Time Out London's 100 Best British Films

[Tommy Bunz]

These were chosen by a panel of industry types (famous directors/actors/critics/etc). The definition of "British Film" here is pretty loose, as it covers not only films by British directors but also those by foreign directors but set in the UK.

A couple things I don't agree with overall (Hunger being way too high, Repulsion and 2001 not high enough, for example) but in the grand scheme it looks like a very solid list and its nice to see some cult favorites getting some love. There are pretty good write-ups on each film for those that are interested.

http://www.timeout.com/london/bestbritishfilms/

The list:

100. In This World
99. The Railway Children
98. School for Scoundrels
97. 28 Days Laterג€¦
96. Theatre of Blood
95. London to Brighton
94. 24 Hour Party People
93. Zulu
92. Dead Manג€™s Shoes
91. Land and Freedom
90. Blue
89. The Go-Between
88. This is England
87. Night and the City
86. The Bridge on the River Kwai
85. I'm All Right, Jack
84. Fish Tank
83. A Cottage on Dartmoor
82. Orlando
81. Dr. No
80. Under The Skin
79. The Offence
78. Billy Liar
77. Piccadilly
76. Penda's Fen
75. A Room For Romeo Brass
74. Four Weddings and a Funeral
73. The Man in the White Suit
72. The Long Day Closes
71. Edvard Munch
70. Bad Timing
69. Oliver!
68. Dead of Night
67. Whisky Galore!
66. Wonderland
65. Dracula
64. Topsy-Turvy
63. Nuts in May
62. Deep End
61. Walkabout
60. The Long Good Friday
59. Blackmail
58. Gregory's Girl
57. 2001: A Space Odyssey
56. Caravaggio
55. Radio On
54. Monty Python and the Holy Grail
53. This Sporting Life
52. Robinson in Space
51. Local Hero
50. Culloden
49. Gallivant
48. Hunger
47. Blow-Up
46. The Fallen Idol
45. Repulsion
44. Sabotage
43. Fires Were Started
42. Listen to Britain
41. Witchfinder General
40. Ratcatcher
39. London
38. Went the Day Well?
37. It Always Rains on Sunday
36. The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner
35. The Servant
34. A Clockwork Orange
33. Secrets & Lies
32. Get Carter
31. The Lady Vanishes
30. The Ladykillers
29. Peeping Tom
28. The Wicker Man
27. The Bill Douglas Trilogy
26. I Know Where I'm Going!
25. Great Expectations
24. Brazil
23. Lawrence of Arabia
22. Saturday Night and Sunday Morning
21. Nil By Mouth
20. Monty Python's Life of Brian
19. Barry Lyndon
18. The Innocents
17. A Canterbury Tale
16. Black Narcissus
15. Withnail & I
14. The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp
13. The 39 Steps
12. Brief Encounter
11. Naked
10. Trainspotting
9. If...
8. Kind Hearts and Coronets
7. Performance
6. A Matter of Life and Death
5. The Red Shoes
4. Kes
3. Distant Voices, Still Lives
2. The Third Man
1. Don't Look Now

[drizzle]

idk about this, seems like somebody over there got a serious Roeg hardon and a burning desire to stir shit up. putting don't look now not just in top 10 but at #1 above the third man, and then putting performance above a bunch of movies routinely cited as some of the greatest ever.... i'm really curious to see the logic behind that

[Comedy Quaddafi]

Great calls for #1 & #2. A good list to find some gems you missed, if nothing else.

[Tommy Bunz]

idk about this, seems like somebody over there got a serious Roeg hardon and a burning desire to stir shit up. putting don't look now not just in top 10 but at #1 above the third man, and then putting performance above a bunch of movies routinely cited as some of the greatest ever.... i'm really curious to see the logic behind that

It was assembled by getting top 10 lists from 150 different industry people, so it wouldn't take more than a few #1 listings from a few people for a specific movie to jump high in the rankings.
Hardly a definitive list, but interesting nonetheless. I've definitely pulled a few titles from it to add to my queue.

[Spartan]

Kind of shocking with many of the movie rankings (eg Zulu) and obvious omissions (eg Passport To Pimlico).

I love Theatre Of Blood, it's an awesome campy cult classic but doesn't belong on any British movie list unless it's for guilty pleasures.

