1. The Last Samurai – Helen DeWitt 2. Against the Day – Thomas Pynchon 3. Madame Bovary – Gustave Flaubert 4. The Novel: An Alternate History – Steven Moore 5. The Life of Tu Fu – Eliot Weinberger 6. Reading Genesis – Marilynne Robinson 7. 84 Charing Cross Road – Helene Hanff 8. The Shakespeare Wars – Ron Rosenbaum 9. Either/Or – Elif Batuman 10. Quantum Criminals – Alex Pappademas 11. The Secret History – Donna Tartt 12. Will in the World – Stephen Greenblatt 13. Unspooled – Rob Drew 14. The Arabian Nights: A Companion – Robert Irwin 15. A Year in the Life of William Shakespeare: 1599 – James Shapiro 16. The Duchess of Bloomsbury Street – Helene Hanff 17. The Church of Baseball – Ron Shelton 18. There Was Nothing You Could Do – Steven Hyden 19. Blood Sweat & Chrome – Kyle Buchanon 20. Long Road – Steven Hyden 21. When the Clock Broke – John Ganz 22. God Only Knows – David Leaf
And these are the books I read but did not finish in 2024.
1. The Path to Power – Robert Caro 2. Remembrance of Things Past – Marcel Proust 3. Oliver Twist – Charles Dickens 4. Paradise Lost – John Milton 5. Winesburg, Ohio – Sherwood Anderson 6. The Tale of the Heike – Royall Tyler (trans.) 7. Orientalism – Edward Said 8. The Valmiki Ramayana – trans. Bibek Debroy 9. Mariners, Renegades, and Castaways – CLR James 10. James – Percival Everett 11. The Penguin Classics Book – Henry Eliot 12. Rabbit, Run – John Updike 13. Count Magnus & Other Ghost Stories — M.R. James 14. Reckless Daughter – David Yaffe
Since my last update, the end of 2023 came and went. I nominated a bunch of movies for the Endy Awards, and listed my favorite Film Discoveries and Books of the past year. I submitted a list to the annual Sense of Cinema World Poll and wrote about Rocky aur Rani for InReview Online’s end of the year list. And I wrote about Ozu Yasujiro’s A Hen in the Wind for Criterion.
If you like what I do here, there, or anywhere else, please consider subscribing to The Chinese Cinema. It’s only $1/month or $10/year for a whole lot of exclusive reviews.
These are the movies I’ve watched and rewatched over the last few months, and where they place on my year-by-year rankings.
Godzilla (Honda Ishiro) – 9, 1954 A Charlie Brown Christmas (Bill Melendez) – 3, 1965 Don’t Look Back (DA Pennebaker) – 4, 1967 A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving (Bill Melendez & Phil Roman) – 38, 1973
Mad Max (George Miller) – 22, 1979 Mad Max 2: The Road Warrior (George Miller) – 6, 1981 The Girl Who Leapt Through Time (Obayashi Nobuhiko) – 5, 1983 Gremlins (Joe Dante) – 7, 1984 This is Spinal Tap (Rob Reiner) – 12, 1984
Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome (George Miller & George Ogilve) – 32, 1985 The Magic Crystal (Wong Jing) – 58, 1986 A Muppet Family Christmas (Eric Till & Peter Harris) – 67, 1987 Scrooged (Richard Donner) – 56, 1988 Home Alone 2: Lost in New York (Chris Columbus) – 80, 1992
Last Hero in China (Wong Jing) – 37, 1993 From Beijing with Love (Stephen Chow & Lee Lik-chi) – 20, 1994 Made in Hong Kong (Fruit Chan) – 2, 1997 Sideways (Alexander Payne) – 20, 2004 Fantastic Mr. Fox (Wes Anderson) – 3, 2009
Skyline (Colin & Greg Strouse) – 67, 2010 The Muppets (James Bobin) – 41, 2011 Mad Max: Fury Road (George Miller) – 2, 2015 One Shot (James Nunn) – 24, 2021 Diary of a Wimpy Kid (Swinton O. Scott III) – 82, 2021
Showing Up (Kelly Reichardt) – 1, 2022 Trenque Lauquen (Laura Citarella) – 6, 2022 Where the Wind Blows (Philip Yung) – 37, 2022 Eye for an Eye: The Blind Swordsman (Yang Bingjia) – 56, 2022
Bad City (Sonomura Kensuke) – 57, 2022 Death on the Nile (Kenneth Branagh) – 81, 2022 Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Roderick Rules (Luke Cormican) – 94, 2022
Rocky Aur Rani Kii Prem Kahaani (Karan Johar) – 1, 2023 Oppenheimer (Christopher Nolan) – 4, 2023 Godzilla Minus One (Yamazaki Takashi) – 5, 2023 The Taste of Things (Trần Anh Hùng) – 6, 2023 Afire (Christian Petzold) – 7, 2023
Jigarthanda DoubleX (Karthik Subbaraj) – 8, 2023 Killers of the Flower Moon (Martin Scorsese) – 10, 2023 The Boy and the Heron (Miyazaki Hayao) – 12, 2023 Menus Plaisirs – Les Troisgros (Frederick Wiseman) – 14, 2023 Fallen Leaves (Aki Kaurismaki) – 15, 2023
Jawan (Atlee) – 16, 2023 All Ears (Liu Jiayin) – 19, 2023 Ferrari (Michael Mann) – 26, 2023 May December (Todd Haynes) – 28, 2023 Poor Things (Yorgos Lanthimos) – 30, 2023
Perfect Days (Wim Wenders) – 32, 023 Are You There, God? It’s Me, Margaret (Kelly Fremon Craig) – 37, 2023 Ballerina (Lee Chung-hyeon) – 38, 2023 Leo (Lokesh Kanagaraj) – 41, 2023 The Holdovers (Alexander Payne) – 42, 2023
Pathaan (Siddharth Anand) – 45, 2023 Silent Night (John Woo) – 47, 2023 A Haunting in Venice (Kenneth Branagh) – 49, 2023 Napoleon (Ridley Scott) – 50, 2023 Eileen (William Oldroyd) – 52, 2023
The Zone of Interest (Jonathan Glazer) – 56, 2023 Moscow Mission (Herman Yau) – 57, 2023 No Hard Feelings (Gene Stupnitsky) – 58, 2023 I Did It My Way (Jason Kwan) – 68, 2023
Albert Brooks: Defending My Life (Rob Reiner) – 69, 2023 Maestro (Bradley Cooper) – 71, 2023 The Pigeon Tunnel (Errol Morris) – 72, 2023 Diary of a Wimpy Kid Christmas: Cabin Fever (Luke Cormican) – 81, 2023
It’s time once again for a list of my favorite movies. For the last decade or so, I’ve been creating a randomly selected Top 100 out of a much larger consideration set. This year, I tried to make a list of my favorites that was as small as possible, and ended up with 309 I simply couldn’t bear to cut. Here they are in random order.
