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1991 Top Ten List

Barton Fink (Joel Coen)

The Commitments (Alan Parker)

Homicide (David Mamet)

The Rapture (Michael Tolkin)

The Lovers on the Bridge (Leos Carax)

Delicatessen (Jeunet & Caro)

Raise the Red Lantern (Zhang Yimou)

Thelma & Louise (Ridley Scott)

La Belle Noiseuse (Jacques Rivette)

The Double Life of Veronique (Krzysztof Kieslowski)

Additional 1991 Films By Rating

Van Gogh (Maurice Pialat)

Proof (Jocelyn Moorhouse)

Delusion (Carl Colpaert)

Madonna: Truth or Dare (Alek Keshishian)

Naked Lunch (David Cronenberg)

My Own Private Idaho (Gus Van Sant)

Poison (Todd Haynes)

35 Up (Michael Apted)

Paris Awakens (Olivier Assayas)

Cape Fear (Martin Scorsese)

Terminator 2: Judgment Day (James Cameron)

Night on Earth (Jim Jarmusch)

The Addams Family (Barry Sonnenfeld)

Jag Mandir (Werner Herzog)

The Silence of the Lambs (Jonathan Demme)

The Fisher King (Terry Gilliam)

The Inland Sea (Lucille Carra)

Beauty and the Beast (Gary Trousdale & Kirk Wise)

Boyz n the Hood (John Singleton)

Point Break (Kathryn Bigelow)

JFK (Oliver Stone)

L.A. Story (Mick Jackson)

Once a Thief (John Woo)

A Brighter Summer Day (Edward Yang)

Until the End of the World (Wim Wenders)

Bill & Ted's Bogus Journey (Pete Hewitt)

Highway 61 (Bruce McDonald)

Father of the Bride (Charles Shyer)

The Last Boy Scout (Tony Scott)

Sólo con tu pareja (Alfonso Cuarón)

Fried Green Tomatoes (Jon Avnet)

For archival purposes, I file everything by the year it had its world premiere. Many of these films will have been commercially released in the U.S. a year or two later, so my lists won’t always match up with other folks’ lists.

Ratings are on a needlessly precise 100-point scale.

Films I haven’t yet rated on that scale are marked with if I currently think they belong in my top ten. These films are subject to being shifted around or yanked altogether at any moment, after I revisit them and they get a numeral. (Lists from prior to about 1988 are especially suspect, as I compiled them long ago from memories that were in many cases already pretty dusty.)

Seen but currently unrated (and not presumptively among my top 10): The Adjuster (Egoyan); At Play in the Fields of the Lord (Babenco); Backdraft (Howard); Billy Bathgate (Benton); Black Robe (Beresford); A Brief History of Time (Morris); Bugsy (Levinson); Career Opportunities (Gordon); City of Hope (Sayles); City Slickers (Underwood); Class Action (Apted); Close My Eyes (Poliakoff); Close to Eden (Mikhalkov); Danzón (Novaro); Daughters of the Dust (Dash); Dead Again (Branagh); Defending Your Life (Brooks); Doc Hollywood (Caton-Jones); The Doctor (Haines); Dogfight (Savoca); The Doors (Stone); Especially on Sunday (Tornatore/Bertolucci/Tullio Giordana); Europa (Von Trier); Eve of Destruction (Gibbins); The Five Heartbeats (Townsend); Flight of the Intruder (Milius); Flirting (Duigan); For the Boys (Rydell); Frankie and Johnny (Marshall); Garden of Scorpions (Kovalov); Germany Year 90 Nine Zero (Godard); Grand Canyon (Kasdan); Guilty by Suspicion (Winkler); Hangin' With the Homeboys (Vasquez); The Hard Way (Badham); He Said, She Said (Kwapis & Silver); Hear My Song (Chelsom); Hearts of Darkness: A Filmmaker's Apocalypse (Bahr & Hickenlooper); High Heels (Almodóvar); Highway Patrolman (A. Cox); Hook (Spielberg); Hot Shots! (Abrahams); The Hours and Times (Münch); Hudson Hawk (Lehmann); Impromptu (Lapine); Jacquot de Nantes (Varda); Jungle Fever (Lee); Kafka (Soderbergh); King Ralph (Ward); Late for Dinner (Richter); Let Him Have It (Medak); Life on a String (Chen); Little Man Tate (Foster); Lovers (Aranda); The Man in the Moon (Mulligan); Mediterraneo (Salvatores); Meet the Applegates (Lehmann); Meeting Venus (Szabó); Men of Respect (Reilly); Mississippi Masala (Nair); Mortal Thoughts (Rudolph); My Girl (Zieff); The Naked Gun 2½: The Smell of Fear (Zucker); Not Without My Daughter (Gilbert); The Object of Beauty (Lindsay-Hogg); Once Around (Hallström); Once Upon a Time in China (Tsui); Other People's Money (Jewison); Pastime (Armstrong); The Prince of Tides (Streisand); Prospero's Books (Greenaway); A Rage in Harlem (Duke); Rambling Rose (Coolidge); Rhapsody in August (Kurosawa); Riff-Raff (Loach); The Rocketeer (Johnston); Rush (Zanuck); Scenes From a Mall (Mazursky); The Search for Signs of Inteligint Life in the Universe (Bailey); Sex, Drugs, Rock & Roll (McNaughton); Shadows and Fog (Allen); Sleeping With the Enemy (Ruben); Soapdish (Hoffman); Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country (Meyer); Straight out of Brooklyn (Rich); Surviving Desire (Hartley); Thousand Pieces of Gold (Kelly); Toto le héros (Van Dormael); Tous les matins du monde (Corneau); Voyager (Schlöndorff); What About Bob? (Oz); Where Angels Fear to Tread (Sturridge); White Fang (Kleiser); A Woman's Tale (P. Cox)