From Zero to Film Hero
When hanging with friends I brought up this list I had come across on Book Riot called "From Zero to Well Read in 100 Books". It was a very interesting subject, and a few days later my friend stated in our discord that they would like to see a film version of the same list. So here we are.
In an effort to not make this a completely arbitrary list I decided on the following criteria: must contain films from all decades of cinema, only one film per director (I’m pretty sure I broke this rule like 3 times), and must “get you” something that is integral to understanding the history and artistry of film (i.e. The 400 Blows gets you an introduction to the French New Wave and some of its key players). Also, I’m pretty sure I’m a little over 100 because I kept adding and subtracting films and lost track. This might actually be 103 to well-watched(?).
Since I have a lot of blindspots I will include a few key categories or films I think people (and I) should check out before starting the list. They are as follows: Something by Tsai-Ming Lang, a spaghetti western, something by Frederick Wiseman, something by John Waters, something by Claire Denis, something by Jim Jarmusch, something by Julie Dash, Intolerance, Shoah, something Giallo, something by Robert Bresson, something by Apichatpong Weerasethakul, something by Charles Burnett, something by De Palma something by Jane Campion, Touki Bouki, something by John Cassavetes, something Blaxploitation, something by Wim Wenders, something Bollywood.
Without further ado, the list:
Arrival of a Train at La Ciotat (1896), Lumiere brothers
What it gets you: apocryphal film history
A Trip to the Moon (1902), Melies
What it gets you: early sci-fi; early color; iconic images
Suspense. (1913), Weber
What it gets you: one of the first female directors; split screen; car chase
Within Our Gates (1920), Micheaux
What it gets you: One of the early black filmmakers; a deconstruction many of the myths portrayed in Birth of a Nation
The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1920), Weine
What it gets you: German Expressionism; early horror; Weimar film tropes
La Roue (1923), Gance
What it gets you: revolutionary (at the time) film techniques; lighting; transitions; cuts
Sherlock Jr. (1924), Keaton
What it gets you: Buster Keaton; slapstick comedy; special effects; stunts
Metropolis (1927), Lang
What it gets you: Fritz Lang; more German Expressionism; early sci-fi; set design; special effects
Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans (1927), Murnau
What it gets you: romance; often considered the best silent picture
The Passion of Joan of Arc (1928), Dreyer
What it gets you: early Danish cinema; Renee Jeanne Falconetti; important film images
Man with a Movie Camera (1929), Vertov
What it gets you: Soviet filmmaking; experimental documentary; Vertov inventing now-common film techniques (slow-mo, match cuts, tracking shots, etc.); montage
Un Chien Andalou (1929), Bunuel
What it gets you: Salvador Dali; surrealism; eye
City Lights (1931), Chaplin
What it gets you: The Tramp; famous ending; often considered Chaplin's best
Duck Soup (1933), McCarey
What it gets you: Marx Brothers; musical comedy
L'Atalante (1934), Vigo
What it gets you: early French cinema; French New Wave inspiration
The Black Cat (1934), Ulmer
What it gets you: Boris Karloff; Bela Legosi; Universal horror; set design
Bringing Up Baby (1938), Hawks
What it gets you: Katharine Hepburn; Cary Grant; screwball comedy; early "manic pixie dream girl"
Stagecoach/The Searchers (1939, 1956), Ford
What they get you: the most important westerns ever made
The Rules of the Game (1939), Renoir
What it gets you: French satire; cinematography; mise-en-scene; the prototypical French film
Pinocchio (1940), Various
What it gets you: Disney animation
Citizen Kane (1941), Welles
What it gets you: Orson Welles; Joseph Cotton; "the greatest film of all time"; deep focus; the prototypical American film
To Be or Not to Be (1942), Lubitsch
What it gets you: Carole Lombard; Jack Benny; black comedy; Nazis
Casablanca (1942), Curtiz
What it gets you: Bogart; Bergman; WWII; romance; one of the most quotable movies of all time
Meshes of the Afternoon (1943), Deren
What it gets you: experimental short film; subjective/objective camera
Double Indemnity (1944), Wilder
What it gets you: Barbara Stanwyck; prototypical film noir; and this hunk of concrete in my stomach
Bicycle Thieves (1948), De Sica
What it gets you: Italian neorealism; post-war
The Red Shoes (1948), Powell & Pressburger
What it gets you: British musical/drama; impressionism; technicolor
