All Time – Scene by Green

The 50 Best Film Composers of All Time

1. John Williams

Top 5 film Scores

Film	Director	Year
1. Star Wars	George Lucas	1976
2. Jaws	Steven Spielberg	1975
3. The Empire Strikes Back	Irvin Kershner	1980
4. Raiders of the Lost Ark	Steven Spielberg	1981
5. Jurassic Park	Steven Spielberg	1993

Star Wars (1977). John Williams’ position at the top is unassailable with a top 5 like that, and an astounding depth to his resume. His use of leitmotifs is unparalleled, attaching symphonic musical ideas to characters and settings that many people who have not even seen these films can hum off the top off their head.

2. Ennio Morricone

Top 5 film Scores

Film	Director	Year
1. The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly	Sergio Leone	1966
2. Days of Heaven	Terrence Malick	1978
3. Once Upon a Time in the West	Sergio Leone	1968
4. Once Upon a Time in America	Sergio Leone	1984
5. A Fistful of Dollars	Sergio Leone	1964

The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly (1966). Morricone is rightfully known for his Spaghetti Western scores more than anything else with bells, whistling, and cracking whips, but it is his blend of unconventional instruments with memorable melodies across his entire career which brought the avant-garde into the mainstream.

3. Bernard Hermann

Top 5 film Scores

Film	Director	Year
1. Psycho	Alfred Hitchcock	1960
2. Vertigo	Alfred Hitchcock	1958
3. Taxi Driver	Martin Scorsese	1976
4. Citizen Kane	Orson Welles	1941
5. North by Northwest	Alfred Hitchcock	1959

Psycho (1960). Hermann pushed orchestral scoring forward with his dissonant harmonies, syncopated rhythms, and complex orchestral textures, often working in the realm of genre films to underscore their tension and unease.

4. Max Steiner

Top 5 film Scores

Film	Director	Year
1. Gone with the Wind	Victor Fleming	1939
2. Casablanca	Michael Curtiz	1942
3. King Kong	Merian C. Cooper, Ernest B. Schoedsack	1933
4. The Searchers	John Ford	1956
5. The Treasure of the Sierra Madre	John Huston	1948

Gone with the Wind (1939). Known as the Father of Film Music for good reason, Steiner was a pioneer in his field when sound cinema entered the mainstream, using sweeping strings sections, brass flourishes, and powerful musical themes to accompany the development of characters.

5. Nino Rota

Top 5 film Scores

Film	Director	Year
1. The Godfather	Francis Ford Coppola	1972
2. The Godfather Part II	Francis Ford Coppola	1974
3. 8 1/2	Federico Fellini	1963
4. The Leopard	Luchino Visconti	1963
5. La Dolce Vita	Federico Fellini	1960

The Godfather (1972). Rota combined classical, folk, and jazz influences into his deeply evocative scores, whether he was heightening the sinister intensity of The Godfather series or the melancholic whimsy of Fellini’s dreamscapes.

6. Hans Zimmer

Top 5 film Scores

Film	Director	Year
1. Inception	Christopher Nolan	2010
2. Dunkirk	Christopher Nolan	2017
3. The Thin Red Line	Terrence Malick	1998
4. Dune: Part One and Two	Denis Villeneuve	2021, 2024
5. The Dark Knight	Christopher Nolan	2008

Inception (2010). Zimmer revolutionised contemporary film music with his blend of traditional orchestration and electronic instruments, creating immersive atmospheres that often build to epic, cinematic crescendoes.

7. Howard Shore

Top 5 film Scores

Film	Director	Year
1. The Lord of the Rings	Peter Jackson	2001-03
2. The Fly	David Cronenberg	1986
3. Dead Ringers	David Cronenberg	1988
4. Se7en	David Fincher	1995
5. The Silence of the Lambs	Jonathan Demme	1991

The Lord of the Rings (2001-03). Shore is a talented a composer with an astounding depth to his resume, but he is largely buoyed to this lofty position by The Lord of the Rings, where his wide array of distinctive instrumentations, textures, and melodies contribute enormously to its majestic world building.

8. Michel Legrand

Top 5 film Scores

Film	Director	Year
1. The Umbrellas of Cherbourg	Jacques Demy	1964
2. The Young Girls of Rochefort	Jacques Demy	1967
3. Lola	Jacques Demy	1961
4. A Woman is a Woman	Jean-Luc Godard	1961
5. Vivre sa Vie	Jean-Luc Godard	1962

The Umbrellas of Cherbourg (1964). Legrand was the composer of choice for two of the French New Wave’s greatest auteurs, marked by lush orchestrations that resonate with romantic nostalgia and swell to grand emotional peaks.

9. Elmer Bernstein

Top 5 film Scores

Film	Director	Year
1. Sweet Smell of Success	Alexander Mackendrick	1957
2. The Man With the Golden Arm	Otto Preminger	1955
3. Hud	Martin Ritt	1963
4. Far From Heaven	Todd Haynes	2002
5. The Age of Innocence	Martin Scorsese	1993

Sweet Smell of Success (1957). Bernstein’s versatility saw him span melodramas, westerns, noirs, and romances, though it was his big band jazz scores which stand out for their brassy boldness, matching the chaotic instability of his characters’ lives.

10. Alexandre Desplat

Top 5 film Scores

Film	Director	Year
1. The Grand Budapest Hotel	Wes Anderson	2014
2. The Shape of Water	Guillermo del Toro	2018
3. The Tree of Life	Terrence Malick	2011
4. Fantastic Mr. Fox	Wes Anderson	2009
5. The Ghost Writer	Roman Polanski	2010

The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014). Desplat’s scores bring a lyrical elegance to films directed by some of our greatest modern auteurs, frequently incorporating exotic flavours from around the world into his instrumentations, rhythms, and melodies.

Composer	Top 3 Film Scores
11. Danny Elfman	1. The Nightmare Before Christmas (1993) 2. Batman (1989) 3. Sleepy Hollow (1999)
12. Jonny Greenwood	1. There Will Be Blood (2007) 2. The Master (2012) 3. Phantom Thread (2017)
13. Maurice Jarre	1. Lawrence of Arabia (1962) 2. Doctor Zhivago (1965) 3. The Damned (1969)
14. Miklós Rózsa	1. Ben-Hur (1959) 2. The Lost Weekend (1945) 3. Double Indemnity (1944)
15. Michael Nyman	1. The Piano (1993) 2. The Cook, The Thief, His Wife & Her Lover (1989) 3. A Zed and Two Noughts (1985)
16. Carter Burwell	1. Fargo (1996) 2. Raising Arizona (1987) 3. Being John Malkovich (1999)
17. Clint Mansell	1. Requiem for a Dream (2000) 2. The Fountain (2006) 3. Black Swan (2010)
18. Thomas Newman	1. American Beauty (1999) 2. WALL-E (2008) 3. The Shawshank Redemption (1994)
19. James Horner	1. Titanic (1997) 2. The New World (2005) 3. Avatar (2009)
20. Georges Delerue	1. The Conformist (1970) 2. Contempt (1963) 3. Shoot the Piano Player (1960)
21. Franz Waxman	1. Sunset Boulevard (1950) 2. The Bride of Frankenstein (1935) 3. Rebecca (1940)
22. Zbigniew Preisner	1. Three Colours: Blue (1993) 2. The Double Life of Veronique (1991) 3. Dekalog (1989)
23. Jerry Goldsmith	1. Chinatown (1974) 2. Alien (1979) 3. L.A. Confidential (1997)
24. Dimitri Tiomkin	1. It’s a Wonderful Life (1946) 2. Rio Bravo (1959) 3. Red River (1948)
25. Jon Brion	1. Punch-Drunk Love (2002) 2. Synecdoche, New York (2008) 3. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004)
26. Brian Easdale	1. The Red Shoes (1948) 2. Peeping Tom (1960) 3. Black Narcissus (1947)
27. Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross	1. The Social Network (2010) 2. Gone Girl (2014) 3. Mank (2020)
28. Fumio Hayasaka	1. Seven Samurai (1954) 2. Rashomon (1950) 3. Ikiru (1952)
29. Philip Glass	1. Mishima: A Life in Four Chapters (1985) 2. Koyaanisqatsi (1982) 3. The Truman Show (1998)
30. Tan Dun	1. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (2000) 2. Hero (2002)
31. Vangelis	1. Blade Runner (1982) 2. Chariots of Fire (1981)
32. Alfred Newman	1. How Green Was My Valley (1941) 2. Wuthering Heights (1939) 3. Leave Her to Heaven (1945)
33. Jack Nitzsche	1. One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest (1975) 2. Performance (1970) 3. The Exorcist (1973)
34. Joe Hisaishi	1. Spirited Away (2001) 2. Princess Mononoke (1997) 3. My Neighbour Totoro (1988)
35. Angelo Badalamenti	1. Mulholland Drive (2001) 2. Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me (1992) 3. Blue Velvet (1986)
36. Alex North	1. A Streetcar Named Desire (1951) 2. Spartacus (1960) 3. Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (1966)
37. Masaru Sato	1. The Bad Sleep Well (1960) 2. Yojimbo (1961) 3. High and Low (1963)
38. Leigh Harline	1. Pinocchio (1940) 2. Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1935) 3. Man of the West (1958)
39. Popol Vuh	1. Aguirre, Wrath of God (1972) 2. Nosferatu the Vampyre (1979) 3. Fitzcarraldo (1982)
40. Goblin	1. Suspiria (1977) 2. Deep Red (1975) 3. Tenebrae (1982)
41. John Barry	1. Out of Africa (1985) 2. Dances with Wolves (1990) 3. Goldfinger (1964)
42. Cliff Martinez	1. Only God Forgives (2013) 2. Drive (2011) 3. The Neon Demon (2016)
43. Henry Mancini	1. Touch of Evil (1958) 2. Charade (1963) 3. Breakfast at Tiffany’s (1961)
44. Frank Skinner	1. Imitation of Life (1959) 2. Written on the Wind (1956) 3. Magnificent Obsession (1954)
45. Alberto Iglesias	1. The Skin I Live In (2011) 2. Talk to Her (2002) 3. Broken Embraces (2009)
46. Roy Webb	1. Cat People (1942) 2. Track of the Cat (1954) 3. Notorious (1946)
47. Pino Donaggio	1. Carrie (1976) 2. The Untouchables (1987) 3. Dressed to Kill (1980)
48. Alan Silvestri	1. Back to the Future (1985) 2. Forrest Gump (1994) 3. Who Framed Roger Rabbit? (1988)
49. Victor Young	1. The Quiet Man (1952) 2. Shane (1953) 3. Johnny Guitar (1954)
50. Nick Cave & Warren Ellis	1. The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford (2007) 2. Blonde (2022) 3. The Road (2009)

