Ah, good to know someone's following it. I thought it was about time i tried to go well beyond simple lists. I was pulled up somewhere for not saying enough about the films. It would have been demoralising to get no reply.


9. SEVEN SAMURAI (KUROSAWA, 1954)

Fifty years on, Kurosawa's famous epic about the bunch of warriors hired to defend a village from marauding bandits, is probably still the most widely loved and admired "foreign language" film; terrific, compelling entertainment and a cinema masterclass in one. The pacing- extended sequences of breath-takingly edited dynamic action interspersed with quieter, lyrical and playful moments- is superb; the characterisations, with Shimura's wise leader and Kitano's swaggering, impulsive clown to the fore, vivid and memorable; the choreography and lighting exceptional. Even Kurosawa's command of weather befits his title of "emperor".

Influenced by Ford's westerns, it was in turn not only the basis for The Magnificent Seven but has had a huge impact on numerous inferior Hollywood imitators.


8. VERTIGO (HITCHCOCK, 1958)

Unloved and misunderstood on its release, Vertigo's reputation has rocketed to astronomic heights- now challenging Kane's crown, and even leading in (the excellent online magazine) Senses of Cinema's ongoing poll. It's undoubtedly Hitch's most daring, disturbing, complex and richest film. Its macabre, sensual, dreamlike, voyeuristic mystery, beautifully shot in a hazy soft-focus, has Stewart's phobic private dick following Novak's icy, ethereal, elusive Madeleine through a range of evocative San Francisco locations, before it audaciously changes tack to probe deeper psycho-sexual recesses, issues of identity and gender, and a veritable vortex of intense emotions. 

Revisited by French admirer Chris Marker in Sans Soleil, it's a fascinating treasure trove for modern film-makers- Brian de Palma, Paul Verhoeven (Basic Instinct), Terry Gilliam (Twelve Monkeys..) and David Lynch (the marvellous Mulholland Drive), among many others. It rewards countless viewings.


7. SUNRISE (MURNAU, 1927)

This most cherishable of silent films reminds me of Sei Shonagon's "In Spring it is the dawn that is most beautiful". Shamefully missing from The AFI 100 (what do they know?), this millenium alone it's been voted in the all-time Top 10 in at least 4 major international polls- Village Voice, Sight and Sound Critics, Spain's Editorial Jaguar and Senses of Cinema.

Combining the director's European artistic sensitivity with Hollywood narrative drive, its story of a married man encouraged by a seductive city vamp to kill his innocent faithful wife balances a wholesome Germanic village with the bright exciting lights of a modern very American metropolis across the water. A film of opposites that delights in various means of transport, it's everything one could wish; inventive in its use of models, its set designs and smoothly roving camera, it's stormy, scary, touching, tender, exhilarating, intoxicating, radiant, romantic, lyrical and .. lovely. 


