120 Years of Best Movies

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So, if you have some time to spare mine the IMDb movie database for trends and patterns buried in the gazillions of movie reviews. Then, parse the results for most positive mentions for a movie for each year — since public movies began. Then post the results on Reddit. That’s what monoglot did for us a couple of weeks ago. The results show the best movies by popular consent, not by critical acclaim. But, fascinating nonetheless. My favorite, goes to the vintage year of 1964, the movie: Stanley Kubrick’s, Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb. It’s a classic, very dark comedy, and all the more hysterical because it’s very close to the truth.

From Reddit:

Year Film Top Votes All Votes Rating
1894 Edison Kinetoscopic Record of a Sneeze 181 824 6.1
1895 Employees Leaving the Lumière Factory 449 2809 6.9
1896 Arrival of a Train at La Ciotat 735 3676 7.3
1897 Leaving Jerusalem by Railway 53 334 6.6
1898 Four Heads Are Better Than One 326 1254 7.7
1899 The Kiss in the Tunnel 51 505 5.9
1900 The One-Man Band 82 1021 7.1
1901 The India Rubber Head 91 1133 7.2
1902 A Trip to the Moon 7563 17189 8.2
1903 The Great Train Robbery 1403 7795 7.4
1904 An Impossible Voyage 388 1615 7.7
1905 Le diable noir 163 1016 7.2
1906 Dream of a Rarebit Fiend 93 931 6.8
1907 Ben Hur 101 336 5.7
1908 Fantasmagorie 102 1015 7.0
1909 The Devilish Tenant 159 661 7.5
1910 Frankenstein 144 1805 6.6
1911 Winsor McCay, the Famous Cartoonist of the N.Y. Herald and His Moving Comics 155 860 7.3
1912 The Revenge of a Kinematograph Cameraman 400 1332 7.9
1913 Fantomas 111 1110 6.8
1914 Tillie’s Punctured Romance 892 2230 7.4
1915 The Birth of a Nation 4121 13736 6.9
1916 Intolerance 3280 8632 8.1
1917 The Immigrant 966 3715 7.8
1918 A Dog’s Life 860 3307 7.8
1919 Broken Blossoms 2089 5804 7.7
1920 The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari 13131 28545 8.1
1921 The Kid 18501 40219 8.4
1922 Nosferatu 21126 55596 8.0
1923 Safety Last! 4569 9933 8.3
1924 Sherlock Jr. 7707 16754 8.3
1925 The Gold Rush 20720 45044 8.3
1926 The General 17175 37337 8.3
1927 Metropolis 37077 80602 8.4
1928 The Passion of Joan of Arc 9826 19651 8.3
1929 Un chien andalou 9507 25019 7.9
1930 All Quiet on the Western Front 18611 40458 8.1
1931 City Lights 38960 69572 8.7
1932 Freaks 7740 25801 8.0
1933 King Kong 21296 56042 8.0
1934 It Happened One Night 21284 46270 8.3
1935 Bride of Frankenstein 9697 25518 7.9
1936 Modern Times 50487 90156 8.6
1937 Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs 25843 92297 7.7
1938 Bringing Up Baby 14224 37432 8.1
1939 The Wizard of Oz 79226 208490 8.2
1940 The Great Dictator 40192 87374 8.5
1941 Citizen Kane 127586 227833 8.5
1942 Casablanca 165578 295675 8.6
1943 Shadow of a Doubt 10359 36995 8.0
1944 Double Indemnity 32626 70925 8.5
1945 Brief Encounter 9876 21469 8.1
1946 It’s a Wonderful Life 114199 196894 8.7
1947 Miracle on 34th Street 9205 24223 7.9
1948 Bicycle Thieves 29153 63377 8.4
1949 The Third Man 39394 85640 8.4
1950 Sunset Blvd. 54848 101571 8.6
1951 A Streetcar Named Desire 29419 63954 8.1
1952 Singin’ in the Rain 58094 107582 8.4
1953 Roman Holiday 31896 69340 8.1
1954 Seven Samurai 113482 171942 8.8
1955 The Night of the Hunter 21862 47527 8.1
1956 The Searchers 19109 50286 8.0
1957 12 Angry Men 192641 291880 8.9
1958 Vertigo 80687 175406 8.5
1959 North by Northwest 76067 165364 8.5
1960 Psycho 135723 295051 8.6
1961 Breakfast at Tiffany’s 25338 90494 7.8
1962 Lawrence of Arabia 75643 140080 8.4
1963 The Great Escape 54982 119526 8.3
1964 Dr. Strangelove 146779 262105 8.6
1965 For a Few Dollars More 45628 103701 8.4
1966 The Good, the Bad and the Ugly 233024 353066 9.0
1967 The Graduate 61087 160755 8.1
1968 2001: A Space Odyssey 164849 294374 8.3
1969 Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid 39801 110558 8.2
1970 Patton 29139 63345 8.1
1971 A Clockwork Orange 208014 385212 8.4
1972 The Godfather 604775 817264 9.2
1973 The Exorcist 87140 229317 8.0
1974 The Godfather: Part II 355223 538216 9.1
1975 One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest 313325 489570 8.8
1976 Taxi Driver 160636 349209 8.4
1977 Star Wars 364912 629158 8.7
1978 The Deer Hunter 79985 173881 8.2
1979 Alien 179377 389950 8.5
1980 The Empire Strikes Back 325241 560760 8.8
1981 Raiders of the Lost Ark 217026 471795 8.6
1982 Blade Runner 160519 348955 8.3
1983 Return of the Jedi 203856 443166 8.4
1984 The Terminator 148056 411266 8.1
1985 Back to the Future 218885 475838 8.5
1986 Aliens 162067 352320 8.5
1987 Full Metal Jacket 126512 332925 8.4
1988 Die Hard 154758 429882 8.3
1989 Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade 159712 362981 8.3
1990 Goodfellas 327955 512429 8.8
1991 The Silence of the Lambs 313522 580596 8.6
1992 Reservoir Dogs 208201 452611 8.4
1993 Schindler’s List 345845 596284 8.9
1994 The Shawshank Redemption 870630 1176527 9.3
1995 Se7en 371390 687759 8.7
1996 Trainspotting 130009 342128 8.2
1997 Titanic 213075 560724 7.7
1998 Saving Private Ryan 322571 597354 8.6
1999 Fight Club 519243 895246 8.9
2000 Memento 325477 602735 8.6
2001 The Fellowship of the Ring 572464 867369 8.9
2002 The Two Towers 438736 756441 8.8
2003 The Return of the King 554928 840800 8.9
2004 Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind 217921 473742 8.4
2005 Batman Begins 302015 656554 8.3
2006 The Departed 321600 595555 8.5
2007 No Country for Old Men 198718 431995 8.2
2008 The Dark Knight 753903 1142277 9.0
2009 Inglourious Basterds 256945 558576 8.3
2010 Inception 618118 936543 8.8
2011 Intouchables 181019 282842 8.6
2012 The Dark Knight Rises 437472 754262 8.6
2013 Gravity 151512 329373 8.2
2014 The Lego Movie 25934 48025 8.4

Read the entire post here.

Image: Slim Pickens as Major T.J. “King” Kong riding a nuclear bomb to oblivion, from the movie Dr.Strangelove. Courtesy of Wikipedia.

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