THE LISTS: Duncan's 25 Greatest Films of All Time

Two days ago marked the enormous milestone of Sight and Sound Magazine's poll of the greatest films of all time. It wasn't quite a matter of what was most at the top, and more of what was on the most Top 10 lists. Given that, it's rather unsurprising what landed at the top, given that it's a much more unanimously acclaimed film than "Citizen Kane", which has suffered from a "top dog fatigue" that most associate it with. Being hailed as the end-all-be-all of cinema takes away some of the wonder from it, like you're not coming upon something fresh for you specifically. It becomes a corporatized experience instead of a personal one. For that reason, "Citizen Kane" just didn't figure into my Top 10, or even 25.

But hey, it's a personal list after all. Not everyone operates under the same criteria, and nobody sticks with the same criteria on every approach at a list. Egregious amounts of ranking with years, decades, and trying to meld those two lists together, ultimately fell apart to a rather hollow and uninteresting list. Going film-by-film asking "Is this better than this?", quickly grew rather tiresome and became an overwhelming chore. A list like this shouldn't come across so mechanically, and it should be a pleasant experience in arriving on certain films rising to the front. So I attempted for a much simpler, far less foolproof approach.

"Vertigo" is the Greatest Film of All Time (According to Sight & Sound)

It's been something close to common knowledge that the publicly agreed upon "best film of all time" has been "Citizen Kane" for a long time. It takes years of consideration, along with enough sheer will, to change an opinion as public as that, but Sight & Sound made a strong case this year for a little variety. Hell, a lot of variety if we're going to be perfectly honest. Their once-a-decade poll of critics and directors has brought two films to the fore as rockers of "Citizen Kane"s strong, and well earned foundation. On the critics side of things, Alfred Hitchcock's "Vertigo" supplanted Orson Welles' film for the top spot, with 17 less years on its hands, but still 50+ years old.

Given my recently discovered adoration of Hitchcock's rather unexpected gem of a film, this turn of events struck me as quite pleasant. On the director's side of things, Yasuhiro Ozu's "Tokyo Story", which I have regrettably not found occasion to see, snagged the top spot away from "Kane". The director's branch reads with a lot more recognizable cinematic icons, like "The Godfather" and "Taxi Driver", while the critics list is filled with films of the 20s and 30s, with "2001: A Space Odyssey" the most recent film on the list. Film of the future, indeed.