The 100 Best Film Scores of All Time

Films from the last 10 years have not been included on this list, and will be eligible in future updates when the moratorium has passed.

Film	Composer	Year
1. Star Wars	John Williams	1977
2. Psycho	Bernard Hermann	1960
3. The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly	Ennio Morricone	1966
4. Lawrence of Arabia	Maurice Jarre	1962
5. The Lord of the Rings	Howard Shore	2001-03
6. Jaws	John Williams	1975
7. Gone With the Wind	Max Steiner	1939
8. The Godfather	Nino Rota	1972
9. Vertigo	Bernard Hermann	1958
10. The Empire Strikes Back	John Williams	1980
11. Taxi Driver	Bernard Hermann	1976
12. Days of Heaven	Ennio Morricone	1978
13. Raiders of the Lost Ark	John Williams	1981
14. Once Upon a Time in the West	Ennio Morricone	1968
15. There Will Be Blood	Jonny Greenwood	2007
16. Jurassic Park	John Williams	1993
17. Casablanca	Max Steiner	1942
18. The Umbrellas of Cherbourg	Michel Legrand	1964
19. Requiem for a Dream	Clint Mansell	2000
20. Sweet Smell of Success	Elmer Bernstein	1957
21. Citizen Kane	Bernard Hermann	1941
22. Once Upon a Time in America	Ennio Morricone	1984
23. E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial	John Williams	1982
24. Dead Man	Neil Young	1995
25. Elevator to the Gallows	Miles Davis	1958
26. Suspiria	Goblin, Dario Argento	1977
27. The Wizard of Oz	Harold Arlen	1939
28. The Third Man	Anton Karas	1949
29. The Red Shoes	Brian Easedale	1948
30. Inception	Hans Zimmer	2010
31. King Kong	Max Steiner	1933
32. Blade Runner	Vangelis	1982
33. The Thin Red Line	Hans Zimmer	1998
34. The Man With the Golden Arm	Elmer Bernstein	1955
35. The Piano	Michael Nyman	1993
36. Pinocchio	Leigh Harline, Paul J. Smith	1940
37. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon	Tan Dun	2000
38. The Social Network	Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross	2010
39. The Young Girls of Rochefort	Michel Legrand	1967
40. Mishima: A Life in Four Chapters	Philip Glass	1985
41. Punch-Drunk Love	Jon Brion	2002
42. The Searchers	Max Steiner	1956
43. The Nightmare Before Christmas	Danny Elfman	1993
44. The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford	Nick Cave, Warren Ellis	2007
45. The Cook, The Thief, His Wife & Her Lover	Michael Nyman	1989
46. Mad Max: Fury Road	Junkie XL	2015
47. North by Northwest	Bernard Hermann	1959
48. Saving Private Ryan	John Williams	1998
49. Titanic	James Horner	1997
50. Batman	Danny Elfman	1989
51. The Master	Jonny Greenwood	2012
52. Breathless	Martial Solal	1960
53. Ben-Hur	Miklós Rózsa	1959
54. Thief	Tangerine Dreams	1981
55. Three Colours: Blue	Zbigniew Preisner	1993
56. The Grand Budapest Hotel	Alexandre Desplat	2014
57. Touch of Evil	Henry Mancini	1958
58. The Godfather Part II	Nino Rota	1974
59. Unforgiven	Lennie Niehaus	1992
60. Anatomy of a Murder	Duke Ellington	1959
61. Pyaasa	S.D. Burman	1957
62. 8 1/2	Nino Rota	1963
63. Aguirre, Wrath of God	Popol Vuh	1972
64. The Dark Knight	Hans Zimmer, James Newton Howard	2008
65. The Lost Weekend	Miklós Rózsa	1945
66. Schindler’s List	John Williams	1993
67. The New World	James Horner	2005
68. Halloween	John Carpenter	1978
69. Doctor Zhivago	Maurice Jarre	1965
70. A Zed and Two Noughts	Michael Nyman	1985
71. Brokeback Mountain	Gustavo Santaolalla	2005
72. The Treasure of the Sierra Madre	Max Steiner	1948
73. Hero	Tan Dun	2002
74. One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest	Jack Nitzsche	1975
75. On the Waterfront	Leonard Bernstein	1954
76. Atonement	Dario Marianelli	2007
77. The Fountain	Clint Mansell	2006
78. The Fly	Howard Shore	1986
79. A Streetcar Named Desire	Alex North	1951
80. Fargo	Carter Burwell	1996
81. A Fistful of Dollars	Ennio Morricone	1964
82. Interstellar	Hans Zimmer	2014
83. Naked	Andrew Dickson	1993
84. Spirited Away	Joe Hisaishi	2001
85. In Cold Blood	Quincy Jones	1967
86. For a Few Dollars More	Ennio Morricone	1964
87. Chinatown	Jerry Goldsmith	1974
88. Pan’s Labyrinth	Javier Navarrete	2006
89. Chariots of Fire	Vangelis	1981
90. American Beauty	Thomas Newman	1999
91. Seven Samurai	Fumio Hayasaka	1954
92. Back to the Future	Alan Silvestri	1985
93. Bob le Flambeur	Eddie Barclay, Jo Boyer	1956
94. The Bad Sleep Well	Masaru Sato	1960
95. One From the Heart	Tom Waits	1981
96. WALL-E	Thomas Newman	2008
97. Mulholland Drive	Angelo Badalamenti	2001
98. Sunset Boulevard	Franz Waxman	1950
99. White Heat	Max Steiner	1949
100. Double Indemnity	Miklós Rózsa	1944

Ennio Morricone’s lush orchestrations elevate the dreamy atmosphere of Days of Heaven (1978).

The 50 Best Cinematographers of All Time

1. Sven Nykvist

Top 5 Cinematographic Works

Film	Director	Year
1. Persona	Ingmar Bergman	1966
2. Cries and Whispers	Ingmar Bergman	1972
3. Fanny and Alexander	Ingmar Bergman	1982
4. The Sacrifice	Andrei Tarkovsky	1986
5. Autumn Sonata	Ingmar Bergman	1978

**Persona (1966).** Nykvist’s portfolio is largely dominated by his collaborations with Ingmar Bergman, blocking and framing human faces like expressively detailed landscapes, and yet his pairings with Andrei Tarkovsky and Roman Polanski also prove his incredible versatility.

2. Emmanuel Lubezki

Top 5 Cinematographic Works

Film	Director	Year
1. The Tree of Life	Terrence Malick	2011
2. Children of Men	Alfonso Cuarón	2006
3. The Revenant	Alejandro Iñárritu	2015
4. The New World	Terrence Malick	2005
5. Birdman	Alejandro Iñárritu	2014

**The Tree of Life (2011).** A Lubezki film is immediately recognised by the floating camerawork and wide-angle lenses, but his talent for shooting in natural light shouldn’t go unnoted either, seeing him take lessons learned from Terrence Malick into his collaborations with Alejandro Iñárritu.