[Philaflava]

34. A Clockwork Orange seems a little too low. Maybe I'm the lone ranger here but Snatch couldn't make a list of 100?

[aleph]

I see the Scots are heavily represented but apart from Hunger where are the Irish? And the Aussies?

[drizzle]

34. A Clockwork Orange seems a little too low. Maybe I'm the lone ranger here but Snatch couldn't make a list of 100?

i don't think snatch would be that far of a stretch considering overall popularity and influence in redefinition of brit crime movies as a genre (mostly for the worse but still). from a critical standpoint lock stock is generally better regarded, so in this context it feels like a bigger omission. but on a list where hitchcock, kubrick or guilliam don't even crack the top 10....

[Harry Hater]

I was actually gonna request that some you film nerds put together a list of your top 10 British and French films, anybody up to it? How about over the last decade for starters?

[Spartan]

Here's the BFI's (British Film Institute) list of the top 100 British movies. http://www.bfi.org.uk/features/bfi100/


1 The Third Man 1949 Carol Reed
2 Brief Encounter 1945 David Lean
3 Lawrence of Arabia 1962 David Lean
4 The 39 Steps 1935 Alfred Hitchcock
5 Great Expectations 1946 David Lean
6 Kind Hearts and Coronets 1949 Robert Hamer
7 Kes 1969 Ken Loach
8 Don't Look Now 1973 Nicolas Roeg
9 The Red Shoes 1948 Powell and Pressburger
10 Trainspotting 1996 Danny Boyle
11 The Bridge on the River Kwai 1957 David Lean
12 if.... 1968 Lindsay Anderson
13 The Ladykillers 1955 Alexander Mackendrick
14 Saturday Night and Sunday Morning 1960 Karel Reisz
15 Brighton Rock 1947 John Boulting
16 Get Carter 1971 Mike Hodges
17 The Lavender Hill Mob 1951 Charles Crichton
18 Henry V 1944 Laurence Olivier
19 Chariots of Fire 1981 Hugh Hudson
20 A Matter of Life and Death 1946 Powell and Pressburger
21 The Long Good Friday 1980 John Mackenzie
22 The Servant 1963 Joseph Losey
23 Four Weddings and a Funeral 1994 Mike Newell
24 Whisky Galore! 1949 Alexander Mackendrick
25 The Full Monty 1997 Peter Cattaneo
26 The Crying Game 1992 Neil Jordan
27 Doctor Zhivago 1965 David Lean
28 Monty Python's Life of Brian 1979 Terry Jones
29 Withnail and I 1987 Bruce Robinson
30 Gregory's Girl 1980 Bill Forsyth
31 Zulu 1964 Cy Endfield
32 Room at the Top 1958 Jack Clayton
33 Alfie 1966 Lewis Gilbert
34 Gandhi 1982 Richard Attenborough
35 The Lady Vanishes 1938 Alfred Hitchcock
36 The Italian Job 1969 Peter Collinson
37 Local Hero 1983 Bill Forsyth
38 The Commitments 1991 Alan Parker
39 A Fish Called Wanda 1988 Charles Crichton
40 Secrets & Lies 1996 Mike Leigh
41 Dr. No 1962 Terence Young
42 The Madness of King George 1994 Nicholas Hytner
43 A Man for All Seasons 1966 Fred Zinnemann
44 Black Narcissus 1947 Powell and Pressburger
45 The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp1943 Powell & Pressburger
46 Oliver Twist 1948 David Lean
47 I'm All Right Jack 1959 John Boulting
48 Performance 1970 Donald Cammell & Nicolas Roeg
49 Shakespeare in Love 1998 John Madden
50 My Beautiful Laundrette 1985 Stephen Frears
51 Tom Jones 1963 Tony Richardson
52 This Sporting Life 1963 Lindsay Anderson
53 My Left Foot 1989 Jim Sheridan
54 Brazil 1985 Terry Gilliam
55 The English Patient 1996 Anthony Minghella
56 A Taste of Honey 1961 Tony Richardson
57 The Go-Between 1971 Joseph Losey
58 The Man in the White Suit 1951 Alexander Mackendrick
59 The IPCRESS File 1965 Sidney J. Furie
60 Blowup 1966 Michelangelo Antonioni
61 The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner 1962 Tony Richardson
62 Sense and Sensibility 1995 Ang Lee
63 Passport to Pimlico 1949 Henry Cornelius
64 The Remains of the Day 1993 James Ivory
65 Sunday Bloody Sunday 1971 John Schlesinger
66 The Railway Children 1970 Lionel Jeffries
67 Mona Lisa 1986 Neil Jordan
68 The Dam Busters 1955 Michael Anderson
69 Hamlet 1948 Laurence Olivier
70 Goldfinger 1964 Guy Hamilton
71 Elizabeth 1998 Shekhar Kapur
72 Goodbye, Mr. Chips 1939 Sam Wood
73 A Room with a View 1985 James Ivory
74 The Day of the Jackal 1973 Fred Zinnemann
75 The Cruel Sea 1952 Charles Frend
76 Billy Liar 1963 John Schlesinger
77 Oliver! 1968 Carol Reed
78 Peeping Tom 1960 Michael Powell
79 Far from the Madding Crowd 1967 John Schlesinger
80 The Draughtsman's Contract 1982 Peter Greenaway
81 A Clockwork Orange 1971 Stanley Kubrick
82 Distant Voices, Still Lives 1988 Terence Davies
83 Darling 1965 John Schlesinger
84 Educating Rita 1983 Lewis Gilbert
85 Brassed Off 1996 Mark Herman
86 Genevieve 1953 Henry Cornelius
87 Women in Love 1969 Ken Russell
88 A Hard Day's Night 1964 Richard Lester
89 Fires Were Started 1943 Humphrey Jennings
90 Hope and Glory 1987 John Boorman
91 My Name Is Joe 1998 Ken Loach
92 In Which We Serve 1942 David Lean
93 Caravaggio 1986 Derek Jarman
94 The Belles of St Trinian's 1954 Frank Launder
95 Life is Sweet 1990 Mike Leigh
96 The Wicker Man 1973 Robin Hardy
97 Nil by Mouth 1997 Gary Oldman
98 Small Faces 1995 Gillies MacKinnon
99 Carry On... Up the Khyber 1968 Gerald Thomas
100 The Killing Fields 1984 Roland Joff

