1001 movies you must see before you die - 2012 edition.
by bol-radioWoo | created - 21 Nov 2012 | updated - 19 Mar 2013 | PublicThe complete list of the book "1001 movies you must see before you die".
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1. A Trip to the Moon (1902)
TV-G | 13 min | Short, Action, Adventure
A group of astronomers go on an expedition to the Moon.
Director: Georges Méliès | Stars: Georges Méliès, Victor André, Bleuette Bernon, Brunnet
Votes: 55,657
2. The Great Train Robbery (1903)
TV-G | 11 min | Short, Action, Adventure
A group of bandits stage a brazen train hold-up, only to find a determined posse hot on their heels.
Director: Edwin S. Porter | Stars: Gilbert M. 'Broncho Billy' Anderson, A.C. Abadie, George Barnes, Justus D. Barnes
Votes: 20,969
3. The Birth of a Nation (1915)
TV-PG | 195 min | Drama, History, War
The Stoneman family finds its friendship with the Camerons affected by the Civil War, both fighting in opposite armies. The development of the war in their lives plays through to Lincoln's assassination and the birth of the Ku Klux Klan.
Director: D.W. Griffith | Stars: Lillian Gish, Mae Marsh, Henry B. Walthall, Miriam Cooper
Votes: 26,320 | Gross: $10.00M
4. Les vampires (1915)
Not Rated | 421 min | Action, Adventure, Crime
An intrepid reporter and his loyal friend battle a bizarre secret society of criminals known as The Vampires.
Director: Louis Feuillade | Stars: Musidora, Édouard Mathé, Marcel Lévesque, Jean Aymé
Votes: 5,424
5. Intolerance (1916)
Passed | 163 min | Drama, History
The story of a poor young woman separated by prejudice from her husband and baby is interwoven with tales of intolerance from throughout history.
Director: D.W. Griffith | Stars: Lillian Gish, Robert Harron, Mae Marsh, F.A. Turner
Votes: 16,708 | Gross: $2.18M
6. The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1920)
Not Rated | 67 min | Horror, Mystery, Thriller
Hypnotist Dr. Caligari uses a somnambulist, Cesare, to commit murders.
Director: Robert Wiene | Stars: Werner Krauss, Conrad Veidt, Friedrich Feher, Lil Dagover
Votes: 69,968
7. Broken Blossoms or the Yellow Man and the Girl (1919)
Not Rated | 90 min | Drama, Romance
A frail waif, abused by her brutal boxer father in London's seedy Limehouse District, is befriended by a sensitive Chinese immigrant with tragic consequences.
Director: D.W. Griffith | Stars: Lillian Gish, Richard Barthelmess, Donald Crisp, Arthur Howard
Votes: 11,052
8. Way Down East (1920)
Passed | 145 min | Drama, Romance
A naive country girl is tricked into a sham marriage by a wealthy womanizer, then must rebuild her life despite the taint of having borne a child out of wedlock.
Director: D.W. Griffith | Stars: Lillian Gish, Richard Barthelmess, Mrs. David Landau, Lowell Sherman
Votes: 5,890 | Gross: $4.50M
9. Within Our Gates (1920)
Not Rated | 79 min | Drama, Romance
Abandoned by her fiancé, an educated black woman with a shocking past dedicates herself to helping a near bankrupt school for impoverished black youths.
Director: Oscar Micheaux | Stars: Evelyn Preer, Flo Clements, James D. Ruffin, Jack Chenault
Votes: 3,617
10. The Phantom Carriage (1921)
Not Rated | 107 min | Drama, Fantasy, Horror
On New Year's Eve, the driver of a ghostly carriage forces a drunken man to reflect on his selfish, wasted life.
Director: Victor Sjöström | Stars: Victor Sjöström, Hilda Borgström, Tore Svennberg, Astrid Holm
Votes: 14,070
11. Orphans of the Storm (1921)
Not Rated | 150 min | Drama, History, Romance
Two orphaned sisters are caught up in the turmoil of the French Revolution, encountering misery and love along the way.
Director: D.W. Griffith | Stars: Lillian Gish, Dorothy Gish, Joseph Schildkraut, Frank Losee
Votes: 5,473 | Gross: $0.79M
12. The Smiling Madame Beudet (1923)
26 min | Short, Drama
An unhappily married woman devises a scheme to get rid of her husband.