3. Gordon Willis

Top 5 Cinematographic Works

Film	Director	Year
1. The Godfather Part II	Francis Ford Coppola	1974
2. The Godfather	Francis Ford Coppola	1972
3. Manhattan	Woody Allen	1979
4. The Parallax View	Alan J. Pakula	1974
5. Stardust Memories	Woody Allen	1980

**The Godfather Part II (1974).** The Prince of Darkness is one of the few cinematographers who can fairly lay claim to the title of auteur, consistently shooting in low-key lighting setups whether he is capturing the malevolent heart of Michael Corleone, the paranoia of Alan J. Pakula’s political thrillers, or Woody Allen’s comedy-dramas.

4. Sacha Vierny

Top 5 Cinematographic Works

Film	Director	Year
1. The Cook, The Thief, His Wife & Her Lover	Peter Greenaway	1989
2. Last Year at Marienbad	Alain Resnais	1961
3. A Zed & Two Noughts	Peter Greenaway	1985
4. Hiroshima Mon Amour	Alain Resnais	1959
5. Mon Oncle d’Amerique	Alain Resnais	1980

**The Cook, The Thief, His Wife & Her Lover (1989).** Vierny peaked twice – first in his mid-century collaborations with Alain Resnais’s black-and-white dreamscapes, and later in the 80s with Peter Greenaway’s vibrantly theatrical allegories. Across both eras though he held onto that unyielding, rolling camera, often tracking in straight lines through magnificently designed set pieces.

5. Vittorio Storaro

Top 5 Cinematographic Works

Film	Director	Year
1. The Conformist	Bernardo Bertolucci	1970
2. Apocalypse Now	Francis Ford Coppola	1979
3. 1900	Bernardo Bertolucci	1976
4. The Last Emperor	Bernardo Bertolucci	1987
5. Reds	Warren Beatty	1981

**Apocalypse Now (1979).** Storaro never flinched at the prospect of shooting historical epics, capturing sprawling scenes brimming with extras in long shots while bringing a more psychological, intimate expressionism to smaller-scale character drama.

6. Asakazu Nakai

Top 5 Cinematographic Works

Film	Director	Year
1. Seven Samurai	Akira Kurosawa	1954
2. The End of Summer	Yasujirō Ozu	1961
3. High and Low	Akira Kurosawa	1963
4. Ikiru	Akira Kurosawa	1952
5. Ran	Akira Kurosawa	1985

**Seven Samurai (1954).** Nakai worked with the two greatest Japanese directors of all time, nailing both the kinetic grace of Akira Kurosawa and the perfectionistic stillness of Yasujirō Ozu, while offering his talent for shooting in deep focus to both.

7. Christopher Doyle

Top 5 Cinematographic Works

Film	Director	Year
1. In the Mood for Love	Wong Kar-wai	2000
2. Hero	Yimou Zhang	2002
3. Chungking Express	Wong Kar-wai	1994
4. 2046	Wong Kar-wai	2004
5. Days of Being Wild	Wong Kar-wai	1990

**In the Mood for Love (2000).** Despite growing up in Australia, Doyle has primarily worked in Chinese and Hong Kong cinema, carrying his keen eye for colours, patterns, and lighting across highly stylised epics and romances.

8. Giuseppe Rotunno

Top 5 Cinematographic Works

Film	Director	Year
1. The Leopard	Luchino Visconti	1963
2. Fellini Satyricon	Federico Fellini	1969
3. Rocco and His Brothers	Luchino Visconti	1960
4. The Adventures of Baron Munchausen	Terry Gilliam	1988
5. Amarcord	Federico Fellini	1973

**The Leopard (1963).** Between the painterly films of Luchino Visconti and the chaotic surrealism of Federico Fellini, Rotunno mastered the art of capturing vibrant historical periods, from an anachronistic Ancient Rome to mid-19th century Sicily.

9. Roger Deakins

Top 5 Cinematographic Works

Film	Director	Year
1. The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford	Andrew Dominik	2007
2. Blade Runner 2049	Denis Villeneuve	2017
3. 1917	Sam Mendes	2019
4. Fargo	The Coen Brothers	1996
5. Skyfall	Sam Mendes	2012

**The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford (2007).** Deakins brings the same dedication to atmospheric lighting setups whether he is filming the Old West, a futuristic dystopia, or a James Bond film, paying keen attention to the composition and contrast of shadows.

10. John Alcott

Top 5 Cinematographic Works

Film	Director	Year
1. Barry Lyndon	Stanley Kubrick	1975
2. The Shining	Stanley Kubrick	1980
3. A Clockwork Orange	Stanley Kubrick	1971
4. 2001: A Space Odyssey (Dawn of Man sequence)	Stanley Kubrick	1968
5. No Way Out	Roger Donaldson	1987

**Barry Lyndon (1975).** The strength of Alcott’s collaborations with Stanley Kubrick carries his legacy. These are some of the most jaw-droppingly beautiful films of all time, accomplishing an aesthetic precision and rigour unrivalled in cinema history.

Cinematographer	Top 3 Cinematographic Works
11. Gregg Toland	1. Citizen Kane (1941) 2. The Best Years of Our Lives (1946) 3. The Grapes of Wrath (1940)
12. Sławomir Idziak	1. Three Colours: Blue (1993) 2. A Short Film About Killing (1988) 3. The Double Life of Veronique (1991)
13. Vilmos Zsigmond	1. Heaven’s Gate (1980) 2. Blow Out (1981) 3. McCabe & Mrs Miller (1971)
14. Yūharu Atsuta	1. Tokyo Story (1953) 2. Early Summer (1951) 3. Late Spring (1949)
15. Robert Richardson	1. Kill Bill (2003-04) 2. Once Upon a Time in Hollywood (2019) 3. The Aviator (2004)
16. Robert Burks	1. Vertigo (1958) 2. Rear Window (1954) 3. North by Northwest (1959)
17. Raoul Coutard	1. Pierrot le Fou (1965) 2. Contempt (1963) 3. Alphaville (1965)
18. Russell Metty	1. Touch of Evil (1958) 2. All That Heaven Allows (1955) 3. Written on the Wind (1956)
19. Robert Yeoman	1. The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014) 2. The Royal Tenenbaums (2001) 3. Moonrise Kingdom (2012)
20. Michael Chapman	1. Raging Bull (1980) 2. Taxi Driver (1976) 3. Hardcore (1979)
21. Gianni Di Venanzo	1. 8 1/2 (1963) 2. Juliet of the Spirits (1965) 3. L’Eclisse (1962)
22. Christian Matras	1. Lola Montès (1955) 2. Grand Illusion (1937) 3. The Earrings of Madame de… (1953)
23. Tonino Delli Colli	1. Once Upon a Time in the West (1968) 2. The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly (1966) 3. Once Upon a Time in America (1984)
24. Sergey Urusevsky	1. I Am Cuba (1964) 2. The Cranes Are Flying (1957) 3. Letter Never Sent (1960)
25. Freddie Young	1. Lawrence of Arabia (1962) 2. Doctor Zhivago (1965) 3. 49th Parallel (1941)
26. Robert Elswit	1. Punch-Drunk Love (2002) 2. Ripley (2024) 3. There Will Be Blood (2007)
27. Kazuo Miyagawa	1. Rashomon (1950) 2. Yojimbo (1961) 3. Sansho the Bailiff (1954)
28. Winton C. Hoch	1. The Searchers (1956) 2. The Quiet Man (1952) 3. She Wore a Yellow Ribbon (1949)
29. Rudolph Maté	1. The Passion of Joan of Arc (1928) 2. Vampyr (1932) 3. The Lady From Shanghai (1947)
30. Jack Cardiff	1. The Red Shoes (1948) 2. Black Narcissus (1947) 3. A Matter of Life and Death (1946)
31. Otello Martelli	1. La Dolce Vita (1960) 2. La Strada (1954) 3. I Vitelloni (1953)
32. Gunnar Fischer	1. The Seventh Seal (1957) 2. Wild Strawberries (1957) 3. Smiles of a Summer Night (1955)
33. Bruno Delbonnel	1. Amelie (2001) 2. The Tragedy of Macbeth (2021) 3. Inside Llewyn Davis (2013)
34. Robby Müller	1. Dead Man (1995) 2. Breaking the Waves (1996) 3. Dancer in the Dark (2000)
35. Michael Ballhaus	1. Goodfellas (1990) 2. The Age of Innocence (1993) 3. Gangs of New York (2002)
36. Janusz Kamiński	1. Schindler’s List (1993) 2. Saving Private Ryan (1998) 3. Lincoln (2012)
37. Lee Garmes	1. Gone with the Wind (1939) 2. Scarface (1932) 3. Morocco (1930)
38. Luciano Tovoli	1. Suspiria (1977) 2. The Passenger (1975) 3. Tenebrae (1982)
39. Henri Decaë	1. The 400 Blows (1959) 2. Le Samouraï (1967) 3. Elevator to the Gallows (1958)
40. Carlo di Palma	1. Red Desert (1964) 2. Blow-Up (1966) 3. Hannah and Her Sisters (1986)
41. Eduard Tisse	1. Battleship Potemkin (1925) 2. Ivan the Terrible (1944-46) 3. Strike (1925)
42. Rodrigo Prieto	1. Amores Perros (2000) 2. The Irishman (2019) 3. Broken Embraces (2009)
43. Peter Suschitzky	1. The Empire Strikes Back (1980) 2. Dead Ringers (1988) 3. Tale of Tales (2015)
44. Geoffrey Unsworth	1. 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) 2. Cabaret (1972) 3. Murder on the Orient Express (1974)
45. Charles Lang	1. The Big Heat (1953) 2. Charade (1963) 3. Ace in the Hole (1951)
46. Robert Krasker	1. The Third Man (1949) 2. Senso (1954) 3. Brief Encounter (1945)
47. Darius Khondji	1. Seven (1995) 2. Bardo, False Chronicle of a Handful of Truths (2022) 3. Delicatessen (1991)
48. Néstor Almendros	1. Days of Heaven (1978) 2. Two English Girls (1971) 3. My Little Loves (1974)
49. Mark Lee Ping-Bing	1. In the Mood for Love (2000) 2. Flowers of Shanghai (1998) 3. The Assassin (2015)
50. Hoyte van Hoytema	1. Dunkirk (2017) 2. Ad Astra (2019) 3. Oppenheimer (2023)

