Several classic films are widely regarded as essential viewing, appearing on multiple authoritative lists. These include foundational works from the 20th century that have shaped cinema and continue to influence filmmakers and audiences.

"Classic films" Proceeds to list dude bro films, surprised his GF hasn't seen them Wants recommendation for other "classics" But not actual classic film shot in B & W, though Answer from Travelgrrl on reddit.com
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American Film Institute
afi.com › afis-100-years-100-movies
AFI’s 100 YEARS…100 MOVIES | American Film Institute
AFI’s 100 YEARS…100 MOVIES The very first edition of AFI's 100 Years...100 Movies is a list of the 100 greatest American films of all time.In 1998, AFI invited more than 1,500 l
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Rotten Tomatoes
editorial.rottentomatoes.com › guide › best-movies-of-all-time
300 Best Movies of All Time | Rotten Tomatoes
1 week ago - Welcome to the 300 highest-rated movies of all time, as reviewed and championed by Tomatometer-approved critics and Rotten Tomatoes users.
Discussions

What are some classic films everyone should watch?
"Classic films" Proceeds to list dude bro films, surprised his GF hasn't seen them Wants recommendation for other "classics" But not actual classic film shot in B & W, though More on reddit.com
🌐 r/movies
145
34
September 22, 2024
What is your list of the 100 best movies of all time?
I only have something like a top 46: Adam And Evelyne (1949 Granger/Simmons) Footsteps In The Fog (1959 Granger/Simmons) Three Godfathers (1936 Chester Morris/Lewis Stone/Walter Brennan) Man's Castle (1933 Young/Tracy/Borzage) The Catered Affair (1956 Chayevsky/Borgnine/Davis) Middle of The Night (1959 Chayefsky/March/Novak/Farrell) Rembrandt (1936 Laughton/Gertrude Lawrence/Elsa Lanchester) Make Me A Star (1932 Blondell/Stu Erwin) All The Way Home (1963 Preston/Simmons) Young Bess (1953 Laughton/Simmons) This Could Be The Night (1957 Simmons/Blondell) Kiss Me, Stupid (1964 Billy Wilder/Dean Martin/Felicia Farr) Period of Adjustment (1962 Jane Fonda/Anthony Franciosa) Rebound (1931 Robert Williams/Ina Claire) Sign of The Cross (1932 Colbert/Laughton) The Misfits (1961 Gable/Clift/Monroe) Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf (1963 Taylor/Burton) Ladybug, Ladybug (1963 Kathryn Hayes) The Heiress (1949 Clift/Olivia De Havilland) Adventure (1946 Garson/Gable) The Gay Bride (1934 Lombard/Morris) Scarlet Street (1945 Robinson/Joan Bennett/Lang) Angel Baby (1961 Salome Jens/Mercedes McCambridge) Union Pacific (1939 McCrea/Stanwyck/DeMille) Blonde Crazy (1931 Blondell/Cagney) They Knew What They Wanted (1940 Laughton/Lombard) Hold Your Man (1933 Gable/Harlow/Loos) Red Dust (1933 Gable/Harlow) Now And Forever (1934 Temple/Lombard/Cooper) Career (1959 Franciosa/Martin/MacLaine) Night of The Iguana (1964 Burton/Gardner/Kerr) The Greeks Had A Word For Them (1932 Ina Claire/Blondell) Quo Vadis (1951 Ustinov/Deborah Kerr) Beau Brummell (1954 Ustinov/Granger) The Gunfighter (1950 Peck) Yellow Sky (1948 Peck) Irma La Douce (1963 Maclaine/Lemmon/Wilder) The Office Wife (1930 Mackaill/Blondell/Stone) The Happy Ending (1969 Simmons) Days of Wine And Roses (1962 Jack Lemmon/Lee Remick) Gun Crazy (1950 cinematography) Born Yesterday (1950 Judy Holliday) Ceasar and Cleopatra (1945 Granger/Leigh/Rains) Two For The Road (1967 Mancini/Hepburn/Finney) Heat Lightning (1934 Glenda Farrell/Aline MacMahon) Love That Brute (1950 Paul Douglas) More on reddit.com
🌐 r/classicfilms
53
15
November 4, 2024
Best "classic" movies to watch?

Dear OP: "classic" movies are ridiculously plenty, but I think these are pretty safe for a "must watch" list.

