Various Critics' Top Ten Lists

Justin Chang

Jordan Cronk

Eric Hynes

Kent Jones

Michael Koresky

Dennis Lim

Adam Nayman

Andréa Picard

Nick Pinkerton

James Quandt

Jordan Cronk Top Ten Lists

These lists are sourced from Patreon from 2015 onwards, and by release year until 2015, and by premiere year onwards.

2012 [Unknown via CriticsTop10]

1. Once Upon a Time in Anatolia (Nuri Bilge Ceylan)
2. The Turin Horse (Tarr Béla and Hranitzky Ágnes)
3. Holy Motors (Leos Carax)
4. Tabu (Miguel Gomes)
5. This Is Not a Film (Jafar Panahi & Mojtaba Mirtahmasb)
6. Almayer's Folly (Chantal Akerman)
7. Two Years at Sea (Ben Rivers)
8. The Kid With a Bike (Jean-Pierre & Luc Dardenne)
9. The Day He Arrives (Hong Sang-soo)
10. 4:44: Last Day on Earth (Abel Ferrara)

2013 [Slant]

1. Leviathan (Lucien Castaing-Taylor & Véréna Paravel)
2. Post Tenebras Lux (Carlos Reygadas)
3. The Last Time I Saw Macao (João Pedro Rodrigues & João Rui Guerra da Mata)
4. Like Someone in Love (Abbas Kiarostami)
5. A Touch of Sin (Jia Zhangke)
6. Bastards (Claire Denis)
7. Beyond the Hills (Cristian Mungiu)
8. Drug War (Johnnie To)
9. Night Across the Street (Raúl Ruiz)
10. You Ain't Seen Nothin' Yet (Alain Resnais)

2014 [Unknown via CriticsTop10]

1. Story of My Death (Albert Serra)
2. Goodbye to Language (Jean-Luc Godard)
3. Norte, the End of History (Lav Diaz)
4. Stray Dogs (Tsai Ming-liang)
5. Stranger by the Lake (Alain Guiraudie)
6. Closed Curtain (Jafar Panahi)
7. What Now? Remind Me (Joaquim Pinto)
8. Life of Riley (Alain Resnais)
9. The Last of the Unjust (Claude Lanzmann)
10. A Spell to Ward Off the Darkness (Ben Russell & Ben Rivers)

2015

1. The Assassin (Hou Hsiao-hsien)
2. Cemetery of Splendour (Apichatpong Weerasethakul)
3. Arabian Nights (Miguel Gomes)
4. 88:88 (Isiah Medina)
5. Lost and Beautiful (Pietro Marcello)
6. No Home Movie (Chantal Akerman)
7. In the Shadow of Women (Philippe Garrel)
8. Visit, or Memories and Confessions (Manoel de Oliveira)
9. Right Now, Wrong Then (Hong Sang-soo)
10. Knight of Cups (Terrence Malick)

2016

1. Toni Erdmann (Maren Ade)
2. Sieranevada (Cristi Puiu)
3. The Death of Louis XIV (Albert Serra)
4. Nocturama (Bertrand Bonello)
5. The Ornithologist (João Pedro Rodrigues)
6. Certain Women (Kelly Reichardt)
7. Elle (Paul Verhoeven)
8. The Dreamed Path (Angela Schanelec)
9. The Human Surge (Eduardo Williams)
10. Staying Vertical (Alain Guiraudie)

2017

1. Twin Peaks: The Return (David Lynch)
2. Jeannette: The Childhood of Joan of Arc (Bruno Dumont)
3. Zama (Lucrecia Martel)
4. Western (Valeska Grisebach)
5. Phantom Thread (Paul Thomas Anderson)
6. Good Luck (Ben Russell)
7. On the Beach at Night Alone (Hong Sang-soo)
8. Lover for a Day (Philippe Garrel)
9. First Reformed (Paul Schrader)
10. El mar la mar (Joshua Bonnetta & J.P. Sniadecki)

2018

1. The Other Side of the Wind (Orson Welles)
2. High Life (Claire Denis)
3. The Image Book (Jean-Luc Godard)
4. Long Day's Journey Into Night (Bi Gan)
5. La Flor (Mariano Llinás)
6. Dead Souls (Wang Bing)
7. What You Gonna Do When the World's on Fire? (Roberto Minervini)
8. Infinite Football (Corneliu Porumboiu)
9. Arboretum Cycle (Nathaniel Dorsky)
10. An Elephant Sitting Still (Hu Bo)

2019

1. I Was at Home, But... (Angela Schanelec)
2. Liberté (Albert Serra)
3. Vitalina Varela (Pedro Costa)
4. Synonyms (Nadav Lapid)
5. Martin Eden (Pietro Marcello)
6. The Irishman (Martin Scorsese)
7. State Funeral (Sergei Loznitsa)
8. Zombi Child (Bertrand Bonello)
9. Tommaso (Abel Ferrara)
10. Heimat Is a Space in Time (Thomas Heise)

Decade [Patreon]

1. Twin Peaks: The Return (2017, David Lynch)
2. Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives (2010, Apichatpong Weerasethakul)
3. The Strange Case of Angelica (2010, Manoel de Oliveira)
4. Goodbye to Language (2014, Jean-Luc Godard)
5. No Home Movie (2015, Chantal Akerman)
6. House of Tolerance (2011, Bertrand Bonello)
7. Horse Money (2014, Pedro Costa)
8. Mysteries of Lisbon (2010, Raúl Ruiz)
9. Holy Motors (2012, Leos Carax)
10. The Turin Horse (2011, Tarr Béla and Hranitsky Ágnes)

2020

1. DAU. (Ilya Khrzhanovsky)
2. Days (Tsai Ming-liang)
3. Malmkrog (Cristi Puiu)
4. The Works and Days (of Tayoko Shiojiri in the Shiotani Basin) (C. W. Winter & Anders Edström)
5. Beginning (Déa Kulumbegashvili)
6. Her Socialist Smile (John Gianvito)
7. The Salt of Tears (Philippe Garrel)
8. Siberia (Abel Ferrara)
9. The Woman Who Ran (Hong Sang-soo)
10. The Year of the Discovery (Luis López Carrasco)

2021

1. What Do We See When We Look at the Sky? (Alexandre Koberidze)
2. Memoria (Apichatpong Weerasethakul)
3. France (Bruno Dumont)
4. Drive My Car (Hamaguchi Ryusuke)
5. Il buco (Michelangelo Frammartino)
6. In Front of Your Face (Hong Sang-soo)
7. Benedetta (Paul Verhoeven)
8. The Card Counter (Paul Schrader)
9. Annette (Leos Carax)
10. Cry Macho (Clint Eastwood)

2022

1. Pacifiction (Albert Serra)
2. Crimes of the Future (David Cronenberg)
3. EO (Jerzy Skolimowski)
4. The Novelist's Film (Hong Sang-soo)
5. Showing Up (Kelly Reichardt)
6. De Humani Corporis Fabrica (Véréna Paravel & Lucien Castaing-Taylor)
7. The Fabelmans (Steven Spielberg)
8. Trenque Lauquen (Laura Citarella)
9. Human Flowers of Flesh (Helena Wittmann)
10. Tales of the Purple House (Abbas Fahdel)

2023

• Do Not Expect Too Much From the End of the World (Radu Jude)
• The Human Surge 3 (Eduardo Williams)
• Eureka (Lisandro Alonso)
• Fallen Leaves (Aki Kaurismäki)
• Close Your Eyes (Víctor Erice)
• Music (Angela Schanelec)
• The Beast (Bertrand Bonello)
• Killers of the Flower Moon (Martin Scorsese)
• Youth (Spring) (Wang Bing)
• The Delinquents (Rodrigo Moreno)

2024

• Scénarios (Jean-Luc Godard)
• It's Not Me (Leos Carax)
• The Shrouds (David Cronenberg)
• Grand Tour (Miguel Gomes)
• Megalopolis (Francis Ford Coppola)
• Henry Fonda for President (Alexander Horwath)
• Caught by the Tides (Jia Zhangke)
• Misericordia (Alain Guiraudie)
• exergue—on documenta 14 (Dimitris Athiridis)
• By the Stream (Hong Sang-soo)

James Quandt Top Ten Lists

All of these lists are sourced from Artforum, except as noted, and after 2002 are (roughly) by premiere year.

2002 [Village Voice]

• *Corpus Callosum (Michael Snow)
• Atanarjuat: The Fast Runner (Zacharias Kunuk)
• I'm Going Home (Manoel de Oliveira)
• In Praise of Love (Jean-Luc Godard)
• La Captive (Chantal Akerman)
• The Orphan of Anyang (Wang Chao)
• Platform (Jia Zhangke)
• Remembrance of Things to Come (Chris Marker & Yannick Bellon)
• Russian Ark (Aleksandr Sokurov)
• What Time Is It There? (Tsai Ming-liang)

2003

1. Blissfully Yours (Apichatpong Weerasethakul)
2. Come and Go (João César Monteiro)
3. Distant (Nuri Bilge Ceylan)
4. The Ground/The Hedge Theater (Robert Beavers)
5. The Man Without a Past (Aki Kaurismäki)
6. Model Shop (Jacques Demy)
7. Remembrance of Things to Come (Chris Marker & Yannick Bellon)
8. The Son (Jean-Pierre & Luc Dardenne)
9. Ten (Abbas Kiarostami)
10. Goodbye, Dragon Inn (Tsai Ming-liang)

2004

1. The World (Jia Zhangke)
2. Notre musique (Jean-Luc Godard)
3. 10e Chambre, Instant d'audiences (Raymond Depardon)
4. Rheimetall/Victoria 8 (Rodney Graham)
5. Café Lumière (Hou Hsiao-hsien)
6. Tropical Malady (Apichatpong Weerasethakul)
7. Vento di terra (Vincenzo Marra)
8. La Blessure (Nicolas Klotz)
9. The Big Red One: The Reconstruction (Samuel Fuller)
10. Trilogy: The Weeping Meadow (Theo Angelopoulos)