The 100 Best Shot Films of All Time

Films from the last 10 years have not been included on this list, and will be eligible in future updates when the moratorium has passed.

Film	Cinematographer	Year
1. 2001: A Space Odyssey	Geoffrey Unsworth, John Alcott	1968
2. Barry Lyndon	John Alcott	1975
3. Lawrence of Arabia	Freddie Young	1962
4. Days of Heaven	Néstor Almendros, Haskell Wexler	1978
5. Tokyo Story	Yūharu Atsuta	1953
6. Citizen Kane	Gregg Toland	1941
7. The Tree of Life	Emmanuel Lubezki	2011
8. The Cook, The Thief, His Wife & Her Lover	Sacha Vierny	1989
9. The Searchers	Winton C. Hoch	1956
10. Sunrise	Charles Rosher, Karl Struss	1927
11. Blade Runner	Jordan Cronenweth	1982
12. Last Year at Marienbad	Sacha Vierny	1961
13. In the Mood for Love	Christopher Doyle, Mark Lee Ping-Bing	2000
14. Raging Bull	Michael Chapman	1980
15. The Leopard	Giuseppe Rotunno	1963
16. The Conformist	Vittorio Storaro	1970
17. Stalker	Alexander Knyazhinsky, Leonid Kalashnikov, Georgy Rerberg	1979
18. Apocalypse Now	Vittorio Storaro	1979
19. Persona	Sven Nykvist	1966
20. Nostalghia	Giuseppe Lanci	1983
21. I Am Cuba	Sergey Urusevsky	1964
22. Cries and Whispers	Sven Nykvist	1972
23. The Passion of Joan of Arc	Rudolph Maté	1928
24. Fanny and Alexander	Sven Nykvist	1982
25. Suspiria	Luciano Tovoli	1977
26. Children of Men	Emmanuel Lubezki	2006
27. Heaven’s Gate	Vilmos Zsigmond	1980
28. Vertigo	Robert Burks	1958
29. Hero	Christopher Doyle	2002
30. Seven Samurai	Asakazu Nakai	1954
31. 8 1/2	Gianni Di Venanzo	1963
32. The Third Man	Robert Krasker	1949
33. The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari	Willy Hameister	1920
34. Rashomon	Kazuo Miyagawa	1950
35. The Revenant	Emmanuel Lubezki	2015
36. Touch of Evil	Russell Metty	1958
37. The Umbrellas of Cherbourg	Jean Rabier	1964
38. The Thin Red Line	John Toll	1998
39. The End of Summer	Asakazu Nakai	1961
40. La Dolce Vita	Otello Martelli	1960
41. Three Colours: Blue	Sławomir Idziak	1993
42. A Short Film About Killing	Sławomir Idziak	1988
43. Taxi Driver	Michael Chapman	1976
44. The Godfather Part II	Gordon Willis	1974
45. The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford	Roger Deakins	2007
46. High and Low	Asakazu Nakai, Takao Saito	1963
47. Red Desert	Carlo di Palma	1964
48. The Godfather	Gordon Willis	1972
49. Metropolis	Karl Freund, Günther Rittau	1927
50. Lola Montès	Christian Matras	1955
51. The New World	Emmanuel Lubezki	2005
52. Ikiru	Asakazu Nakai	1952
53. The Turin Horse	Fred Kelemen	2011
54. Once Upon a Time in the West	Tonino Delli Colli	1968
55. Sátántangó	Gábor Medvigy	1994
56. Playtime	Jean Badal, Andréas Winding	1967
57. Songs from the Second Floor	István Borbás, Jesper Klevenas, Robert Komarek	2000
58. The Shining	John Alcott	1980
59. Early Summer	Yūharu Atsuta	1951
60. The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly	Tonino Delli Colli	1966
61. Gone with the Wind	Ernest Haller, Lee Garmes	1939
62. Napoleon	Jules Kruger	1927
63. Chungking Express	Christopher Doyle, Andrew Lau	1994
64. The Red Shoes	Jack Cardiff	1948
65. Werckmeister Harmonies	Milós Gurbán, Erwin Lanzensberger, Gábor Medvigy, Emil Novák, Patrick de Ranter, Rob Tregenza, Jörg Widmer	2000
66. The Rules of the Game	Jean Bachelet	1939
67. L’Avventura	Aldo Scavarda	1960
68. Bicycle Thieves	Carlo Montuori	1948
69. Goodfellas	Michael Ballhaus	1990
70. Birdman	Emmanuel Lubezki	2014
71. 2046	Christopher Doyle, Lai Yiu-fai, Kwan Pun-leung	2004
72. A Zed and Two Noughts	Sacha Vierny	1985
73. The Trial	Edmond Richard	1962
74. The Double Life of Veronique	Sławomir Idziak	1991
75. The Magnificent Ambersons	Stanley Cortez	1942
76. The Grand Budapest Hotel	Robert Yeoman	2014
77. The Sacrifice	Sven Nykvist	1986
78. The Bad Sleep Well	Yuzuru Aizawa	1960
79. Grand Illusion	Christian Matras	1937
80. The Ballad of Narayama	Hiroyuki Kusuda	1958
81. Three Colours: Red	Piotr Sobociński	1994
82. The Last Laugh	Karl Freund	1924
83. The Blue Angel	Günther Rittau	1930
84. Brazil	Roger Pratt	1985
85. Andrei Rublev	Vadim Yusov	1966
86. Mirror	Georgy Rerberg	1975
87. Black Narcissus	Jack Cardiff	1947
88. The Cranes Are Flying	Sergey Urusevsky	1957
89. Die Nibelungen	Carl Hoffmann, Günther Rittau, Walter Ruttmann	1924
90. The Earrings of Madame de…	Christian Matras	1953
91. Naked	Dick Pope	1993
92. The Royal Tenenbaums	Robert Yeoman	2001
93. The Seventh Seal	Gunnar Fischer	1957
94. Punch-Drunk Love	Robert Elswit	2002
95. A Brighter Summer Day	Chang Hui-kung, Li Long-yu	1991
96. Ran	Takao Saito, Masaharu Ueda, Asakazu Nakai	1985
97. Juliet of the Spirits	Gianni Di Venanzo	1965
98. Manhattan	Gordon Willis	1979
99. Paths of Glory	Georg Krause	1957
100. A Clockwork Orange	John Alcott	1971

*Winton C. Hoch’s blazing Technicolour and astounding eye for composition in The Searchers (1956).*

The 50 Best Film Editors of All Time

1. Sergei Eisenstein

Top 5 Edited films

Film	Director	Year
1. Battleship Potemkin	Sergei Eisenstein	1925
2. Strike	Sergei Eisenstein	1925
3. October: Ten Days That Shook the World	Sergei Eisenstein	1928
4. Alexander Nevsky	Sergei Eisenstein, Dmitri Vasilyev	1938
5. Ivan the Terrible	Sergei Eisenstein	1944-46

**Battleship Potemkin (1925).** Eisenstein pioneered the theory of montage in cinema’s early years, emphasising the power of juxtaposition to generate tension, heighten drama, and inspire revolutionary thought in the minds of viewers.

2. Thelma Schoonmaker

Top 5 Edited Films

Film	Director	Year
1. Raging Bull	Martin Scorsese	1980
2. Goodfellas	Martin Scorsese	1990
3. Casino	Martin Scorsese	1995
4. The Aviator	Martin Scorsese	2004
5. The Age of Innocence	Martin Scorsese	1993

**Raging Bull (1980).** Schoonmaker has been Martin Scorsese’s editor since the 1960s, building a kinetic energy through pulsating montages, inspired jump cuts, and dynamic narrative rhythms.