Rashomon (1950), Akira Kurosawa
What it gets you: Toshiro Mifune; "jidaigeki"; samurai; multiple perspectives; early New Wave
Signin’ in the Rain (1952), Donen/Kelly
What it gets you: Gene Kelly; Debbie Reynolds; film history; iconic songs and dances
Rabbit Seasoning (1952), Jones
What it gets you: Chuck Jones; Bugs Bunny; Daffy Duck; Elmer Fudd; Merrie Melodies/Looney Tunes
Tokyo Story (1953), Ozu
What it gets you: Setsuko Hara; post-war Japan; static shots ("tatami shot")
Godzilla (1954), Honda
What it gets you: Godzilla; post-war Japan; "kaiju"; anti-war
The Night of the Hunter (1955), Laughton
What it gets you: Robert Mitchum; serial killer; love and hate
All That Heaven Allows (1955), Sirk
What it gets you: melodrama; Rock Hudson; technicolor
The Apu Trilogy (1955, 1956, 1959), Ray
What it gets you: Indian realism; child acting; classical Indian music; coming of age
Vertigo (1958), Hitchcock
What it gets you: Hitchcock; Jimmy Stewart; Saul Bass; the film that overtook Citizen Kane on the Sight and Sound; iconic final sequence; dolly zoom
Some Like it Hot (1959), Wilder
What it gets you: Marilyn Monroe; Jack Lemmon; Tony Curtis; screwball comedy; cross-dressing; famous last line
The 400 Blows (1959), Truffaut
What it gets you: Jean-Pierre Leaud; early French New Wave; famous last shot
Vivre Sa Vie (1962), Godard
What it gets you: Godard; Anna Karina; French New Wave; auteurism; jump cuts; unusual camera placement
La Jetée (1962), Marker
What it gets you: Left Bank; experimental sci-fi
8 1/2 (1963), Fellini
What it gets you: Marcello Mastroianni; avant-garde; metanarrative; filmmaker's film
Umbrellas of Cherbourg (1964), Demy
What it gets you: Catherine Deneuve; Michel Legrand; French New Wave one of the most influential musicals
Le Bonheur (1965), Varda
What it gets you: Agnes Varda’s nastiest film; French New Wave;
Black Girl (1966), Sembène
What it gets you: Senegalese cinema; postcolonial cinema
Battle of Algiers (1966), Pontecorvo
What it gets you: the revolution on film
Persona (1966), Bergman
What it gets you: Ingmar Bergman; Bibi Andersson and Liv Ullmann; one of the best “persona swap” films
Daisies (1966), Chytilová
What it gets you: Czech New Wave; feminism; anarchy; satire
Bonnie and Clyde (1967), Penn
What it gets you: Beatty and Dunaway; early New Hollywood
Dragon Inn (1967), Hu
What it gets you: Chinese martial arts (wuxia)
Playtime (1967), Tati
What it gets you: Mr. Hulot; sound design; set design; the restaurant sequence
2001: A Space Odyssey (1968), Kubrick
What it gets you: Kubrick; HAL; special effects
Night of the Living Dead (1968), Romero
What it gets you: the zombie bible; Duane Jones; black protagonist; social commentary
Salesman (1969), Maysles Brothers
What it gets you: direct cinema
Color of Pomegranates (1969), Parajanov
What it gets you: art film; queer imagery; “tableaux vivants”
Wanda (1970), Loden
What it gets you: independent cinema; only Loden feature film
A New Leaf (1971), May
What it gets you: black romantic comedy; Walter Matthau; Elaine May
Walkabout (1971), Roeg
What it gets you: David Gulpilil; Australian New Wave
The Godfather (1972), Coppola
What it gets you: Brando; Pacino; New Hollywood; gangster film
Ali: Fear Eats the Soul (1974), Fassbinder
What it gets you: New German Cinema; melodrama; “taboo” romance
Chinatown (1974), Polanski
What it gets you: Nicholson; neo-noir; often considered one of the best screenplays
Black Christmas (1974), Clark
What it gets you: prototypical slasher; feminist social commentary
Celine and Julie Go Boating (1974), Rivette
What it gets you: another “persona swap” film; one of the most unique films on this list
Jeanne Dielman, 23 Commerce Quay, 1080 Brussels (1975), Akerman
What it gets you: slow cinema; feminist classic; #1 on sight and sound
Nashville (1975), Altman
What it gets you: ensemble cast; the way Altman records dialogue scenes; America
Jaws (1975), Spielberg
What it gets you: the original summer blockbuster, shark, Roy Scheider
In the Realm of the Sense (1976), Oshima
What it gets you: erotic art film; unsimulated sex
Salò, or the 120 Days of Sodom (1977), Pasolini
What it gets you: anti-fascism; Pasolini’s final film
Star Wars (1977), Lucas
What it gets you: special effects; Darth Vader; changed movies for better or worse; score
Halloween (1978), Carpenter
What it gets you: Michael Myers; slasher; scream queen; score
Days of Heaven (1978), Malick
What it gets you: American period picture; Terrence Malick; cinematography
Stalker (1979), Tarkovsky
What it gets you: Tarkovsky. You just have to watch it.
