A movie is both entertainment and art. Some enjoy movies mainly as entertainment and others are considering it as an art form. Movies are also part of its industry and, therefore, a commercial factor exists that sometimes interfere with artistic intentions.

Greatest Movies of All Time

The greatest movies are often the combination of different components there excitement, fascination and delight meets the storytelling, the visual craft and the actors conception of a character. You will find tons of movie tips on this site from the greatest directors, actors and top lists dedicated to genres and periods in the history of film.

The Greatest Movies of All Time can never be presented in any objective or "true" way. It does exist a canon, but there are lots of people disagreeing to a such standard. Here you will find list of the highest ranked movies from both the critics and the ordinary audience. Here follows a collection of list from some of the biggest authorities in the industry.

The list of American Film Institute

The American Film Institute (AFI) has presented many top lists over the years. In 2007 they celebrated 100 years and did of course present a list of the 100 best movies of all time. One thing to be noted regarding the lists from AFI is that American movies are premiered.

1. Citizen Kane
2. The Godfather
3. Casablanca
4. Raging Bull
5. Singin’ In the Rain
6. Gone with the Wind
7. Lawrence of Arabia
8. Schindler’s List
9. Vertigo
10. The Wizard of Oz

→ See the whole list of AFI’s 100 Movies.

Sight & Sound

Sight & Sound is one of the highest regarded British film magazines. Since the 1950s Sight & Sound has presented top ten lists made by critics once every decade. The latest list is from 2012 and the following movies are included:

1. Vertigo
2. Citizen Kane
3. Tokyo Story
4. La Règle du jeu (The Rules of the Game)
5. Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans
6. 2001: A Space Odyssey
7. The Searchers
8. Man with a Movie Camera
9. The Passion of Joan of Arc
10. 8½

Empire

In 2008 the film magazine Empire made an ambitious attempt to nominate the 500 greatest movies in history by a big voting in which readers (10,000) participated together with movie makers (150) and critics (50). The top ten of this list looked like this:

1. The Godfather
2. Raiders of The Lost Ark
3. The Empire Strikes Back
4. The Shawshank Redemption
5. Jaws
6. Godfellas
7. Apocalypze Now
8. Singin’ In the Rain
9. Pulp Fiction
10. Fight Club

→ See the whole list of Empire’s 500 Greatest Movies Of All Time.

New York Times

In 2004 New York Times published a list of 1,000 movies edited by Peter M. Nichols. In this case the movies were not ranked and instead ordered alphabetically.  
→ Go to The New York Times Guide to the Best 1,000 Movies Ever Made.

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The Best Action Comedy Movies according to GreatestMovies.org.

The list

10 Bad Boys
If you can handle endless of wrangle between two big egos which also are police detectives this one can be recommended.
Year: 1995 | Director: Michael Bay

9 Lethal Weapon
Definitely action and some laughs are certainly present. It is a pretty hard case to decide which is the best between first movie and the Lethal Weapon 2. It is, however, easy to say the rest of the sequels could match the first two. 
Year: 1987 | Director: Richard Donner

8 Lethal Weapon 2
Mel Gibson and Danny Glower succeeds a second time in being entertaining as companions solving crime and on the same time wrangle about  this and that. 
Year: 1998 | Director: Brett Ratner

7 Smokey and the Bandit
A classic in its own terms and early example of what a mix of action and comedy could lead to. Car chases to an excess and plenty of machismo are given then a redneck police chasing a road cowboy over 1.000 miles. 
Year: 1977 | Director: Hal Needham

6 The Princess Bride
The Princess Bride is told as a fairy tale of archetypal comportments which is matched with some peculiar features resulting in an original romantic adventure comedy.
Year: 1987 | Director: William Goldman

5 Ghostbusters
The ghost are explicit and even that it may not be all too scary the idea is original and give lots of room for comic scenes.  
Year: 1984 | Director: Ivan Reitmanl  

4 Beverly Hills Cop
The police Axel Foley got a mission that takes him away from the big city slum in Detroit and are replaced with the grandeur of Beverly Hills. Eddie Murphy in his hey days are delivering it and Harlod Faltermayer contribute with a classic soundtrack.  
Year: 1984 | Director: Martin Brest

3 The Mask
Jim Carrey’s character Stanley Ipkiss deviates from his role in life as a browbeaten to a crazy green super hero. This film is splendid in its creative mix of action and comedy. 
Year: 1994 | Director: Spike Jonze

2 Midnight Run
Robert de Niro and Charles Grodin bring about great dynamics. The excitement may hang on better for the younger audience, but there is also some true entertainment.  
Year: 1988 | Director: Martin Brest

1 48 hrs.
The story is terrific, but even better is the dialogue between the cop played by Nick Nolte and the convict played by Eddie Murphy. The movie has also been known as the first that features a contrasting duo working together solving crimes, but arguing even more. 
Year: 1982 | Director: Walter Hill

The cross-over genre known as Action comedy is relative new. The oldest movie included on the list is from 1977, but like always there is no correct way to outline a certain genre. There are, of course, older movies that combine action and comedy, but without the characteristics that is associated with this sub genre.

It could be argued for that the action comedies are mainly using the form of the action movie as the foundation and then embrace features of comedy. The definition here is that the movie must get its fuel from both action and comedy elements, and not only have scenes that represent action and comedy.  

The Best Action Movies according to GreatestMovies.org.

The list

16 Inception
This action thriller taking place in the people’s dreams was one of the biggest hit in 2010. The Director behind The Dark Knight trilogy puts together another shadowy world and this time with Leonardo DiCaprio in the main role.
Year: 2010 | Director: Christopher Nolan

15 Gone In 60 Seconds
60 seconds is the time i takes to lose a car and never see it again. This movie (that came as a remake in 2000) includes also perhaps the greatest car chase ever in a movie. 
Year:1974 | Director: H. B. Halicki

14 The Bourne Identity
The Bourne Identity is the first and probably the best movie in the Bourne trilogy that are based on novels by Robert Ludlum. Matt Damon plays the, former CIA, super agent who after an unsolved incident got CIA as his enemy. 
Year: 2002 | Director: Doug Liman

13 The Terminator
The Terminator part one included Arnold Schwarzenegger as the cyborg sent from the future to change history by assassinating the mother whose son are to be an important man in the war against the machines.
Year: 1984 | Director: James Cameron

12 Beverly Hills Cop
The police Axel Foley got a mission that takes him from the big city slum in Detroit and are replaced with the grandeur of Beverly Hills. Eddie Murphy in his hey days delivers it and Harlod Faltermayer contribute with a classic soundtrack.
Year: 1984 | Director: Martin Brest

11 Dirty Harry
This is the first and the best in the sequels that had Clint Eastwood in front as the macho cop Harry Callahan. Unless a serial killer receives a demanded ransom he threatens to strike again and Callahan is no wonder the man who gets the lousy job as the courier.
Year: 1971 | Director: Don Siegel