3. Akira Kurosawa

Top 5 Edited Films

Film	Director	Year
1. Rashomon	Akira Kurosawa	1950
2. Seven Samurai	Akira Kurosawa	1954
3. Ran	Akira Kurosawa	1985
4. Yojimbo	Akira Kurosawa	1961
5. High and Low	Akira Kurosawa	1963

**Rashomon (1950).** Kurosawa’s editing accentuates action and rhythm in his samurai films, emphasising the fluid movement of actors within the frame itself, but his creative accomplishments extend into the broader narrative structures at work as well.

4. George Tomasini

Top 5 Edited Films

Film	Director	Year
1. Psycho	Alfred Hitchcock	1960
2. Vertigo	Alfred Hitchcock	1958
3. Rear Window	Alfred Hitchcock	1954
4. North by Northwest	Alfred Hitchcock	1959
5. The Birds	Alfred Hitchcock	1963

**Psycho (1960).** Tomasini worked as Hitchcock’s primary editor during his strongest period of filmmaking, building psychological tension through cross-cutting, match cuts, and long stretches of pure visual storytelling.

5. Nino Baragli

Top 5 Edited Films

Film	Director	Year
1. The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly	Sergio Leone	1966
2. Once Upon a Time in the West	Sergio Leone	1968
3. Once Upon a Time in America	Sergio Leone	1984
4. Django	Sergio Corbucci	1966
5. Teorema	Pier Paolo Pasolini	1968

**The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly (1966).** Baragli expertly manipulates time and rhythm in Sergio Leone’s Spaghetti Westerns, generating dynamic suspense in elongated sequences, abrupt cuts, and sharp contrasts between images.

6. D.W. Griffith, James and Rose Smith

Top 5 Edited Films

Film	Director	Year
1. Intolerance	D.W. Griffith	1916
2. The Birth of a Nation	D.W. Griffith	1915
3. Broken Blossoms	D.W. Griffith	1919
4. Way Down East	D.W. Griffith	1920
5. Orphans of the Storm	D.W. Griffith	1921

**Intolerance (1916).** The Father of Modern Cinema and powerhouse couple James and Rose Smith were an editing trio to be reckoned with in Hollywood’s early days, pioneering new techniques in cross-cutting and narrative structure. They invented a cinematic language that is so woven into the art form today, it has become virtually invisible – but it is still evident that they are among the few to have truly mastered it.

7. Yoshiyasu Hamamura

Top 5 Edited Films

Film	Director	Year
1. Tokyo Story	Yasujirō Ozu	1953
2. Early Summer	Yasujirō Ozu	1951
3. Late Spring	Yasujirō Ozu	1949
4. An Autumn Afternoon	Yasujirō Ozu	1962
5. There Was a Father	Yasujirō Ozu	1942

**Tokyo Story (1953).** Unlike so many other editors on this list, Hamamura emphasises lyrical pacing and reflective pauses above propulsive momentum, complementing Yasujirō Ozu’s minimalist storytelling with meditative pillow shots to gently transition between scenes.

8. Marguerite Beaugé

Top 5 Edited Films

Film	Director	Year
1. The Passion of Joan of Arc	Carl Theodor Dreyer	1928
2. Napoleon	Abel Gance	1927
3. La Roue	Abel Gance	1923
4. Pépé le Moko	Julien Duvivier	1937
5. Olivia	Jacqueline Audry	1951

**The Passion of Joan of Arc (1928).** Beaugé’s resume is small, but her top three films display some of the most innovative editing of the silent era, revealing an incredible intuition for sharp visual rhythms and avant-garde experimentations.

9. Michael Kahn

Top 5 Edited Films

Film	Director	Year
1. Raiders of the Lost Ark	Steven Spielberg	1981
2. Saving Private Ryan	Steven Spielberg	1998
3. Schindler’s List	Steven Spielberg	1993
4. Jurassic Park	Steven Spielberg	1993
5. Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom	Steven Spielberg	1984

**Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981).** Kahn demonstrates remarkable consistency across his collaborations with Steven Spielberg, not so much pushing the art form forward with experimental techniques as he is perfecting the art of action and continuity editing, maintaining a visceral sense of adventure.

10. Jay Rabinowitz

Top 5 Edited Films

Year	Director	Year
1. Requiem for a Dream	Darren Aronofsky	2000
2. The Tree of Life	Terrence Malick	2011
3. The Fountain	Darren Aronofsky	2006
4. Dead Man	Jim Jarmusch	1995
5. Ghost Dog: The Way of the Samurai	Jim Jarmusch	1999

**Requiem for a Dream (2000).** Rabinowitz’s achievements are varied across collaborations with several magnificent directors, though he frequently emphasises atmosphere above all else, whether that comes through the disjointed, dreamlike quality of Jim Jarmusch’s deadpan ruminations or Darren Aronofsky’s feverish montages.

Film Editor	Top 3 Edited Films
11. William Chang	1. Chungking Express (1994) 2. In the Mood for Love (2000) 3. The Grandmaster (2013)
12. Gerald B. Greenberg	1. Apocalypse Now (1979) 2. The French Connection (1971) 3. The Untouchables (1987)
13. Dylan Tichenor	1. There Will Be Blood (2007) 2. Magnolia (1999) 3. Boogie Nights (1997)
14. Sally Menke	1. Pulp Fiction (1994) 2. Reservoir Dogs (1992) 3. Kill Bill (2003-04)
15. Eraldo Da Roma	1. Red Desert (1964) 2. L’Avventura (1960) 3. L’Eclisse (1962)
16. Lee Smith	1. Dunkirk (2017) 2. Inception (2010) 3. The Dark Knight (2008)
17. Lou Lombardo	1. The Wild Bunch (1969) 2. McCabe & Mrs. Miller (1971) 3. The Long Goodbye (1973)
18. Ulla Ryghe	1. Persona (1966) 2. The Silence (1963) 3. Hour of the Wolf (1968)
19. Paul Hirsch	1. Blow Out (1981) 2. Carrie (1976) 3. The Empire Strikes Back (1980)
20. Ruggero Mastroianni	1. Juliet of the Spirits (1965) 2. Amarcord (1973) 3. Fellini Satyricon (1969)
21. Graeme Clifford	1. Don’t Look Now (1973) 2. The Man Who Fell to Earth (1976) 3. The Rocky Horror Picture Show (1975)
22. Agnès Guillemot	1. Contempt (1963) 2. Weekend (1967) 3. Alphaville (1965)
23. Ray Lovejoy	1. 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) 2. The Shining (1980) 3. Aliens (1986)
24. Joe Walker	1. Shame (2011) 2. Dune (2021-23) 3. Blade Runner 2049 (2017)
25. Dede Allen	1. Bonnie and Clyde (1967) 2. Dog Day Afternoon (1975) 3. Reds (1981)
26. Cécile Decugis	1. Breathless (1960) 2. Shoot the Piano Player (1960) 3. My Night at Maud’s (1969)
27. Barry Alexander Brown	1. Do the Right Thing (1989) 2. Malcolm X (1992) 3. 25th Hour (2002)
28. Tom Cross	1. Whiplash (2014) 2. La La Land (2016) 3. Babylon (2022)
29. Billy Weber	1. The Tree of Life (2011) 2. The Thin Red Line (1998) 3. Days of Heaven (1978)
30. Anne V. Coates	1. Lawrence of Arabia (1962) 2. Out of Sight (1998) 3. The Elephant Man (1980)
31. Sam O’Steen	1. Rosemary’s Baby (1968) 2. The Graduate (1967) 3. Chinatown (1974)
32. Peter Zinner	1. The Godfather Part II (1974) 2. The Godfather (1972) 3. The Deer Hunter (1978)
33. Zach Staenberg	1. The Matrix (1999) 2. Speed Racer (2008) 3. The Matrix Reloaded (2003)
34. Claudine Bouché	1. Jules and Jim (1962) 2. Shoot the Piano Player (1960) 3. The Soft Skin (1964)
35. The Coen Brothers	1. No Country for Old Men (2007) 2. Inside Llewyn Davis (2013) 3. Blood Simple (1984)
36. Susan E. Morse	1. Manhattan (1979) 2. Stardust Memories (1980) 3. Broadway Danny Rose (1984)
37. Jill Bilcock	1. Moulin Rouge! (2001) 2. Romeo + Juliet (1996) 3. Muriel’s Wedding (1994)
38. Robert Wise	1. Citizen Kane (1941) 2. The Magnificent Ambersons (1942) 3. The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1939)
39. Leo Catozzo	1. 8 1/2 (1963) 2. La Dolce Vita (1960) 3. Nights of Cabiria (1957)
40. Chris Dickens	1. Hot Fuzz (2007) 2. Submarine (2010) 3. Small Axe (2020)
41. Pietro Scalia	1. JFK (1991) 2. The Quick and the Dead (1995) 3. Gladiator (2000)
42. Verna Fields	1. Jaws (1975) 2. American Graffiti (1973) 3. What’s Up, Doc? (1972)
43. Stuart Gilmore	1. The Palm Beach Story (1942) 2. Sullivan’s Travels (1941) 3. The Andromeda Strain (1971)
44. Hank Corwin	1. The Tree of Life (2011) 2. The New World (2005) 3. The Big Short (2015)
45. Mary Sweeney	1. Mulholland Drive (2001) 2. Lost Highway (1997) 3. Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me (1992)
46. Walter Murch	1. Apocalypse Now (1979) 2. The Conversation (1974) 3. The English Patient (1996)
47. Alan Heim	1. Lenny (1974) 2. American History X (1998) 3. Network (1976)
48. Gene Havlick	1. Mr Smith Goes to Washington (1939) 2. It Happened One Night (1934) 3. Lost Horizon (1937)
49. Joe Bini	1. We Need to Talk About Kevin (2011) 2. You Were Never Really Here (2017) 3. Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans (2009)
50. Stephen Mirrione	1. 21 Grams (2003) 2. Traffic (2000) 3. The Revenant (2015)

The 100 Best Edited Films of All Time

Films from the last 10 years have not been included on this list, and will be eligible in future updates when the moratorium has passed.

