 1980)
- Tokyo Story (Yasujirô Ozu — 1953)
- The Tree of Life (Terrence Malick — 2010)
- Vertigo (Alfred Hitchcock — 1958)