  • The Godfather I & II

  • Casablanca

  • Psycho

  • Lawrence of Arabia

  • Apocalypse Now (personal reccomendation)

If you want heavier/more "thinky" stuff :

  • 2001 : A Space Odyssey

  • Citizen Kane

More on reddit.com
🌐 r/movies
247
89
March 20, 2016
Classic movies that everyone should watch?
Arsenic and Old Lace Some like it Hot Auntie Mame Singing in the Rain The Great Escape 12 angry men All the Presidents Men Jaws Star Wars The Goonies Working Girl Aliens When Harry Met Sally Godfather 1&2 Terminator 2 Pulp Fiction Withnail and I Before sunset Gross point blank Life is Beautiful More on reddit.com
🌐 r/MovieSuggestions
330
162
November 24, 2023
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IMDb
imdb.com › list › ls021997760
The 100 Best Classic Movies of All Time
The story of T.E. Lawrence, the English officer who successfully united and led the diverse, often warring, Arab tribes during World War I in order to fight the Turks.DirectorDavid LeanStarsPeter O'TooleAlec GuinnessAnthony Quinn ... When a mysterious artifact is uncovered on the Moon, a spacecraft manned by two humans and one supercomputer is sent to Jupiter to find its origins.DirectorStanley KubrickStarsKeir DulleaGary LockwoodWilliam Sylvester ... After two male musicians witness a mob hit, they flee the state in an all-female band disguised as women, but further complications set in.DirectorBilly WilderStarsMarilyn MonroeTony CurtisJack Lemmon
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Reddit
reddit.com › r/movies › what are some classic films everyone should watch?
r/movies on Reddit: What are some classic films everyone should watch?
September 22, 2024 -

My wife hasn’t seen a ton of films I always took for granted that everyone had seen, things like Fight Club, Alien, American Psycho, Goodfellas etc. what are some classic films that everyone should see at some point in their life (not really looking for old classics like Casablanca/citizen kane things like that though)