[Comedy Quaddafi]

I was actually gonna request that some you film nerds put together a list of your top 10 British and French films, anybody up to it? How about over the last decade for starters?

I know dick about classic French movies but I've watched a lot of what came out from the latest decade. I'd say these are the best recent ones (2000-2010) from what I've seen, deliberately ignoring my own favorites (horror- and 'art'-movies) and sticking to what might have broad appeal. I also left off what I think everyone has seen or knows about, e.g. Amelie, A Prophet, Irreversible, Mesrine.

Department 36
I've Loved You So Long
Tell No One
Angel-A
Cach

[Req]

no "The Hit"?

Terence Stamp, John Hurt and Tim Roth? Can't go wrong with that.

[Y@k Bollocks]

I see the Scots are heavily represented but apart from Hunger where are the Irish? And the Aussies?

Wait. What?

[drizzle]

BFI's list feels more on point, but its also more predictable

[aleph]

I see the Scots are heavily represented but apart from Hunger where are the Irish? And the Aussies?

Wait. What?

Ok, pre-independence Aussie. Oh, never mind.

[drizzle]

u mean like convicts?

that's an interesting point actually, would The Proposition qualify for this list?

[Y@k Bollocks]

I see the Scots are heavily represented but apart from Hunger where are the Irish? And the Aussies?

Wait. What?

Ok, pre-independence Aussie. Oh, never mind.

Ah! I see. Didn't read the first post properly.

[StormShadow]

Kind of shocking with many of the movie rankings (eg Zulu) and obvious omissions (eg Passport To Pimlico).

I love Theatre Of Blood, it's an awesome campy cult classic but doesn't belong on any British movie list unless it's for guilty pleasures.

make a charters and caldecott thread and educate me (ie, I haven't seen passport to pimlico or that's not cricket and some of the others) because I only came in here to say that Lady Vanishes should be a lot higher

[Harry Hater]

I was actually gonna request that some you film nerds put together a list of your top 10 British and French films, anybody up to it? How about over the last decade for starters?

I know dick about classic French movies but I've watched a lot of what came out from the latest decade. I'd say these are the best recent ones (2000-2010) from what I've seen, deliberately ignoring my own favorites (horror- and 'art'-movies) and sticking to what might have broad appeal. I also left off what I think everyone has seen or knows about, e.g. Amelie, A Prophet, Irreversible, Mesrine.

Department 36
I've Loved You So Long
Tell No One
Angel-A
Cach