I've never had the persistence to put together a Top 100 to it's final numbers, but the Top 100 Club made me go the full distance (at last!
)....
I limited myself to one movie per director. The upper third of the list is pretty manifest while the remaining two thirds are less so. More than half of those film should appear on any other day's list, the rest maybe not. The list is a bit weak on silent and animated movies, Asian even more so and there isn't a single film from Africa on the list
. And is 10% female directors OK? The one film per director limit probably took 10-20 films off the list and i can name as least as many movies that I haven't yet seen, that could make the list. It's an eternal research!
To the list then:
1. Trouble Every Day (Claire Denis, 2001)
2. Dekalog (Krzysztof Kieslowski, 1989)
3. Sympathy For The Devil (Jean-Luc Godard, 1968)
4. Wings Of Desire (Wim Wenders, 1987)
5. Russian Ark (Aleksandr Sokurov, 2002)
6. Grey Gardens (Albert & David Maysles, Ellen Hovde, Muffie Meyer; 1975)
7. Le feu follet (Louis Malle, 1963)
8. Time Regained (Raoul Ruiz, 1999)
9. Aguirre, der Zorn Gottes (Werner Herzog, 1972)
10. One From The Heart (Francis Ford Coppola, 1981)
11. Man With A Movie Camera (Dziga Vertov, 1929)
12. Dogville (Lars von Trier, 2003)
13. Sombre (Philippe Grandrieux, 1998)
14. Cul-de-sac (Roman Polanski, 1966)
15. Brown Bunny (Vincent Gallo, 2003)
16. The Swimmer (Frank Perry, 1968)
17. The Battle Of Algiers (Gillo Pontecorvo, 1966)
18. Touch Of Evil (Orson Welles, 1958)
19. La maman et la putain (Jean Eustache, 1973)
20. A Special Day (Ettore Scola, 1977)
21. Rashomon (Akira Kurosawa, 1950)
22. Playtime (Jacques Tati, 1967)
23. Goodbye, Dragon Inn (Tsai Ming-liang, 2003)
24. The Long Goodbye (Robert Altman, 1973)
25. A Summer’s Tale (Eric Rohmer,1996)
26. Pulp Fiction (Quentin Tarantino, 1994)
27. Les 400 coups (François Truffaut, 1959)
28. Baby Doll (Elia Kazan, 1956)
29. Daisies (Vera Chytilová, 1966)
30. The Turin Horse (Béla Tarr, Ágnes Hranitzky; 2011)
31. Unsere Afrikareise (Peter Kubelka, 1966)
32. Thérèse (Alain Cavalier, 1986)
33. The Women (George Cukor, 1939)
34. La jetée (Chris Marker, 1962)
35. Le gamin au vélo (Jean-Pierre & Luc Dardenne, 2011)
36. Dead Man (Jim Jarmusch, 1995)
37. The Piano (Jane Campion, 1993)
38. Little Fugitive (Ray Ashley, Morris Engel, Ruth Orkin; 1953)
39. Killer Of Sheep (Charles Burnett, 1978)
40. The Piano Teacher (Michael Haneke, 2001)
41. Pickpocket (Robert Bresson, 1959)
42. Paper Moon (Peter Bogdanovich, 1973)
43. Don’t Look Back (D.A. Pennebaker, 1967)
44. 8 femmes (François Ozon, 2002)
45. Midnight Cowboy (John Schlesinger, 1969)
46. The Night Of The Hunter (Charles Laughton, 1955)
47. The Ice Storm (Ang Lee, 1997)
48. Man On The Moon (Milos Forman, 1999)
49. Snatch (Guy Ritchie, 2000)
50. Los olvidados (Luis Buñuel, 1950)
51. Brief Encounter (David Lean, 1945)
52. Eyes Wide Shut (Stanley Kubrick, 1999)
53. Les triplettes de Belleville (Sylvain Chomet, 2003)
54. Vertigo (Alfred Hitchcock, 1958)
55. Saturday Night And Sunday Morning (Karel Reisz, 1960)
56. The New Land (Jan Troell, 1972)
57. The Adventures Of Prince Achmed (Lotte Reiniger, 1926)
58. Badlands (Terrence Malick, 1973)
59. Gare du Nord (Jean Rouch, 1965; segment of Paris vu par… )
60. Vagabond (Agnès Varda, 1985)
61. Slap Shot (George Roy Hill, 1977)
62. Le sang d'un poète (Jean Cocteau, 1932)
63. Stop Making Sense (Jonathan Demme, 1984)
64. Breathless (Jim McBride, 1983)
65. Meshes Of The Afternoon (Maya Deren, 1943)
66. When We Were Kings (Leon Gast, 1996)
67. Beavis And Butt-head Do America (Mike Judge, 1996)
68. Gadjo dilo (Tony Gatlif, 1997)
69. Rebel Without A Cause (Nicholas Ray, 1955)
70. A.K.A. Serial Killer (Masao Adachi, 1969)
71. The King Of Comedy (Martin Scorsese, 1982)
72. YouTube clip from Kranked 8: Revolve (2009)
73. A Woman Under The Influence (John Cassavetes, 1974)
74. The Apostle (Robert Duvall, 1997)
75. Araya (Margot Benacerraf, 1959)
76. Kes (Ken Loach, 1969)
77. Duel (Steven Spielberg, 1971)
78. Skammen (Ingmar Bergman, 1968)
79. The Bridges Of Madison County (Clint Eastwood, 1995)
80. Wendy And Lucy (Kelly Reichardt, 2008)
81. Out Of The Blue (Dennis Hopper, 1980)
82. Roma città aperta (Roberto Rossellini, 1945)
83. The Hours (Stephen Daldry, 2002)
84. In A Lonely Place (Nicholas Ray, 1950)
85. The Honeymoon Killers (Leonard Kastle, 1969)
86. Before The Devil Knows You’re Dead (Sidney Lumet, 2007)
87. Limite (Mario Peixoto, 1931)
88. Diva (Jean-Jacques Beineix, 1981)
89. The Man Who Fell To Earth (Nicolas Roeg, 1976)
90. Far From Heaven (Todd Haynes, 2002)
91. The Fountain (Darren Aronofsky, 2006)
92. The Draughtman’s Contract (Peter Greenaway, 1982)
93. La cérémonie (Claude Chabrol, 1995)
94. Gomorra (Matteo Garrone, 2008)
95. Amour fou (Jessica Hausner, 2014)
96. Happiness (Todd Solondz, 1998)
97. The Diving Bell And The Butterfly (Julian Schnabel, 2007)
98. Hausu (Nobuhiko Obayashi, 1977)
99. The Full Monty (Peter Cattaneo, 1997)
100. Låt den rätte komma in (Tomas Alfredson, 2008)
And there is a tumblr with a gallery
here