10 The Dark Knight
The Batman movies become one of the biggest hype on the 2000s and the movie that captured most fans of all was this one. This time The Dark Knight, or Batman as we traditionally know him, meets a ruthless combatant in the Joker, memorable portrayed by Heath Ledger. 
Year: 2008 | Director: Christopher Nolan

9 The Getaway
Steve McQueen brings his coolness to this movie about a bank job. The mix of drama and action and a few humorous scenes plus great acting from the leading actors McQueen and Ali MacGraw creates a sexual atmosphere.
Year: 1972 | Director: Sam Pekinpah

8 Thief
James Caan's character is a thief, specialized in safecracking, who want to live an ordinary life but he refuses a retirement until he will have a good economy for the rest of his life. This is an equation that can’t be solved without risks.  
Year: 1981 | Director: Michael Mann

7 Top Gun
Tom Cruise plays Maverick who is one of the new talented recruits on Air Force Fighter Weapons School. The adrenaline is high in the air and the story on the ground is geared up well.
Year: 1982 | Director: Tony Scott

6 48 Hrs.
The story is not so bad and the dialogue between the cop played by Nick Nolte and the convict played by Eddie Murphy is superb. The movie has also been known as the first showing a contrasting duo working together solving crimes, but arguing even more. 
Year: 1982 | Director: Walter Hill

5 Die Hard
When John McClane arrives in Los Angeles to meet his wife at a Christmas party in the Nakatomi Plaze sky scrape he does so almost simultaneously with some German terrorists who occupies the building.
Year: 1988 | Director: John McTiernan

4 Runaway Train
Two prisoners Manny (Jon Voight) and Buck (Eric Roberts) are escaping from a prison in the cold winter. They succeed in finding an escape by a train, but the runaway train turns out to be a trap.
Year: 1985 | Director: Andrey Konchalovskiy

3 Terminator 2: Judgment Day
A high-tech cyborg arrives from another time to assassin a certain John Connor, who is destined to become an important man in the rebellion against the machines in the future. The special effects in Terminator 2 were before its time and the movie was overshadowing its predecessor. 
Year: 1991 | Director: James Cameron

2 The Matrix
The action scenes of Matrix with slow motions and visual effects set a new standard for the genre. Neo lives in a world which is dominated by the machines, but one night some people knocks at his door and wants to show him the real world.
Year: 1999 | Director: Lana Wachowski & Andy Wachowski

1 Heat
Al Pacino as the good guy and Robert de Niro as the crook are good qualifications for a great action movie and the result could well match the expectations. The story includes both excitement and deep character studies.
Year: 1995 | Director: Michael Mann

Action heroes in films have been seen long into the past and early as the days of the silent movie with, for example, Douglas Fairbanks portraying Zorro and Robin Hood. The action movie as a genre is clearly extensive and likewise to many others hard to give a strict classification. It often assimilates with crime, science-fiction and war movies to mention some other genres.

Some significations are the presence of car chases, shootings, fights and explosions. For many the genre seems to have embodied its typical components and styles in the 1980s with movies like The Terminator (1984) and Die Hard (1988). Moreover, the action is sometimes blended with comedy in titles like 48 Hrs. (1982) and Beverly Hills Cop (1984).

The adventure movies are capsule traditional narrative elements like antagonism between good and bad which holds romantic heroes on one side. It is one of the genres where escapism is an almost obvious component.

Going back in time we can find Douglas Fairbank portraying Zorro and Robin Hood in the 1920s and Johnny Weismüller as Tarzan in the 1930s. A somewhat more modern figure is the British agent James Bond, who has been seen in series of action adventure movies. Another modern hero is of course the archaeologist Indiana Jones. In recent days two of the biggest commercial successes are Lord of the Rings and Pirates of the Carribean.

Lots of biopic movies have been made with a famous artist as the object. Pablo Picasso, Vincent van Gogh, Francisco de Goya and Jackson Pollock are just a few of the historical painters which life has been depicted on the silver screen. Here is a list with the editor’s choice of the best movies about painters.

The List

1 Lust for Life
The life of Vincent van Gogh was filled with sorrows and in the end it was influenced by insanity. Kirk Douglas is terrific in the role as the Dutch painter. This is also a movie in which the painting is given much room and we are led trough the progress of van Gogh's art. Lust for Life had its premiere in 1956 and was directed by Vincente Minnelli. In 1990 Robert Altman did a surprisingly weak film about the same painter in the movie titled Vincent & Theo.
Director: Vincente Minnelli | Actors: Kirk Douglas, Anthony Quinn | Year: 1956

2 Les Amants de Montparnasse  (The Lovers of Monterparnasse)
Without being historically correct in every aspect Les Amants de Montparnasse (The Lovers of Monterparnasse, 1958) is a magnificent movie about the Italian painter Amedeo Modigliani. “Modi” as he is called wants recognition for his art as well as true love in his life. However, the world wasn’t ready for his art under Modigliani's lifetime and he used alcohol as consolation. Gérard Philipe makes a great impression in the role as Modigliani.
Director: Jacques Becker | Actors: Gérard Philipe, Lilli Palmer | Year: 1958

3 Moulin Rougue
This movie of the French illustrator Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec is one of the greatest among movies about painters and is directed by John Huston. The scenes from Paris and the Moulin Rouge feels very authentic and so does the portrait of the painter. Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec had an accident at a young age which affected his legs to not grow normally. He became short the rest of his life and this, of course, was a struggle for him. The remorse over the handicap and the hardships in life that was caused by it is heartrending depicted and the film doesn’t try to soften the facts.
Director: John Huston | Actors: José Ferrer, Zsa Zsa Gabor, Colette Marchand | Year: 1952

4 Basquit
Jean-Michael Basquit was a black young man living on the street who suddenly rise to stardom in the art world with his graffiti-style paintings. The movie Basquiat from 1996 is a true story about a rebellious artist that never tries to adjust to the big audience or trying to romanticize anything that wasn’t there. The director is Julian Schnabel and Basquit are played by Jeffrey Wright.
Director: Julian Schnabel | Actors: Jeffrey Wright, Michael Wincott | Year: 1996

5 Pollock
Jackson Pollock paintings are worth millions today, but as so often with remarkable artists, it took some time until the acknowledge from the art world came. The movie Pollock portrays an artist that however reach the fame before his death and we can observe how Pollock is handling his success after being an unknown painter. Ed Harris makes the role of a suffering painter artist with many unsympathetic sides in impressive style. The fact that Pollock is a Hollywood product is sometimes obvious, but as a whole it still has many authentic qualities. 
Director: Ed Harris | Actors: Ed Harris, Marcia Gay Harden | Year: 2000