2005

1. The Death of Mr. Lazarescu (Cristi Puiu)
2. Three Times (Hou Hsiao-hsien)
3. The Sun (Aleksandr Sokurov)
4. Garlands (T.J. Wilcox)
5. Palast (Tacita Dean)
6. Instructions for a Light and Sound Machine (Peter Tscherkassky)
7. Moments choisis des Histoire(s) du cinéma (Jean-Luc Godard)
8. La Trahison (Philippe Faucon)
9. Last Days (Gus Van Sant)
10. Grizzly Man (Werner Herzog)

2006

1. Colossal Youth (Pedro Costa)
2. Syndromes and a Century (Apichatpong Weerasethakul)
3. Still Life (Jia Zhangke)
4. Kodak (Tacita Dean)
5. Army of Shadows (Jean-Pierre Melville)
6. Bamako (Abderrahmane Sissako)
7. Magic Mirror (Manoel de Oliveira)
8. I Don't Want to Sleep Alone (Tsai Ming-liang)
9. Woman on the Beach (Hong Sang-soo)
10. Kristall (Matthias Müller & Christoph Girardet)

2007

1. These Encounters of Theirs (Jean-Marie Straub & Danièle Huillet)
2. Pour vos beaux yeux (Henri Storck)
3. 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days (Cristian Mungiu)
4. Useless (Jia Zhangke)
5. Tarahi V (Haris Epaminonda)
6. La Morte rouge (Víctor Erice)
7. Fengming, a Chinese Memoir (Wang Bing)
8. The Romance of Astrée and Céladon (Éric Rohmer)
9. Alexandra (Aleksandr Sokurov)
10. At Sea (Peter Hutton)

2008

1. Itinerary of Jean Bricard (Jean-Marie Straub & Danièle Huillet)
2. Artemide's Knee (Jean-Marie Straub)
3. The Headless Woman (Lucrecia Martel)
4. Liverpool (Lisandro Alonso)
5. Tony Manero (Pablo Larraín)
6. 24 City (Jia Zhangke)
7. United Red Army (Wakamatsu Kōji)
8. Wonderful Town (Aditya Assarat)
9. Cleópatra (Júlio Bressane)
10. Summer Hours (Olivier Assayas)

2009

1. Wilhelm Noack oHG (Simon Starling)
2. Police, Adjective (Corneliu Porumboiu)
3. To Die Like a Man (João Pedro Rodrigues)
4. The White Ribbon (Michael Haneke)
5. Giardini (Steve McQueen)
6. Like You Know It All (Hong Sang-soo)
7. In Comparison (Harun Farocki)
8. Eccentricities of a Blonde-haired Girl (Manoel de Oliveira)
9. Track of the Cat (William Wellman)
10. Huacho (Alejandro Fernández Almendras)

Decade [IndieWire]

1. These Encounters of Theirs (2006, Jean-Marie Straub & Danièle Huillet)
2. In Praise of Love (2001, Jean-Luc Godard)
3. Platform (2000, Jia Zhangke)
4. Syndromes and a Century (2006, Apichatpong Weerasethakul)
5. The Death of Mr. Lazarescu (2005, Cristi Puiu)
6. In Vanda's Room (2000, Pedro Costa)
7. The Headless Woman (2008, Lucrecia Martel)
8. La Commune (Paris, 1871) (2000, Peter Watkins)
9. Come and Go (2003, João César Monteiro)
10. La Blessure (2004, Nicolas Klotz)

2010

1. Rite of Spring (Manoel de Oliveira)
   The Strange Case of Angelica (Manoel de Oliveira)
2. Mysteries of Lisbon (Raúl Ruiz)
3. Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives (Apichatpong Weerasethakul)
4. Film Socialisme (Jean-Luc Godard)
5. Aurora (Cristi Puiu)
6. Carlos (Olivier Assayas)
7. Le Quattro Volte (Michelangelo Frammartino)
8. The Mouth of the Wolf (Pietro Marcello)
9. The Wanderer (Avishai Sivan)
10. Static (Steve McQueen)

2011

1. Eika Katappa (Werner Schroeter)
   The Death of Maria Malibran (Werner Schroeter)
2. The Clock (Christian Marclay)
3. Le Havre (Aki Kaurismäki)
4. This Is Not a Film (Jafar Panahi & Mojtaba Mirtahmasb)
5. The Turin Horse (Tarr Béla and Hranitzky Ágnes)
6. Play (Ruben Östlund)
7. Once Upon a Time in Anatolia (Nuri Bilge Ceylan)
8. Blood of My Blood (João Canijo)
9. Aita (José María de Orbe)
10. Porfirio (Alejandro Landres)

2012

1. Night Across the Street (Raúl Ruiz)
   La Maleta (Raúl Ruiz)
2. The Last Time I Saw Macao (João Pedro Rodrigues & João Rui Guerra da Mata)
3. In Another Country (Hong Sang-soo)
4. No (Pablo Larraín)
5. Perret in France and Algeria (Heinz Emigholz)
6. The Repentant (Merzak Allouache)
7. Holy Motors (Leos Carax)
8. Neighboring Sounds (Kleber Mendonça Filho)
9. Wild Girl (Raoul Walsh)
10. The Act of Killing (Joshua Oppenheimer)

2013

1. Norte, the End of History (Lav Diaz)
2. 'Til Madness Do Us Part (Wang Bing)
3. Three Exercises of Interpretation (Cristi Puiu)
4. What Now? Remind Me (Joaquim Pinto)
5. The King's Body (João Pedro Rodrigues)
6. A Touch of Sin (Jia Zhangke)
   Manuscripts Don't Burn (Mohammad Rasoulof)
7. Ravel Ravel (Anri Sala)
8. The Last of the Unjust (Claude Lanzmann)
9. Stranger by the Lake (Alain Guiraudie)
10. Salvation Army (Abdellah Taïa)

2014

1. Goodbye to Language (Jean-Luc Godard)
2. Amour Fou (Jessica Hausner)
3. Horse Money (Pedro Costa)
4. Das Spektrum Europas (Cristi Puiu)
5. Hill of Freedom (Hong Sang-soo)
6. Jauja (Lisandro Alonso)
7. The Tribe (Myroslav Slaboshpytskiy)
8. Timbuktu (Abderrahmane Sissako)
9. Above and Below the Minhocão (Mark Lewis)
10. August Winds (Gabriel Mascaro)

2015

1. Labour in a Single Shot (Harun Farocki & Antje Ehmann)
2. Visit, or Memories and Confessions (Manoel de Oliveira)
3. Bleak Street (Arturo Ripstein)
4. Singularity (Albert Serra)
5. Neon Bull (Gabriel Mascaro)
6. Ashes (Steve McQueen)
7. The Films and Videos of Michaël Borremans
8. Lost and Beautiful (Pietro Marcello)
9. Actua 1 (Philippe Garrel)
10. "The Owners of Dixie," from The Arabian Nights Trilogy, Vol. 2, The Desolate One (Miguel Gomes)

2016

1. Jean-Marie Straub and Danièle Huillet (Museum of Modern Art, New York)
2. From the Branches Drops the Withered Blossom (Paul Meyer)
3. Sieranevada (Cristi Puiu)
4. The Death of Louis XIV (Albert Serra)
5. The Ornithologist (João Pedro Rodrigues)
6. Ma' Rosa (Brillante Mendoza)
7. Yourself and Yours (Hong Sang-soo)
8. Neruda (Pablo Larraín)
9. Kékszakállú (Gaston Solnicki)
10. As Without So Within (Manuela De Laborde)

2017

1. "The Boat Is Leaking. The Captain Lied." (Fondazione Prada, Venice)
2. Jean Vigo (Il Cinema Ritrovato, Bologna, Italy)
3. Zama (Lucrecia Martel)
4. Western (Valeska Grisebach)
5. The Nothing Factory (Pedro Pinho)
6. Faces Places (Agnès Varda & JR)
7. Closeness (Kantemir Balagov)
8. 12 Days (Raymond Depardon)
9. Caniba (Véréna Paravel & Lucien Castaing-Taylor)
10. Ex Libris: The New York Public Library (Frederick Wiseman)

2018

1. Dead Souls (Wang Bing)
2. The Image Book (Jean-Luc Godard)
3. A Man Walks in the City (Marcello Pagliero)
4. Thomas Bayrle (New Museum, New York)
5. The Manet and Ravel Sequences from La Flor (Mariano Llinás)
6. Elegant Beast (Kawashima Yūzō)
7. Burning (Lee Chang-dong)
8. The Load (Ognjen Glavonić)
9. Ayka (Sergey Dvortsevoy)
10. The Black Book (Valeria Sarmiento)

2019

1. Luc Tuymans (Palazzo Grassi, Venice)
   The White Album (Arthur Jafa)
2. Vitalina Varela (Pedro Costa)
3. Beanpole (Kantemir Balagov)
4. State Funeral (Sergei Loznitsa)
5. Collective (Alexander Nanau)
6. Bacurau (Kleber Mendonça Filho & Juliano Dornelles)
7. Heimat Is a Space in Time (Thomas Heise)
8. Invisible Life (Karim Aïnouz)
9. Fire Will Come (Oliver Laxe)
10. Nana (Jean Renoir)

Decade [Film Comment]

1. Zama (2017, Lucrecia Martel)
2. Goodbye to Language (2014, Jean-Luc Godard)
3. Norte, the End of History (2013, Lav Diaz)
4. Film Socialisme (2010, Jean-Luc Godard)
5. Vitalina Varela/Horse Money (2019/2014, Pedro Costa)
6. Amour Fou (2014, Jessica Hausner)
7. Sieranevada (2016, Cristi Puiu)
8. The Death of Louis XIV (2016, Albert Serra)
9. The Strange Case of Angelica (2010, Manoel de Oliveira)
10. Mysteries of Lisbon (2010, Raúl Ruiz)

2020

1. The Woman Who Ran (Hong Sang-soo)
2. Days (Tsai Ming-liang)
3. The Year of the Discovery (Luis López Carrasco)
4. Xiao Wu (Jia Zhangke)
5. A Night at the Opera (Sergei Loznitsa)
6. The Monopoly of Violence (David Dufresne)
7. Malmkrog (Cristi Puiu)
8. Notturno (Gianfranco Rosi)
9. While Cursed by Specters (Burak Çevik)
10. Gunda (Victor Kossakovsky)

2021

1. Introduction (Hong Sang-soo)
2. In Front of Your Face (Hong Sang-soo)
3. The Round-Up (Jancsó Miklós)
4. Ahed's Knee (Nadav Lapid)
5. Il Buco (Michelangelo Frammartino)
6. Întregalde (Radu Muntean)
7. Flee (Jonas Poher Rasmussen)
8. Returning to Reims (Jean-Gabriel Périot)
9. Unclenching the Fists (Kira Kovalenko)
10. Dog Star Descending (Aykan Safoğlu)

2022

1. Where Is This Street? Or With No Before and After (João Pedro Rodrigues & João Rui Guerra da Mata)
2. The Novelist's Film (Hong Sang-soo)
3. The Adventures of Gigi the Law (Alessandro Comodin)
4. Unrest (Cyril Schäublin)
5. Pacifiction (Albert Serra)
6. Stonewalling (Huang Ji & Otsuka Ryuji)
7. Autobiography (Makbul Mubarak)
8. The Long Farewell (Kira Muratova)
9. Pier Paolo Pasolini – Agnès Varda – New York – 1967 (Agnès Varda)
10. Dry Ground Burning (Joana Pimenta & Adirley Queirós)

Andréa Picard Top Ten Lists

These lists are sourced as follows: Village Voice 2007-2009, Senses of Cinema 2013-2018, except as noted, and by release year until 2009, and by premiere year onwards until 2021.