1. Labyrinth of Cinema 2. Steamboat Bill, Jr 3. Celine and Julie Go Boating 4. An Autumn Afternoon 5. Hard-Boiled 6. Millennium Mambo 7. Moonrise Kingdom 8. Ballet 9. Vampyr 10. Red Cliff 11. The Lion in Winter 12. A Canterbury Tale 13. The Love Eterne 14. Dangerous Encounters — First Kind 15. Kicking and Screaming 16. The Grandmaster 17. Trouble in Paradise 18. Whisper of the Heart 19. Ran 20. School on Fire 21. Funny Face 22. The Day He Arrives 23. Seven Samurai 24. Bram Stoker’s Dracula 25. Modern Times
26. One Froggy Evening 27. Made in Hong Kong 28. Shanghai Express 29. I’m Not There 30. Rushmore 31. The Matrix 32. The Right Stuff 33. Yi yi 34. The Lady Eve 35. Intolerance: Love’s Struggle through the Ages 36. Only Angels Have Wings 37. Legend of the Mountain 38. Throw Down 39. In the Mood for Love 40. House 41. The Empire Strikes Back 42. The Adventures of Robin Hood 43. Journey to the West: Conquering the Demons 44. 35 Shots of Rum 45. Once Upon a Time in the West 46. Casablanca 47. Nomad 48. A Matter of Life and Death 49. Dead Man 50. Fantasia
51. A Touch of Zen 52. Blind Detective 53. Dazed and Confused 54. Days of Being Wild 55. Eyes Wide Shut 56. Oki’s Movie 57. The Flowers of Shanghai 58. The Thin Red Line 59. The General 60. The Bellboy 61. Zulu 62. Bull Durham 63. Slacker 64. Jackie Brown 65. Original Cast Album: Company 66. Die Nibelungen 67. L’Avventura 68. Harlan County, USA 69. Metropolis 70. Fantastic Mr. Fox 71. Duck Soup 72. The Puppetmaster 73. Black Narcissus 74. Duvidha 75. The Midnight After
76. Inherent Vice 77. Awaara 78. Last of the Mohicans 79. Chan is Missing 80. Orlando 81. Reds 82. Heat 83. The History of the Seattle Mariners 84. Comrades: Almost a Love Story 85. Still Life 86. The Mission (1999) 87. Big Night 88. Xiao Wu 89. Johnny Guitar 90. The Last Temptation of Christ 91. Duck Amuck 92. In the Heat of the Sun 93. The New World 94. Jeanne Dielman, 23 quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles 95. A New Leaf 96. What’s Opera, Doc? 97. The Red Shoes 98. The Terrorizers 99. Pierrot le fou 100. A City of Sadness
101. Two-Lane Blacktop 102. The Philadelphia Story 103. Wheels on Meals 104. Yearning 105. Mahanagar 106. The 36th Chamber of Shaolin 107. The Searchers 108. Shanghai Blues 109. Bringing Up Baby 110. All About Eve 111. The Quiet Man 112. Howard’s End 113. All that Jazz 114. Robin and Marian 115. The Battle of Algiers 116. Mughal-e-azam 117. Les amants du Pont-Neuf 118. Hero 119. They Were Expendable 120. A Day in the Country 121. The Docks of New York 122. The Musketeers of Pig Alley 123. Rock ‘n’ Roll High School 124. The Third Man 125. Raiders of the Lost Ark
126. Touch of Evil 127. Stranger than Paradise 128. The Rules of the Game 129. Romancing in Thin Air 130. Certified Copy 131. Sunrise 132. The Miracle Fighters 133. Annie Hall 134. Dragon Gate Inn 135. Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest 136. A Woman is a Woman 137. Hatari! 138. Beau travail 139. Unforgiven 140. The Eight-Diagram Pole Fighter 141. The Harder They Come 142. Singin’ in the Rain 143. Exiled 144. The Shop Around the Corner 145. The Blade 146. Police Story 147. Mr. Smith Goes to Washington 148. Lovers Rock 149. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon 150. Punch-Drunk Love
151. Chungking Express 152. Alien 153. Hellzapoppin’ 154. Airplane! 155. Fort Apache 156. Blackhat 157. SPL 2: A Time for Consequences 158. Les Vampires 159. Mulholland Dr. 160. Histoire(s) du cinema 161. Wagon Master 162. Renaldo & Clara 163. Out of the Past 164. The Last Days of Disco 165. La Commune (Paris 1871) 166. Charade 167. Peking Opera Blues 168. Bambi 169. The Bad News Bears 170. Mahjong 171. Broadcast News 172. Hana and Alice 173. Sans soleil 174. Pyaasa 175. The Age of Innocence
176. Holiday 177. Los Angeles Plays Itself 178. The Heart of the World 179. His Motorbike, Her Island 180. Goodbye, Dragon Inn 181. Metropolitan 182. Shadow Kingdom 183. The Fellowship of the Ring 184. Late Spring 185. Throne of Blood 186. Running on Karma 187. Three Colors: Blue 188. Vertigo 189. City Lights 190. Don’t Go Breaking My Heart 2 191. Liz and the Blue Bird 192. The Bridges of Madison County 193. Tropical Malady 194. Perceval le Gallois 195. The Princess Bride 196. Ash is Purest White 197. Anatomy of a Murder 198. Ugetsu 199. Satantango 200. Speed Racer
201. Chimes at Midnight 202. The Royal Tenenbaums 203. Glengarry Glen Ross 204. Mad Max: Fury Road 205. It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown 206. Playtime 207. Let the Bullets Fly 208. A Charlie Brown Christmas 209. Rear Window 210. Gremlins 2: The New Batch 211. Sparrow 212. My Fair Lady 213. The Music Room 214. La danse: The Paris Opera Ballet 215. Trainspotting 216. Dirty Ho 217. Young Mr. Lincoln 218. The Umbrellas of Cherbourg 219. The BIg Sleep 220. Miller’s Crossing 221. My Neighbor Totoro 222. I am Cuba 223. Platform 224. Meek’s Cutoff 225. Citizen Kane
226. Linda Linda Linda 227. Fallen Angels 228. Miami Vice 229. Children of Paradise 230. Song of the Exile 231. Night of the Hunter 232. Only Yesterday (1991) 233. Happy Together 234. Meet Me in St. Louis 235. Broken Blossoms 236. Kiki’s Delivery Service 237. The Big Red One 238. My Left Eye Sees Ghosts 239. Excalibur 240. Green Snake 241. Bound for the Fields, the Mountains, and the Seacoast 242. Kung Fu Hustle 243. The Killer 244. Good Men, Good Women 245. Conan the Barbarian 246. A Moment of Romance 247. An American in Paris 248. Phantoms of Nabua 249. Henry V 250. It Felt Like a Kiss
251. Voyage in Italy 252. Journey to the West (2014) 253. Days of Heaven 254. Sherlock, Jr 255. Once Upon a Time in China 256. Kill Bill Vol. 1 257. Rio Bravo 258. Kiss Me Kate 259. The Big Lebowski 260. Wolf Children 261. Om Shanti Om 262. Dangerous Liaisons 263. City on Fire 264. Irma Vep 265. Morocco 266. The Time to Live, the Time to Die 267. M. Hulot’s Holiday 268. The Rocking Horsemen 269. Pulp Fiction 270. Full Contact 271. Safety Last 272. It’s a Wonderful Life 273. A Brighter Summer Day 274. Last Life in the Universe 275. Paterson
276. Monty Python and the Holy Grail 277. Apocalypse Now 278. The Story of Woo Viet 279. Do the Right Thing 280. Fire Walk with Me 281. Rouge 282. F for Fake 283. Little Women 284. The Birds 285. Ruggles of Red Gap 286. 2046 287. The Wind that Shakes the Barley 288. News from Home 289. The Green Ray 290. Ashes of Time 291. Mean Streets 292. The Band Wagon 293. Cat People 294. A Better Tomorrow 295. Oxhide II 296. The Pirate 297. One Week 298. Psycho 299. Jaws 300. The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly
301. Amanda (2019) 302. Spring in a Small Town 303. Japanese Girls at the Harbor 304. Ishtar 305. North by Northwest 306. Yourself & Yours 307. Claire’s Camera 308. Baahubali 309. Early Summer
It is time once again for a Top 100 Films of All-Time list. The film listed here were randomly selected from a consideration set of 310 films . The order is also randomized.