Selection of other biopics about painters

Mr. Turner (2014) – based on the life of J.M.W. Turner.
The Mill and the Cross (2013) – a story based upon one painting by Pieter Bruegel the Elders paintings.
Renoir (2012) – based on the life of Renoir.
Séraphine (2008) – based on the life of Séraphine de Senlis.
Goya’s Ghost (2006) – Goya en Burdeos (Goya in Bordeaux, 1999) – based on the life of Francisco Goya.
Klimt (2006) – John Malkovich portrays Gustav Klimt.
Girl with a Pearl Earring (2003) – a story based upon one a painting of Johannes Vermeer.
Frida (2002) – based on the life of Frida Kahlo.
Love Is the Devil (1998) – based on the life of Francis Bacon.
Surviving Picasso (1996) – based on the life of Pablo Picasso.
Dalí (1991) – based on the life of Salvador Dali.
Caravaggio (1986) – based on the life of Caravaggio.
The Agony and the Ecstasy (1965) – based on the life of Michelangelo.
Rembrandt (1936) – based on the life of Rembrandt.

The Best Comedy Movies according to GreatestMovies.org.

The list

15 Nurse Betty
The unlike Morgan Freeman and Chris Rock characters match each other well and Renée Zellweger could be seen in her most charming role.
Year: 2000 | Director: Neil LaBute

14 Unfaithfully Yours
Some of the slapstick jokes are outdated and the sound effects being used are silly, but Unfaithfully Yours is nevertheless a movie that must be mention among the best comedies ever because of its high points.
Year: 1948 | Director: Preston Sturges

13 Man on the Moon
Jim Carrey does an excellent portrait of the eccentric comedian Andy Kaufman. The unknown stand-up comedian makes a breakthrough that gets a part in a TV-show. But his jokes are becoming more exceptional and are touching the limits of that can be called a joke.
Year: 1999 | Director: Milos Forman

12 Office Space
Peter hates his job and his boss. He has, however, no choice but to return every day to the office. But one day after a meeting with a hypnotherapist he is starting to do exactly what he feels like and the formula actually seem to work.
Year: 1999 | Director: Mike Judge

11 The Seven Year Itch
Billy Wilder is always telling the story in an elegant manner and The Seven Year Itch is no exception. Marilyn Monroe’s performance generates a lot of charm to this comedy that also succeeds in depicting the American middle class life in the 1950s.
Year: 1955 | Director: Billy Wilder

10 Election
Reese Witherspoon plays the over ambitious student Tracy Flick and Matthew Broderick are the teacher that pending between love and hate against her. Election is a lovely dark comedy with a sting of satire.
Year: 1999 | Director: Alexander Payne

9 The Mask
Jim Carrey’s character Stanley Ipkiss deviates from his role in life as a browbeaten to a crazy green super hero.
Year: 1994 | Director: Spike Jonze

8 Rushmore
The first co-operation between the director Wes Anderson and the actor Bill Murray was a strike. Jason Schwartzman is perfect in his role as an odd student and Murray’s laconic humor is just brilliant.
Year: 1998 | Director: Wes Anderson

7 Being John Malkovich
Highly original and intelligent plot. A portal to the head and the thoughts of the actor John Malkovich is found and is soon used frequently.
Year: 1999 | Director: Spike Jonze

6 Trouble in Paradise
Ernst Lubitsch was a master of the sophisticated comedy. In Trouble in Paradise the swindlers time schedule is delayed when he falls in love with his victim.
Year: 1932 | Director: Ernst Lubitsch

5 The Gold Rush
One of the biggest classics of Charlie Chaplin. This time his tramp character is searching for gold in Klondike and the movie contains famous scenes with Chaplin eating his shoes and lets his cutlery dance on the table.
Year: 1925 | Director: Charlie Chaplin

4 Duck Soup
Duck Soup may well be the best The Marx Brothers movie. The famous hat scene is included and also the mirror scene with Groucho challenging Harpo in a duel about his reflected image.
Year: 1933 | Director: Leo McCarey

3 Annie Hall
Woody Allen and Diane Keaton are the two neurotics that meet in this tragic-comic story that holds tons of one-liners. The love problems are mixed with intellectual reflections in this celebrated comedy.
Year: 1977 | Director: Woody Allen

2 Some Like It Hot
One of the biggest comedy classics with Tony Curtis and Jack Lemmon dressed as women in an attempt to hide out from the mob. 
Year: 1959 | Director: Billy Wilder

1 The Apartment
A brilliant comedy to the last detail. C.C. Baxter lets his apartment be at disposal for his bosses and therefore being promoted. But under such circumstances the possibilities of romance with the secretary of his chief are diminished.
Year: 1960 | Director: Billy Wilder

The cinemas have tried to amuse audiences with funny moments since the beginning of film. The Waterer Watered (L'Arroseur Arrossé, 1895) is considered to be the very first comedy on the screen in which a gardener being the victim of a practical joke.

In the beginning when the movies were silent physical situations, so-called slapstick, stood as the foundation for the laughs. Some of the famous comedians on the screen at this time were Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy with throwing cakes in other people’s faces as a specialty. Buster Keaton and Harold Lloyd did choose a more dangerous way to present jokes which incorporate breathtaking aerobatics and other stunt tricks.

After 1930s with the sound film the Marx Brothers was successful in combining slapsticks with a comic dialogue. A trend in the 1930s and 1940s was the screwball comedy: a sophisticated farce in high tempo with a romance in the center.

As the years go by the comedy has been dressed in many costumes and nowadays film enthusiasts’ talks about black comedy, blue comedy and cringe comedy. Another popular sub genre is of course the romantic comedy with movie titles like When Harry Met Sally… (1989) and Notting Hill (1999).

The Best Crime Movies according to GreatestMovies.org. The list does not include film noir or gangster movies because these genres will be presented on their own.