2007

1. Syndromes and a Century (Apichatpong Weerasethakul)
2. I Don't Want to Sleep Alone (Tsai Ming-liang)
3. Colossal Youth (Pedro Costa)
4. Flandres (Bruno Dumont)
5. Regular Lovers (Philippe Garrel)
6. 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days (Cristian Mungiu)
7. Belle Toujours (Manoel de Oliveira)
8. Bamako (Abderrahmane Sissako)
9. Eastern Promises (David Cronenberg)
10. In Between Days (So Yong Kim)

2008

1. Before I Forget (Jacques Nolot)
2. The Romance of Astrée and Céladon (Éric Rohmer)
3. Still Life (Jia Zhangke)
4. Alexandra (Aleksandr Sokurov)
5. The Duchess of Langeais (Jacques Rivette)
6. Silent Light (Carlos Reygadas)
7. Love Songs (Christophe Honoré)
8. Slingshot (Brillante Mendoza)
9. Woman on the Beach (Hong Sang-soo)
10. Profit motive and the whispering wind (John Gianvito)

2009

1. The Headless Woman (Lucrecia Martel)
2. 24 City (Jia Zhangke)
3. Liverpool (Lisandro Alonso)
4. Still Walking (Koreeda Hirokazu)
5. Import/Export (Ulrich Seidl)
6. Night and Day (Hong Sang-soo)
7. Lorna's Silence (Jean-Pierre & Luc Dardenne)
8. Frontier of the Dawn (Philippe Garrel)
9. Summer Hours (Olivier Assayas)
10. Serbis (Brillante Mendoza)

Decade [IndieWire]

1. Syndromes and a Century (2006, Apichatpong Weerasethakul)
2. In Praise of Love (2001, Jean-Luc Godard)
3. Three Times (2005, Hou Hsiao-hsien)
4. Platform (2000, Jia Zhangke)
5. Colossal Youth (2006, Pedro Costa)
6. Los muertos (2004, Lisandro Alonso)
7. The Headless Woman (2008, Lucrecia Martel)
8. Beau Travail (1999, Claire Denis)
9. Moolaadé (2004, Ousmane Sembène)
10. Regular Lovers (2005, Philippe Garrel)

2013

1. Norte, the End of History (Lav Diaz)
2. Stranger by the Lake (Alain Guiraudie)
3. A Touch of Sin (Jia Zhangke)
4. Story of My Death (Albert Serra)
5. 'Til Madness Do Us Part (Wang Bing)
6. What Now? Remind Me (Joaquim Pinto)
7. The Strange Little Cat (Ramon Zürcher)
8. Stray Dogs (Tsai Ming-liang)
9. A Thousand Suns (Mati Diop)
   The King's Body (João Pedro Rodrigues)
   Redemption (Miguel Gomes)
10. Mouton (Gilles Deroo & Marianne Pistone)

2014

1. P'tit Quinquin (Bruno Dumont)
2. Horse Money (Pedro Costa)
3. Goodbye to Language (Jean-Luc Godard)
4. Nathalie Granger (Marguerite Duras)
5. Jauja (Lisandro Alonso)
6. Das Spektrum Europas (Cristi Puiu)
7. Amour Fou (Jessica Hausner)
8. Kommunisten (Jean-Marie Straub)
9. Hill of Freedom (Hong Sang-soo)
10. The Innocents (Jean-Paul Kelly)
    Brouillard: Passage #14 (Alexandre Larose)
    The Dragon Is the Frame (Mary Helena Clark)

2016 [possibly unranked list]

1. Sieranevada (Cristi Puiu)
2. The Death of Louis XIV (Albert Serra)
3. The Dreamed Path (Angela Schanelec)
4. Elle (Paul Verhoeven)
5. Toni Erdmann (Maren Ade)
6. Nocturama (Bertrand Bonello)
7. The Human Surge (Eduardo Williams)
8. The Ornithologist (João Pedro Rodrigues)
9. The Dreamed Ones (Ruth Beckermann)
10. Certain Women (Kelly Reichardt)

2017

1. Zama (Lucrecia Martel)
2. Western (Valeska Grisebach)
3. On the Beach at Night Alone (Hong Sang-soo)
4. Eight Hours Don't Make a Day (Rainer Werner Fassbinder)
5. Good Time (Josh & Benny Safdie)
6. Araby (João Dumans & Affonso Uchôa)
7. Also Known as Jihadi (Éric Baudelaire)
8. Streetscapes [Dialogue] (Heinz Emigholz)
9. The Nothing Factory (Pedro Pinho)
10. The Other Side of Hope (Aki Kaurismäki)

2018

1. Transit (Christian Petzold)
2. The Image Book (Jean-Luc Godard)
3. An Elephant Sitting Still (Hu Bo)
4. Dead Souls (Wang Bing)
5. What You Gonna Do When the World's on Fire? (Roberto Minervini)
6. L. Cohen (James Benning)
7. In My Room (Ulrich Köhler)
8. Ada Kaleh (Helena Wittmann)
9. The Load (Ognjen Glavonić)
10. Ash Is Purest White (Jia Zhangke)

2021 [Film Comment]

1. Memoria (Apichatpong Weerasethakul)
2. The Souvenir Part II (Joanna Hogg)
3. Days (Tsai Ming-liang)
4. Drive My Car (Hamaguchi Ryusuke)
5. The Woman Who Ran (Hong Sang-soo)
6. Malmkrog (Cristi Puiu)
7. Wheel of Fortune and Fantasy (Hamaguchi Ryusuke)
8. Undine (Christian Petzold)
9. What Do We See When We Look at the Sky? (Alexandre Koberidze)
10. Bergman Island (Mia Hansen-Løve)

2022 [Screen Slate]

1. In Front of Your Face (Hong Sang-soo)
2. Crimes of the Future (David Cronenberg)
3. The Eternal Daughter (Joanna Hogg)
4. A Night of Knowing Nothing (Payal Kapadia)
5. The Novelist's Film (Hong Sang-soo)
6. Întregalde (Radu Muntean)
7. Vortex (Gaspar Noé)
8. Aftersun (Charlotte Wells)
9. Ahed's Knee (Nadav Lapid)
10. Return to Seoul (Chou Davy)

Dennis Lim Top Tens

These lists are sourced as follows: Village Voice 1998-2005, Indiewire 2006-2010, Film at Lincoln Center onwards, and by release year until 2012, and by premiere year onwards.

1998

1. Fallen Angels (Wong Kar-wai)
   
2. Velvet Goldmine (Todd Haynes)
3. Hana-bi (Takeshi Kitano)
4. The Thin Red Line (Terrence Malick)
5. The Butcher Boy (Neil Jordan)
6. Out of Sight (Steven Soderbergh)
7. Affliction (Paul Schrader)
8. There's Something About Mary (Peter & Bobby Farrelly)
9. Love Is the Devil (John Maybury)
10. The Hanging Garden (Thom Fitzgerald)

1999

1. Flowers of Shanghai (Hou Hsiao-hsien)
2. Magnolia (Paul Thomas Anderson)
3. The Hole (Tsai Ming-liang)
4. Being John Malkovich (Spike Jonze)
5. eXistenZ (David Cronenberg)
6. Rosetta (Jean-Pierre & Luc Dardenne)
7. Leila (Dariush Mehrjui)
8. Those Who Love Me Can Take the Train (Patrice Chéreau)
9. Last Night (Don McKellar)
10. Fight Club (David Fincher)

2000

1. Beau Travail (Claire Denis)
2. The House of Mirth (Terence Davies)
3. L'Humanité (Bruno Dumont)
4. Pola X (Leos Carax)
5. The Wind Will Carry Us (Abbas Kiarostami)
6. Yi Yi (Edward Yang)
7. Lies (Jang Sun-woo)
8. Ratcatcher (Lynne Ramsay)
9. Criminal Lovers/Water Drops on Burning Rocks (François Ozon)
10. Rapture/Fervor (Shirin Neshat)

2001

1. Mulholland Drive (David Lynch)
2. In the Mood for Love (Wong Kar-wai)
3. In the Bedroom (Todd Field)
4. Intimacy (Patrice Chéreau)
5. The Low Down (Jamie Thraves)
6. Under the Sand (François Ozon)
7. The River (Tsai Ming-liang)
8. Donnie Darko (Richard Kelly)
9. Little Otik (Jan Švankmajer)
10. Moulin Rouge! (Baz Luhrmann)

2002

1. Esther Kahn (Arnaud Desplechin)
2. Punch-Drunk Love (Paul Thomas Anderson)
3. Far From Heaven (Todd Haynes)
4. Time Out (Laurent Cantet)
5. Gangs of New York (Martin Scorsese)
6. The Sleepy Time Gal (Christopher Munch)
7. I'm Going Home (Manoel de Oliveira)
8. 24 Hour Party People (Michael Winterbottom)
9. Adaptation. (Spike Jonze)
10. What Time Is It There? (Tsai Ming-liang)