My Left Eye Sees Ghosts (Johnnie To & Wai Ka-fai, 2002) Reds (Warren Beatty, 1981) Hellzapoppin’ (HC Potter, 1941) It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown (Bill Melendez, 1966) Last Life in the Universe (Pen-Ek Ratanaruang, 2003) Pat Garrett & Billy the Kid (Sam Peckinpah, 1973) The Killer (John Woo, 1989) A Day in the Country (Jean Renoir, 1936) The Lion in Winter (Anthony Harvey, 1968) Mother! (Darren Aronofsky, 2017)
Broadcast News (James L. Brooks, 1987) Titanic (James Cameron, 1997) The Rules of the Game (Jean Renoir, 1939) Duck Soup (Leo McCarey, 1933) Certified Copy (Abbas Kiarostami, 2010) What’s Opera, Doc? (Chuck Jones, 1957) Original Cast Album: Company (DA Pennebaker, 1970) The Love Eterne (Li Han-hsiang, 1963) One Froggy Evening (Chuck Jones, 1955) Journey to the West (Tsai Ming-liang, 2014)
The Wind that Shakes the Barley (Ken Loach, 2006) Les amants du Pont-Neuf (Leos Carax, 1991) Meek’s Cutoff (Kelly Reichardt, 2010) News from Home (Chantal Akerman, 1977) The Gang’s All Here (Busby Berkeley, 1943) Meet Me in St Louis (Vincente Minnelli, 1944) The Big Red One (Samuel Fuller, 1980) They Were Expendable (John Ford, 1946) Duvidha (Mani Kaul, 1973) The Bellboy (Jerry Lewis, 1960)
Early Summer (Ozu Yasujiro, 1951) Three Times (Hou Hsiao-hsien, 2005) Rouge (Stanley Kwan, 1987) The Philadelphia Story (George Cukor, 1940) The Manchurian Candidate (John Frankenheimer, 1962) Yourself & Yours (Hong Sangsoo, 2016) The Lady Eve (Preston Sturges, 1941) Bound for the Fields, the Mountains, and the Seacoast (Obayashi Nobuhiko, 1986) 8 Diagram Pole Fighter (Lau Kar-leung, 1984) Intolerance (DW Griffith, 1916)
Seven Samurai (Kurosawa Akira, 1954) The Terrorizers (Edward Yang, 1986) City on Fire (Ringo Lam, 1987) Last of the Mohicans (Michael Mann, 1992) Tropical Malady (Apichatpong Weerasethakul, 2004) Robin and Marian (Richard Lester, 1976) Zulu (Cy Endfield, 1964) Japanese Girls at the Harbor (Shimizu Hiroshi, 1933) Drive My Car (Hamaguchi Ryusuke, 2021) Beau travail (Claire Denis, 1999)
The Young Girls of Rochefort (Jacques Demy, 1967) Made in Hong Kong (Fruit Chan, 1998) Morocco (Josef von Sternberg, 1930) Xiao Wu (Jia Zhangke, 1997) Don’t Look Back (DA Pennebaker, 1967) The Good, the Bad, & the Ugly (Sergio Leone, 1966) Fire Walk with Me (David Lynch, 1992) The Quiet Man (John Ford, 1952) Kiss Me Kate (George Sydney, 1953) Pierrot le fou (Jean-Luc Godard, 1965)
Cat People (Jacques Tourneur, 1942) Only Angels Have Wings (Howard Hawks, 1938) Miami Vice (Michael Mann, 2006) Choose Me (Alan Rudolph, 1984) Time and Tide (Tsui Hark, 2000) Om Shanti Om (Farah Khan, 2007) The Harder they Come (Perry Henzell, 1972) Rock n Roll High School (Allan Arkush, 1979) Liz and the Blue Bird (Yamada Naoko, 2018) Jazz on a Summer’s Day (Aram Avakian & Bert Stern, 1959)
Heat (Michael Mann, 1995) Green Snake (Tsui Hark, 1993) Yearning (Naruse Mikio, 1964) Shanghai Blues (Tsui Hark, 1984) Out of the Past (Jacques Tourneur, 1947) Metropolitan (Whit Stillman, 1990) Bull Durham (Ron Shelton, 1988) Speed Racer (Lana & Lilly Wachowski, 2008) The Music Room (Satyajit Ray, 1958) Ace Attorney (Miike Takashi, 2012)
The Third Man (Carol Reed, 1949) Linda Linda Linda (Yamashita Nobuhiro, 2005) F for Fake (Orson Welles, 1973) The Last Days of Disco (Whit Stillman, 1998) Jaws (Steven Spielberg, 1975) Phantoms of Nabua (Apichatpong Weerasethakul, 2009) Vertigo (Alfred Hitchcock, 1958) The Birds (Alfred Hitchcock, 1962) Hero (Zhang Yimou, 2002) A Brighter Summer Day (Edward Yang, 1991)
The Docks of New York (Josef von Sternberg, 1928) Inherent Vice (Paul Thomas Anderson, 2014) Amanda (Mikhaël Hers, 2018) His Motorbike, Her Island (Obayashi Nobuhiko, 1986) Mughal-e-azam (K. Asif, 1960) La Commune (Paris, 1871) (Peter Watkins, 2000) Fat Choi Spirit (Johnnie To & Wai Ka-fai, 2002) The Day He Arrives (Hong Sangsoo, 2011) Once Upon a Time in China (Tsui Hark, 1991) Dirty Ho (Lau Kar-leung, 1979)
It is time once again for a Top 100 Films of All-Time list. As I’ve done for the last few years, the first ten spots on the list comprise a hypothetical Sight & Sound-style ballot. We had an on-going project related to this on The George Sanders Show, that is now based at Seattle Screen Scene. This top ten is presented here in chronological order. The remaining 90 films were randomly selected from a consideration set of 1024 films, which excluded films that made my Top Tens in 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, and 2020.
