Solely for screenwriting? Toughie.

Kane.
Shawshank.
Butch Cassidy.
A Few Good Men.
Rashomon.
Groundhog Day.
Usual Suspects.
City Hall.
Ronin.
The Big Chill.



A list no doubt colored by my own taste in movies and the fact that I don't like many movies made before I was born.

Lethal Weapon
Pretty Woman
Jerry Maquire
Four Weddings and Funeral
Casablanca
Alien
Singin' in the Rain
Liar Liar
The Incredibles
Fargo

I tried to include several genres, but I could do separate top 10s for Comedy, RomCom, and Drama.

From a screenwriting perspective:

Citizen Kane
Chinatown
The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou
Superman (1978)
An American Werewolf in London
The Empire Strikes Back
Blade Runner
The Departed
Ghostbusters
The Big Lebowski

It's hard to quantify what a must-see movie is. There are many reasons someone would choose one film over another. If it's to learn about complex film structure, a film like Memento would definitely be on that list. And yet, I wouldn't include it in my top 10.

But I can say my favorite ten films in no particular order are:

1. Seven Samurai
2. The Godfather 1 & 2
3. Lord of the Rings
4. Casablanca
5. Yojimbo
6. Braveheart
7. The Dark Knight
8. Raiders of the Lost Ark
9. Star Wars/Empire/Return
10. The Matrix

I recognize that a few of these may not be groundbreaking in terms of the art of filmmaking but they all resonated with me personally.

If we're talking about filmmaking:

1. 2001
2. Citizen Kane
3. Clockwork Orange
4. Rashomon
5. Psycho
6. Chinatown
7. Taxi Driver
8. Lawrence of Arabia
9. Close Encounters
10. The Godfather 1& 2

And this list of course can go on and on...

Die Hard
First Blood
Fight Club
Fantastic Mr. Fox
Last of the Mohicans
Karate Kid
Raiders of the Lost Ark
E.T.
There Will Be Blood
Rocky

Patton
Three Days of the Condor
The Day of the Jackal
Miller's Crossing
Barton Fink
Collateral
Rosencranz and Guildenstern are Dead
The Age of Innocence
Finding Neverland
The Last Boy Scout

Cinema Paradiso
You Can Count on Me
Raiders of the Lost Ark
The Hunt for Red October
Shawshank Redemption
E.T.
Chinatown
L.A. Confidential
Blade Runner
Shakespeare in Love
Fletch
Midnight in Paris
American Beauty
A Few Good Men
The Departed
48 Hours
Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon
The Secret in Their Eyes

Fletch probably doesn't belong on this list but Chevy was really at the top of his game on this one so I'll put it in the vault.

Red October is on there because every time it showed on TNT I had to watch it.

I would recommend the Secret in their Eyes for those looking for a thrill with a solid romantic thread. I never read the screenplay, but the movie is mapped in a solid manner that I believe deserves study.

Impossible to narrow it down to 10.
500 is more to my taste. So I'll pass.

The Spanish Prisoner
The King of Comedy
Joe vs. the Volcano
Brazil
Ikiru
Whisper of the Heart
Rushmore
The Third Man
Nashville
Chungking Express


It's not that I consider these the "greatest movies ever made" but I can definitely say they've all affected me on a deeply personal level and inspired my work in one way or another, for better or worse.

Sunset Blvd.
Memento
Love Actually
Raiders of the Lost Ark
Die Hard
Pulp Fiction
Seven
Lethal Weapon
Casablanca
Shaun of the Dead

Mildred Pierce
The Bad Seed
The Deliberate Stranger
Garde à vue
Kill Bill
Sunset Blvd
Ghostbusters
Testament
Notorious
Dishonored

Nice to see such a wide variety of films on everyone's lists.

@Jeffrey - Joe vs. the Volcano is such an underrated film. I'm glad to see you included it.