The list

13 Get Carter
Michale Caine plays the former gangster who returns to his hometown Newcastle after his brother has died. Mike Hodges delivers a complex crime movie that offers a realistic and ferocious story.
Year: 1971 | Director: Mike Hodges

12 I Walk Alone
Burt Lancaster plays Frankie Madison who has been 14 years in prison. His former bootlegging companion is Dink Turner played by Kirk Douglas. Dink should be grateful to Frankie but are trying to keep him away from his successful business.
Year: 1948 | Director: Byron Haskin

11 Dirty Harry
This is the first and the best in the sequels that had Clint Eastwood in front as the macho cop Harry Callahan. Unless a serial killer delivers a demanded ransom he threatens to strike again and Callahan is no wonder the man who gets the lousy job as courier.
Year: 1971 | Director: Don Siegel

10 Infernal Affairs (Wui jian dao)
This is the movie that got an American version (The Departed) which also was a movie worth seeing, but the original are the sharper one. Chan Wing Yan are the police detective undercover in the Hong Kong secret crime world. But it seems to some other who is also playing a double role – on his own division.
Year: 2002 | Director: Wai-Keung Lau & Alan Mak

9 High Sierra
Humphrey Bogart and Ida Lupino are two worried souls that meet when a heist is being planned. High Sierra is a fascinating crime movie that also shows how you can be dragged to your own ruin – the only thing that last after your destiny have been defeated.
Year: 1941 | Director: Billy Wilder

8 Goldfinger
Maybe the most classic of the James Bond movies. Sean Connery is agent 007 that this time has to deal with the master criminal Auric Goldfinger and his dangerous servant Oddjon.
Year: 1964 | Director: Guy Hamilton

7 Fargo
Steve Buscemi and Peter Stormare are seen as a guncrazy kidnapping pair and Francis McDomand as a smart police in that might be the best movie from the Coen brothers. The North Dakota is an odd environment for a violent crime story and so is sometimes the humor.
Year: 1996 | Director: Ethan and Joel Coen

6 The Killing
One of the first feature movies by Stanley Kubrick, made with a small budget but with clever dialogue and some fascinating characters. The plot centers around a robbery against a horse track, but then details of the plan leaks things start to get dangerous and complicated. 
Year: 1956 | Director: Stanley Kubrick

5 Heat
Al Pacino as the good guy and Robert de Niro as the crook are first-class qualifications for a great crime movie and the result match the expectations. The story involves both intense action and deep character studies.
Year: 1995 | Director:  Michael Mann

4 Gun Crazy
Gun Crazy was produced without more ambition than a regular B-movie, but became a remarkable piece of work. Especially the scene of the bank robbery taken in one single long shot and with the camera placed inside the car gives it freshness that still last.
Year: 1950 | Director: Joseph H. Lewis

3 Rififi
Influential movie in its genre and violent for its time. The movie includes a very long scene when a jewelry store is being robbed and the meticulous shots provide superb realism and excitement.
Year: 1955 | Director: Jules Dassin

2 Bonnie and Clyde
Faye Dunaway and Warren Betty portraits the ultimate American outlaws who lived by crime in the 1930s. Arthur Peens movie version is captivating and very skilled crafted.
Year: 1967 | Director: Arthur Peen

1 Witness for the Prosecution
Another masterpiece from Billy Wilder and one of the best courtroom dramas ever. The greatness lies in many things: the well built characters, the intricate intrigue and the a story that not is being foreseeable.
Year: 1957 | Director: Billy Wilder

Crime in movies are not exactly rare, it is a popular ingredient for fueling the story. By the same reason, it is not easy to define its genre and furthermore, there are sub genres as film noir and gangster with own distinct features. Crime Movies holds no specific style, as film noir, or themes, like the mafia, instead the plot centers on criminal undertakings in various degrees.

The erotic thriller is essentially based on the thriller structure, but adds an erotic flavor. The erotic ingredients assist the main story with an extra exhilaration for the audience. The erotic relationships among characters are usually an element that contributes to the story and can often be the reason for the main intrigue. The desirability of sexuality makes people do radical things and this is one of the typical components in this sub genre.

The list

7 The Blue Room
The French movie The Blue Room (La Chambre Bleue, 2014) centers around a secret love affair which also generate a crime that lets the audience guess about the details.  
Year: 1980 | Director: Nicolas Roeg

6 Bad Timing
A teaching professor (Art Garfunkel) meets a younger woman (Theresa Russell) and a romance begin with obsession, jealousy and betrayal unhealthy mixed together.  
Year: 1980 | Director: Nicolas Roeg

5 Cat People
Irena and Paul are cat people that transform to panthers after having sex with humans. Paul Schrader’s remake is in level with the original from 1942 and, because of the different time periods, less “censured” in part of nudity.
Year: 1982 | Director: Paul Schrader

4 Bound
Bound may have some minor clichés, but the main impression of this film is very good. It is a stylistic thriller with film noir reminiscences and the story is a high-level work.
Year: 1996 | Director: Andy Wachowski and Lana Wachowski

3 The Swimming Pool (La piscine)
Marianne and Jean-Paul spends their summer vacation in a house near Saint-Tropez. Then Harry makes a visit together with his daughter the relationships became complicated.
Year: 1969 | Director: Jacques Deray

2 BodyHeat
Kathleen Turner and William Hurt fall in love by false premises in this movie that build up around a clever story and a sharp dialogue.
Year: 1981 | Director: Lawrence Kasdan

1 Straw Dogs
David (Dustin Hoffman) and Amy (Susan George) is moving to the British countryside. David is busy with his mathematical work, and she is not satisfied with how much interest he shows for her. Because of that she shows interest in the workers around the house who are very interested in her too.
Year: 1971 | Director: Sam Peckinpah

One of the most popular genre cross-over is the romantic comedy. The romantic comedies could be seen in basic forms already in the silent era, but Happened One Night from 1934 accented a feature that would be seen over and over again: the contenders that sooner or later become aware of the true nature in their feelings for each other.

In modern days movies like Pretty Woman (1990) and Bridget Jones’s Diary (2001) have been hits. One of the reasons is probably that the movies distance themselves from harsh realism in the real life and let love triumph over everything including barriers like social class.

The romantic comedy has also succeeded in symbioses with action and adventure in movies like Romancing the Stone (1984) and The Princess Bride (1987).

The list

12 Shakespeare in Love
The British writer William Shakespeare (played by Joseph Fiennes) is being inspired to a new play after meeting Viola De Lesseps (Gwyneth Paltrow). Their goals are happily combined when he search for a muse and she wants to act on the stage that at this time is strictly forbidden for women.
Year: 1998 | Director: John Madden

11Jerry Maguire
Jerry Maguire is not free from typical cliches in this genre but it also holds a script with terrific parts. The story is not very original, but succeeds in entertain the whole way: And Tom Cruse in the main role is great and his co-actors Cuba Gooding Jr. and Renée Zellweger even better.
Year: 1996 | Director: Cameron Crowe
Year: 1998 | Director: John Madden

10The Importance of Being Ernest
A romantic comedy-drama based on Oscar Wilde’s famous comedy. The adaption for the movie medium keeps much of the play intact and gives a dialogue that is far more sophisticated than in most films.
Year: 1952 | Director: Anthony Asquith

9Say Anything
A comedy with both charm and seriousness tells a story about the sport interested guy Lloyd (John Cusack) without any particular plans for the future who meets Diane (Ione Skye) who is intelligent and beautiful. The moral of the story has definitively something to do with love.
Year: 1989 | Director: Cameron Crowe

8 The Princess Bride
The Princess Bride is told as a fairy tale of archetypal components which is matched with some peculiar features resulting in an original romantic adventure comedy.
Year: 1987 | Director: William Goldman