Director: Germaine Dulac | Stars: Germaine Dermoz, Madeleine Guitty, Jean d'Yd, Yvette Grisier
Votes: 2,941
13. Dr. Mabuse, the Gambler (1922)
Not Rated | 242 min | Crime, Mystery, Thriller
Arch-criminal Dr. Mabuse sets out to make a fortune and run Berlin. Detective Wenk sets out to stop him.
Director: Fritz Lang | Stars: Rudolf Klein-Rogge, Aud Egede-Nissen, Gertrude Welcker, Alfred Abel
Votes: 9,162
14. Nanook of the North (1922)
Passed | 78 min | Documentary
In this silent predecessor to the modern documentary, film-maker Robert J. Flaherty spends one year following the lives of Nanook and his family, Inuits living in the Arctic Circle.
Director: Robert J. Flaherty | Stars: Allakariallak, Alice Nevalinga, Cunayou, Allegoo
Votes: 13,440
15. Nosferatu (1922)
Not Rated | 94 min | Fantasy, Horror
Vampire Count Orlok expresses interest in a new residence and real estate agent Hutter's wife.
Director: F.W. Murnau | Stars: Max Schreck, Alexander Granach, Gustav von Wangenheim, Greta Schröder
Votes: 105,301
16. Häxan (1922)
Not Rated | 91 min | Documentary, Fantasy, Horror
Fictionalized documentary showing the evolution of witchcraft, from its pagan roots to its confusion with hysteria in Eastern Europe.
Director: Benjamin Christensen | Stars: Benjamin Christensen, Elisabeth Christensen, Maren Pedersen, Clara Pontoppidan
Votes: 16,690
17. Foolish Wives (1922)
Not Rated | 117 min | Drama, Thriller
A con artist masquerades as Russian nobility and attempts to seduce the wife of an American diplomat.
Director: Erich von Stroheim | Stars: Rudolph Christians, Miss DuPont, Maude George, Mae Busch
Votes: 4,016 | Gross: $0.40M
18. Our Hospitality (1923)
Passed | 65 min | Comedy, Romance, Thriller
A man returns to his Appalachian homestead. On the trip, he falls for a young woman. The only problem is her family has vowed to kill every member of his family.
Directors: John G. Blystone, Buster Keaton | Stars: Buster Keaton, Natalie Talmadge, Joe Keaton, Joe Roberts
Votes: 12,482 | Gross: $1.17M
19. The Wheel (1923)
Not Rated | 417 min | Drama
A railway engineer adopts a young girl orphaned by a train crash. Years later when she starts getting suitors, he grapples with whether or not to tell her the truth about her parentage.
Director: Abel Gance | Stars: Gabriel de Gravone, Pierre Magnier, Georges Térof, Séverin-Mars
Votes: 2,559
20. The Thief of Bagdad (1924)
Not Rated | 155 min | Adventure, Family, Fantasy
A recalcitrant thief vies with a duplicitous Mongol ruler for the hand of a beautiful princess.
Director: Raoul Walsh | Stars: Douglas Fairbanks, Julanne Johnston, Snitz Edwards, Charles Belcher
Votes: 6,967 | Gross: $4.36M
21. Strike (1925)
Not Rated | 82 min | Drama
A group of oppressed factory workers go on strike in pre-revolutionary Russia.
Director: Sergei Eisenstein | Stars: Grigoriy Aleksandrov, Maksim Shtraukh, Mikhail Gomorov, I. Ivanov
Votes: 8,608
22. Greed (1924)
Not Rated | 140 min | Drama, Thriller, Western
The sudden fortune won from a lottery fans such destructive greed that it ruins the lives of the three people involved.
Director: Erich von Stroheim | Stars: Gibson Gowland, Zasu Pitts, Jean Hersholt, Dale Fuller
Votes: 10,750 | Gross: $0.16M
23. Sherlock Jr. (1924)
Passed | 45 min | Action, Comedy, Romance
A film projectionist longs to be a detective, and puts his meagre skills to work when he is framed by a rival for stealing his girlfriend's father's pocketwatch.
Director: Buster Keaton | Stars: Buster Keaton, Kathryn McGuire, Joe Keaton, Erwin Connelly
Votes: 56,842 | Gross: $0.98M
24. The Last Laugh (1924)
Not Rated | 90 min | Drama
An aging doorman is forced to face the scorn of his friends, neighbors and society after being fired from his prestigious job at a luxurious hotel.