Film	Editor	Year
1. Battleship Potemkin	Sergei Eisenstein, Grigori Aleksandrov	1925
2. Raging Bull	Thelma Schoonmaker	1980
3. The Good, the Bad and the Ugly	Nino Baragli, Eugenio Alabiso	1966
4. Intolerance	D.W. Griffith, James Smith, Rose Smith	1916
5. The Passion of Joan of Arc	Marguerite Beaugé, Carl Theodor Dreyer	1928
6. JFK	Joe Hutshing, Pietro Scalia	1991
7. Breathless	Cécile Decugis	1960
8. Apocalypse Now	Richard Marks, Walter Murch, Gerald B. Greenberg, Lisa Fruchtman	1979
9. Tokyo Story	Yoshiyasu Hamamura	1953
10. Psycho	George Tomasini	1960
11. The Wild Bunch	Lou Lombardo	1969
12. Once Upon a Time in the West	Nino Baragli	1968
13. Strike	Sergei Eisenstein	1925
14. The Birth of a Nation	D.W. Griffith, James Smith, Rose Smith	1915
15. Rashomon	Akira Kurosawa	1950
16. The Godfather Part II	Peter Zinner, Barry Malkin, Richard Marks	1974
17. The French Connection	Gerald B. Greenberg	1971
18. Seven Samurai	Akira Kurosawa	1954
19. Citizen Kane	Robert Wise	1941
20. Requiem for a Dream	Jay Rabinowitz	2000
21. Jules and Jim	Claudine Bouché	1962
22. The Godfather	William Reynolds, Peter Zinner	1972
23. Whiplash	Tom Cross	2014
24. 2001: A Space Odyssey	Ray Lovejoy	1968
25. Performance	Antony Gibbs, Brian Smedley-Aston, Frank Mazzola	1970
26. Moulin Rouge	Jill Bilcock	2001
27. Don’t Look Now	Graeme Clifford	1973
28. Napoleon	Marguerite Beaugé	1927
29. Inception	Lee Smith	2010
30. October	Sergei Eisenstein	1928
31. Lawrence of Arabia	Anne V. Coates	1962
32. Chungking Express	William Chang, Kai Kit-wai, Kwong Chi-Leung	1994
33. Rear Window	George Tomasini	1954
34. Jaws	Verna Fields	1975
35. Once Upon a Time in America	Nino Baragli	1984
36. Stagecoach	Otho Lovering, Dorothy Spencer	1939
37. Pulp Fiction	Sally Menke	1994
38. Goodfellas	Thelma Schoonmaker	1990
39. Run Lola Run	Mathilde Bonnefoy	1998
40. Persona	Ulla Ryghe	1966
41. Distant Voices, Still Lives	William Diver	1988
42. Mad Max: Fury Road	Margaret Sixel	2015
43. Taxi Driver	Marcia Lucas, Tom Rolf, Melvin Shapiro	1976
44. Pierrot Le Fou	Françoise Collin	1965
45. The Tree of Life	Hank Corwin, Jay Rabinowitz, Daniel Rezende, Billy Weber, Mark Yoshikawa	2011
46. The Fountain	Jay Rabinowitz	2006
47. The Matrix	Zach Staenberg	1999
48. I Am Cuba	Nina Glagoleva	1964
49. We Need to Talk About Kevin	Joe Bini	2011
50. Trainspotting	Masahiro Hirakubo	1996
51. The Thin Red Line	Billy Weber, Leslie Jones, Saar Klein	1998
52. Cabaret	David Bretherton	1972
53. Bonnie and Clyde	Dede Allen	1967
54. The End of Summer	Koichi Iwashita	1961
55. 8 1/2	Leo Catozzo	1963
56. Vertigo	George Tomasini	1958
57. Early Summer	Yoshiyasu Hamamura	1951
58. In the Mood for Love	William Chang	2000
59. Do the Right Thing	Barry Alexander Brown	1989
60. Manhattan	Susan E. Morse	1979
61. Enter the Void	Gaspar Noé, Marc Boucrot, Jérôme Pesnel	2009
62. Last Year at Marienbad	Henri Colpi, Jasmine Chasney	1961
63. The New World	Richard Chew, Hank Corwin, Saar Klein, Mark Yoshikawa	2005
64. Days of Heaven	Billy Weber	1978
65. Raiders of the Lost Ark	Michael Kahn	1981
66. Midnight Cowboy	Hugh A. Robertson	1969
67. La Roue	Marguerite Beaugé	1923
68. Lenny	Alan Heim	1974
69. The Man Who Fell to Earth	Graeme Clifford	1976
70. Reservoir Dogs	Sally Menke	1992
71. Late Spring	Yoshiyasu Hamamura	1949
72. Annie Hall	Ralph Rosenblum, Wendy Greene Bricmont	1977
73. Shame	Joe Walker	2011
74. Millennium Actress	Satoshi Terauchi	2001
75. Hot Fuzz	Chris Dickens	2007
76. The Big Short	Hank Corwin	2015
77. The Grandmaster	William Chang	2013
78. Saving Private Ryan	Michael Kahn	1998
79. Mulholland Drive	Mary Sweeney	2001
80. The Conversation	Walter Murch, Richard Chew	1974
81. A Fistful of Dollars	Roberto Cinquini	1964
82. Easy Rider	Donn Cambern	1969
83. There Will Be Blood	Dylan Tichenor	2007
84. The Master	Peter McNulty, Leslie Jones	2012
85. Mr Smith Goes to Washington	Gene Havlick, Al Clark	1939
86. For a Few Dollars More	Eugenio Alabiso, Giorgio Serrallonga, Adriana Novelli	1965
87. The Third Man	Oswald Hafenrichter	1949
88. Blow Out	Paul Hirsch	1981
89. Scott Pilgrim vs. the World	Jonathan Amos, Paul Machliss	2010
90. Ran	Akira Kurosawa	1985
91. Wings	E. Lloyd, Sheldon Lucien Hubbard	1927
92. Alexander Nevsky	Sergei Eisenstein	1938
93. North by Northwest	George Tomasini	1959
94. Memento	Dody Dorn	2000
95. Mother	Vsevolod Pudovkin	1926
96. Juliet of the Spirits	Ruggero Mastroianni	1965
97. Carrie	Paul Hirsch	1976
98. Earth	Oleksandr Dovzhenko	1930
99. The Lord of the Rings	John Gilbert, Michael J. Horton, Jamie Selkirk	2001
100. Magnolia	Dylan Tichenor	1999

*Yoshiyasu Hamamura’s gentle montage editing through ‘pillow shots’ in Tokyo Story (1953).*

The 50 Best Screenwriters of All Time

Many of cinema’s great screenwriters frequently worked in partnerships or teams, and so in the interest of giving credit where it is due, the names of their key collaborators have been listed as co-writers. The main exception is if co-writers have had strong careers independent of each other, in which case they are listed here separately.

1. Ingmar Bergman

Top 5 Screenplays

Film	Year
1. The Seventh Seal	1957
2. Persona	1966
3. Scenes from a Marriage	1973
4. Winter Light	1963
5. Wild Strawberries	1957

**The Seventh Seal (1957).** Bergman weaves poetic reflections and savage verbal sparring through profound examinations of our relationship with God, ourselves, and each other – all equally marked by existential spiritual turmoil.

2. Billy Wilder

Top 5 Screenplays

Film	Year
1. Double Indemnity	1944
2. Sunset Boulevard	1950
3. The Apartment	1960
4. Some Like it Hot	1959
5. Ace in the Hole	1951

**Double Indemnity (1944).** Wilder proved he could do it all, from fatalistic film noirs to biting satire, each thrumming along with razor-sharp wit. In all his best screenplays though, he also understands his characters’ desires and weaknesses on an intimate level, building these into his narratives with incredible economy.

