1998 Top Ten List

Buffalo '66 (Vincent Gallo)

Rushmore (Wes Anderson)

The Hole (Tsai Ming-liang)

The Celebration (Thomas Vinterberg)

Out of Sight (Steven Soderbergh)

The Last Days of Disco (Whit Stillman)

Autumn Tale (Eric Rohmer)

Praise (John Curran)

My Name Is Joe (Ken Loach)

Show Me Love (Lukas Moodysson)

Additional 1998 Films By Rating

Saving Private Ryan (Steven Spielberg)

π (Darren Aronofsky)

John Carpenter's Vampires (John Carpenter)

Run Lola Run (Tom Tykwer)

I Stand Alone (Gaspar Noé)

The Book of Life (Hal Hartley)

The Newton Boys (Richard Linklater)

Late August, Early September (Olivier Assayas)

The Big Lebowski (Joel Coen)

The Truman Show (Peter Weir)

The Thin Red Line (Terrence Malick)

After Life (Hirokazu Kore-eda)

Dr. Akagi (Shohei Imamura)

Rounders (John Dahl)

A Simple Plan (Sam Raimi)

The General (John Boorman)

Another Day in Paradise (Larry Clark)

Birdcage Inn (Kim Ki-duk)

Beloved (Jonathan Demme)

Zero Effect (Jake Kasdan)

Shakespeare in Love (John Madden)

Besieged (Bernardo Bertolucci)

Following (Christopher Nolan)

A Bug's Life (John Lasseter)

Babe: Pig in the City (George Miller)

Forty Two Up (Michael Apted)

The Dreamlife of Angels (Erick Zonca)

Enemy of the State (Tony Scott)

He Got Game (Spike Lee)

Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas (Terry Gilliam)

Lost in Space (Stephen Hopkins)

Bulworth (Warren Beatty)

Happiness (Todd Solondz)

The Big Hit (Che-Kirk Wong)

Central Station (Walter Salles)

The X-Files (Rob Bowman)

Pleasantville (Gary Ross)

The Flowers of Shanghai (Hou Hsiao-hsien)

The Power of Kangwon Province (Hong Sang-soo)

Velvet Goldmine (Todd Haynes)

Dark City (Alex Proyas)

Wild Things (John McNaughton)

Rush Hour (Brett Ratner)

Ringu (Hideo Nakata)

Dirty Work (Bob Saget)

The Idiots (Lars von Trier)

Armageddon (Michael Bay)

New Rose Hotel (Abel Ferrara)

Shark Skin Man and Peach Hip Girl (Katsuhito Ishii)

Mercury Rising (Harold Becker)

What Dreams May Come (Vincent Ward)

The Letterboxd version of this list has posters for every film and whatnot.

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.

Seen but currently unrated (and not presumptively among my top 10): The Adventures of Sebastian Cole (T. Williams); Alice and Martin (Téchiné); All I Wanna Do! (Kernochan); American History X (Kaye); Among Giants (S. Miller); Antz (Darnell & Johnson); Anxiety (De Oliveira); The Apple (S. Makhmalbaf); Aprile (Moretti); Belly (H. Williams); Black Cat, White Cat (Kusturica); Blade (Norrington); The Brandon Teena Story (Muska & Olafsdottir); Broken Vessels (Ziehl); Cabaret Balkan (Paskaljevic); Celebrity (Allen); The City (Riker); A Civil Action (Zaillian); Claire Dolan (Kerrigan); The Class Trip (C. Miller); Croupier (Hodges); The Cruise (B. Miller); Dad Savage (Evans); Dangerous Beauty (Herskovitz); Diary of a Serial Killer (J. Wallace); The Dinner Game (Veber); Divine (Ripstein); Elizabeth (Kapur); The Emperor and the Assassin (Chen Kaige); Eternity and a Day (Angelopoulos); Everest (Breashears & MacGillivray & Judson); The Faculty (Rodriguez); Fallen (Hoblit); The Farm: Angola, USA (Stack & Garbus); The Gingerbread Man (Altman); God Said, "Ha!" (Sweeney); Gods and Monsters (Condon); Goshogaoka (Lockhart); Hideous Kinky (MacKinnon); High Art (Cholodenko); Hilary and Jackie (Tucker); Hi-Life (Hedden); The Horse Whisperer (Redford); The Impostors (Tucci); The Inheritors (Ruzowitzky); Khrustalyov, My Car! (German); The Land Girls (Leland); Last Night (McKellar); The Last Seduction II (Marcel); L'Ennui (Kahn); License to Live (Kurosawa); Life Is to Whistle (Pérez); Life on Earth (Sissako); Like It Is (Oremland); Little Voice (Herman); Living Out Loud (LaGravenese); Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels (Ritchie); Love Is the Devil: Study for a Portrait of Francis Bacon (Maybury); Madeline (Von Scherler Mayer); Major League: Back to the Minors (Warren); The Mask of Zorro (Campbell); Meet Joe Black (Brest); The Mighty (Chelsom); Mighty Joe Young (Underwood); Moment of Impact (Loktev); Montana (Leitzes); Monument Ave. (T. Demme); Mulan (Cook & Bancroft); Neil Simon's The Odd Couple II (Deutch); Next Stop Wonderland (Anderson); No Looking Back (Burns); Of Freaks and Men (Balabanov); One (Barbieri); One True Thing (Franklin); The Opposite of Sex (Roos); Orphans (Mullan); The Outskirts (Lutsik); Perfect Blue (Kon); The Personals (Chen Kuo-fu); Polish Wedding (Connelly); A Price Above Rubies (Yakin); Primary Colors (Nichols); The Prophecy II (Spence); Psycho (Van Sant); The Quarry (Hänsel); The Red Violin (Girard); The Replacement Killers (Fuqua); Ringmaster (Abramson); River of Gold (Rocha); Ronin (Frankenheimer); The School of Flesh (Jacquot); The Silence (M. Makhmalbaf); Sitcom (Ozon); Slam (Levin); SLC Punk! (Merendino); Slums of Beverly Hills (Jenkins); Smoke Signals (Eyre); Snake Eyes (De Palma); So Close to Paradise (Wang); A Soldier's Daughter Never Cries (Ivory); The Spree (T. L. Wallace); Storefront Hitchcock (J. Demme); Talk of Angels (Hamm); Tango (Saura); The Terrorist (Sivan); There's Something About Mary (Farrellys); Those Who Love Me Can Take the Train (Chéreau); Titanic Town (Michell); trans (Goldberger); Twilight (Benton); U.S. Marshals (Baird); Very Bad Things (Berg); Victor (Veysset); West Beirut (Doueiri); Without Limits (Towne); The Wounds (Dragojevic); Xiu-Xiu: The Sent-down Girl (J. Chen); Your Friends & Neighbors (LaBute); You're Laughing (Tavianis)

As yet unseen: Battu's Bioscope (Fidyk); A Hero Never Dies (To); Sombre (Grandrieux)