2003

1. Platform (Jia Zhangke)
2. Unknown Pleasures (Jia Zhangke)
3. demonlover (Olivier Assayas)
4. Millennium Mambo (Hou Hsiao-hsien)
5. In My Skin (Marina de Van)
6. Elephant (Gus Van Sant)
7. School of Rock (Richard Linklater)
8. Cowards Bend the Knee (Guy Maddin)
9. The Son (Jean-Pierre & Luc Dardenne)
10. The Slaughter Rule (Alex & Andrew J. Smith)

2004

1. I ♥ Huckabees (David O. Russell)
2. Primer (Shane Carruth)
3. Before Sunset (Richard Linklater)
4. Dogville (Lars von Trier)
5. Blissfully Yours (Apichatpong Weerasethakul)
6. Goodbye, Dragon Inn (Tsai Ming-liang)
7. Infernal Affairs (Andrew Lau & Alan Mak)
8. Son frère (Patrice Chéreau)
9. A Talking Picture (Manoel de Oliveira)
10. Code 46 (Michael Winterbottom)
    Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (Michel Gondry)

2005

1. Café Lumière (Hou Hsiao-hsien)
2. The Power of Nightmares (Adam Curtis)
3. A History of Violence (David Cronenberg)
4. Tropical Malady (Apichatpong Weerasethakul)
5. Caché (Michael Haneke)
6. The Century of the Self (Adam Curtis)
7. Last Days (Gus Van Sant)
8. Kings and Queen (Arnaud Desplechin)
9. L'Intrus (Claire Denis)
10. Darwin's Nightmare (Hubert Sauper)
    Mondovino (Jonathan Nossiter)
    Chain (Jem Cohen)
    The World (Jia Zhangke)

2006

1. Inland Empire (David Lynch)
2. L'Enfant (Jean-Pierre & Luc Dardenne)
3. A Scanner Darkly (Richard Linklater)
4. Children of Men (Alfonso Cuarón)
5. The Death of Mr. Lazarescu (Cristi Puiu)
6. Borat (Larry Charles)
7. Old Joy (Kelly Reichardt)
8. 4 (Ilya Khrzhanovsky)
9. Mutual Appreciation (Andrew Bujalski)
10. The Science of Sleep (Michel Gondry)

2007

1. There Will Be Blood (Paul Thomas Anderson)
2. Colossal Youth (Pedro Costa)
3. Syndromes and a Century (Apichatpong Weerasethakul)
4. Zodiac (David Fincher)
5. Offside (Jafar Panahi)
6. I Don't Want to Sleep Alone (Tsai Ming-liang)
7. Black Book (Paul Verhoeven)
8. Lady Chatterley (Pascale Ferran)
9. Regular Lovers (Philippe Garrel)
10. Death Proof (Quentin Tarantino)

2008

1. Flight of the Red Balloon (Hou Hsiao-hsien)
2. Before I Forget (Jacques Nolot)
3. Still Life (Jia Zhangke)
4. In the City of Sylvia (José Luis Guerín)
5. Paranoid Park (Gus Van Sant)
6. Wendy and Lucy (Kelly Reichardt)
7. The Duchess of Langeais (Jacques Rivette)
8. Hunger (Steve McQueen)
9. My Winnipeg (Guy Maddin)
10. Milk (Gus Van Sant)

2009

1. Summer Hours (Olivier Assayas)
2. The Limits of Control (Jim Jarmusch)
3. The Headless Woman (Lucrecia Martel)
4. Inglourious Basterds (Quentin Tarantino)
5. 24 City (Jia Zhangke)
6. Police, Adjective (Corneliu Porumboiu)
7. Fantastic Mr. Fox (Wes Anderson)
8. Night and Day (Hong Sang-soo)
9. Liverpool (Lisandro Alonso)
10. Beeswax (Andrew Bujalski)

Decade [Film Comment]

1. Platform (2000, Jia Zhangke)
2. Mulholland Drive (2001, David Lynch)
3. Esther Kahn (2000, Arnaud Desplechin)
4. Café Lumière (2003, Hou Hsiao-hsien)
5. Punch-Drunk Love (2002, Paul Thomas Anderson)
6. Inland Empire (2006, David Lynch)
7. There Will Be Blood (2007, Paul Thomas Anderson)
8. Colossal Youth (2006, Pedro Costa)
9. Syndromes and a Century (2006, Apichatpong Weerasethakul)
10. The Trap: What Happened to Our Dream of Freedom (2007, Adam Curtis)

2010

1. The Strange Case of Angelica (Manoel de Oliveira)
2. World on a Wire (Rainer Werner Fassbinder)
3. Secret Sunshine (Lee Chang-dong)
4. Alamar (Pedro González-Rubio)
5. Wild Grass (Alain Resnais)
6. Around a Small Mountain (Jacques Rivette)
7. Everyone Else (Maren Ade)
8. Trash Humpers (Harmony Korine)
9. Ghost Town (Zhao Dayong)
10. Sweetgrass (Ilisa Barbash & Lucien Castaing-Taylor)

2012 [Senses of Cinema]

1. Tabu (Miguel Gomes)
2. Leviathan (Lucien Castaing-Taylor & Véréna Paravel)
3. Holy Motors (Leos Carax)
4. The Master (Paul Thomas Anderson)
5. differently, Molussia (Nicolas Rey)
6. Morning of Saint Anthony's Day (João Pedro Rodrigues)
7. Neighboring Sounds (Kleber Mendonça Filho)
8. Barbara (Christian Petzold)
9. The Last Time I Saw Macao (João Pedro Rodrigues & João Rui Guerra da Mata)
10. Cosmopolis (David Cronenberg)

2013

1. Stranger by the Lake (Alain Guiraudie)
2. Norte, the End of History (Lav Diaz)
3. Redemption (Miguel Gomes)
4. What Now? Remind Me (Joaquim Pinto)
5. Only Lovers Left Alive (Jim Jarmusch)
6. Manakamana (Stephanie Spray & Pacho Velez)
7. Stray Dogs (Tsai Ming-liang)
8. A Touch of Sin (Jia Zhangke)
9. Computer Chess (Andrew Bujalski)
10. Mouton (Gilles Deroo & Marianne Pistone)

2014

1. Horse Money (Pedro Costa)
2. Inherent Vice (Paul Thomas Anderson)
3. Jauja (Lisandro Alonso)
4. Goodbye to Language (Jean-Luc Godard)
5. Saint Laurent (Bertrand Bonello)
6. The Kindergarten Teacher (Nadav Lapid)
7. P'tit Quinquin (Bruno Dumont)
8. The Princess of France (Matías Piñeiro)
9. Maidan (Sergei Loznitsa)
10. Phoenix (Christian Petzold)

2015

1. Arabian Nights (Miguel Gomes)
2. Cemetery of Splendour (Apichatpong Weerasethakul)
3. The Assassin (Hou Hsiao-hsien)
4. Visit, or Memories and Confessions (Manoel de Oliveira)
5. Lost and Beautiful (Pietro Marcello)
6. Mountains May Depart (Jia Zhangke)
7. Kaili Blues (Bi Gan)
8. In the Shadow of Women (Philippe Garrel)
9. Neon Bull (Gabriel Mascaro)
10. Poet on a Business Trip (Ju Anqi)

2016 [direct message]

1. Nocturama (Bertrand Bonello)
2. Toni Erdmann (Maren Ade)
3. The Human Surge (Eduardo Williams)
4. The Death of Louis XIV (Albert Serra)
5. Elle (Paul Verhoeven)
6. Staying Vertical (Alain Guiraudie)
7. By the Time It Gets Dark (Anocha Suwichakornpong)
8. Sieranevada (Cristi Puiu)
9. Hermia & Helena (Matías Piñeiro)
10. The Dreamed Path (Angela Schanelec)

2017

1. Twin Peaks: The Return (David Lynch)
2. Zama (Lucrecia Martel)
3. Phantom Thread (Paul Thomas Anderson)
4. Western (Valeska Grisebach)
5. Streetscapes [Dialogue] (Heinz Emigholz)
6. The Day After (Hong Sang-soo)
   On the Beach at Night Alone (Hong Sang-soo)
   Claire's Camera (Hong Sang-soo)
7. Downsizing (Alexander Payne)
8. Araby (João Dumans & Affonso Uchôa)
9. Tonsler Park (Kevin Jerome Everson)
10. Electro-Pythagoras: A Portrait of Martin Bartlett (Luke Fowler)

2018

1. Transit (Christian Petzold)
2. La Flor (Mariano Llinás)
3. An Elephant Sitting Still (Hu Bo)
4. Ash Is Purest White (Jia Zhangke)
5. Classical Period (Ted Fendt)
6. Long Day's Journey Into Night (Bi Gan)
7. Happy as Lazzaro (Alice Rohrwacher)
8. High Life (Claire Denis)
9. Dead Souls (Wang Bing)
10. What You Gonna Do When the World's on Fire? (Roberto Minervini)

2019

1. Martin Eden (Pietro Marcello)
2. Once Upon a Time...in Hollywood (Quentin Tarantino)
3. Vitalina Varela (Pedro Costa)
4. Liberté (Albert Serra)
5. Heimat Is a Space in Time (Thomas Heise)
6. I Was at Home, But... (Angela Schanelec)
7. Zombi Child (Bertrand Bonello)
8. Synonyms (Nadav Lapid)
9. Present.Perfect. (Zhu Shengze)
10. The Plagiarists (Peter Parlow)

2020

1. Days (Tsai Ming-liang)
2. The Year of the Discovery (Luis López Carrasco)
3. Lovers Rock (Steve McQueen)
4. The Last City (Heinz Emigholz)
5. Los conductos (Camilo Restrepo)
6. The Calming (Song Fang)
7. The Woman Who Ran (Hong Sang-soo)
8. The Works and Days (of Tayoko Shiojiri in the Shiotani Basin) (C. W. Winter & Anders Edström)
9. Undine (Christian Petzold)
10. The Metamorphosis of Birds (Catarina Vasconcelos)

2021

1. Drive My Car (Hamaguchi Ryusuke)
2. Memoria (Apichatpong Weerasethakul)
3. Annette (Leos Carax)
4. Bad Luck Banging or Loony Porn (Radu Jude)
5. In Front of Your Face (Hong Sang-soo)
6. Wheel of Fortune and Fantasy (Hamaguchi Ryusuke)
7. The Souvenir Part II (Joanna Hogg)
8. Benedetta (Paul Verhoeven)
9. What Do We See When We Look at the Sky? (Alexandre Koberidze)
10. The Worst Person in the World (Joachim Trier)

2022

1. Pacifiction (Albert Serra)
2. The Novelist's Film (Hong Sang-soo)
3. Showing Up (Kelly Reichardt)
4. The Plains (David Easteal)
5. Unrest (Cyril Schäublin)
6. Aftersun (Charlotte Wells)
7. De Humani Corporis Fabrica (Véréna Paravel & Lucien Castaing-Taylor)
8. Walk Up (Hong Sang-soo)
9. The United States of America (James Benning)
10. Saint Omer (Alice Diop)

2023

• The Beast (Bertrand Bonello)
• Do Not Expect Too Much From the End of the World (Radu Jude)
• Evil Does Not Exist (Hamaguchi Ryusuke)
• Here (Bas Devos)
• The Human Surge 3 (Eduardo Williams)

Michael Koresky Top Tens

All of these lists are by NYC release year.