1. Hellzapoppin’ (HC Potter, 1941)
2. Anatomy of a Murder (Otto Preminger, 1959)
3. Duvidha (Mani Kaul, 1973)
4. Renaldo & Clara (Bob Dylan, 1978)
5. His Motorbike, Her Island (Obayashi Nobuhiko, 1986)
6. Slacker (Richard Linklater, 1990)
7. Ballet (Frederick Wiseman, 1995)
8. Goodbye, Dragon Inn (Tsai Ming-liang, 2003)
9. Throw Down (Johnnie To, 2004)
10. Claire’s Camera (Hong Sangsoo, 2017)
11. New York, New York (Martin Scorsese, 1977)
12. Woodstock (Michael Wadleigh, 1970)
13. Return of the King (Peter Jackson, 2003)
14. Mr. Thank You (Shimizu Hiroshi, 1936)
15. Eyes Wide Shut (Stanley Kubrick, 1999)
16. They Live by Night (Nicholas Ray, 1948)
17. Predator (John McTiernan, 1987)
18. Andrei Rublev (Andrei Tarkovsky, 1969)
19. Miami Vice (Michael Mann, 2006)
20. Trouble in Paradise (Ernst Lubitsch, 1932)
21. The Romance of Astrea and Celadon (Eric Rohmer, 2007)
22. Dishonored (Josef von Sternberg, 1931)
23. The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (Tobe Hooper, 1974)
24. Suspicion (Alfred Hitchcock, 1941)
25. My Night at Maud’s (Eric Rohmer, 1969)
26. Window Water Baby Moving (Stan Brakhage, 1959)
27. A Matter of Interpretation (Lee Kwangkuk, 2014)
28. How Green was My Valley (John Ford, 1941)
29. Bye Bye Birdie (George Sidney, 1963)
30. The Testament of Dr. Mabuse (Fritz Lang, 1933)
Since the last update I wrote the liner notes essay for the upcoming Criterion Collection release of Johnnie To’s Throw Down (preorder now!). I also wrote about Christian Petzold’s Jerichow for InReview Online and the Demon Slayer movie at Seattle Screen Scene. I also handed out the 2020 Endy Awards.
These are the movies I’ve watched or rewatched over the last few weeks, and where they place on my year-by-year rankings.
The Goat (Buster Keaton & Malcolm St. Clair) – 5, 1921 Duck Soup (Leo McCarey) – 1, 1933 Three Little Pigs (Burt Gillett) – 22, 1933 Queen of Sports (Sun Yu) – 22, 1934 The Foghorn Leghorn (Robert McKimson) – 24, 1948
Rabbit Seasoning (Chuck Jones) – 10, 1952 Feed the Kitty (Chuck Jones) – 13, 1952 One Froggy Evening (Chuck Jones) – 3, 1955 What’s Opera, Doc? (Chuck Jones) – 3, 1957 Hare-way to the Stars (Chuck Jones) – 17, 1958 Robin Hood Daffy (CHuck Jones) – 21, 1958
The Road to Fort Alamo (Mario Bava) – 25, 1964 The Good, the Bad & the Ugly (Sergio Leone) – 1, 1966 The Shooting (Monte Hellman) – 6, 1966 Ride in the Whirlwind (Monte Hellman) – 7, 1966 Navajo Joe (Sergio Corbucci) – 16, 1966
Festival (Murray Lerner) – 20, 1967 The Great Silence (Sergio Corbucci) – 7, 1968 The Heartbreak Kid (Elaine May) – 5, 1972 The Eiger Sanction (Clint Eastwood) – 15, 1975 The Bad News Bears (Michael Ritchie) – 6, 1976 Hard Rain (Jacques Levy) – 16, 1976
China 9, Liberty 37 (Monte Hellman) – 11, 1978 Every Which Way but Loose (James Fargo) – 26, 1978 The Butterfly Murders (Tsui Hark) – 19, 1979 Zu: Warriors from the Magic Mountain (Tsui Hark) – 5, 1983 Wheels on Meals (Sammo Hung) – 2, 1984 The Muppets Take Manhattan (Frank Oz) – 48, 1984
Peking Opera Blues (Tsui Hark) – 3, 1986 Willow (Ron Howard) – 38, 1988 Paper Marriage (Alfred Cheung) – 48, 1988 Green Snake (Tsui Hark) – 2, 1993 Dylan at Woodstock ’94 (Bruce Gowers) – 49, 1994
The Blade (Tsui Hark) – 7, 1995 Scream (Wes Craven) – 18, 1996 Independence Day (Roland Emmerich) – 56, 1996 I Know What You Did Last Summer (Jim Gillespie) – 45, 1997 Scream 2 (Wes Craven) – 55, 1997
Chicken Run (Nick Park & Peter Lord) – 30, 2000 Running Out of Time 2 (Johnnie To & Law Wing-cheong) – 14, 2001 Fat Choi Spirit (Johnnie To & Wai Ka-fai) – 6, 2002 Feel Like Going Home (Martin Scorsese) – 27, 2003
Throw Down (Johnnie To) – 2, 2004 Breaking News (Johnnie To) – 14, 2004 Yesterday Once More (Johnnie To) – 17, 2004 War of the Worlds (Steven Spielberg) – 7, 2005 No Direction Home (Martin Scorsese) – 12, 2005 Akeelah and the Bee (Doug Atchison) – 30, 2006
1966-1978: After the Crash (Chrome Dreams) – 34, 2006 The Other Side of the Mirror (Murray Lerner) – 33, 2007 Sparrow (Johnnie To) – 4, 2008 Jerichow (Christian Petzold) – 13, 2008 1978-1989: Both Ends of the Rainbow (Chrome Dreams) – 46, 2008 Coraline (Henry Selick) – 45, 2009 1990-2006: The Never-Ending Narrative (Chrome Dreams) – 58, 2011
Into the Woods (Rob Marshall) – 45, 2014 Roads Rapidly Changing (Tom O’Dell) – 63, 2015 The American Epic (Bernard MacMahon) – 61, 2017 Trouble No More (Jennifer Lebeau) – 65, 2017
1. Oki’s Movie (Hong Sangsoo, 2010)
2. The Midnight After (Fruit Chan, 2014)
3. Baahubali (SS Rajamouli, 2015/2017)
4. Ash is Purest White (Jia Zhangke, 2018)
5. Liz and the Blue Bird (Naoko Yamada, 2018)
6. Inherent Vice (Paul Thomas Anderson, 2014)
7. Yourself & Yours (Hong Sangsoo, 2016)
8. The Assassin (Hou Hsiao-hsien, 2015)
9. Paterson (Jim Jarmusch, 2016)
10. The Grandmaster (Wong Kar-wai, 2013)
11. The Day He Arrives (Hong Sangsoo, 2011)
12. Amanda (Mikhaël Hers, 2018)
13. Romancing in Thin Air (Johnnie To, 2012)
