David Whitehead Presents:
David Whitehead introduces the Sight & Sound Top Ten from 2002 and reflects on what it has to offer for the modern cinema goer. 2002 Sight and Sound Top Ten 1) Citizen Kane (1941) 2) Vertigo (1958) 3) La Regle du jeu (1939) 4) The Godfather & The Godfather Part II (1972 & 1974) 5) Tokyo Story (1953) 6) 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) =7) Battleship Potemkin (1925) =7) Sunrise (1927) 9) 8 ½ (1963) 10) Singin’ in the Rain (1952) This summer, something
momentous is happening in the world of film. For the first time in ten years Sight and Sound Magazine will publish the results of its critics' poll otherwise known as The Ten Greatest Films of All Time. The first Sight & Sound poll took place in 1952, when the world’s leading critics were asked to compile a list of the best films ever made. Bicycle Thieves (1948) by Italian director Vittorio De Sica was declared the greatest of all. The magazine has repeated the poll every ten years
since and each time Citizen Kane has taken top spot. For 50 years Sight and Sound has told the world that Orson Welles’ directorial debut is the finest film ever produced. The 2002 poll was the biggest yet with 145 critics, writers and academics from across the world contributing. Citizen Kane beat Alfred Hitchcock’s Vertigo by just five votes. Film aficionados everywhere are eagerly awaiting the 2012 Top Ten and the possibility of a new number one. This is one movie list which has
real impact.
10. Singin’ in the Rain (1952)
watch.
But beyond the headlines and history books, is the Sight and Sound Top Ten - which currently includes nothing produced after 1974 - relevant to ordinary film fans? Is it a must-see list or just an intellectual curiosity? Over the next few months we’re going to look at the 2002 Top Ten and and see what it has to offer a modern audience.
The only musical and perhaps the most popular film on the list. Generation after generation have fallen in love with Gene Kelly and Stanley Donen’s feel-good classic and deservedly so.
For all its brilliance Singin’ in the Rain is far from the perfect movie and regularly feels like a collection of scenes rather than a coherent whole. Fortunately, any flaws are completely overridden by the pure genius of its lead actor, choreographer and co-director, Gene Kelly.
We begin with the first four films on the list.
The script about two rival movie stars trying to survive the move to talking pictures superbly captures the comic reality of that famously difficult transition. Combined with several of the 20th Century’s most iconic musical numbers, it’s a joyous
Verdict: Woody Allen once said that Singin’ in the Rain would be as fresh in 500 years as it was on the day it was released. He might just be right.