Sight and Sound crowns Jeanne Dielman The Greatest Film of All Time

If you’re a film critic, there is no more daunting question than “what’s your favourite film?” Yet every decade since 1952, hundreds of film critics from all over the globe have had to grapple with this question when film magazine Sight and Sound invite them to partake in its legendary once-a-decade poll. This year, over 1,600 film critics, academics and programmers were asked to nominate their personal canon of ten great films, which Sight and Sound then aggregated to find the list of the Greatest Films of All Time.

Vittorio De Sica’s Bicycle Thieves topped the 1952 list, then for five consecutive polls – that’s 50 years – one film reigned supreme: Citizen Kane. But ten years ago, in the 2012 poll, the equivalent of a seismic event took place. Orson Welle’s 1941 film was demoted to second place by Alfred Hitchcock’s Vertigo. This slight change in the order of things caused quite a stir in cinephile circles at the time. (To be fair, we don’t get out much.) There are sure to be similar feelings of shock, surprise and delight today at the news a dark horse has usurped both Hitchcock and Welle’s films. This decade’s poll sees Chantal Akerman’s groundbreaking Jeanne Dielman, 23 quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles, made in 1975 when Akerman was only 25, crowned the greatest film of all time. Below is the new top ten in full:

10. Singin' in the Rain (Stanley Donen & Gene Kelly, 1951)
9. Man with a Movie Camera (Dziga Vertov,1929)
8. Mulholland Dr. (David Lynch, 2001)
7. Beau travail (Claire Denis, 1999)
6. 2001: A Space Odyssey (Stanley Kubrick, 1968)
​​5. In the Mood for Love (Wong Kar Wai, 2001)
4. Tokyo Story (Ozu Yasujiro, 1953)
3. Citizen Kane (Orson Welles, 1941)
2. Vertigo (Alfred Hitchcock, 1959)
1.  Jeanne Dielman, 23 quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles (Chantal Akerman, 1975)

Just before he launched this list onto the world we caught up with Mike Williams, Sight and Sound’s editor-in-chief. Speaking to Williams on a video call from his London office, we asked how he and his team felt when they began to realise that their magazine's monolithic film canon, which has only seen subtle changes since its inception in 1952, had been reshaped in a radical fashion this time around, with a woman director finally taking the top spot?

“Well we ask a world of critics, programmers, curators, academics and archivists to vote," says Williams, "so we’re just taking the temperature of this moment in time, and there's organically going to be a consensus that builds around certain things, so we're not trying to engineer the vote or anything. However, we're not going to pretend that it's not exciting to see certain changes.”

Jeanne Dielman hitting the top spot isn’t the only shakeup of Sight and Sound's list. In 2012, only two films directed by women made the top 100 – Akerman’s film and Claire Denis’ Beau Travail. Today’s list features 11 works by women filmmakers. Akerman has a second entry, News from Home, at number 52. Agnes Varda appears twice with Cléo from 5 to 7 at number 14 and The Gleaners and I at number 67. There’s also Maya Deren’s Meshes of the Afternoon (16th place), Vera Chytilov’s Daisies (no. 28), Céline Sciamma’s Portrait of a Lady on Fire (no. 30), Barbara Loden’s Wanda (no. 48), Jane Campion's The Piano (no. 50) and Julie Dash’s Daughters of the Dust (no. 60).

Back in 2012, Black filmmakers were similarly shut out, with only Touki Bouki by Djibril Diop making the cut. This time around, there are seven titles in the top 100 by Black filmmakers. Touki Bouki was back again (at 67th place), and joined by Dash’s Daughters of the Dust, Spike Lee’s Do the Right Thing (24th place), Charles Burnett’s Killer of Sheep (no. 43), Barry Jenkins’s Moonlight (no. 60), and Jordan Peele’s Get Out and Ousmane Sembène’s Black Girl jointly in 95th place.

Williams reckons the film community as a whole will be pleased with the overhaul of the old guard. “Change has happened because there's been a really positive international movement behind celebrating and spotlighting underseen films,” he says “whether that's women making films or filmmakers of colour – those works that haven't necessarily had the attention that they would have had had it not been for certain ideas of establishment and canon dominating. I think the response will be really positive.”

One factor that has helped bring about a more progressive list is surely the increased diversity of those taking part in the vote. In 2012, 846 critics took part. This year, there were over 1,600 participants. Before the announcement of these results, many were predicting a more populist list with suggestions that a more widely seen film like 2001: A Space Odyssey would take the top spot; Kubrick’s 1969 sci-fi was actually a non-mover, sticking a number six.

Instead, an experimental epic has taken centre stage. A non-narrative puzzle of a film, Jeanne Dielman follows a single mother over two days as she obsessively performs her daily routines, which includes cooking, housework and a daily session of sex work to pay the bills. Using long, static shots and precise framing and editing, Akerman shines a light on aspects of life that are rarely explored in film, and in doing so made a profound and deeply empathetic statement about the lives of ordinary women. It’s a groundbreaking work in feminist cinema and a breathtaking experiment in film form, and it couldn’t be more different from its 'Greatest Film' predecessors.

“It's definitely the most challenging film that has ever topped the poll,” agrees Williams. Citizen Kane and Vertigo are both remarkable films but they are also products of the Hollywood system, and as such, much more conventional and accessible than Akerman's film. "I think it’s really interesting that we've asked a much wider group of people to vote, and I would say it's the most democratic list that Sight and Sound has ever produced because of that, and the result is that it's the most diverse list we've ever produced and it's got the most challenging number one," says Williams. "I think that's such an amazing result that just feels like anything but exclusive and insular. It's a whole world of cinema represented in this amazing watchlist.”

Jeanne Dielman is certainly lesser-seen than previous winners but of course, the reason films like Citizen Kane and Vertigo are more well-known is that they are continuously being released and are regulars on the rep circuit. “Citizen Kane is famous and well-regarded because of the film that it is,” notes Williams, “but I think a huge part of why it's become such a shorthand for greatness is because it has sat at the top of the Sight and Sound poll for 50 years.”

Jeanne Dielman, by contrast, is rarely screened in cinemas and I can’t recall ever seeing it on UK television schedules. But that’s the beauty of Sight and Sound’s poll: such is its influence that it has the power to help reshape the film canon. “A film like Jeanne Dielman appearing at the top of the poll, that will give it its own attention, and it will absolutely encourage and influence programming and releases in the future.”

The impact will be even more immediate than that. “When our poll goes live, people will be able to go and watch [Jeanne Dielman] on BFI player,” explains Williams. “There's also a season at Southbank where every film in the top 100 will be shown across a couple of months – people will be able to see it there. And Mark Jenkin has programmed it at the Southbank in January too, as part of a season of films that influenced his Enys Man. You're going to see it appear more and more in different places. Some people will seek it out because of this list and they might already know the name and have read pieces about its impact and its influence. But in some cases, people will literally be reading that title for the first time and thinking, ‘I don't even know what this film is but I’m going to watch it.’ That's a fantastic thing for this list to achieve, which is spotlighting the work and giving it a much wider audience.”

---

Jeanne Dielman is available to watch now on BFI Player 
Jeanne Dielman will screen at BFI Southbank, London, on 4 and 28 Jan as part of Mark Jenkin's The Cinematic DNA of Enys Men 
Read the full Sight and Sound Greatest Films of All Time poll at bfi.org.uk/sight-and-sound/greatest-films-all-time