Iain Stott

Iain Stott
The One-Line Review

My list, for what it’s worth, upon which I have cheated horribly (the more eagle-eyed amongst you may have noticed that my list includes somewhere between 74 and 89 films, depending upon how you count the various trilogies, etc.) I’ve also included a number of television titles, although, admittedly, most of these were released theatrically in the UK. Some certainly were not, but how could I possibly leave out Mr. Alan Bleasedale?

My list also includes two people who went to my school: Rex Harrison in Unfaithfully Yours (1948) and Nathan Walsh, who was actually in my class, in Distant Voices, Still Lives (1988), which serves as further proof of my evident prejudices on a list that includes far more British titles than could ever possibly be deemed representative of world cinema in general (which is strange as I am one of those that thinks of patriotism as being something akin to racism.)

• Andrei Rublev (1966)
• The Apartment (1960) or
  Sunset Boulevard (1950)
• Au Hasard Balthazar (1966)
• The Bank Dick (1940)
• Barton Fink (1991)
• Berlin Alexanderplatz (1980)
• Bicycle Thieves (1948)
  
• Big Business (1929) or
  Tit for Tat (1935)
• Bigger Than Life (1956)
• A Blonde in Love (1965) or
  The Firemen's Ball (1967)
• Boudu Saved from Drowning (1932) or
  La Regle du Jeu (1939)
• Boys from the Blackstuff (1982) or
  G.B.H. (1991)
• Brief Encounter (1945) or
  Great Expectations (1946)
• A Canterbury Tale (1944) or
  Peeping Tom (1960)
• Un Chant d'Amour (1950)
• Citizen Kane (1941)
• Close-Up (1990) or
  The Koker Trilogy {Where Is My Friend's House? (1987) And Life Goes on... (1991) Through the Olive Trees (1994)} or
  A Taste of Cherry (1997)
• Comrades (1986)
• Days of Heaven (1978)
• Dekalog (1989)
• Distant Voices, Still Lives (1988) or
  The Terence Davies Trilogy (1984) or
  The Long Day Closes (1992)
• Don't Look Now (1973) or
  The Man Who Fell to Earth (1976)
• Dr. Strangelove, Or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964)
• Duck Soup (1933)
• Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004)
• Gallivant (1997)
• Girl Shy (1924)
• Harvie Krumpet (2003)
• Ikiru (1952) or
  I Live in Fear (1955)
• In the Mood for Love (2000)
• Irréversible (2002) and Innocence (2004)
• Krapp's Last Tape (2000) or
  Exotica (1994)
• The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner (1962)
• MASH (1970) or
  The Long Goodbye (1973)
• Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1975) or
  Monty Python's Life of Brian (1979)
• Night and Fog (1955)
• The Noriko Trilogy {Late Spring (1949) Early Summer (1951) Tokyo Story (1953)} or
  The Only Son (1936) or
  An Autumn Afternoon (1962)
• O Lucky Man! (1973) or
  If.... (1968)
• Oh, Mr. Porter! (1937)
• Our Daily Bread (2005)
• Persona (1966) or
  The Virgin Spring (1960) or
  Face to Face (1976)
• Picnic at Hanging Rock (1975)
• Radio On (1980)
• Raging Bull (1980) or
  Taxi Driver (1976)
• Rear Window (1954)
• Rosetta (1999)
• Somersault (2004)
• Stardust Memories (1980) or
  Hannah and Her Sisters (1986)
• A Swedish Love Story (1970)
• Unfaithfully Yours (1948)
• Vive l'Amour (1994)