14. Journey to the West: Conquering the Demons (Stephen Chow & Derek Kwok, 2013)
15. Meek’s Cutoff (Kelly Reichardt, 2010)
16. The Missing Picture (Rithy Panh, 2013)
17. Blackhat (Michael Mann, 2015)
18. Blind Detective (Johnnie To, 2013)
19. Claire’s Camera (Hong Sangsoo, 2017)
20. The Irishman (Martin Scorsese, 2019)
21. Blackkklansman (Spike Lee, 2018)
22. A Silent Voice (Naoko Yamada, 2016)
23. The Tale of the Princess Kaguya (Isao Takahata, 2013)
24. The Grand Bizarre (Jodie Mack, 2018)
25. Asako I & II (Ryūsuke Hasmaguchi, 2018)
26. Don’t Go Breaking My Heart 2 (Johnnie To, 2014)
27. Let the Bullets Fly (Jiang Wen, 2010)
28. Arabian Nights (Miguel Gomes, 2015)
29. The Tree of Life (Terrence Malick, 2011)
30. Resident Evil: The Final Chapter (Paul WS Anderson, 2016)
31. Certified Copy (Abbas Kiarostami, 2010)
32. Dawson City: Frozen Time (Bill Morrison, 2016)
33. Wolf Children (Mamoru Hosada, 2012)
34. Grass (Hong Sangsoo, 2018)
35. A Touch of Sin (Jia Zhangke, 2013)
36. Bad Genius (Nattawut Poonpiriya, 2017)
37. Support the Girls (Andrew Bujalski, 2018)
38. Little Women (Greta Gerwig, 2019
39. The Wind Rises (Hayao Miyazaki, 2013)
40. Shin Godzilla (Hideaki Anno, 2016)
41. Dusty Stacks of Mom (Jodie Mack, 2013)
42. Mother! (Darren Aronofsky, 2017)
43. La última película (Raya Martin & Mark Peranson, 2013)
44. Fourteen (Dan Sallitt, 2019)
45. 120 Beats per Minute (Robin Campillo, 2017)
46. Mad Max: Fury Road (George Miller, 2015)
47. Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives (Apichatpong Weerasethakul, 2010)
48. Night is Short, Walk on Girl (Masaaki Yuasa, 2017)
49. SPL 2: A Time for Consequences (Soi Cheang, 2015)
50. Moonrise Kingdom (Wes Anderson, 2012)
51. Hill of Freedom (Hong Sangsoo, 2014)
52. Mountains May Depart (Jia Zhangke, 2015)
53. Hanagatami (Nobuhiko Obayashi, 2017)
54. Cemetery of Splendour (Apichatpong Weerasethakul, 2015)
55. Love in a Puff (Pang Ho-cheung, 2010)
56. Toni Erdmann (Maren Ade, 2016)
57. Journey to the West (Tsai Ming-liang, 2014)
58. The Last Jedi (Rian Johnson, 2017)
59. Drug War (Johnnie To, 2012)
60. Like Someone in Love (Abbas Kiarostami, 2012)
61. The Other Side of the Wind (Orson Welles, 2018)
62. Happy Hour (Ryūsuke Hamaguchi, 2015)
63. Our Time Will Come (Ann Hui, 2017)
64. Lincoln (Steven Spielberg, 2012)
65. First Love (Takashi Miike, 2019)
66. Romance Joe (Lee Kwangkuk, 2011)
67. Girl Walk//All Day (Jacob Krupnick, 2011)
68. Lynch: A History (David Shields, 2019)
69. Long Day’s Journey Into Night (Bi Gan, 2018)
70. National Gallery (Frederick Wiseman, 2014)
71. Your Name. (Makoto Shinkai, 2016)
72. The Royal Road (Jenni Olson, 2015)
73. Margaret (Kenneth Lonergan, 2011)
74. Love & Friendship (Whit Stillman, 2016)
75. A Home with a View (Herman Yau, 2019)
76. The Deep Blue Sea (Terence Davies, 2011)
77. Hypernormalization (Adam Curtis, 2016)
78. On the Beach at Night Alone (Hong Sangsoo, 2017)
79. Once Upon a Time in Hollywood (Quentin Tarantino, 2019)
80. Phantom Thread (Paul Thomas Anderson, 2017)
81. Phoenix (Christian Petzold, 2014)
82. Mistress America (Noah Baumbach, 2015)
83. Stray Dogs (Tsai Ming-liang, 2013)
84. The Wolf of Wall Street (Martin Scorsese, 2013)
85. Resident Evil: Retribution (Paul WS Anderson, 2012)
86. List (Hong Sangsoo, 2011)
87. K-On! The Movie (Naoko Yamada, 2011)
88. Transit (Christian Petzold, 2018)
89. Don’t Go Breaking My Heart (Johnnie To, 2011)
90. If Beale Street Could Talk (Barry Jenkins, 2018)
91. Damsels in Distress (Whit Stillman, 2011)
92. Crosscurrent (Yang Chao, 2016)
93. Carlos (Olivier Assayas, 2010)
94. Jauja (Lisandro Alonso, 2014)
95. Kaili Blues (Bi Gan, 2015)
96. Maison du bonheur (Sofia Bohdanowicz, 2017)
97. Bacurau (Kleber Mendonça Filho, 2019)
98. Tabu (Miguel Gomes, 2012)
99. The Master (Paul Thomas Anderson, 2012)
100. Ace Attorney (Takashi Miike, 2012)
101. Aquarius (Kleber Mendonça Filho, 2016)
102. 24 Frames (Abbas Kiarostami, 2017)
103. A Quiet Passion (Terence Davies, 2016)
104. Mekong Hotel (Apichatpoing Weerasethakul, 2012)
105. The Forbidden Room (Guy Maddin & Evan Johnson, 2015)
106. Pitch Perfect (Jason Moore, 2012)
107. Our Sunhi (Hong Sangsoo, 2013)
108. The Crossing Part One (John Woo, 2014)
109. Things to Come (Mia Hansen-Love, 2016)
110. Spider-Man: Into the Spiderverse (Bob Persichetti, Peter Ramsey & Rodney Rothman, 2018)
111. Rogue One (Gareth Edwards, 2016)
112. By the Time It Gets Dark (Anocha Suwichakornpong, 2016)
113. A Matter of Interpretation (Lee Kwangkuk, 2014)
114. Little Forest (Yim Soonrye, 2018)
115. Silence (Martin Scorsese, 2016)
116. Cold War (Paweł Pawlikowski, 2018)
117. Marriage Story (Noah Baumbach, 2019)
118. A Hidden Life (Terrence Malick, 2019)
119. Camera falls from airplane and lands in pig pen—MUST WATCH END!! (Mia Munselle, 2014)
120. No. 1 Chung Ying Street (Derek Chiu, 2018)
121. Legend of the Demon Cat (Chen Kaige, 2017)
122. Three (Johnnie To, 2016)
123. The Hedonists (Jia Zhangke, 2016)
