Ebert's Bests

Roger Ebert

• Publisher: The University of Chicago Press
• Year: 2012
• eBook ISBN: 9780226048901
• Topic: Media & Performing Arts
• Subtopic: Film & Video

A treasury of year-by-year ten-best lists, plus personal reminiscences by the man whose name became synonymous with the movies. In Ebert's Bests, the iconic Roger Ebert takes us through the journey of how he became a film critic, from his days at a student-run cinema club to his rise as a television commentator in At the Movies and Siskel & Ebert. Recounting the influence of the French New Wave; his friendships with Werner Herzog and Martin Scorsese; and travels to Sweden and Rome to visit Ingrid Bergman and Federico Fellini, Ebert never loses sight of film as a key component of our cultural identity. In considering the ethics of film criticism—why we should take all film seriously, without prejudgment or condescension—he argues that film critics ought always to engage in open-minded dialogue with a movie. All this is accompanied by decades' worth of annual ten-best lists, which showcase Roger Ebert's recommendations—while at the same time reminding us that hearts and minds, and even rankings, are bound to change.

Ten Best Lists, 1967–2011

1967

1. Bonnie and Clyde

2. Ulysses

3. Blow-Up

4. The Graduate

5. A Man for All Seasons

6. The War Game

7. Reflections in a Golden Eye

8. Cool Hand Luke

9. Elvira Madigan

10. In the Heat of the Night

1968

1. The Battle of Algiers

2. 2001: A Space Odyssey

3. Falstaff

4. Faces

5. The Two of Us

6. The Producers

7. Oliver!

8. The Fifth Horseman Is Fear

9. Rachel, Rachel

10. Romeo and Juliet

1969

1. Z

2. Medium Cool

3. Weekend

4. If. . . .

5. Last Summer

6. The Wild Bunch

7. Easy Rider

8. True Grit

9. Downhill Racer

10. War and Peace

1970

1. Five Easy Pieces

2. M*A*S*H

3. The Revolutionary

4. Patton

5. Woodstock

6. My Night at Maud’s

7. Ådalen ’31

8. The Passion of Anna

9. The Wild Child

10. Fellini Satyricon

1971

1. The Last Picture Show

2. McCabe and Mrs. Miller

3. Claire’s Knee

4. The French Connection

5. Sunday, Bloody Sunday

6. Taking Off

7. Carnal Knowledge

8. Tristana

9. Goin’ Down the Road

10. Bed and Board

1972

1. The Godfather

2. Chloe in the Afternoon

3. Le Boucher

4. Murmur of the Heart

5. The Green Wall

6. The Sorrow and the Pity

7. The Garden of the Finzi-Continis

8. Minnie and Moskowitz

9. Sounder

10. The Great Northfield, Minnesota, Raid

1973

1. Cries and Whispers

2. Last Tango in Paris

3. The Emigrants/The New Land

4. Blume in Love

5. The Iceman Cometh

6. The Exorcist

7. The Day of the Jackal

8. American Graffiti

9. Fellini’s Roma

10. The Friends of Eddie Coyle

1974

1. Scenes from a Marriage

2. Chinatown

3. The Mother and the Whore

4. Amarcord

5. The Last Detail

6. The Mirages

7. Day for Night

8. Mean Streets

9. My Uncle Antoine

10. The Conversation

1975

1. Nashville

2. Night Moves

3. Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore

4. Farewell, My Lovely

5. The Phantom of...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Contents
• Becoming a Film Critic
• The Best—Some Introductory Words
• Ten Best Lists, 1967–2011