7 The Thin Man
A successful mix of exciting thriller and amusing comedy with the couple Nora and Nick that have lived together a long time and have started going on each other’s nerves. But as a team in solving a murder mystery they turn out to be great together.
Year: 1934 | Director: W.S. Van Dyke

6 Bed and Board (Domicile conjugal)
Doinel has got married to Christine in this sequel to Stolen Kisses (Baisers voldés) and they are now a happy couple, but Doniels regularly confused proceedings are shaking the relation. This is a captivating drama with great comical charm.  
Year: 1970 | Director: François Truffaut

5 Breakfast at Tiffany’s
Audrey Hepburn plays a rootless and confused young woman holding a highest wish to find a rich man to make her life easier. Breakfast at Tiffany’s is a romantic comedy-drama with much atmosphere, taking part in New York with the luxury Tiffany’s boutique nearby.
Year: 1961 | Director: Blake Edvards

4 Roman Holiday
Audrey Hepburn was one of the most charming actresses of Hollywood in the 1950s and 60s. In Roman Holiday she does a vivacious portrait of a princess who by coincidence meets a foreign journalist.
Year: 1953
Director: William Wyler

3 Adam’s Rib
Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn are combating in court which also turns out to be a combat between the sexes where masculinity meets femininity. Tracy’s character is representing a man which woman has tried to murder him. Hepburn’s character is of course representing the woman.
Year: 1949 | Director: George Cukor

2 The Lady Eve
One of the great classics in the genre distinguished by a fine dialogue and with twisting complications between the lovely impostor Eve (Barbara Stanwyck) and the naïve moneyed bachelor Charles (Henry Fonda).
Year: 1941 | Director: Preston Sturges

1 Trouble In Paradise
Ernst Lubitsch was the master of the sophisticated comedy-dramas in which the intrigues often revolved around romantic complications. In this movie the hustler gets delayed after falling in love with his victim.
Year: 1932 | Director: Ernst Lubitsch

The Best Science Fiction Movies according to GreatestMovies.org.

The list

16 Minority Report
The year is 2045 and the crime fighting have been revolutionized to that degree that it almost been totally eliminated thanks to the special ”precrime” police squad. Minority Report is an interesting eyehole into a futuristic scenario with Tom Cruise in the main role.
Year: 2002 | Director: Steven Spielberg

15 The Road Warrior
The Mad Max movies was Australia’s contribution to the sci-fi genre. Mel Gibson does one of his best performance as Max who is the “Road Warrior” in this post-apocalyptic desert world in which gas are more valued than gold. .
Year: 1981 | Director: George Miller

14 Fahrenheit 405
A movie based on a novel by the prominent science fiction author Ray Bradbury and uses the common theme of the genre about a totalitarian society that makes people lose the contact with its cultural tradition and emotional behaviors.
Year: 1966 | Director: François Truffaut

13 Dark City
John Murdoch wakes up in a room with a murdered woman, but remember nothing about her. Soon he meet other people who also seem to have problems with their memory and he begins to suspect that something strange going on in the city. Dark City is a fine stylistic science fiction movie that mixes the ingredients of Dick Tracy with mystery. 
Year: 1998 | Director: Alex Proyas

12 THX 1138
A dystopian picture of the future by Star Wars director George Lucas. Some hundred years forward in time the people living underground and a certain medicine that must be taken regularly. Original science fiction in a minimalistic style.
Year: 1971 | Director: George Lucas

11 The Day the Earth Stood Still
An early classic in the genre containing a pacifistic message. The special effects are outdated and may seem ridiculous by today’s standards, but the movie has other merits and the questions raised about the leadership of the world and the ability to protect it with rational actions are still actual. 
Year: 1951 | Director: Robert Wise

10 Terminator 2
A high-tech cyborg arrives from another time to assassin a certain John Connor, who is destined to become an important man in the rebellion against the machines in the future. The special effects in Terminator 2 were before its time and the movie was overshadowing its predecessor. 
Year: 1991 | Director: James Cameron

9 Back to the Future
Michael J Fox travels in space in this movie hit from the eighties. Strange time paradoxes occur when his character Marty McFly goes backwards in the timeline and meets his parents in his own age. The two following sequels were inferior to the original.
Year: 1985 | Director: Robert Zemeckis

8 Moon
In this British science-fiction film, the threat to humans in the future is not aliens nor machines but corporations. The human race is mining helium-3 from the moon and one of the operators are Sam Bell, at least it is that what he thinks.
Year: 2009 | Director: Duncan Jones

7 Matrix
The action scenes with slow motions and visual effects were innovating and spectacular. Neo lives in a world which is dominated by the machines, but one night some people knock at his door and wants to show him the real world. Great mix of excitement and philosophy.
Year: 1999 | Director: Lana Wachowski & Andy Wachowski

6 The Empire Strikes Back
A terrific sequel to Star Wars and by many ranked as the best in the George Lucas spectacular series. Luke Skywalker meets the Jedi master and preparing to meet Dart Vader representing the dark side.
Year: 1980 | Director: George Lucas

5 Planet of the Apes
A group of astronauts is crash landing in a foreign unknown place. They are soon to discover that human are not the dominate species on the planet. But even more horrifying discoveries are waiting for them until the last astonishing final.
Year: 1968 | Director: Franklin J. Schaffner

4 Alien
A claustrophobic science fiction adventure with Sigourney Weaver as one of the passengers on board a cargo ship on a mission. The excitement is slowly increased until it culminates in an exhausting final.  
Year: 1979 | Director: Ridley Scott

3 Star Wars
One of the most spectacular stories ever told in that today has the status of a cult movie. Luke Skywalker is fighting his nemesis Darth Vader in a story that takes place ”A long time ago in a galaxy far far away…”
Year: 1977 | Director: George Lucas

2 2001: A Space Odyssey
An artifact is found and seems to contain some kind of intelligence. A genial overture and then an unforgettable space epos with a powerful finale.
Year: 1968 | Director: Stanley Kubrick

1 Blade Runner
A film noir set in Los Angeles anno 2019. Deckard is a so-called ”Blade runner” with the mission to retire ”replicants”, a kind of androids. A science fiction masterpiece with an unpleasant view of a distant future enriched with philosophic perspectives.
Year: 1982 | Director: Ridley Scott

The science fiction movie goes beyond the present and the ordinary with features like artificial worlds, extra-terrestrial life forms and futuristic technology. In the history of film A Trip to the Moon (Le Voyage dans la lune, 1902) by Georges Méliès was one of the first examples in this genre.

Science Fiction in books and movies are often presentations of a dystopia that have emerged in a distant future there the human race is threatened by the machines as in the Matrix (1999) and Terminator (1984) or by hostile aliens as in The War of the Worlds (1953, remake 2005) and Alien (1979).