124. The Case of Hana and Alice (Shunji Iwai, 2015)
125. Pompeii (Paul WS Anderson, 2014)
126. Sunset Song (Terence Davies, 2015)
127. The Dead Don’t Die (Jim Jarmusch, 2019)
128. Wuxia (Peter Chan, 2011)
129. Ex Libris: New York Public Library (Frederick Wiseman, 2017)
130. Murmur of the Hearts (Sylvia Chang, 2015)
131. In Another Country (Hong Sangsoo, 2012)
132. The Three Musketeers (Paul WS Anderson, 2011)
133. Nobody’s Daughter Haewon (Hong Sangsoo, 2013)
134. Hit 2 Pass (Kurt Walker, 2014)
135. In this Corner of the World (Sunao Katabuchi, 2016)
136. The Age of Shadows (Kim Jiwon, 2016)
137. Angels Wear White (Vivian Qu, 2017)
138. 77 Heartbreaks (Herman Yau, 2017)
139. John McEnroe: In the Realm of Perfection (Julien Faraut, 2018)
140. Non-Fiction (Olivier Assayas, 2018)
141. Night Across the Street (Raúl Ruiz, 2012)
142. Unstoppable (Tony Scott, 2010)
143. World of Tomorrow (Don Hertzfeldt, 2015)
144. Highway (Imtiaz Ali, 2014)
145. Uncut Gems (Josh & Benny Safdie, 2019)
146. MS Slavic 7 (Sofia Bohdanowicz & Deragh Campbell, 2019)
147. Shirkers (Sandi Tan, 2018)
148. Bisbee ’17 (Robert Greene, 2018)
149. Pumpkin Movie (Sophy Romvari, 2017)
150. Downsizing (Alexander Payne, 2017)
151. Train to Busan (Yeon Sangho, 2016)
152. Hit the Night (Jeong Ga-young, 2017)
153. Peterloo (Mike Leigh, 2018)
154. Soulmate (Derek Tsang, 2016)
155. Moonlight (Barry Jenkins, 2016)
156. The Coffin in the Mountain (Xin Yukun, 2014)
157. Mysteries of Lisbon (Raúl Ruiz, 2010)
158. Happiness is a Warm Blanket, Charle Brown (Frank Molieri & Andy Beall, 2011)
159. The Lighthouse (Robert Eggers, 2019)
160. Thomas Mao (Zhu Web, 2010)
161. Parasite (Bong Joonho, 2019)
162. The Last Poems Trilogy (Sofia Bohdanowicz, 2016)
163. I Am Not Your Negro (Raoul Peck, 2016)
164. A Bride for Rip Van Winkle (Shunji Iwai, 2016)
165. Bad Black (Nabwanna IGG, 2016)
166. Chasing Dream (Johnnie To, 2019)
167. 1987: When the Day Comes (Jang Joonhwan, 2017)
168. Tremble All You Want (Akiko Ohku, 2017)
169. The Village of No Return (Chen Yu-hsun, 2017)
170. Rolling Thunder Revue (Martin Scorsese, 2019)
171. Jupiter Ascending (Lana & Lilly Wachowski, 2015)
172. The New King of Comedy (Stephen Chow, 2019)
173. Yellowing (Chan Tze-woon, 2016)
174. 607 (Liu Jiayin, 2010)
175. The Shallows (Jaume Collet-Serra, 2016)
176. To the Wonder (Terrence Malick, 2012)
177. What You Gonna Do When the World’s on Fire? (Roberto Minervini, 2018)
178. Dolemite is My Name (Craig Brewer, 2019)
179. Everybody Wants Some!!! (Richard Linklater, 2016)
180. Port of Call (Philip Yung, 2015)
181. Go Away Mr. Tumor (Han Yan, 2015)
182. Office (Johnnie To, 2015)
183. Obvious Child (Gillian Robespierre, 2014)
184. When Night Falls (Ying Liang, 2012)
185. Viola (Matias Piñeiro, 2012)
186. Noah (Darren Aronfosky, 2014)
187. Life without Principle (Johnnie To, 2011)
188. Hard To Say (Lee Kwangkuk, 2013)
189. Sully (Clint Eastwood, 2016)
190. Let Your Heart Be Light (Sophy Romvari, 2016)
191. Martin Eden (Pietro Marcello)
192. Faces Places (Agnès Varda & JR, 2017)
193. The Wasted Times (Er Cheng, 2016)
194. Love and Goodbye and Hawaii (Shingo Matsumura, 2017)
195. Last Letter (Shunji Iwai, 2018)
196. The Crossing (Bai Xue, 2018)
197. Horse Money (Pedro Costa, 2014)
198. Love Education (Sylvia Chang, 2017)
199. Hermia & Helena (Matías Piñeiro, 2016)
200. Hahaha (Hong Sangsoo, 2010)
201. The Mermaid (Stephen Chow, 2016)
202. Ex (Heiward Mak, 2011)
203. In Jackson Heights (Frederick Wiseman, 2015)
204. Jeux de plage (Aimi Natsuto, 2019)
205. 88:88 (Isiah Medina, 2015)
206. It’s Such a Beautiful Day (Don Hertzfeldt, 2012)
207. Four Ways to Die in My Hometown (Chai Chunya, 2013)
208. Deadwood: the Movie (Daniel Minahan, 2019)
209. At Berkeley (Frederick Wiseman, 2013)
210. The Florida Project (Sean Baker, 2017)
211. Memories Look at Me (Song Fang 2012)
212. Elle (Paul Verhoeven, 2016)
213. Gallants (Derek Kwok & Clement Cheng, 2010)
214. Carol (Todd Haynes, 2015)
215. Knight of Cups (Terrence Malick, 2015)
216. Weathering with You (Makoto Shinkai, 2019)
217. Gone with the Bullets (Jiang Wen, 2014)
218. Tokyo Tribe (Sion Sono, 2014)
219. Sixty Six (Lewis Klahr, 2015)
220. Before We Vanish (Kiyoshi Kurosawa, 2017)
We are now halfway through the year and as hasbecome anannual traditionhere at The End, it’s time to look back at the best movies of the year so far. As I discussed in the 2013 halfway post, the consensus movie-dating system is nonsensical and posits New York as the center of the universe. Far more logical (and much easier to use) is a system reliant on imdb’s dating system, which locates a film in whatever year it first played for an audience. That’s what we use here for all Rankings & Awards as it’s the most fair to all eras and areas. (A dating system reliant on playing in a certain locality I think can be valuable for a publication that is geographically specific, like a local newspaper or website. But here at The End, we have a global reach.)