3. Woody Allen

Co-writers: Marshall Brickman

Top 5 Screenplays

Film	Year
1. Annie Hall	1977
2. Manhattan	1979
3. Hannah and Her Sisters	1986
4. Crimes and Misdemeanours	1989
5. Broadway Danny Rose	1984

**Annie Hall (1977).** Allen’s neurotic humour delivered a shock to the comedy genre in the 1970s, examining romantic and moral complexities with an intellectual yet self-deprecating tone.

4. The Coen Brothers

Top 5 Screenplays

Film	Year
1. Fargo	1996
2. No Country for Old Men	2007
3. The Big Lebowski	1998
4. Inside Llewyn Davis	2013
5. A Serious Man	2009

**Fargo (1996).** Dark, deadpan humour, eccentric characters, and an absurd sense of fatalism define the Coen Brothers as a writing duo, revelling in the chaotic unpredictability of life and the poor souls caught up in it.

5. Quentin Tarantino

Top 5 Screenplays

Film	Year
1. Pulp Fiction	1994
2. Reservoir Dogs	1992
3. Inglourious Basterds	2009
4. Once Upon a Time in Hollywood	2019
5. Django Unchained	2012

**Pulp Fiction (1994).** Tarantino is widely recognised as one of cinema’s great masters of dialogue, and this is certainly true – but he is not up this high either without his masterful non-linear storytelling and genre subversions.

6. Paul Schrader

Co-writers: Leonard Schrader, Mardik Martin

Top 5 Screenplays

Film	Year
1. Taxi Driver	1976
2. Raging Bull	1980
3. Mishima: A Life in Four Chapters	1985
4. First Reformed	2017
5. The Card Counter	2021

**Taxi Driver (1976).** Schrader has written some of cinema’s greatest character studies, revealing the inner lives of morally compromised antiheroes on paths to redemption, or alternatively destruction.

7. Francis Ford Coppola

Co-writers: Mario Puzo, John Milius

Top 5 Screenplays

Film	Year
1. The Godfather	1972
2. The Godfather Part II	1974
3. Apocalypse Now	1979
4. The Conversation	1974
5. Patton	1970

**The Godfather (1972).** Coppola’s greatest narratives are grand, operatic fables with richly layered characters, often exploring the subtle madness which underlies their power and ambition.

8. Paul Thomas Anderson

Top 5 Screenplays

Film	Year
1. There Will Be Blood	2007
2. The Master	2012
3. Magnolia	1999
4. Punch-Drunk Love	2002
5. Boogie Nights	1997

**There Will Be Blood (2007).** There is an intricate, psychological depth to Anderson’s writing, often possessing a dark humour which underscores his explorations of surrogate families, obsessive ambition, and distorted power dynamics,

9. Stanley Kubrick

Co-writers: Terry Southern

Top 5 Screenplays

Year	Film
1. Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb	1964
2. A Clockwork Orange	1971
3. Paths of Glory	1957
4. Eyes Wide Shut	1999
5. The Shining	1980

**Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964).** Kubrick approaches his writing with the same intellectual rigour and ironic detachment as his meticulous direction, aiming a critical tone at frail societal constructs and their relationship to humanity’s darkest impulses.

10. Akira Kurosawa

Co-writers: Hideo Oguni, Ryūzō Kikushima, Eijiro Hisaita

Top 5 Screenplays

Film	Year
1. Rashomon	1950
2. Seven Samurai	1954
3. High and Low	1963
4. Ikiru	1952
5. The Bad Sleep Well	1960

**Rashomon (1950).** Forces of honour and corruption fight for their own forms of moral justice in Kurosawa’s deeply cynical parables, often using Japanese history as a rich cultural backdrop, and carrying a Shakespearean gravitas even when he isn’t directly adapting the Bard himself.

Screenwriter	Top 3 Screenplays
11. Federico Fellini Co-writers: Ennio Flaiano, Tullio Pinelli, Brunello Rondi	1. La Dolce Vita (1960) 2. 8 1/2 (1963) 3. Amarcord (1973)
12. Charlie Kaufman	1. I’m Thinking of Ending Things (2020) 2. Synecdoche, New York (2008) 3. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004)
13. Richard Linklater Co-writers: Ethan Hawke, Julie Delpy, Kim Krazan	1. Before Sunset (2004) 2. Before Midnight (2013) 3. Dazed and Confused (1993)
14. Krzysztof Kieślowski Co-writer: Krzysztof Piesiewicz	1. Dekalog (1989) 2. Three Colours: Red (1994) 3. The Double Life of Veronique (1991)
15. Ben Hecht Co-writers: Charles Lederer, W.R. Burnett, John Lee Mahin, Seton I. Miller, Charles MacArthur, Samson Raphaelson, Arthur Laurents, Walter Newman, Lewis Meltzer	1. His Girl Friday (1940) 2. Notorious (1946) 3. Scarface (1932)
16. Martin Scorsese Co-writers: Mardik Martin, Nicholas Pileggi, Jay Cocks	1. Goodfellas (1990) 2. Mean Streets (1973) 3. Casino (1995)
17. John Huston Co-writers: Anthony Veiller, James Agee, Peter Viertel, John Collier, Gladys Hill, Ben Maddow, Charles MacArthur	1. The Maltese Falcon (1941) 2. The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1948) 3. The Asphalt Jungle (1950)
18. Christopher Nolan Co-writer: Jonathan Nolan	1. Memento (2000) 2. Oppenheimer (2023) 3. The Dark Knight (2008)
19. Orson Welles	1. Citizen Kane (1941) 2. Touch of Evil (1958) 3. The Magnificent Ambersons (1942)
20. David Lynch	1. Mulholland Drive (2001) 2. Blue Velvet (1986) 3. Lost Highway (1997)
21. Aaron Sorkin	1. The Social Network (2010) 2. A Few Good Men (1992) 3. Steve Jobs (2015)
22. William Goldman	1. All The President’s Men (1976) 2. Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969) 3. The Princess Bride (1987)
23. Joseph L. Mankiewicz Co-writers: Ranald MacDougall, Sidney Buchman	1. All About Eve (1950) 2. A Letter to Three Wives (1949) 3. Manhattan Melodrama (1934)
24. Tonino Guerra Co-writer: Michelangelo Antonioni	1. Amarcord (1973) 2. Nostalghia (1983) 3. L’Avventura (1960)
25. Wes Anderson Co-writer: Owen Wilson	1. The Royal Tenenbaums (2001) 2. The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014) 3. Rushmore (1998)
26. François Truffaut Co-writers: Jean Gruault, Marcel Moussy, Jean-Louis Richard, Suzanne Schiffman	1. The 400 Blows (1959) 2. Jules and Jim (1962) 3. Shoot the Piano Player (1960)
27. Andrei Tarkovsky Co-writers: Andrei Konchalovsky, Aleksandr Misharin, Friedrich Gorenstein, Vladimir Bogomolov, Mikhail Papava	1. Nostalghia (1983) 2. Andrei Rublev (1966) 3. Solaris (1972)
28. Preston Sturges	1. The Lady Eve (1941) 2. Sullivan’s Travels (1941) 3. Unfaithfully Yours (1948)
29. Michael Powell, Emeric Pressburger	1. The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp (1943) 2. A Matter of Life and Death (1946) 3. Black Narcissus (1947)
30. Jim Jarmusch	1. Dead Man (1995) 2. Stranger than Paradise (1984) 3. Paterson (2016)
31. Shinobu Hashimoto	1. Rashomon (1950) 2. Seven Samurai (1954) 3. Ikiru (1952)
32. Roman Polanski Co-writers: Robert Harris, Gérard Brach, Jakub Goldberg, Jerzy Skolimowski	1. Chinatown (1974) 2. Rosemary’s Baby (1968) 3. Knife in the Water (1962)
33. Noah Baumbach Co-writer: Greta Gerwig	1. Marriage Story (2019) 2. Frances Ha (2012) 3. The Squid and the Whale (2005)
34. Yasujirō Ozu Co-writers: Kōgo Noda, Tadao Ikeda, Takao Anai	1. Tokyo Story (1953) 2. The End of Summer (1961) 3. Early Summer (1951)
35. Leigh Brackett	1. The Big Sleep (1946) 2. Rio Bravo (1959) 3. The Long Goodbye (1973)
36. Jules Furthman	1. The Big Sleep (1946) 2. Rio Bravo (1959) 3. Morroco (1930)
37. Dudley Nichols Co-writer: Hagar Wilde	1. Bringing Up Baby (1938) 2. Scarlet Street (1945) 3. Stagecoach (1939)
38. Jean Renoir Co-writer: Carl Koch	1. The Rules of the Game (1939) 2. Grand Illusion (1937) 3. La Chienne (1931)
39. Luis Buñuel Co-writers: Julio Alejandro, Jean-Claude Carrière	1. The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie (1972) 2. Viridiana (1961) 3. Tristana (1970)
40. Robert Towne	1. Chinatown (1974) 2. The Last Detail (1973) 3. Mission: Impossible (1996)
41. Herman J. Mankiewicz Co-writers: Noel Langley, Florence Ryerson, Edgar Allan Woolf, John Lee Mahin, John F. Goodrich	1. Citizen Kane (1941) 2. The Wizard of Oz (1939) 3. Dinner at Eight (1933)
42. Graham Greene Co-writers: William Templeton, Lesley Storm	1. The Third Man (1949) 2. The Fallen Idol (1948) 3. Brighton Rock (1948)
43. Lars von Trier	1. Breaking the Waves (1996) 2. Melancholia (2011) 3. Dancer in the Dark (2000)
44. Spike Lee Co-writers: Arnold Perl, Charlie Wachtel, David Rabinowitz, Kevin Willmott	1. Do the Right Thing (1989) 2. Malcolm X (1992) 3. BlacKkKlansman (2018)
45. Sergio Leone Co-writers: Sergio Donati, Luciano Vincenzoni, Age & Scarpelli, Leonardo Benvenuti, Piero De Bernardi, Enrico Medioli, Franco Arcalli, Franco Ferrini	1. Once Upon a Time in the West (1968) 2. The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly (1966) 3. Once Upon a Time in America (1984)
46. Pedro Almodóvar	1. Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown (1988) 2. Talk to Her (2002) 3. Bad Education (2004)
47. Thea von Harbou Co-writer: Fritz Lang	1. M (1931) 2. Dr. Mabuse the Gambler (1922) 3. Metropolis (1927)
48. Luchino Visconti Co-writers: Enrico Medioli, Nicola Badalucco	1. The Leopard (1963) 2. Rocco and His Brothers (1960) 3. The Damned (1960)
49. Lawrence Kasdan	1. Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981) 2. The Empire Strikes Back (1980) 3. Body Heat (1981)
50. Frances Goodrich, Albert Hackett	1. It’s a Wonderful Life (1946) 2. The Thin Man (1934) 3. Seven Brides for Seven Brothers (1954)