Director: F.W. Murnau | Stars: Emil Jannings, Maly Delschaft, Max Hiller, Emilie Kurz
Votes: 15,191 | Gross: $0.09M
25. Seven Chances (1925)
Passed | 56 min | Comedy, Romance
A man learns that he will inherit a fortune if he marries by 7PM that evening.
Director: Buster Keaton | Stars: Buster Keaton, Ruth Dwyer, T. Roy Barnes, Snitz Edwards
Votes: 11,716 | Gross: $1.30M
26. The Phantom of the Opera (1925)
Passed | 93 min | Horror
A mad, disfigured composer seeks love with a lovely young opera singer.
Directors: Rupert Julian, Lon Chaney, Ernst Laemmle, Edward Sedgwick | Stars: Lon Chaney, Mary Philbin, Norman Kerry, Arthur Edmund Carewe
Votes: 20,078 | Gross: $3.75M
27. Battleship Potemkin (1925)
Not Rated | 66 min | Drama, History, Thriller
In the midst of the Russian Revolution of 1905, the crew of the battleship Potemkin mutiny against the brutal, tyrannical regime of the vessel's officers. The resulting street demonstration in Odessa brings on a police massacre.
Director: Sergei Eisenstein | Stars: Aleksandr Antonov, Vladimir Barskiy, Grigoriy Aleksandrov, Ivan Bobrov
Votes: 61,398 | Gross: $0.05M
28. The Gold Rush (1925)
Passed | 95 min | Adventure, Comedy, Drama
A prospector goes to the Klondike during the 1890s gold rush in hopes of making his fortune, and is smitten with a girl he sees in a dance hall.
Director: Charles Chaplin | Stars: Charles Chaplin, Mack Swain, Tom Murray, Henry Bergman
Votes: 118,521 | Gross: $5.45M
29. The Big Parade (1925)
Not Rated | 151 min | Drama, Romance, War
A young American soldier witnesses the horrors of the Great War.
Directors: King Vidor, George W. Hill | Stars: John Gilbert, Renée Adorée, Hobart Bosworth, Claire McDowell
Votes: 7,266 | Gross: $11.00M
30. Metropolis (1927)
Not Rated | 153 min | Drama, Sci-Fi
In a futuristic city sharply divided between the working class and the city planners, the son of the city's mastermind falls in love with a working-class prophet who predicts the coming of a savior to mediate their differences.
Director: Fritz Lang | Stars: Brigitte Helm, Alfred Abel, Gustav Fröhlich, Rudolf Klein-Rogge
Votes: 185,306 | Gross: $1.24M
31. Sunrise (1927)
Passed | 94 min | Drama, Romance
A sophisticated city woman seduces a farmer and convinces him to murder his wife and join her in the city, but he ends up rekindling his romance with his wife when he changes his mind at the last moment.
Director: F.W. Murnau | Stars: George O'Brien, Janet Gaynor, Margaret Livingston, Bodil Rosing
Votes: 53,803 | Gross: $0.54M
32. The General (1926)
Passed | 78 min | Action, Adventure, Comedy
After being rejected by the Confederate military, not realizing it was due to his crucial civilian role, an engineer must single-handedly recapture his beloved locomotive after it is seized by Union spies and return it through enemy lines.
Directors: Clyde Bruckman, Buster Keaton | Stars: Buster Keaton, Marion Mack, Glen Cavender, Jim Farley
Votes: 98,043 | Gross: $1.03M
33. The Unknown (1927)
Unrated | 68 min | Drama, Horror, Romance
A criminal on the run hides in a circus and seeks to possess the daughter of the ringmaster at any cost.
Director: Tod Browning | Stars: Lon Chaney, Norman Kerry, Joan Crawford, Nick De Ruiz
Votes: 9,131 | Gross: $0.41M
34. October (Ten Days that Shook the World) (1927)
95 min | Drama, History
A large-scale view on the events of 1917 in Russia, when the monarchy was overthrown.
Directors: Grigoriy Aleksandrov, Sergei Eisenstein | Stars: Boris Livanov, Nikolay Popov, Vasili Nikandrov, Layaschenko
Votes: 8,438
35. The Jazz Singer (1927)
Passed | 88 min | Drama, Music, Musical
The son of a Jewish Cantor must defy the traditions of his religious father in order to pursue his dream of becoming a jazz singer.