A by-product of the system is that a number of films that first go into wide-release in any given year actually had their premiere in the year before. A number of the films on many critics’ halfway-point lists will include these films, films that find their proper home here on my 2018 list. And so here we have two lists: the Best Movies of 2019, following the strict imdb dating system, and the Best 2018 Movies of 2019, which includes those films from last year (and one from 45 years ago) that you might find on a more chronologically-illogical list. I also have a third list, Best Unreleased Movies of 2018, of last year’s films that have yet to see a New York release and therefore don’t (yet) exist by the standards of most critics. And there’s a fourth list, a halfway version of my annual Best Older Movies list, counting the top movies I saw for the first time this year that are more than a few years old.
The Best Movies of 2019 (So Far)
1. A Home with a View (Herman Yau)
2. Lynch: A History (David Shields)
3. The Rolling Thunder Revue (Martin Scorsese)
4. Deadwood: The Movie (Daniel Minahan)
5. The New King of Comedy (Stephen Chow & Herman Yau)
6. The Dead Don’t Die (Jim Jarmusch)
7. Furie (Lê Văn Kiệt)
8. Avengers: Endgame (Anthony & Joe Russo)
9. Booksmart (Olivia Wilde)
10. Master Z: Ip Man Legacy (Yuen Woo-ping)
11. White Snake (Amp Wong & Ji Zhao)
12. Missbehavior (Pang Ho-cheung)*
13. Pegasus (Han Han)
14. The Wandering Earth (Frant Gwo)
15. Triple Threat (Jesse V. Johnson)
16. Us (Jordan Peele)
The Best 2018 Movies of 2019 (So Far)
1. Ash is Purest White (Jia Zhangke)
2. Asako I & II (Ryusuke Hamguchi)
3. Grass (Hong Sangsoo)
4. The Fate of Lee Khan (King Hu, 1973)
5. Long Day’s Journey Into Night (Bi Gan)
6. Transit (Christian Petzold)
7. Non-Fiction (Olivier Assayas)
8. The Crossing (Bai Xue)
9. Legend of the Demon Cat (Chen Kaige, 2017)*
10. Suburban Birds (Qiu Sheng)
11. The Eyes of Orson Welles (Mark Cousins)
12. The Image Book (Jean-Luc Godard)
13. An Elephant Sitting Still (Hu Bo)
14. Hotel by the River (Hong Sangsoo)
15. Diamantino (Gabriel Abrantes & Daniel Schmidt)
16. Shadow (Zhang Yimou)
The Best Unreleased Films of 2018 (So Far)
1. The Grand Bizarre (Jodie Mack)
2. Hidden Man (Jiang Wen)
3. Little Forest (Yim Soonrye)
4. Blue (Apichatpong Weerasethakul)
5. No. 1 Chung Ying Street (Derek Chiu)
6. Chinese Portrait (Wang Xiaoshuai)
7. Tourism (Daisuke Miyazaki)
8. La cartographe (Nathan Douglas)
9. Veslemøy’s Song (Sofia Bohdanowicz)
10. Norman Norman (Sophy Romvari)
11. Shoot the Moon Right Between the Eyes (Graham Carter)
12. Dead Pigs (Cathy Yan)
13. A Land Imagined (Yeo Siew Hua)
14. Girls Always Happy (Yang Mingming)
15. House of Hummingbird (Kim Bora)
16. Song Lang (Leon Le)
2019 Discoveries (So Far)
1. Chan is Missing (Wayne Wang, 1982)
2. Street Angel (Yuan Muzhi, 1937)
3. Desperately Seeking Susan (Susan Seidelman, 1985)
4. War and Peace (Sergei Bondarchuk, 1966)
5. Taxi Hunter (Herman Yau, 1993)
6. Suzhou River (Lou Ye, 2000)
7. Red Sorghum (Zhang Yimou, 1987)
8. The Untold Story (Herman Yau, 1993)
9. From Beijing with Love (Stephen Chow & Lee Lik-chi, 1994)
10. Yellow Earth (Chen Kaige, 1984)
11. Cry Me a River (Jia Zhangke, 2008)
12. Duel to the Death (Ching Siu-tung, 1983)
13. The Horse Thief (Tian Zhuangzhuang, 1986)
14. Legend of the Stardust Brothers (Makoto Tezuka, 1985)
15. Useless (Jia Zhangke, 2007)
16. Troublesome Night 3 (Herman Yau, 1998)
17. The Mindscape of Alan Moore (Dez Vylenz, 2003)
18. Captain America: Winter Soldier (Joe & Anthony Russo, 2014)
19. Xiao Shan Going Home (Jia Zhangke, 1995)
20. Howard the Duck (Willard Huyck, 1986)
21. Ju Dou (Zhang Yimou, 1990)
22. Maximum Risk (Ringo Lam, 1996)
23. Springtime in a Small Town (Tian Zhuangzhuang, 2002)
24. Dong (Jia Zhangke, 2006)
25. Three Sad Tigers (Raúl Ruiz, 1968)
26. Breakin’ (Joel Silberg, 1984)
*According to Mike D’Angelo’s list, neither Missbehavior nor Legend of the Demon Cat played in New York in 2019, but they did play in other North American cities, including Seattle, and so I’m considering them to exist.
These are the movies I’ve watched or rewatched over the last few weeks, and where they place on my year-by-year rankings.