Stop Making Sense (1984), Demme
What it gets you: one of the best concert films; David Byrne being weird; big suit
Repo Man (1984), Cox
What it gets you: Harry Dean Stanton; Reagan-era satire
Police Story (1985), Chan
What it gets you: Hong Kong action; prime Jackie Chan; Brigitte Lin and Maggie Cheung
Tampopo (1985), Itami
What it gets you: “ramen western”; I don’t want to say more just watch it.
Ferris Bueller’s Day Off (1986), Hughes
What it gets you: prototypical 80s teen comedy; fourth wall breaks that don’t suck
Robocop (1987), Verhoeven
What it gets you: Paul Verhoeven’s uncanny ability to see the future
Do the Right Thing (1989), Lee
What it gets you: Spike!; Bill Nunn; some of the best character actors out there; probably the best American film ever made
Close-Up (1990), Kiarostami
What it gets you: Iranian New Wave; a blending of documentary and fiction; a completely idiosyncratic film experience
Goodfellas (1990), Scorsese
What it gets you: Marty; De Niro; Pesci; gangster film; narration
Paris Is Burning (1990), Livingston
What it gets you: iconic documentary about drag culture in the 80s
Boyz n the Hood (1991), Singleton
What it gets you: classic 90s crime movie; stacked cast of actors; classic ending
A Brighter Summer Day (1991), Yang
What it gets you: Taiwanese New Wave; a child singing Elvis in a way that will stick with you forever.
Hard Boiled (1992), Woo
What it gets you: Chow Yun-fat; Tony Leung; Hong Kong action; the hospital shootout
Just Another Girl on the I.R.T. (1992), Harris
What it gets you: daring social drama; one of the most important films ever made; fourth wall
Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me (1992), Lynch
What it gets you: David Lynch; the world of Twin Peaks
Three Colors Trilogy (1993-1994), Kieslowski
What it gets you: Juliette Binoche; one of the great Polish filmmakers
Pulp Fiction (1994), Tarantino
What it gets you: Travolta; Jackson; Thurman; one of the most influential films of its era
Before Sunrise (1995), Linklater
What it gets you: one of the great romances; great dialogue; great acting
Cure (1997), Kurosawa
What it gets you: Japanese Horror; beach scene
The Big Lebowski (1998), Coen Brothers
What it gets you: The Dude; neo–noir; great character actors; Dick Cheney
The Matrix (1999), Wachowski Sisters
What it gets you: Keanu; red and blue pill; important contributions to film language
In the Mood for Love (2000), Wong Kar-wai
What it gets you: Tony Leung; Hong Kong New Wave; maybe the greatest film ever
Spirited Away (2001), Miyazaki
What it gets you: Studio Ghibli anime; a hangout film
The Royal Tenenbaums (2001), Anderson
What it gets you: Wes Anderson; Bill Murray; Gene Hackman; classic Wes frame narrative
Fat Girl (2001), Breillat
What it gets you: controversial sex movie; Catherine Breillat’s nimble handling of controversial sex movies
La Ciénaga (2001), Martel
What it gets you: Argentinian cinema; swamp; the bourgeois on film
Jackass: The Movie (2002), Tremaine
What it gets you: the logical endpoint of slapstick comedy; male friendship; skateboarding; balls
Who Killed Captain Alex? (2010), Nabwana IGG
What it gets you: Ugandan cinema; special effects; the invention of the “VJ” (video joker)
Moonlight (2016), Jenkins
What it gets you: probably the movie that will go on to define 2010s cinema
Uncut Gems (2019), Safdie Brothers
What it gets you: Adam Sandler; probably the other movie that will define 2010s cinema
Pipe rock theory (2025), O’Malley
What it gets you: probably the movie that will go on to define the 2020s.