Here are my ten in no particular order:

Persona
The Bridge On The River Kwai
Vertigo
Amarcord
The Apartment
Out Of Sight
Finding Nemo
The Lives of Others
The Sting
Sideways

Scott, how about your ten?

@Teddy: My 10? Thinking primarily about what we can learn from a screenwriting standpoint? How about these:

The Shawshank Redemption: Dual Protagonists & multiple time ellipses

Little Miss Sunshine: Multiple Protagonists & I want a specialty / indie movie on the list

The Silence of the Lambs: Classic Protagonist psychological journey & unique Mentor (Lecter)

The Apartment: Perfect movie

Der Himmel über Berlin (Wings of Desire): Powerful example of Protagonist want and need

Groundhog Day: Stellar execution of a terrific high concept

Die Hard: Paradigm for all contemporary action movies

Up: A lyrical ode to metamorphosis as resurrection

Alien: Because it scared the shit out of me when I first saw it & W. Hill's haiku style version of the script

Network: One of the greatest satires of all time & Chayefsky's prophetic voice through dialogue

Like the rest of you, I could suggest dozens and dozens more. In fact, I'm going to cheat and add one more specifically tied to spec scripts:

Butch Cassidy & the Sundance Kid: Anti-heroes, chase movie, and a project that ushered in the modern era of spec scripts (thanks W. Goldman).

BTW, great lists, everyone. Such a broad diversity of movies. All of them worthy of screening and analyzing.

These titles remind me of one unalterable fact: I love movies!

Hell, yes. Joe Vs. The Volcano, seconded.

I was so tempted to put Butch & Sundance on my list.

Capturing the Friedmans - a documentary structured like Greek tragedy

My Neighbor Totoro - a lovely film that is free of villains

Bottle Rocket - delicate blend of tones

Departures - gentle morbid humor with an incredibly moving final reel

Do the Right Thing - an ensemble pic that truly begs for empathy

City Lights - one of the greatest endings ever executed

Eat Drink Man Woman - great characterization elevates the film from the genre of melodrama/farce into something much more human, while adhering strictly to the structures

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind - this one manages to stay coherent amidst layers upon layers of zany contrivances

The Enigma of Kaspar Hauser - so odd and so beautiful!

Annie Hall - neurosis has never been so dramatized

Star Wars
Raiders of the Lost Ark
The Matrix
Aliens
The Philadelphia Story
Patton
North by Northwest
L.A. Confidential
Rear Window
The Thing

Purely a product of how I was feeling when I wrote that just now. And that list could change every 10 minutes.

This is not necessarily a ten films for any screenwriter list, so much as ten films that have made me who I am and that you'd want to watch to understand/work with me.


1) Kieslowski's Trois Couleurs (I I had to recommend one of the three, it'd be Bleu - though I personally prefer Rouge, Bleu stands better on it's own.

2) Blade Runner

3) The Manchurian Candidate (original, of course)

4) Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf

5) The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension!

6) What's Eating Gilbert Grape

7) The Pillow Book

8) Strangers on a Train

9) Angel at my Table

10) A Raisin in the Sun


Though, my goodness, that leaves out so much!

The Matrix
Empire Strikes Back
Big Trouble In Little China
Raiders of the Lost Ark
Snatch
Fist of Fury
Boondock Saints
Die Hard
The Big Lebowski
Gangs of New York
The Prestige

I know that's eleven, but it really hurt to cut the other 20 or so from my "Top 10" list.

I'm new to this community, still just beginning to get my feet wet, but I thought I'd add my two cents.

Two 2010 releases first, thinking if you want to know screenplays, you need to know what's succeeded recently:
1. The Social Network
2. Inception

Then, a few which made several lists:
3. Citizen Kane
4. Chinatown
5. The Shawshank Redemption
6. Die Hard
7. Back to the Future

And a few more for your consideration:
8. Tootsie
9. Toy Story (1, 2, or 3 actually)
10. My Cousin Vinny