2003 [Film Comment]

1. The Son (Jean-Pierre & Luc Dardenne)
2. Dogville (Lars von Trier)
3. Goodbye, Dragon Inn (Tsai Ming-liang)
4. Kill Bill Vol. 1 (Quentin Tarantino)
5. Love & Diane (Jennifer Dworkin)
6. Lost in Translation (Sofia Coppola)
7. Since Otar Left (Julie Bertuccelli)
8. The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (Peter Jackson)
9. Angels in America (Mike Nichols)
10. Irréversible (Gaspar Noé)

2004 [Film Comment]

1. Before Sunset (Richard Linklater)
2. Tropical Malady (Apichatpong Weerasethakul)
3. Nobody Knows (Koreeda Hirokazu)
4. Twentynine Palms (Bruno Dumont)
5. The Village (M. Night Shyamalan)
6. Notre musique (Jean-Luc Godard)
7. Crimson Gold (Jafar Panahi)
8. Primer (Shane Carruth)
9. Million Dollar Baby (Clint Eastwood)
10. Funny Ha Ha (Andrew Bujalski)

2005 [Village Voice]

1. 2046 (Wong Kar-wai)
2. Tropical Malady (Apichatpong Weerasethakul)
3. The New World (Terrence Malick)
4. L'Intrus (Claire Denis)
5. Caché (Michael Haneke)
6. Kings and Queen (Arnaud Desplechin)
7. Breakfast on Pluto (Neil Jordan)
8. Nobody Knows (Koreeda Hirokazu)
9. Junebug (Phil Morrison)
10. War of the Worlds (Steven Spielberg)

2006 [IndieWire]

1. L'Enfant (Jean-Pierre & Luc Dardenne)
2. Letters From Iwo Jima (Clint Eastwood)
3. The Death of Mr. Lazarescu (Cristi Puiu)
4. Three Times (Hou Hsiao-hsien)
5. A Prairie Home Companion (Robert Altman)
6. A Lion in the House (Julia Reichert & Steven Bognar)
7. The Departed (Martin Scorsese)
8. Clean (Olivier Assayas)
9. Fast Food Nation (Richard Linklater)
10. Inland Empire (David Lynch)

2007 [Village Voice]

1. Syndromes and a Century (Apichatpong Weerasethakul)
2. There Will Be Blood (Paul Thomas Anderson)
3. I Don't Want to Sleep Alone (Tsai Ming-liang)
4. 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days (Cristian Mungiu)
5. Offside (Jafar Panahi)
6. No Country for Old Men (Joel & Ethan Coen)
7. Regular Lovers (Philippe Garrel)
8. Death Proof (Quentin Tarantino)
9. Flandres (Bruno Dumont)
10. Colossal Youth (Pedro Costa)

2008 [Indiewire]

1. Flight of the Red Balloon (Hou Hsiao-hsien)
2. Waltz With Bashir (Ari Folman)
3. A Christmas Tale (Arnaud Desplechin)
4. Synecdoche, New York (Charlie Kaufman)
5. Silent Light (Carlos Reygadas)
6. Still Life (Jia Zhangke)
7. Ballast (Lance Hammer)
8. The Last Mistress (Catherine Breillat)
9. The Class (Laurent Cantet)
10. Before I Forget (Jacques Nolot)

2009 [Indiewire]

1. The Headless Woman (Lucrecia Martel)
2. Inglourious Basterds (Quentin Tarantino)
3. 35 Shots of Rum (Claire Denis)
4. Summer Hours (Olivier Assayas)
5. Lorna's Silence (Jean-Pierre & Luc Dardenne)
6. Still Walking (Koreeda Hirokazu)
7. Of Time and the City (Terence Davies)
8. Drag Me to Hell (Sam Raimi)
9. Coraline (Henry Selick)
10. A Serious Man (Joel & Ethan Coen)

Decade [Film Comment]

1. Mulholland Drive (2001, David Lynch)
2. A.I. Artificial Intelligence (2001, Steven Spielberg)
3. The Son (2002, Jean-Pierre & Luc Dardenne)
4. Syndromes and a Century (2006, Apichatpong Weerasethakul)
5. Before Sunset (2004, Richard Linklater)
6. Flight of the Red Balloon (2007, Hou Hsiao-hsien)
7. The House of Mirth (2000, Terence Davies)
8. L'Intrus (2004, Claire Denis)
9. Bamboozled (2000, Spike Lee)
10. What Time Is It There? (2001, Tsai Ming-liang)

2010 [Indiewire]

1. Mother (Bong Joon-ho)
2. Alamar (Pedro González-Rubio)
3. Another Year (Mike Leigh)
4. White Material (Claire Denis)
5. Everyone Else (Maren Ade)
6. Secret Sunshine (Lee Chang-dong)
7. The Strange Case of Angelica (Manoel de Oliveira)
8. Eccentricities of a Blonde-haired Girl (Manoel de Oliveira)
9. Dogtooth (Yorgos Lanthimos)
10. Hadewijch (Bruno Dumont)

2012 [Unknown via CriticsTop10]

1. The Deep Blue Sea (Terence Davies)
2. This Is Not a Film (Jafar Panahi & Mojtaba Mirtahmasb)
3. Kill List (Ben Wheatley)
4. The Kid With a Bike (Jean-Pierre & Luc Dardenne)
5. Lincoln (Steven Spielberg)
6. Almayer's Folly (Chantal Akerman)
7. Tabu (Miguel Gomes)
8. I Wish (Koreeda Hirokazu)
9. Once Upon a Time in Anatolia (Nuri Bilge Ceylan)
10. You Are Here (Daniel Cockburn)

2013 [Unknown via CriticsTop10]

1. Beyond the Hills (Cristian Mungiu)
2. To the Wonder (Terrence Malick)
3. Before Midnight (Richard Linklater)
4. Inside Llewyn Davis (Joel & Ethan Coen)
5. Post Lenebras Lux (Carlos Reygadas)
6. In the Fog (Sergei Loznitsa)
7. Museum Hours (Jem Cohen)
8. Like Someone in Love (Abbas Kiarostami)
9. Frances Ha (Noah Baumbach)
10. Passion (Brian De Palma)

2014 [Unknown via CriticsTop10]

1. Boyhood (Richard Linklater)
2. Stranger by the Lake (Alain Guiraudie)
3. Closed Curtain (Jafar Panahi)
4. Only Lovers Left Alive (Jim Jarmusch)
5. Stray Dogs (Tsai Ming-liang)
6. Manakamana (Stephanie Spray & Pacho Velez)
7. The Missing Picture (Panh Rithy)
8. Maidan (Sergei Loznitsa)
9. National Gallery (Frederick Wiseman)
10. The Babadook (Jennifer Kent)

2015 [Village Voice]

1. The Look of Silence (Joshua Oppenheimer)
2. In Jackson Heights (Frederick Wiseman)
3. Carol (Todd Haynes)
4. The Assassin (Hou Hsiao-hsien)
5. Timbuktu (Abderrahmane Sissako)
6. Eastern Boys (Robin Campillo)
7. Taxi (Jafar Panahi)
8. Bridge of Spies (Steven Spielberg)
9. Clouds of Sils Maria (Olivier Assayas)
10. La Sapienza (Eugène Green)

2016 [Film at Lincoln Center]

1. Aquarius (Kleber Mendonça Filho)
2. Toni Erdmann (Maren Ade)
3. Cameraperson (Kirsten Johnson)
4. Cemetery of Splendour (Apichatpong Weereasethakul)
5. No Home Movie (Chantal Akerman)
6. Sunset Song (Terence Davies)
7. Silence (Martin Scorsese)
8. Certain Women (Kelly Reichardt)
9. Moonlight (Barry Jenkins)
10. The Other Side (Roberto Minervini)

2017 [Film Comment]

• 120 BPM (Beats Per Minute) (Robin Campillo)
• By the Time It Gets Dark (Anocha Suwichakornpong)
• A Ghost Story (David Lowery)
• The Human Surge (Eduardo Williams)
• The Lost City of Z (James Gray)
• Personal Shopper (Olivier Assayas)
• Phantom Thread (Paul Thomas Anderson)
• The Post (Steven Spielberg)
• A Quiet Passion (Terence Davies)
• Wonderstruck (Todd Haynes)

2018 [Film Comment]

• The Ballad of Buster Scruggs (Joel & Ethan Coen)
• Bisbee '17 (Robert Greene)
• Burning (Lee Chang-dong)
• Happy as Lazzaro (Alice Rohrwacher)
• Hereditary (Ari Aster)
• If Beale Street Could Talk (Barry Jenkins)
• Let the Sunshine In (Claire Denis)
• Roma (Alfonso Cuarón)
• Shoplifters (Koreeda Hirokazu)
• Zama (Lucrecia Martel)

2019 [Film Comment]

• Ash Is Purest White (Jia Zhangke)
• Atlantics (Mati Diop)
• End of the Century (Lucio Castro)
• The Irishman (Martin Scorsese)
• Pain and Glory (Pedro Almodóvar)
• Parasite (Bong Joon-ho)
• Portrait of a Lady on Fire (Céline Sciamma)
• The Souvenir (Joanna Hogg)
• 3 Faces (Jafar Panahi)
• Uncut Gems (Josh & Benny Safdie)

Decade [Film Comment]

1. The Tree of Life (2011, Terrence Malick)
2. Another Year (2010, Mike Leigh)
3. Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives (2010, Apichatpong Weerasethakul)
4. The Souvenir (2019, Joanna Hogg)
5. Boyhood (2014, Richard Linklater)
6. A Quiet Passion (2017, Terence Davies)
7. Beyond the Hills (2012, Cristian Mungiu)
8. Toni Erdmann (2016, Maren Ade)
9. Zama (2017, Lucrecia Martel)
10. By the Time It Gets Dark (2016, Anocha Suwichakornpong)

Nick Pinkerton Top Tens

All of these lists are by release year.