It can also be about the development of an unnatural world in which the emotions in human nature has been oppressed and part of its culture has been forgotten or forbidden. Among movies containing this theme are Fahrenheit 405 (1966) and THX 1138 (1971).

The Best War Movies according to GreatestMovies.org.

The list

20 Decision Before Dawn
In the World War II, the allies decide to use German prisoners for missions in German Territory. Karl Maurer accepts the offer, but is ambivalent to face his own people again on a secret mission prepared by the other side.
Year: 1951
Director: Anatole Litvak

19 The Battle of Algiers (La battaglia di Algeri)
Political war movie with impressing realism re-creates the history of the Algerian fight for independence from France. It doesn’t avoid showing the cold blooded terror methods of the revels or the ruthlessness in the French military’s responds. 
Year: 1966
Director: Gillo Pontecorvo

18 Schindler’s List
A touching story about the holocaust in black and white. In the center is Oskar Schindler, who have a high position in the German society, but becomes more and more concern about the immoral action made by the Nazi regime. 
Year: 1993
Director: Steven Spielberg

17 A Man Escaped (Un condamé à mort s’est échappé)
This movie holds on to every course of event in meticulous fashion. The plan and execution of an escape in small segments and never lose the fascination and excitement.
Year: 1956
Director: Robert Bresson

16 Platoon
An iconographic war movie that succeeds in describing an image of the Vietnam War with many strong portraits of young American soldiers. The director Oliver Stone uses his own experiences and project them on Charlie Sheen's character Chris Taylor.
Year: 1986
Director: Oliver Stone

15 Battleground
A splendid war movie that comes very close to some American soldiers' emotional lives and their hard conditions on the battleground under the Second World War. This movie gives another perspective with soldiers who is not extraordinary brave or heroic.
Year: 1949
Director: William Wellman

14 The General
One of the best silent movies with Buster Keaton as Johnny Gray who get turned down for war service but makes his own contribution as a train engineer. High tempo through the film and marvelous stunts.
Year: 1926
Director: Buster Keaton

13 Stalag 17
When two Americans are killed in an escape attempt Sgt J.J. Sefton is suspected of being an informer. Just like The Great Escape, another great war prisoner movie, Stalag 17 succeeding at being entertaining with excitement and occasional wittiness thus the harsh subject.
Year: 1953
Director: Billy Wilder

12 Patton
The American general George S. Patton is the center of actions and the movie re-creates the battles between the Alliances and the Axis Powers in North Africa. Patton is presented as the eccentric general who loves his job even that the circumstances are life and death.
Year: 1970
Director: Franklin J. Schaffner

11 Das Boot
A superb depiction of the life under the sea level made from the German perspective in WWII. The men on board the submarine who fights the enemy must also try to understand the politics of their country.
Year: 1981
Director: Wolfgang Petersen

10 Downfall (Der Untergang)
This German war movie takes us into the bunker that Adolf Hitler and his closest alliance were hiding in the last days of War World II. For these people surrender is no option and they are heading for the total wreckage. The Führer is excellently played by Bruno Ganz.
Year: 2004
Director: Oliver Hirschbiegel

9 Ballad of a soldier
The Russian soldier Alyosha Skvortsov is on a short permission from the war and meets a girl on a train. In poetic visual imagery they got strongly attached in a country demolished by the war.
Year: 1959
Director: Grigoriy Chukhray

8 The Deer Hunter
A strong and frightening depiction of the Vietnam War and a group of friends experiences from it. The actors perform well in showing how the war in different degrees changes their characters.
Year: 1978
Director: Michael Cimino

7 M*A*S*H
A comedy that makes fun of the war and the authorities involved. The director Robert Altman does it in typical style and Donald Sutherland makes one of his best performances. The movie is outstanding in comparison to the TV-production that came afterwards. 
Year: 1970
Director: Robert Altman

6 Grand Illusion (La grande illusion)
Jean Gabin and Erich von Stroheim meet as French prisoner and German Captain under the first world war. On the surface an adventure drama with many attempts to escape from prisons, but also a multifaceted anti war movie.
Year: 1937
Director: Jean Renoir

5 The Great Escape
Enjoyable excitement from the first to the last scene. A great story based on an actual event and one of the most entertaining movies from the sub genre ”Prison escape movies”.
Year: 1963
Director: John Sturges

4 The Bridge Over River Kwai (1957)
Capture British soldiers are working on a railway bridge on Japan territory. This is an intense drama with war metaphoric in which British spirit is tested by a demanding and arrogant Japanese colonel.
Year: 1959
Director: Grigoriy Chukhray

3 Paths of Glory (1957)
A pacifistic war movie set in the trenches under the World War I. You get a feel of being present when cannon fire is digging holes in the ground. Stanley Kubrik behind the camera and Kirk Douglas as one of the characters in front.
Year: 1959
Director: Grigoriy Chukhray

2 Apocalypse Now
The most haunting and probably the best of all Vietnam War films present an odyssey along the river into the heart of darkness. Music from The Doors and Wagner blends in this story of the madness of war.
Year: 1979
Director: Francis Ford Coppola

1 Ran
A brilliant epos from the mediaeval Japan are displaying a trial of strength between a father and his three sons. Ran is a triumph in both visual aspects as much as the depth in storytelling.
Year: 1985
Director: Akira Kurosawa

The war movie became a distinct genre at the time of the First World War. It was mostly movies that took a stand against the war or showed sympathy for one side – two themes that have stayed in the genre.

The production of war movies was probably bigger than ever under the second war and the years after. Under the war the movies are often patriotic with the function of increase the morale in its own country.

There are also movies with perspective from the competitor’s sides in the two world wars that have become popular in the US and Western Europe. All Quiet on the Western Front (1930) and Das Boot (1981) are both depicting German soldiers.

The war movies are not always bringing the scenes directly from the battlefield, sometimes the drama will take place away from the epicenter of the war but with the war as the catalyst. Several movies have used a prison camp in war time as its milieu; two famous examples are Stalag 17 (1953) and The Great Escape (1963).

Another repeated theme is the home coming soldier, marked by the war and with the following complications to readapt. Coming Home (1978) and Born on the Fourth of July (1989) have expressed the complications in various ways.

War movies that centers around fights in the air.