Director: Alan Crosland | Stars: Al Jolson, May McAvoy, Warner Oland, Eugenie Besserer
Votes: 11,063 | Gross: $7.63M
36. Napoleon (1927)
330 min | Biography, Drama, History
A film about the French general's youth and early military career.
Director: Abel Gance | Stars: Albert Dieudonné, Vladimir Roudenko, Edmond Van Daële, Alexandre Koubitzky
Votes: 8,784
37. The Kid Brother (1927)
Passed | 82 min | Comedy, Drama, Family
A sheriff's milquetoast son has a chance to prove himself when a medicine show run by con artists comes into town.
Directors: Ted Wilde, Harold Lloyd, Lewis Milestone, J.A. Howe | Stars: Harold Lloyd, Jobyna Ralston, Walter James, Leo Willis
Votes: 4,815 | Gross: $1.55M
38. The Crowd (1928)
Not Rated | 98 min | Drama, Romance
The life of a man and woman together in a large, impersonal metropolis through their hopes, struggles, and downfalls.
Director: King Vidor | Stars: Eleanor Boardman, James Murray, Bert Roach, Estelle Clark
Votes: 9,153
39. The Docks of New York (1928)
Not Rated | 76 min | Crime, Drama, Film-Noir
A blue-collar worker on New York's depressed waterfront finds his life changed after he saves a woman attempting suicide.
Director: Josef von Sternberg | Stars: George Bancroft, Betty Compson, Olga Baclanova, Clyde Cook
Votes: 5,023
40. Un chien andalou (1929)
Not Rated | 16 min | Short, Fantasy, Horror
Luis Buñuel and Salvador Dalí present 16 minutes of bizarre, surreal imagery.
Director: Luis Buñuel | Stars: Pierre Batcheff, Simone Mareuil, Luis Buñuel, Pancho Cossío
Votes: 53,756
41. The Passion of Joan of Arc (1928)
Passed | 114 min | Biography, Drama, History
In 1431, Jeanne d'Arc is placed on trial on charges of heresy. The ecclesiastical jurists attempt to force Jeanne to recant her claims of holy visions.
Director: Carl Theodor Dreyer | Stars: Maria Falconetti, Eugene Silvain, André Berley, Maurice Schutz
Votes: 60,583 | Gross: $0.02M
42. Steamboat Bill, Jr. (1928)
Not Rated | 70 min | Action, Comedy, Drama
The effete son of a cantankerous riverboat captain comes to join his father's crew.
Directors: Charles Reisner, Buster Keaton | Stars: Buster Keaton, Tom McGuire, Ernest Torrence, Tom Lewis
Votes: 16,165
43. Storm Over Asia (1928)
74 min | Drama, War
After a run-in with the law, a Mongolian man becomes a fugitive and joins the Russian Civil War.
Director: Vsevolod Pudovkin | Stars: I. Inkizhinov, I. Dedintsev, Valéry Inkijinoff, Aleksandr Chistyakov
Votes: 2,309
44. Blackmail (1929)
Not Rated | 85 min | Crime, Drama, Thriller
After killing a man in self-defense, a young woman is blackmailed by a witness to the killing.
Director: Alfred Hitchcock | Stars: Anny Ondra, John Longden, Sara Allgood, Charles Paton
Votes: 11,943
45. Man with a Movie Camera (1929)
Not Rated | 68 min | Documentary
A man travels around a city with a camera slung over his shoulder, documenting urban life with dazzling invention.
Director: Dziga Vertov | Stars: Mikhail Kaufman, Elizaveta Svilova
Votes: 27,930
46. Pandora's Box (1929)
Not Rated | 109 min | Crime, Drama, Romance
The rise and inevitable fall of an amoral but naive young woman whose insouciant eroticism inspires lust and violence in those around her.
Director: Georg Wilhelm Pabst | Stars: Louise Brooks, Fritz Kortner, Francis Lederer, Carl Goetz
Votes: 11,844 | Gross: $0.01M
47. Constantine (2005)
R | 121 min | Action, Fantasy, Horror
Supernatural exorcist and demonologist John Constantine helps a policewoman prove her sister's death was not a suicide, but something more.
Director: Francis Lawrence | Stars: Keanu Reeves, Rachel Weisz, Djimon Hounsou, Shia LaBeouf
Votes: 373,798 | Gross: $75.98M
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