2007 [Indiewire]

• Black Book (Paul Verhoeven)
• Bug (William Friedkin)
• Death Proof (Quentin Tarantino)
• The Exterminating Angels (Jean-Claude Brisseau)
• Hot Fuzz (Edgar Wright)
• Margot at the Wedding (Noah Baumbach)
• Poison Friends (Emmanuel Bourdieu)
• The Wayward Cloud (Tsai Ming-liang)
• We Own the Night (James Gray)
• Youth Without Youth (Francis Ford Coppola)

2008 [Indiewire]

• I Can No Longer Hear the Guitar (Philippe Garrel)
• Boarding Gate (Olivier Assayas)
• The Duchess of Langeais (Jacques Rivette)
• The Foot Fist Way (Jody Hill)
• W. (Oliver Stone)
• La France (Serge Bozon)
• Shotgun Stories (Jeff Nichols)
• Definitely, Maybe (Adam Brooks)
• My Brother Is an Only Child (Daniele Luchetti)
• State Legislature (Frederick Wiseman)

2009 [Village Voice]

• Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans (Werner Herzog)
• Extract (Mike Judge)
• Import/Export (Ulrich Seidl)
• Orphan (Jaume Collet-Serra)
• Somers Town (Shane Meadows)
• 35 Shots of Rum (Claire Denis)
• Two Lovers (James Gray)
• Summer Hours (Olivier Assayas)
• A Perfect Getaway (David Twohy)
• Adventureland (Greg Mottola)

2010 [Village Voice]

• The Portuguese Nun (Eugène Green)
• Piranha 3D (Alexandre Aja)
• 45365 (Bill & Turner Ross)
• The City of Your Final Destination (James Ivory)
• Ghost Town (Zhao Dayong)
• The Temptation of St. Tony (Veiko Õunpuu)
• The Runaways (Floria Sigismondi)
• World on a Wire (Rainer Werner Fassbinder)
• Buried (Rodrigo Cortés)

2011 [LA Weekly]

• The Autobiography of Nicolae Ceauşescu (Andrei Ujică)
• The Descendants (Alexander Payne)
• Final Destination 5 (Steven Quale)
• The Future (Miranda July)
• The Tree of Life (Terrence Malick)
• The Princess of Montpensier (Bertrand Tavernier)
• Rise of the Planet of the Apes (Rupert Wyatt)
• Take Shelter (Jeff Nichols)
• La Pivellina (Tizza Covi & Rainer Frimmel)
• The Mill and the Cross (Lech Majewski)

2012 [Village Voice]

• Alps (Yorgos Lanthimos)
• Bernie (Richard Linklater)
• The Deep Blue Sea (Terence Davies)
• The Grey (Joe Carnahan)
• Haywire (Steven Soderbergh)
• Magic Mike (Steven Soderbergh)
• Moonrise Kingdom (Wes Anderson)
• Tabu (Miguel Gomes)
• Wanderlust (David Wain)
• Zero Dark Thirty (Kathryn Bigelow)

2013 [Unknown via CriticsTop10]

• To the Wonder (Terrence Malick)
• Bastards (Claire Denis)
• The Canyons (Paul Schrader)
• The Grandmaster (Wong Kar-wai)
• Inside Llewyn Davis (Joel & Ethan Coen)
• Leviathan (Lucien Castaing-Taylor & Véréna Paravel)
• Like Someone in Love (Abbas Kiarostami)
• Museum Hours (Jem Cohen)
• Paradise: Love (Ulrich Seidl)
• Prince Avalanche (David Gordon Green)
• The Wolf of Wall Street (Martin Scorsese)

2015 [Film Comment]

• Arabian Nights (Miguel Gomes)
• Blackhat (Michael Mann)
• Carol (Todd Haynes)
• Hard to Be a God (Aleksei German)
• Heaven Knows What (Josh & Benny Safdie)
• Inside Out (Pete Docter)
• Mad Max: Fury Road (George Miller)
• Magic Mike XXL (Gregory Jacobs)
• No Home Movie (Chantal Akerman)
• Timbuktu (Abderrahmane Sissako)

2016 [Film Comment]

• The Academy of Muses (José Luis Guerín)
• The Illinois Parables (Deborah Stratman)
• Knight of Cups (Terrence Malick)
• No Home Movie (Chantal Akerman)
• The Other Side (Roberto Minervini)
• The Shallows (Jaume Collet-Serra)
• Silence (Martin Scorsese)
• Sully (Clint Eastwood)
• Things to Come (Mia Hansen-Løve)
• 'Til Madness Do Us Part (Wang Bing)

2017 [Film Comment]

1. Twin Peaks: The Return (David Lynch)
2. Ex Libris: The New York Public Library (Frederick Wiseman)
3. Downsizing (Alexander Payne)
4. The Human Surge (Eduardo Williams)
5. By the Time It Gets Dark (Anocha Suwichakornpong)
6. Good Time (Josh & Benny Safdie)
7. All These Sleepless Nights (Michał Marczak)
8. mother! (Darren Aronofsky)
9. Logan Lucky (Steven Soderbergh)
10. Brawl in Cell Block 99 (S. Craig Zahler)

2018 [Film Comment]

• Araby (João Dumans & Affonso Uchôa)
• The Ballad of Buster Scruggs (Joel & Ethan Coen)
• Eight Hours Don't Make a Day (Rainer Werner Fassbinder)
• First Reformed (Paul Schrader)
• Hale County This Morning, This Evening (RaMell Ross)
• Let the Sunshine In (Claire Denis)
• The Mule (Clint Eastwood)
• The Other Side of the Wind (Orson Welles)
• Personal Problems (Bill Gunn)
• Ready Player One (Steven Spielberg)

2019 [Sight & Sound]

• Atlantics (Mati Diop)
• Asako I & II (Hamaguchi Ryūsuke)
• Diamantino (Gabriel Abrantes & Daniel Schmidt)
• A Hidden Life (Terrence Malick)
• La Flor (Mariano Llinás)
• The Irishman (Martin Scorsese)
• Martin Eden (Pietro Marcello)
• Once Upon a Time...in Hollywood (Quentin Tarantino)
• Peterloo (Mike Leigh)
• What You Gonna Do When the World's on Fire? (Roberto Minervini)

Kent Jones Top Tens

All of these lists are sourced from Film Comment, except as noted, and are by (NYC) premiere year.

1996

1. Dead Man (Jim Jarmusch)
   Goodbye South, Goodbye (Hou Hsiao-hsien)
   Thieves (André Téchiné)
   Crash (David Cronenberg)
2. My Sex Life...or How I Got Into an Argument (Arnaud Desplechin)
   My Favorite Season (André Téchiné)
   The Phantom Heart (Philippe Garrel)
   Love's Debris (Werner Schroeter)
   Irma Vep (Olivier Assayas)
   Vive L'Amour (Tsai Ming-liang)
3. Le Garçu (Maurice Pialat)
   A Moment of Innocence (Mohsen Makhmalbaf)
   Kardiogramma (Darezhan Omirbayev)
   A Portrait of Arshile (Atom Egoyan)

1997

1. Taste of Cherry (Abbas Kiarostami)
   Kundun (Martin Scorsese)
   The Apostle (Robert Duvall)
2. The Sweet Hereafter/Sarabande (Atom Egoyan)
   Ulee's Gold (Victor Nuñez)
   From Today Until Tomorrow (Jean-Marie Straub & Danièle Huillet)/Seventh Heaven (Benoît Jacquot)
   Public Housing (Frederick Wiseman)
   The River (Tsai Ming-liang)
   Mother and Son (Alexander Sokurov)
   Affliction (Paul Schrader)
   Triste (Nathaniel Dorsky)/The Present (Robert Frank)/If You Stand With Your Back to the Slowing of the Speed of Light in Water (Julie Murray)
3. L.A. Confidential (Curtis Hanson)/The Rainmaker (Francis Ford Coppola)

1998

1. The Thin Red Line (Terrence Malick)
2. Khrustalyov, My Car! (Aleksei German)
3. Flowers of Shanghai (Hou Hsiao-hsien)
4. Variations (Nathaniel Dorsky)
5. Late August, Early September (Olivier Assayas)
6. Dr. Akagi (Imamura Shōhei)
7. Henry Fool (Hal Hartley)
8. Same Old Song (Alain Resnais)
9. A Soldier's Daughter Never Cries (James Ivory)
10. Rushmore (Wes Anderson)

1999 [alphabetical except for first film]

• Eyes Wide Shut (Stanley Kubrick)
• American Movie (Chris Smith)
• Beau Travail (Claire Denis)
• Belfast, Maine (Frederick Wiseman)
• Bringing Out the Dead (Martin Scorsese)
• Buena Vista Social Club (Wim Wenders)/Negative Space (Chris Petit)/Frontline: "Snitch" (Ofra Bikel)
• eXisTenZ (David Cronenberg)
• Ghost Dog: The Way of the Samurai (Jim Jarmusch)
• The Letter (Manoel de Oliveira)/Sicilia! (Jean-Marie Straub & Danièle Huillet)
• Rosetta (Jean-Pierre & Luc Dardenne)
• Topsy-Turvy (Mike Leigh)
• The Wind Will Carry Us (Abbas Kiarostami)