The list

5 Wings
A silent movie that was the first film ever to get an Oscar for Best Motion Picture. The air fights are ahead of its time and the combats on the ground would set a standard for coming war movies.
Year: 1927
Director: William A. Wellman

4 Battle of Britain
An ambitious attempt to in a historical correct way depicts the British Royal Air Force fights against the Luftwaffe in World War II.
Year: 1969
Director: Guy Hamilton

3 The Bridges at Toko-Ri
The Bridges at Toko-Ri is set during the Korean War and centers around a dangerous bombing mission. William Holdem plays the main character and Grace Kelly can be seen as his wife.
Year: 1954
Director: Mark Robson

2 Tora! Tora! Tora!
Perhaps the best movie about the attack on Peal Harbour. The movie use two perspectives, both the Japanese and American and also giving a picture of why the Americans was not better prepared.
Year: 1970
Director: Richard Fleischer, Kinji Fukasaku

1 Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo
A couple of pilots are accomplishing a top secret bombing mission over Japan under the second war. A war movie with great mix of excitement and psychology.
Year: 1944
Director: Mervyn LeRoy

The List - best classic westerns according to GreatestMovies.org

24 Man of the West
Anthony Mann was one of the most prominent directors of western movies in the 1950s. Man of the West is one of his most matured and forming a tragedian drama.
Year: 1958 | Director: Anthony Mann

23 High Plain Drifter
One of the best western with Clint Eastwood which also directing this one. A stranger arrives to a town that are threaten by a gang. After showing his skill with weapons, the stranger are asked to protect the town. He accepts being the safeguard but also demands a high and unexpected price.
Year: 1973 | Director: Clint Eastwood

22 Duel in the Sun
Duel in the Sun, written a produced by David O. Selznick, deserve to be mentioned among the best westerns. The emotionally intense acting between Jennifer Jones and Gregory Peck almost hurt and the script is complex enough to make us wonder all the way to the finish.
Year: 1946 | Director: King Vidor

21 Bend of the River
A classic western with the typical theme settlers going to the west for finding a new place to live. They have Glyn McLyntock (James Stewart) as the scout, who is taking the caravan through the plains, through the river and up in the mountains. He will also help with the escort through the dangerous land in which indians and other evil forces. The movie has some naïve features, but on the same time work great as escapism in Technicolor.
Year: 1952
Director: Anthony Mann

20 My Darling Clementine
John Ford is one of the most recognized western directors of all time and his movies always bear something of the old American history of the west. In My Darling Clementine he is telling his version of the famous Wyatt Earp and Doc Holliday camaraderie.
Year: 1946 | Director: John Ford
19 Hour of the Gun
John Sturges return once again to depict the Wyatt Earp-Dock Holiday-Clanton Brothers ten years after his Gunfight at the O.K. Corral film. Hour of the Gun is a western with an ambition to tell the true story and therefore divide from the the legend.
Year: 1967 | Director: John Sturges

18 Rancho Notorious
Fritz Lang as the director and Marlene Dietrich as one of the characters in a splendidly told story. A man is searching for the murderer to his fiancée and follow the traces to a place called “Chuck-a-luck”.
Year: 1952 | Director: Fritz Lang

17 Cowboy
You don’t expect to meet Jack Lemmon in a western movie, but his persona work well even in this genre, which are demonstrated here. He plays against Glenn Ford and the duo creates fine dynamics on the screen. Ford’s character Tom Reece is an experience cowboy and Lemmon’s character Frank Harris is a hotel clerk who wants to have a more exciting life and want to catch up with the girl who for a while stayed on the hotel he worked.
Year: 1958
Director: Delmer Daves

16 How the West Was Won
How the West Was Won includes so much more than a story about a revolver man or a fight between landlords. Here is the American early civilization portrayed in great pictures and integrates a fine story.
Year: 1962 | Directors: John Ford, Henry Hathaway, George Marshall & Richard Thorpe

15 Stagecoach
The breakthrough movie by the western director par excellence, John Ford. Stage Couch depicts some of the essences of western movies with the desolated Monument Valley as fond for human drama in a violent and undomesticated world. 
Year: 1939 | Director: John Ford

14 Pat Garrett & Billy the Kid
Kris Kristofferson portraits the outlaw Billy the Kid in a stylized western movie with ingredients of a Bob Dylan soundtrack and violent revolver fights. One of the best attempts to capture the famous story of the antagonistic affair between Billy the Kid and Pat Garrett. 
Year: 1973 | Director: Sam Peckinpah

13 The Naked Spur
The best of the five movies Anthony Mann made with James Stewart as the main character. A well constructed plot with a wanted murderer who has been captured and are transported to his hanging. After it being confirmed that there is a reward involved the dynamic in the group changes.
Year: 1953 | Director: Anthony Mann

12 The Gunfighter
Gregory Peck portraits the feared gunfighter Jimmy Ringo that returns to a certain town with the intention to meet a woman he hasn’t seen for a long time. He has left his violent background behind, but he still has to deal with his reputation.
Year: 1950 | Director: Henry King

11 Hombre
Paul Newman plays the unconventional western hero John Russell reminding about Humphrey Bogarts Rick in Casablanca that only show which side he stands on with implicit gestures until a dramatic event forces him to expose it.
Year: 1967 | Director: Martin Ritt

10 The Unforgiven
Revisionist western of the best kind with Clint Eastwood as Bill Munny, former revolver man, but now old and regretful. But after a cut up of a prostitute he once again rides out when his old partner is asking for help.
Year: 1992 | Director: Clint Eastwood

9 The Ballad of Cable Hogue
Cable Hogue finds water in the desert on a desolated transport route and acquires the land. Sam Peckinpah has revised the western genre in many ways and the result is both different and sometimes funny.If you can't agree that a car and a motorcycle can be among the props in a classic western, you have to avoid this one.
Year: 1970
Director: Sam Peckinpah

8 Ride the High Country
The ex-sheriff Steve Judd is hired to transport gold trough dangerous territory. To his help he rides with an old and a new partner. The story tells what gold can do with people and their loyalties. 
Year: 1962 | Director: Sam Peckinpah

7 Red River
One of the best contribution from Howard Hawks to the genre. John Wayne and Montgomery Clift are the father and son herding cattle to Missouri. Then the son turns against the tyrannical father a bitter confrontation takes place.
Year: 1948 | Director: Howard Hawk

6 The good, the bad and the ugly (Il buono, il brutto, il cattivo)
Sergio Leones masterpiece with Clint Eastwood as Blondie, a bounty hunter with very odd methods. He and Tuco enter a partnership without trust in the quest for a gold treasure. The upper hand between them shifts many times along the way.
Year: 1966 | Director: Sergio Leone

5 Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid
A celebrated western movie with the pair-horses Paul Newman and Robert Redford as Butch Cassidy and Sundance Kid. After doing one too many bank jobs they are being hunted by a large force, driving them to Mexico and the ending is classic. 
Year: 1969 | Director: George Roy Hill

4 The Searchers
A western movie monumental in its complexity and as storyteller of a hazardous, bygone world. John Wayne comes and goes out through the screen in the intro and the final, which renders two classic film sequences. The scenery of the pompous monumental valley gives this epic story an even greater resonance.
Year: 1956 | Director: John Ford

