Updated 6.04.09
[I pulled these from the excellent list compiled at the site They Shoot Pictures, Don't They? - they collated the top 1000 films from over 1800 other lists and critics lists, I have a link to the list on the sidebar, under "Film Sites", also added to the bottom of this post - Jose]
This list is about 140 films - how many have you seen? I highlighted my favorites of these in BLUE [40 of the 140]
Top Critically Ranked Films for Each Country
Shows title, rank in top 1000, director - I also show some higher-ranked joint country efforts, there are really too many combos of those to show them all.
Algiers-France: Battle of Algiers (95) - Gillo Pontecorvo
Argentina: The Hour of the Furnaces (519) - Octavio Getino & Fernando E. Solanas
Australia:
1. The Piano (261) - Jane Campion
2. The Road Warrior (Mad Max 2) (391) - George Miller
3. Picnic at Hanging Rock (526) - Peter Weir
4. Walkabout (648) - Nicholas Roeg
5. The Year of Living Dangerously (876) - Peter Weir
Belgium: Deanne Dielman, 23 Quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxellse (141) - Chantal Akerman
Brazil: Black God, White Devil (323) - Glauber Rocha
Brazil-France: Black Orpheus (863) - Marcel Camus
Brazil-Ger-France: City of God (778) - Fernando Meirelles
Canada:
1. Wavelength (339) - Michael Snow
2. Dead Ringers (439) - David Cronenberg
3. Videodrome (505) - David Cronenberg
Canada-France: Atlantic City (749) - Louis Malle
China:
1. Spring in a Small Town (480) - Fei Mu
2. Yellow Earth (642) - Chen Kaige
3. Red Sorghum (702) - Zhang Yimou
China-Taiwan-U.S.: Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (822) - Ang Lee
Cuba: Memories of Underdevelopment (376) - Tomas Gutierrez Alea
Czechoslavakia: Closely Watched Trains (351) - Jiri Menzel
Denmark: Ordet (34) - Carl Dreyer
Denmark-Swe-Fr-Neth-Norw: Breaking the Waves (383) - Lars von Trier
France:
1. Rules of the Game (3) - Jean Renoir
2. L'Atalante (16) - Jean Vigo
3. The Passion of Joan of Arc (17) - Carl Dreyer
4. La Grande Illusion (25) - Jean Renoir
France-Germ: Vampyr (183) - Carl Dreyere
France-Germ-Italy: 1900 (267) - Bernardo Bertolucci
France-Iran-W.Germ: F for Fake (318) - Orson Welles
France-Italy: Contempt (56) - Jean-Luc Godard
France-Japan: Hiroshima mon amour (96) - Alain Resnais
France-Spain: Tristana (349) - Luis Bunuel
France-W Germ: Wings of Desire (247) - Wim Wenders
Germany:
1. M (53) - Fritz Lang
2. Metropolis (70) - Fritz Lang
3. Aguire: The Wrath of God (91) - Werner Herzog
4. Nosferatu (105) - F.W. Murnau
5. The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (144) - Robert Wiene
Hong Kong: Chungking Express (328) - Wong Kar-Wai
Hong Kong-China: Farewell, My Concubine (551) - Chen Kaige
Hong Kong-France: In the Mood for Love (344) - Wong Kar-Wai
Hungary: The Round-Up (673) - Miklos Jancso
Hungary-Germ-Switz: Satantango (343) - Bela Tarr
India:
1. Pather Panchali (59) - Satyajit Ray
2. The World of Apu (165)- Satyajit Ray
3. The Music Room (192)- Satyajit Ray
4. Aparajito (289)- Satyajit Ray
5. Charulata (324)- Satyajit Ray
[Where is Mira Nair? and others, they have lots of great films!]
Iran: Close-Up (191) - Abbas Kiarostami
Iran-Fr-Switz: A Moment of Innocence (412) Mohsen Makhmalbaf
Italy:
1. 8 1/2 (5) - Federico Fellini
2. The Bicycle Thief (14) - Vittorio De Sica (I prefer his Umberto D.)
3. La Dolce Vita (26) - Federico Fellini
4. La Strada (50) - Federico Fellini
5. The Leopard (66) - Luchino Visconti
Italy-France: L'avventura (38) - Michelangelo Antonioni
Italy-Fr-Germ: The Conformist (65) - Bernardo Bertolucci (Great Film!)
Italy-Spain: The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly (187) - Sergio Leone
Italy-UK: Blow-Up (197)- Michelangelo Antonioni
Italy-US: Once Upon a Time in the West (73) - Sergio Leone
Italy-W.Germ: Germany, Year Zero (236) - Luchino Visconti
Japan:
1. The Seven Samurai (9) - Akira Kurosawa
2. Tokyo Story (10) - Yasujiro Ozu
3. Rashomon (19) - Akira Kurosawa
4. Ugetsu monogatari (54) - Kenji Mizoguchi
5. Ikiru (81) - Akira Kurosawa
Japan-China: Ju Dou (735) - Zhang Yimou
Japan-Hong Kong: Princess Yang Kwei Fei (617) - Kenji Mizoguchi
Japan-Russia: Dersu Uzala (451) - Akira Kurosawa
Korea: Oldboy (816) - Chan-Wook Park
Mali: Yeelen (725) - Souleymane Cisse
Mexico:
1. Los Olvidados (109) - Luis Bunuel
2. The Exterminating Angel (120) - Luis Bunuel
3. El (315) - Luis Bunuel
[Hey, isn't Bunuel actually French? Do any native Mexicans make movies? Gregory Nava?]
