Film Studies Association of Canada's Top 100 Films

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I humbly submit my latest attempt at making a "100 Best Films" list. I understand why most intelligent film scholars reject list-making and canon formation altogether. I do it mainly because I'm appalled at all of the lists I see in print. The AFI Best 100 American Films is, of course, the worst of the well-known examples because it was a totally corrupt exercise at promoting Hollywood (Major) studio films that were already available on video. It did nothing to help preserve and distribute worthy and lesser-known titles.

I also have problems in producing a list of only 100 films. The BFI idea of creating a repertory of 360 films for every (non-holi)day of the year is a great one, but unfortunately, theirs is much too heavily weighted towards Hollywood product -- over one third of the titles are American (139).

My own film studies formation (at Concordia and NYU) led me to see more American and French films than any other, and most people would agree that in the historical development of film style, they are the two key nations. But the Hollywood dominance of "best films" lists has become unacceptable. (And, I am sure that if FSAC were to do a compilation of their own members' choices, we would see a similar trend.) My list reflects a choice of films which, for me, represents the development of "Film as Art" whatever that might mean. I regret the exclusion of animated films÷I considered including one or two titles, but in the end decided it was best for me to stay away from a field I know very little about. I didn't deliberately exclude "entertainment" -- approximately a quarter of my list could classify here -- but this was not a major consideration.

Peter Rist
Concordia University