2000

1. The House of Mirth (Terence Davies)
2. Origins of the 21st Century (Jean-Luc Godard)
3. Arbor Vitae (Nathaniel Dorsky)
4. Gohatto (Nagisa Oshima)
5. Werckmeister Harmonies (Tarr Béla and Hranitzky Ágnes)
6. Platform (Jia Zhangke)
7. In the Mood for Love (Wong Kar-wai)
8. Almost Famous (Cameron Crowe)
9. Mysterious Object at Noon (Apichatpong Weerasethakul)
10. Tears of the Black Tiger (Wisit Sasanatieng)

2001

1. The Royal Tenenbaums (Wes Anderson)
2. Waking Life (Richard Linklater)
3. Domestic Violence (Frederick Wiseman)
4. Loin (André Téchiné)
5. I'm Going Home (Manoel de Oliveira)
6. Mulholland Drive (David Lynch)
7. Micro Garden (Stan Brakhage)
8. Ghost World (Terry Zwigoff)
9. Moulin Rouge! (Baz Luhrmann)
10. The Man Who Wasn't There (Joel & Ethan Coen)

2002

• POV: "Afghanistan Year 1380" (Alberto Vendemmiati & Fabrizio Lazzaretti)
• Blissfully Yours (Apichatpong Weerasethakul)
• demonlover (Olivier Assayas)
• Friday Night (Claire Denis)
• Gangs of New York (Martin Scorsese)
• The Son (Jean-Pierre & Luc Dardenne)
• Spirited Away (Miyazaki Hayao)
• Springtime in a Small Town (Tian Zhuangzhuang)
• Talk to Her (Pedro Almodóvar)
• Unknown Pleasures (Jia Zhangke)

2003

1. Gambling, Gods and LSD (Peter Mettler)
2. Mystic River (Clint Eastwood)
3. Goodbye, Dragon Inn (Tsai Ming-liang)
4. Jealousy Is My Middle Name (Park Chan-ok)
5. Ford Transit (Hany Abu-Assad)
6. The Fog of War (Errol Morris)
7. Le Monde vivant (Eugène Green)
8. Lost in Translation (Sofia Coppola)
9. A Mighty Wind (Christopher Guest)
10. Domestic Violence 2 (Frederick Wiseman)

2004

1. The Big Red One: The Reconstruction (Samuel Fuller)
   The Holy Girl (Lucrecia Martel)
   Saraband (Ingmar Bergman)
2. The Aviator (Martin Scorsese)
   Before Sunset (Richard Linklater)
   Clean (Olivier Assayas)
3. The Garden (Frederick Wiseman)
   Kings and Queen (Arnaud Desplechin)
   Million Dollar Baby (Clint Eastwood)
   Pin Boy (Ana Poliak)
   Sideways (Alexander Payne)
   Spartan (David Mamet)
   Triple Agent (Eric Rohmer)

2005

1. L'Intrus (Claire Denis)
2. Three Times (Hou Hsiao-hsien)
3. The New World (Terrence Malick)
4. Regular Lovers (Philippe Garrel)
5. No Direction Home (Martin Scorsese)
6. A Visit to the Louvre (Jean-Marie Straub & Danièle Huillet)
7. A History of Violence (David Cronenberg)
8. Tale of Cinema (Hong Sang-soo)
9. L'Enfant (Jean-Pierre & Luc Dardenne)
10. Panorama Ephemera (Rick Prelinger)

2006

1. Army of Shadows (Jean-Pierre Melville)
2. The Departed (Martin Scorsese)
3. Flags of Our Fathers/Letters from Iwo Jima (Clint Eastwood)
4. When the Levees Broke (Spike Leigh)
5. A Prairie Home Companion (Robert Altman)
6. A Scanner Darkly (Richard Linklater)
7. Woman on the Beach (Hong Sang-soo)
8. Neil Young: Heart of Gold (Jonathan Demme)
9. The Go Master (Tian Zhuangzhuang)
10. Fast Food Nation (Richard Linklater)

2007

1. Zodiac (David Fincher)
2. Black Book (Paul Verhoeven)
3. There Will Be Blood (Paul Thomas Anderson)
4. Flight of the Red Balloon (Hou Hsiao-hsien)
5. The Darjeeling Limited (Wes Anderson)
6. The Romance of Astrée and Céladon (Éric Rohmer)
7. These Encounters of Theirs (Jean-Marie Straub & Danièle Huillet)
8. No Country for Old Men (Joel & Ethan Coen)
9. Retribution (Kurosawa Kiyoshi)
10. I'm Not There (Todd Haynes)

2008

1. The Headless Woman (Lucrecia Martel)
   RR (James Benning)
   Summer Hours (Olivier Assayas)
2. A Christmas Tale (Arnaud Desplechin)
   Tokyo Sonata (Kurosawa Kiyoshi)
   The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (David Fincher)
   Me and Orson Welles (Richard Linklater)
   Generation Kill (Susanna White and Simon Cellan Jones)
   The Frontier of Dawn (Philippe Garrel)/Chouga (Darezhan Omirbaev)
3. Wendy and Lucy (Kelly Reichardt)/Be Kind Rewind (Michel Gondry)
   35 Shots of Rum (Claire Denis)
   Wall•E (Andrew Stanton)

2009

1. White Material (Claire Denis)
2. Everyone Else (Maren Ade)
3. A Serious Man (Joel & Ethan Coen)
4. Fantastic Mr. Fox (Wes Anderson)
5. The Limits of Control (Jim Jarmusch)
6. A Prophet (Jacques Audiard)
7. Wild Grass (Alain Resnais)
8. Bright Star (Jane Campion)
9. Pandora's Box (Yeşim Ustaoǧlu)
10. Moloch Tropical (Raoul Peck)

Decade

1. Zodiac (2007, David Fincher)
2. Three Times (2005, Hou Hsiao-hsien)
3. L'Intrus (2004, Claire Denis)
4. The Royal Tenenbaums (2001, Wes Anderson)
5. The Garden (2005, Frederick Wiseman)
6. The Son (2002, Jean-Pierre & Luc Dardenne)
7. RR (2007, James Benning)
8. Summer Hours (2008, Olivier Assayas)
9. A Christmas Tale (2008, Arnaud Desplechin)
10. The Headless Woman (2008, Lucrecia Martel)

2010

1. Carlos (Olivier Assayas)
   The Social Network (David Fincher)
2. The Autobiography of Nicolae Ceauşescu (Andrei Ujică)
   Boxing Gym (Frederick Wiseman)
3. Another Year (Mike Leigh)
   Aurora (Cristi Puiu)
   Film Socialisme (Jean-Luc Godard)
   Shutter Island (Martin Scorsese)
   True Grit (Joel & Ethan Coen)
   Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives (Apichatpong Weerasethakul)

2011

• The Descendants (Alexander Payne)
• The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo (David Fincher)
• Hugo/George Harrison: Living in the Material World (Martin Scorsese)
• The Karski Report (Claude Lanzmann)
• The Kid With a Bike (Jean-Pierre & Luc Dardenne)
• Midnight in Paris (Woody Allen)
• Mildred Pierce (Todd Haynes)
• Seeking the Monkey King (Ken Jacobs)
• The Tree of Life (Terrence Malick)
• Words of Mercury (Jerome Hiler)

2012

• Beasts of the Southern Wild (Benh Zeitlin)
• Bernie (Richard Linklater)
• Haywire (Steven Soderbergh)
• Holy Motors (Leos Carax)
• In the Stone House (Jerome Hiler)
• Lincoln (Steven Spielberg)
• The Master (Paul Thomas Anderson)
• Moonrise Kingdom (Wes Anderson)
• small roads (James Benning)
• Something in the Air (Olivier Assayas)

2013 [alphabetical except for first two films]

• The Last of the Unjust (Claude Lanzmann)
• Song + Spring (Nathaniel Dorsky)
• Before Midnight (Richard Linklater)
• Computer Chess (Andrew Bujalski)
• The End of Time (Peter Mettler)
• Inside Llewyn Davis (Joel & Ethan Coen)
• Nebraska (Alexander Payne)
• A Touch of Sin (Jia Zhangke)
• The Wind Rises (Miyazaki Hayao)
• The Wolf of Wall Street (Martin Scorsese)

2014

• Boyhood (Richard Linklater)
• Clouds of Sils Maria (Olivier Assayas)
• Eden (Mia Hansen-Løve)
• Gone Girl (David Fincher)
• Goodbye to Language (Jean-Luc Godard)
• The Grand Budapest Hotel (Wes Anderson)
• Horse Money (Pedro Costa)
• Inherent Vice (Paul Thomas Anderson)
• Mr. Turner (Mike Leigh)
• National Gallery (Frederick Wiseman)

2015

• The Assassin (Hou Hsiao-hsien)
• Bridge of Spies (Steven Spielberg)
• Brooklyn (John Crowley)
• Carol (Todd Haynes)
• Heart of a Dog (Laurie Anderson)
• Junun (Paul Thomas Anderson)
• Mistress America (Noah Baumbach)
• My Golden Days (Arnaud Desplechin)
• No Home Movie (Chantal Akerman)
• A Poem Is a Naked Person (Les Blank)

2016 [alphabetical except for first film]

• Silence (Martin Scorsese)
• 13th (Ava DuVernay)
• Everybody Wants Some!! (Richard Linklater)
• I Am Not Your Negro (Raoul Peck)
• The Lost City of Z (James Gray)
• Manchester by the Sea (Kenneth Lonergan)
• Paterson (Jim Jarmusch)
• Personal Shopper (Olivier Assayas)
• Toni Erdmann (Maren Ade)
• Whose Country? (Mohamed Siam)

2019 [FILO, possibly unranked or inaccurate ranking]

1. I Heard You Paint Houses (Martin Scorsese)
2. Ad Astra (James Gray)
3. Apollo 11 (Todd Douglas Miller)
4. The Dead Don't Die (Jim Jarmusch)
5. Oh Mercy! (Arnaud Desplechin)
6. Pain and Glory (Pedro Almodóvar)
7. Conjuring the Rolling Thunder Re-vue (Martin Scorsese)
8. The Souvenir (Joanna Hogg)
9. Vitalina Varela (Pedro Costa)
10. Young Ahmed (Jean-Pierre & Luc Dardenne)

Eric Hynes Top Ten Lists

All of these lists are by NYC release year.