The 100 Best Screenplays of All Time

Films from the last 10 years have not been included on this list, and will be eligible in future updates when the moratorium has passed.

Film	Screenwriter	Year
1. Chinatown	Roman Polanski, Robert Towne	1974
2. The Godfather	Francis Ford Coppola, Mario Puzo	1972
3. Citizen Kane	Orson Welles, Herman J. Mankiewicz	1941
4. Pulp Fiction	Quentin Tarantino	1994
5. Taxi Driver	Paul Schrader	1976
6. The Seventh Seal	Ingmar Bergman	1957
7. Double Indemnity	Billy Wilder	1944
8. The Godfather Part II	Francis Ford Coppola, Mario Puzo	1974
9. Sunset Boulevard	Billy Wilder	1950
10. The Social Network	Aaron Sorkin	2010
11. Annie Hall	Woody Allen, Marshall Brickman	1977
12. All About Eve	Joseph L. Mankiewicz	1950
13. Casablanca	Julius J. Epstein, Philip G. Epstein, Howard Koch	1942
14. There Will Be Blood	Paul Thomas Anderson	2007
15. Goodfellas	Nicholas Pileggi, Martin Scorsese	1990
16. Raging Bull	Paul Schrader, Mardik Martin	1980
17. The Master	Paul Thomas Anderson	2012
18. Rashomon	Akira Kurosawa, Shinobu Hashimoto	1950
19. Persona	Ingmar Bergman	1966
20. Reservoir Dogs	Quentin Tarantino	1992
21. Scenes from a Marriage	Ingmar Bergman	1973
22. Lawrence of Arabia	Robert Bolt, Michael Wilson	1962
23. The Big Sleep	Leigh Brackett, William Faulkner, Jules Furthman	1946
24. La Dolce Vita	Federico Fellini, Tullio Pinelli, Ennio Flaiano, Brunello Rondi, Pier Paolo Pasolini	1960
25. Winter Light	Ingmar Bergman	1963
26. Fargo	The Coen Brothers	1996
27. Bringing Up Baby	Dudley Nichols, Hagar Wilde	1938
28. Seven Samurai	Akira Kurosawa, Shinobu Hashimoto, Hideo Oguni	1954
29. No Country For Old Men	The Coen Brothers	2007
30. His Girl Friday	Charles Lederer, Ben Hecht	1940
31. Dr. Strangelove	Stanley Kubrick, Terry Southern	1964
32. 8 1/2	Federico Fellini, Tullio Pinelli, Ennio Flaiano, Brunello Rondi	1963
33. The Big Lebowski	The Coen Brothers	1998
34. Wild Strawberries	Ingmar Bergman	1957
35. The Third Man	Graham Greene	1949
36. High and Low	Ryūzō Kikushima, Hideo Oguni, Eijiro Hisaita, Akira Kurosawa	1963
37. All the President’s Men	William Goldman	1976
38. The Graduate	Calder Willingham, Buck Henry	1967
39. The Apartment	Billy Wilder	1960
40. Psycho	Joseph Stefano	1960
41. Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid	William Goldman	1969
42. Manhattan	Woody Allen, Marshall Brickman	1979
43. Synecdoche, New York	Charlie Kaufman	2008
44. Network	Paddy Chayefsky	1976
45. Inglourious Basterds	Quentin Tarantino	2009
46. It’s a Wonderful Life	Frances Goodrich, Albert Hackett, Frank Capra	1946
47. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind	Charlie Kaufman	2004
48. Inside Llewyn Davis	The Coen Brothers	2013
49. A Clockwork Orange	Stanley Kubrick	1971
50. One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest	Lawrence Hauben, Bo Goldman	1975
51. The Rules of the Game	Jean Renoir, Carl Koch	1939
52. Vertigo	Alec Coppel, Samuel Taylor	1958
53. Hiroshima Mon Amour	Marguerite Duras	1959
54. Rear Window	John Michael Hayes	1954
55. Memento	Christopher Nolan	2000
56. Magnolia	Paul Thomas Anderson	1999
57. The 400 Blows	Francois Truffaut, Marcel Moussy	1959
58. 12 Angry Men	Reginald Rose	1957
59. The Maltese Falcon	John Huston	1941
60. L.A. Confidential	Brian Helgeland, Curtis Hanson	1997
61. On the Waterfront	Budd Schulberg	1954
62. Hannah and Her Sisters	Woody Allen	1986
63. Dead Man	Jim Jarmusch	1995
64. Ikiru	Akira Kurosawa, Shinobu Hashimoto, Hideo Oguni	1952
65. Groundhog Day	Danny Rubin, Harold Ramis	1993
66. Mulholland Drive	David Lynch	2001
67. Some Like it Hot	Billy Wilder	1959
68. Birdman	Alejandro G. Iñárritu, Nicolás Giacobone, Alexander Dinelaris Jr., Armando Bó	2014
69. Dekalog	Krzysztof Kieślowski, Krzysztof Piesiewicz	1989
70. Mishima: A Life in Four Chapters	Paul Schrader, Leonard Schrader	1985
71. Out of the Past	Daniel Mainwaring	1947
72. Apocalypse Now	John Milius, Francis Ford Coppola	1979
73. Before Sunset	Richard Linklater, Julie Delpy, Ethan Hawke	2004
74. The Treasure of the Sierra Madre	John Huston	1948
75. My Dinner with Andre	Wallace Shawn, André Gregory	1981
76. Naked	Mike Leigh	1993
77. Touch of Evil	Orson Welles	1958
78. Last Year at Marienbad	Alain Robbe-Grillet	1961
79. The Usual Suspects	Christopher McQuarrie	1995
80. Crimes and Misdemeanours	Woody Allen	1989
81. Do the Right Thing	Spike Lee	1989
82. The Best Years of our Lives	Robert E. Sherwood	1946
83. Rio Bravo	Jules Furthman, Leigh Brackett	1959
84. Notorious	Ben Hecht	1946
85. Breaking the Waves	Lars von Trier, Peter Asmussen	1996
86. Before Midnight	Richard Linklater, Ethan Hawke, Julie Delpy	2013
87. The Long Goodbye	Leigh Brackett	1973
88. The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie	Luis Buñuel, Jean-Claude Carrière	1972
89. Three Colours: Red	Krzysztof Kieślowski, Krzysztof Piesiewicz	1994
90. Fanny and Alexander	Ingmar Bergman	1982
91. Punch-Drunk Love	Paul Thomas Anderson	2002
92. M	Fritz Lang, Thea von Harbou	1931
93. North by Northwest	Ernest Lehman	1959
94. The Lady Eve	Preston Sturges	1941
95. A Woman Under the Influence	John Cassavetes	1974
96. The Searchers	Frank S. Nugent	1956
97. Stalker	Arkady Strugatsky, Boris Strugatsky	1979
98. JFK	Oliver Stone, Zachary Sklar	1991
99. The Departed	William Monahan	2006
100. Back to the Future	Robert Zemeckis, Bob Gale	1985

*The Seventh Seal (1957) written by Ingmar Bergman.*

The 50 Best Female Actors of All Time