Something Good–Negro Kiss (William Selig) – 1, 1898
Street Angel (Yuan Muzhi) – 4, 1937
Spring in a Small Town (Fei Mu) – 3, 1948
A Charlie Brown Christmas (Bill Melendez) – 4, 1965
How the Grinch Stole Christmas (Chuck Jones) – 13, 1966
Three Sad Tigers (Raúl Ruiz) – 15, 1968
Chan is Missing (Wayne Wang) – 3, 1982
Yellow Earth (Chen Kaige) – 13, 1984
The Horse Thief (Tain Zhuangzhuang) – 17, 1986
City on Fire (Ringo Lam) – 2, 1987
Red Sorghum (Zhang Yimou) – 5, 1987
School on Fire (Ringo Lam) – 2, 1988
Full Contact (Ringo Lam) – 11, 1992
Farewell, My Concubine (Chen Kaige) – 62, 1993
Ricky Jay and His 52 Assistants (David Mamet) – 29, 1996
Maximum Risk (Ringo Lam) – 53, 1996
Full Alert (Ringo Lam) – 17, 1997
X-Men (Bryan Singer) – 37, 2000
Replicant (Ringo Lam) – 39, 2001
Springtime in a Small Town (Tian Zhuangzhuang) – 21, 2002
Looking for Mr. Perfect (Ringo Lam) – 15, 2003
X2 (Bryan Singer) – 33, 2003
In Hell (Ringo Lam) – 44, 2003
Shaun of the Dead (Edgar Wright) – 18, 2004
X-Men: The Last Stand (Brett Ratner) – 68, 2006
Hot Fuzz (Edgar Wright) – 32, 2007
X-Men: First Class (Matthew Vaughn) – 65, 2011
Flowers of Taipei: Taiwan New Cinema (Chinlin Hsieh) – 48, 2014
X-Men: Days of Future Past (Bryan Singer) – 76, 2014
X-Men: Apocalypse (Bryan Singer) – 121, 2016
Deadpool (Tim Miller) – 137, 2016
Paddington 2 (Paul King) – 99, 2017
Blackkklansman (Spike Lee) – 4, 2018
If Beale Street Could Talk (Barry Jenkins) – 6, 2018
Spider-Man: Into the Spider-verse (Peter Ramsey, Robert Persichetti Jr. & Rodney Rothman) – 16, 2018
Blue (Apichatpong Weerasethakul) – 21, 2018
Us and Them (René Liu) – 41, 2018
Venom (Ruben Fleischer) – 47, 2018
Aquaman (James Wan) – 48, 2018
Animal World (Han Yan) – 54, 2018
Happy as Lazzaro (Alice Rohrwacher) – 58, 2018
Avengers: Infinity War (Anthony & Joe Russo) – 61, 2018
Black Panther (Ryan Coogler) – 69, 2018
The Sisters Brothers (Jacques Audiard) – 72, 2018
A Quiet Place (John Krasinski) – 76, 2018
Deadpool 2 (David Leitch) – 78, 2018
At Eternity’s Gate (Julian Schnabel) – 79, 2018
Roma (Alfonso Cuarón) – 81, 2018
A Cool Fish (Rao Xiaozhi) – 85, 2018
Blockers (Kay Cannon) – 91, 2018
The Favourite (Yorgos Lanthimos) – 93, 2018
The Leakers (Herman Yau) – 98, 2018
Springsteen on Broadway (Thom Zimney) – 110, 2018
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These are the movies I’ve watched or rewatched over the last few weeks, and where they place on my year-by-year rankings.
Charlie Brown’s All-Stars (Bill Melendez) – 28, 1966
The Water Margin (Chang Cheh, Wu Ma & Pao Hsueh-li) – 18, 1972
Shaolin Temple (Chang Cheh) – 15, 1976
The Dream of the Red Chamber (Li Han-hsiang) – 9, 1977
The Brave Archer (Chang Cheh) – 20, 1977
Crippled Avengers (Chang Cheh) – 8, 1978
ET: The Extra-Terrestrial (Steven Spielberg) – 3, 1982
House of Traps (Chang Cheh) – 36, 1982
That Day, On the Beach (Edward Yang) – 5, 1983
Passion (Sylvia Chang) – 21, 1986
Sisters of the World Unite (Sylvia Chang & Maisy Tsui) – 39, 1991
Mary from Beijing (Sylvia Chang) – 42, 1992
Eat Drink Man Woman (Ang Lee) – 21, 1994
Kamikaze Taxi (Masato Harada) – 10, 1995
Siao Yu (Sylvia Chang) – 33, 1995
Tonight Nobody Goes Home (Sylvia Chang) – 20, 1996
Tempting Heart (Sylvia Chang) – 8, 1999
Tears of the Black Tiger (Wisit Sasanatieng) – 10, 2000
20 30 40 (Sylvia Chang) – 9, 2004
Beast Stalker (Dante Lam ) – 38, 2008
Run Papa Run (Sylvia Chang) – 55, 2008
Tig (Kristina Goolsby & Ashley York) – 65, 2015
Phantom Thread (Paul Thomas Anderson) – 13, 2017
Let the Sunshine In (Claire Denis) – 17, 2017
Angels Wear White (Vivian Qu) – 21, 2017
Hit the Night (Jeong Gayoung) – 28, 2017
1987: When the Day Comes (Jang Joonhwan) – 33, 2017
Sekigahara (Masato Harada) – 37, 2017
Wrath of Silence (Xin Yukun) – 42, 2017
Lu Over the Wall (Masaaki Yuasa) – 57, 2017
Microhabitat (Jeon Gowoon) – 64, 2017
The Third Murder (Kore-eda Hirokazu) – 67, 2017
The Looming Storm (Dong Yue) – 87, 2017
The Brink (Jonathan Li) – 97, 2017
The Bold, the Corrupt, and the Beautiful (Yang Ya-che) – 120, 2017
Little Fiorest (Yim Soonrye) – 2, 2018
Dead Pigs (Cathy Yan) – 3, 2018
Matangi/Maya/MIA (Steven Loveridge) – 5, 2018
Avengers: Infinity War (Anthony & Joe Russo) – 8, 2018
La cartographe (Nathan Douglas) – 11, 2018
Girls Always Happy (Yang Mingming) – 12, 2018
The Widowed Witch (Cai Chengjie) – 14, 018
Solo (Ron Howard) – 16, 2018
People’s Republic of Desire (Hao Wu) – 18, 2018
Ready Player One (Steven Spielberg) – 19, 2018
Game Night (John Francis Daley & Jonathan Goldstein) – 20, 2018
Freaks and Geeks: the Documentary (Brent Hodge) – 23, 2018
Ocean’s 8 (Gary Ross) – 24, 2018
House of the Rising Sons (Antony Chan) – 25, 2018
The End of Cinema 