Mexico-US: Que viva Mexico! (473) - Sergei Eisenstein
New Zealand: Angel at My Table (532) - Jane Campion
Poland: 1.Ashes and Diamonds (118) - Andrzej Wajda
2. Dekalog (132) - Krszystof Kieslowski
3. A Short Film About Killing (631) - Krszystof Kieslowski
Russia (see also 'USSR', for Soviet era films):
1. Battleship Potemkin (8) - Sergei Eisenstein
2. Andrei Rublev (41) - Andrei Tarkovsky
3. The Mirror (69) - Andrei Tarkovsky
4. Stalker (125) - Andrei Tarkovsky
5. Earth (134) - Alexander Dovzhenko
Russia-France: Burnt by the Sun (885) - Nikita Mikhalkov
Senegal: Xala (554) - Ousmane Sembene
Spain:
1. Viridiana (68) - Luis Bunuel
2. The Spirit of the Beehive (194) - Victor Erice
3. Land Without Bread (586) - Luis Bunuel
4. Law of Desire (672) - Pedro Almodovar
Spain-France: All About My Mother (635) - Pedro Almodovar
Spain-Italy: El Verdugo (277) - Luis Garcia Berlanga
Spain-Switz: Chimes At Midnight (124) - Orson Welles
Sweden:
1. Persona (40) - Ingmar Bergman
2. The Seventh Seal (52) - Ingmar Bergman
3. Wild Strawberries (57) - Ingmar Bergman
4. Fanny & Alexander (74) - Ingmar Bergman
[Well, Lasse Hallstrom's "My Life as a Dog" made the list, but seemingly after every mediocre film Bergman made, and there were many; most of them, in fact, although these four are his best.. Watch "Dog", far more enjoyable - Jman]
Taiwan: The Time to Live and the Time to Die (287) - Hsiao-Hsien Hou
Taiwan-Japan: Yi Yi (597) - Edward Yang
United Kingdom:
1. 2001: A Space Odyssey (4) - Stanley Kubrick
2. Lawrence of Arabia (13) - David Lean
3. The Third Man (24) - Carol Reed
4. Dr. Strangelove (39) - Stanley Kubrick
5. Barry Lyndon (92) - Stanley Kubrick
6. A Clockwork Orange (93) - Stanley Kubrick
United States (has 458 of the top 1000)
1. Citizen Kane (1) - Orson Welles
2. Vertigo (2) - Alfred Hitchcock
3. The Godfather (6) - Francis Coppola
4. The Searchers (7) - John Ford
5. Singin in the Rain (11) - Stanley Donen & Gene Kelly
6. Sunrise (12) - F.W. Murnau (silent but great!)
7. Casablanca (15) - Michael Curtiz
8. Raging Bull (18) - Martin Scorsese
9. The Godfather Part II (20) - Francis Coppola
10. Touch of Evil (21) - Orson Welles
[I much prefer Welles' The Magnificent Ambersons to this, even Kane, and it's also high on this list, at #43 but falling annually. I also prefer Godfather II to the first - add DeNiro and Strasburg and time shifts to a young Don Corleone in Italian, much more artistic a film to me]
US-Australia: The Matrix (733) - Andy & Larry Wachowski
US-Germany: Dead Man (445) - Jim Jarmusch
US-India: The River (219) - Jean Renoir
US-New Zealand: Lord of the Rings I (860) - Peter Jackson
[Not sure why Rings III isn't here actually, instead of part I]
USSR
1. The Man with a Movie Camera (97) - Dziga Vertov
2. Alexander Nevsky (217) - Sergei Eisenstein
3. Strike (284) - Sergei Eisenstein
4. October (292) - Sergei Eisenstein
5. The Colour of Pomegranate (382) - Sergei Parajanov
USSR-Cuba: I Am Cuba (446) - Alexander Dovzhenko
[Must've been made before the psychotic 'trade embargo'! can we be more petty?]
US-UK: The Big Lebowski (777) - Ethan and Joel Coen
[Argh - one of their worst! give me Raising Arizona anytime]
West Germany:
1. In a Year with 13 Moons (335) - Rainer Werner Fassbinder
2. The Enigma of Kaspar Hauser (484) - Werner Herzog
3. Fitzcarraldo (575) - Werner Herzog
[Even the documentary about this, Burden of Dreams, is a great film as well; but the best German film to me is now The Lives of Others, 2006, with the comedy Goodbye, Lenin! close behind]
Yugoslavia: Time of the Gypsies (561) - Emir Kusturica
Irony: Alfred Hitchcock, a British director, is usually listed hightest for Vertigo (or sometimes Psycho), made in the U.S after he came to Hollywood. Stanley Kubrick, an American director, made his best films (2001, Dr. Strangelove, A Clockwork Orange) in the U.K. Of all the films that get listed in the top 10, I'd put 2001 above them all. In spite of a lack of pace, it had more influence on the entire industry than Kane or Vertigo; none of the others was authored by Arthur C. Clarke either, the most visionary author of the century. He co-created radar for the British, and predicted (in the 40's) telecom satellites circling the globe.
For the full list of 1000 critically ranked films:
They Shoot Pictures, Don't They?