3 Shane
An iconic western that succeed in many ways. Shane is the man from the vast land that got a job for some settlers who is terrorized by some landowners. A common theme that has been seen over and over again in a western, but Shane is nonetheless a memorable movie. The director George Stevens known for movies like Giant and A Place in the Sun delivers here a great contribution to the western genre.
Year: 1953 | Director: George Stevens

2 The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance
John Ford’s late western film is loaded with symbols and rich of nuances. A senator arrives at Shinbone for attending the funeral of Tom Doniphon. The question is why such a simple man known for drinking attracts a visit from a Washington senator. 
Year: 1962 | Director: John Ford

1 The Wild Bunch
Sam Peckinpah puts a new rawness to the western genre with The Wild Bunch that may be his masterpiece. The movie shows a new kind of esthetic of violence and depicts a couple of desperate humans and their restlessness in a world doesn't seem to have any place for them much longer.
Year: 1969 | Director: Sam Peckinpah

The Western genre is a bit peculiar by being so clearly defined to a specific milieu and time. The milieu is North America and in particular the west: the once unexplored land for the civilization, behind “the frontier line”. The time was mainly the second half of the 19th century.

Nevertheless was western one of the first movie genres and become very popular in the 1920s and following decades. The most prominent director was John Ford and in his movies the audience would often see John Wayne, who personified the raucous western in which the modern culture was not yet fully present.

Typical scenerios are the bare land and rocky hills or towns there the saloons became meeting points offering card games, whiskey and girls. The stories often revolve around conflicts there powerful land owners are involved. Not seldom are some lonely drifting man getting involved and increasing the odds for the weaker side.

John Ford (1894-1973) is probably the most influential of western film directors. He made his first western film in 1917 (The Tornado) and the last in 1964 (Cheyenne Autumn). His movies add more ingredients to the genre - the nostalgia and sorrowfulness are often present and sets a mood beyond the traditional adventures with cowboys and Indians.

Under his lifetime his non-Western movies were higher regarded, but today John Ford is primarily associated with westerns and his masterpieces helped advance the status of the genre. One important step to achieve a higher status was made with Stagecoach (1939). The movie is partly shot in Monument Valley, a milieu that impacted the mood and perspective in the film. Film critic Peter French writes in the book Cowboy Metaphysics: “The grandeur of the great outdoors virtually swallows up the human stories, gives them perspective against the enormous monoliths of raw nature.”

Below is a list of ten of Fords movies in the western genre, the best according to GreatestMovies.org. This article is apart of the Western Genre section of this site.

10 3 Godfathers
John Wayne in one of his many western collaborations with John Ford. Although not one of the best - the story has plenty of sentimental moments and the religious overtones will probably feel slightly distant for viewers of today. 
Year: 1948

9 She Wore a Yellow Ribbon
Some are considering this movie as one of Ford absolutely best movies, but it could also be argued that is showing many sentimental elements and the heroically appearance by John Wayne in the leading role are somewhat tame.
Year: 1949

8 Fort Apache
Another film by Ford with John Wayne in a leading role. John Wayne plays a Captain in U.S. cavalry and thanks to a bad leadership from the commandant of the regiment he is forced to fight the Apache Indians.
Year: 1948

7 Wagon Master
The plot is set around a wagon train of Mormons and Travis Blue and Sandy Owens are hired to guide them to the wanted location. The richness of this motion picture comes from many colorful characters which different aspirations that are creating a dynamic configuration. 
Year: 1950

6 Cheyenne Autumn
This is John Ford’s last movie and it could be placed in the category of revisionist western movies, implying an attempt to reevaluate the fixed view on a subject, which in western movies often is the relation between Indians and white men. This is an epic film (154 minutes long) and includes an ambition to tell a story devoted to historical facts. It is a story of how the Cheyenne tribe in late 1870s is trying to establish a future life for their coming generations in America.
Year: 1964

5 My Darling Clementine
John Ford is one of the most recognized western directors of all time and his movies always bear something of the old American history of the west. In My Darling Clementine, he is telling his version of the famous Wyatt Earp and Doc Holliday camaraderie.
Year: 1946

4 Stage Coach
One of the most important movies in John Ford's early career, Stage Couch establishes some of the essential features of the genres. Ford uses the desolated Monument Valley as fond of a human drama in which persons from different background are traveling through the waste land by a stage coach.
Year: 1939

3 How the West Was Won
John Ford is only one of many directors in this western. As the name of the movie imply it is an overview of a crucial phase in the North American history. For them that enjoys western that are driven more by depicting an old world than no longer exist than by action this is a strong recommendation.
Year: 1962

2 The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance
John Ford’s late western film is loaded with symbols and rich of nuances. A senator arrives at Shinbone for attending the funeral of Tom Doniphon. The question is why such a simple man known for drinking attracts a visit from a Washington senator.
Year: 1962

1 The Searchers
This is a monumental western movie by its complexity and as storyteller of a hazardous and bygone world. John Wayne comes and goes out through the screen in the intro and the final, which renders two classic film sequences.
Year: 1956

Wyatt Earp was a historical person who lived in America (1848-1929). He was a deputy town marshal in Tombstone. Several movies have been made with him as a main figure. Here is a list of the best motion pictures concerning the life of Wyatt Earp and the legends of his life.

This article is apart of the Western Genre section of this site.

5 Wyatt Earp
Released the year after Tombstone and with Kevin Costner portraying Wyatt Earp. Another take on the rivalry of the Earp and Clanton brothers, but much made as a biopic.
Year: 1994 | Director: Lawrence Kasdan

4 Gunfight at the O.K. Corral
Burt Lancaster and Kirk Douglas as the Wyatt Earp and Doc Holliday duo. Entertaining, but not fully historical correct.
Year: 1957 | Director: John Sturges

3 Tombstone
Kurt Russell as Wyatt Earp and Val Kilmer as his charismatic friend Doc Holliday. Entertaining and action driven attempt to depict the western legend.
Year: 1993 | Director: George P. Cosmatos

2 My Darling Clementine
The great western director John Ford did a fascinating movie that includes shooting duels, but also trying to get close to Wyatt Earp and Doc Holliday as persons.
Year: 1946 | Director: John Ford

1 Hour of the Gun
John Sturges return to his subject ten years after Gunfight at the O.K. Corral with ambition to tell the true story and not the legend. James Garner plays Wyatt Earp in a movie that differs from many other movies since the plot starting with the legendary gunfight at the O.K. Corral.
Year: 1967 | Director: John Sturges

Other relevant movies:
Frontier Marshal (1939)
Tombstone: The Town too Tough to Die (1942)

 

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The approach is not to choose the most popular movies or the movies that have won most critic acclaim. The list of Greatest Movies of all time are certainly that but in that case if will be told also. In all other cases the opinions are independent and hopefully quite original (there are already too many list that are using other lists as a foundation).

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