2008 [IndieWire]

1. Flight of the Red Balloon (Hou Hsiao-hsien)
2. Zidane: A 21st Century Portrait (Douglas Gordon & Philippe Parreno)
3. Synecdoche, New York (Charlie Kaufman)
4. A Christmas Tale (Arnaud Desplechin)
5. Happy-Go-Lucky (Mike Leigh)
6. Waltz With Bashir (Ari Folman)
7. Ballast (Lance Hammer)
8. Hunger (Steve McQueen)
9. Man on Wire (James Marsh)
10. My Winnipeg (Guy Maddin)

2009 [IndieWire]

1. Summer Hours (Olivier Assayas)
2. The Headless Woman (Lucrecia Martel)
3. Tulpan (Sergey Dvortsevoy)
4. Inglourious Basterds (Quentin Tarantino)
5. A Serious Man (Joel & Ethan Coen)
6. Duplicity (Tony Gilroy)
7. Two Lovers (James Gray)
8. 35 Shots of Rum (Claire Denis)
9. Fantastic Mr. Fox (Wes Anderson)
10. Public Enemies (Michael Mann)

Decade [IndieWire]

1. In the Mood for Love (2000, Wong Kar-wai)
2. In Praise of Love (2001, Jean-Luc Godard)
3. Flight of the Red Balloon (2007, Hou Hsiao-hsien)
4. Mulholland Drive (2001, David Lynch)
5. The New World (2005, Terrence Malick)
6. Kings and Queen (2004, Arnaud Desplechin)
7. There Will Be Blood (2007, Paul Thomas Anderson)
8. A.I. Artificial Intelligence (2001, Steven Spielberg)
9. 2046 (2004, Wong Kar-wai)
10. Summer Hours (2008, Olivier Assayas)

2010 [IndieWire]

1. Everyone Else (Maren Ade)
2. Carlos (Olivier Assayas)
3. I Am Love (Luca Guadagnino)
4. Mother (Bong Joon-ho)
5. Another Year (Mike Leigh)
6. White Material (Claire Denis)
7. Secret Sunshine (Lee Chang-dong)
8. Alamar (Pedro González-Rubio)
9. Easy A (Will Gluck)
10. The Social Network (David Fincher)

2011 [LA Weekly]

1. The Tree of Life (Terrence Malick)
2. Take Shelter (Jeff Nichols)
3. The Interrupters (Steve James)
4. Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives (Apichatpong Weerasethakul)
5. The Autobiography of Nicolae Ceauşescu (Andrei Ujică)
6. A Dangerous Method (David Cronenberg)
7. The Arbor (Clio Barnard)
8. Weekend (Andrew Haigh)
9. A Separation (Asghar Farhadi)
10. Tuesday, After Christmas (Radu Muntean)

2012 [IndieWire]

1. Holy Motors (Leos Carax)
2. This Is Not a Film (Jafar Panahi & Mojtaba Mirtahmasb)
3. Tabu (Miguel Gomes)
4. The Deep Blue Sea (Terence Davies)
5. The Kid With a Bike (Jean-Pierre & Luc Dardenne)
6. Goodbye First Love (Mia Hansen-Løve)
7. Keep the Lights On (Ira Sachs)
8. The Master (Paul Thomas Anderson)
9. Only the Young (Jason Tippet & Elizabeth Mims)
10. Almayer's Folly (Chantal Akerman)

2013 [Village Voice]

1. To the Wonder (Terrence Malick)
2. Post Tenebras Lux (Carlos Reygadas)
3. The Act of Killing (Joshua Oppenheimer)
4. Inside Llewyn Davis (Joel & Ethan Coen)
5. Before Midnight (Richard Linklater)
6. Like Someone in Love (Abbas Kiarostami)
7. Stories We Tell (Sarah Polley)
8. The Square (Jehane Noujaim)
9. Gravity (Alfonso Cuarón)
10. Something in the Air (Olivier Assayas)

2014 [Unknown]

1. Boyhood (Richard Linklater)
2. Love Is Strange (Ira Sachs)
3. Goodbye to Language (Jean-Luc Godard)
4. The Overnighters (Jesse Moss)
5. 20,000 Days on Earth (Iain Forsyth & Jane Pollard)
6. The Immigrant (James Gray)
7. Actress (Robert Greene)
8. National Gallery (Frederick Wiseman)
9. Manakamana (Stephanie Spray & Pacho Velez)
10. Ida (Paweł Pawlikowski)

2015 [Film Comment]

1. The Look of Silence (Joshua Oppenheimer)
2. Carol (Todd Haynes)
3. In Jackson Heights (Frederick Wiseman)
4. Arabian Nights (Miguel Gomes)
5. Of Men and War (Laurent Bécue-Renard)
6. Clouds of Sils Maria (Olivier Assayas)
7. Phoenix (Christian Petzold)
8. We Come as Friends (Hubert Sauper)
9. The Mend (John Magary)
10. Anomalisa (Charlie Kaufman & Duke Johnson)

2016 [IndieWire]

1. Cameraperson (Kirsten Johnson)
2. Toni Erdmann (Maren Ade)
3. Manchester by the Sea (Kenneth Lonergan)
4. Paterson (Jim Jarmusch)
5. Elle (Paul Verhoeven)
6. Fire at Sea (Gianfranco Rosi)
7. Moonlight (Barry Jenkins)
8. The Fits (Anna Rose Holmer)
9. Under the Sun (Vitaly Mansky)
10. The Other Side (Roberto Minervini)

2017 [Village Voice]

1. The Work (Jairus McLeary and Gethin Aldous)
2. Ex Libris—The New York Public Library (Frederick Wiseman)
3. Nocturama (Bertrand Bonello)
4. Good Time (Josh & Benny Safdie)
5. Phantom Thread (Paul Thomas Anderson)
6. Mudbound (Dee Rees)
7. Personal Shopper (Olivier Assayas)
8. A Quiet Passion (Terence Davies)
9. Strong Island (Yance Ford)
10. All These Sleepless Nights (Michał Marczak)

2018 [Film Comment]

1. Hale County This Morning, This Evening (RaMell Ross)
2. Zama (Lucrecia Martel)
3. Burning (Lee Chang-dong)
4. Happy as Lazzaro (Alice Rohrwacher)
5. Dead Souls (Wang Bing)
6. Roma (Alfonso Cuarón)
7. Infinite Football (Corneliu Porumboiu)
8. First Reformed (Paul Schrader)
9. Western (Valeska Grisebach)
10. Of Fathers and Sons (Talal Derki)

2019 [Sight & Sound]

1. Our Time (Carlos Reygadas)
2. The Irishman (Martin Scorsese)
3. Peterloo (Mike Leigh)
4. Uncut Gems (Josh & Benny Safdie)
5. American Factory (Steven Bognar & Julia Reichert)
6. Atlantics (Mati Diop)
7. The Souvenir (Joanna Hogg)
8. The Hottest August (Brett Story)
9. Clemency (Chinonye Chukwu)
10. High Life (Claire Denis)

Decade [Film Comment]

1. The Act of Killing/The Look of Silence (2012/2014, Joshua Oppenheimer)
2. Everyone Else (2009, Maren Ade)
3. Holy Motors (2012, Leos Carax)
4. The Tree of Life (2011, Terrence Malick)
5. Cameraperson (2016, Kirsten Johnson)
6. Inside Llewyn Davis (2013, Joel & Ethan Coen)
7. Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives (2010, Apichatpong Weerasethakul)
8. Dead Souls (2018, Wang Bing)
9. The Wolf of Wall Street (2013, Martin Scorsese)
10. Carlos (2010, Olivier Assayas)

2020 [Screen Slate]

1. Time (Garrett Bradley)
2. Collective (Alexander Nanau)
3. Martin Eden (Pietro Marcello)
4. Vitalina Varela (Pedro Costa)
5. Bloody Nose, Empty Pockets (Bill & Turner Ross)
6. First Cow (Kelly Reichardt)
7. Bacurau (Kleber Mendonça Filho & Juliano Dornelles)
8. Mayor (David Osit)
9. Dick Johnson Is Dead (Kirsten Johnson)
10. Sound of Metal (Darius Marder)

2021 [Film Comment]

1. The Viewing Booth (Ra'anan Alexandrowicz)
2. What Do We See When We Look at the Sky? (Alexandre Koberidze)
3. This Is Not a Burial, It's a Resurrection (Lemohang Jeremiah Mosese)
4. Procession (Robert Greene)
5. Drive My Car (Hamaguchi Ryusuke)
6. Memoria (Apichatpong Weerasethakul)
7. Annette (Leos Carax)
8. Downstream to Kinshasa (Dieudo Hamadi)
9. Preparations to Be Together for an Unknown Period of Time (Horvát Lili)
10. Notturno (Gianfranco Rosi)

2022 [Sight & Sound]

1. The Fabelmans (Steven Spielberg)
2. Benediction (Terence Davies)
3. Dos Estaciones (Juan Pablo González)
4. All That Breathes (Shaunak Sen)
5. The Eternal Daughter (Joanna Hogg)
6. Murina (Antoneta Alamat Kusijanović)
7. Both Sides of the Blade (Claire Denis)
8. Aftersun (Charlotte Wells)
9. EO (Jerzy Skolimowski)
10. Jackass Forever (Jeff Tremaine)

2023 [Film Comment]

1. Our Body (Claire Simon)
2. May December (Todd Haynes)
3. All of Us Strangers (Andrew Haigh)
4. Poor Things (Yorgos Lanthimos)
5. The Zone of Interest (Jonathan Glazer)
6. Menus-Plaisirs—Les Troisgros (Frederick Wiseman)
7. A Still Small Voice (Luke Lorentzen)
8. The Taste of Things (Trần Anh Hùng)
9. De Humani Corporis Fabrica (Véréna Paravel & Lucien Castaing-Taylor)
10. Beau Is Afraid (Ari Aster)