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IMDb
imdb.com › list › ls089946760
[Must-See] Timeless Classic Movies for Me
A small-time Philadelphia boxer gets a supremely rare chance to fight the world heavyweight champion in a bout in which he strives to go the distance for his self-respect.DirectorJohn G. AvildsenStarsSylvester StalloneTalia ShireBurt Young ... Green Beret veteran Rambo takes on a Pacific Northwest sheriff and the National Guard.DirectorTed KotcheffStarsSylvester StalloneBrian DennehyRichard Crenna ... The solitary life of an artificial man with scissors for hands is upended when he is taken in by a suburban family.DirectorTim BurtonStarsJohnny DeppWinona RyderDianne Wiest
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Netflix
netflix.com › browse › genre › 31574
Classic Movies | Netflix Official Site
Some films are so great they belong to the ages. From war movies to biopics to iconic comedies, dramas and thrillers, these flicks have stood the test of time.
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Oldhollywoodtour
oldhollywoodtour.com › blog › classicfilmstowatchduringquarantine
Classic Films Recommended by Classic Film Fans: Take I — April's Old Hollywood
November 8, 2020 - Before their divorce becomes final, Jerry (Grant) and Lucy Warriner (Dunne) both do their best to undermine each other's subsequent romances. Their methods to prevent each other from pursuing romance make for a classic romp through 1930s comedy. ... This classic set in 1927 follows a silent film company making a rocky transition into the talkies. The movie also offers an entertaining take on the Hollywood publicity machine.
Find elsewhere
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Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org › wiki › AFI's_100_Years...100_Movies
AFI's 100 Years...100 Movies - Wikipedia
October 8, 2025 - The first of the AFI 100 Years... series of cinematic milestones, AFI's 100 Years...100 American Movies is a list of the 100 best American movies, as determined by the American Film Institute from a poll of more than 1,500 artists and leaders in the film industry who chose from a list of 400 nominated movies.
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Films101
films101.com › best-movies-by-year.htm
The Best Movies by Year, Decade, Classic Movies
Browse the best movies of all time by year, decade, century, classic movies. The best movies to watch right now.
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Empire
empireonline.com › movies › features › best-movies-of-all-time-us
Best Movies Of All Time: The Top 100 According To 3,000 Fans
November 21, 2025 - The 100 best movies of all time voted by Empire fans; 1 Lord of The Rings · 2 Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back · 3 The Godfather · 4 The Dark Knight
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Rolling Stone
rollingstone.com › tv-movies › tv-movie-lists › 100-greatest-movies-of-the-1980s-1277869
The 100 Greatest Movies of the 1980s
March 3, 2022 - Rolling Stone's The 100 Greatest Movies of the 1980s — from 'Raging Bull' to 'The Road Warrior,' 'Do the Right Thing' to 'The Terminator.'
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ScreenRant
screenrant.com › home › movies › the 60 best movies of all time
The 60 Best Movies Of All Time
October 6, 2025 - Here are the Best Movies of All Time, as evaluated by Screen Rant. Covering Guillermo del Toro’s Pan’s Labyrinth to Alfred Hitchcock’s classic thriller Rear Window, with cartoon rats, gangsters and superheroes in between, it’s the perfect list for emerging cinephiles or checking off essential watches.
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Roger Ebert
rogerebert.com › roger ebert › the greatest films of all time
The greatest films of all time | Roger Ebert | Roger Ebert
December 15, 2012 - One of my shifts last time was to replace Hitchcock’s “Notorious” (1946) with “Vertigo,” because after going through both a shot at a time during various campus sessions, I decided that “Vertigo” was, after all, the better of two nearly perfect films. The other titles I consider the best work by their directors.
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Quora
quora.com › What-are-some-of-the-best-classic-films-that-everybody-should-experience
What are some of the best classic films that everybody should experience? - Quora
Answer (1 of 10): Let me lead with the finest * Casablanca. Possibly the best film of all time. A love triangle interwoven with a story about the oppressive effects of a repressive regime on ordinary people. Ends with a life affirming idea, that doing what is right is more important than acting...
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Johnson County Library
jocolibrary.bibliocommons.com › v2 › list › display › 73976810 › 1703375629
88 Movies You Have to Watch at Least Once in Your Life — a staff-created list from Johnson County Library | Johnson County Library | BiblioCommons
December 11, 2025 - Director Marielle Heller gives us the sex-positive coming of age movie you never thought would arrive, while…Read moreRead more of this annotation ... The '00s weren’t the '00s without Amanda Bynes, and She’s the Man proves it. When Viola (Bynes) finds out that her school is cutting the women’s soccer team, she decides to take a chance and disguises herself as her twin brother to play for his…Read moreRead more of this annotation ... It’s the classic underdog story that made Sylvester Stallone a household name.
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TCM
tcm.com
Watch Turner Classic Movies on TCM.com
Turner Classic Movies presents the greatest classic films of all time from one of the largest film libraries in the world. Find extensive video, photos, articles, and archival content from some of the best movies ever made only at TCM.com.
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Hulu
hulu.com › hub › classics-movies
Watch Popular Classic Movies Shows Online | Hulu
A widower with a six year-old boy has a hard time finding a new wife/stepmother that meets his son's approval.Drama, Classics • Movie (1963) ... A tough cop meets his match when he has to guard a gangster's moll on a tense train ride.TVPG • Drama, Classics • Movie (1952) ... A tough race car driver comes up against an equally tough newspaper columnist in a drama set against the fast action of the auto racing world.
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Marie Claire
marieclaire.com › culture › movies
The 100 Best Movies of All Time: The Ultimate Must-Watch Films | Marie Claire
April 21, 2025 - The unlikely bond shared on-screen between him, John "Plato" Crawford (Sal Mineo), and Judy (Natalie Wood) gave American youths at the time a movie where they could finally see themselves on the screen. ... It’s the classic underdog story that made Sylvester Stallone a household name. The sports movie follows boxer Rocky Balboa (Stallone) on the road to fight heavyweight champion Apollo Creed in a match deemed “a somebody vs. nobody.” The film, written by Stallone, won Best Picture at the Oscars in 1977. ... See for yourself where all the live versions of the cult favorite Rocky Horror Picture Show began with this over-the-top, perfectly cast musical (see: young Susan Sarandon).
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Quora
quora.com › What-are-some-must-see-classic-films-that-have-stood-the-test-of-time
What are some must-see classic films that have stood the test of time? - Quora
Answer (1 of 3): Watch this classic film on YouTube for free, you will never regret your choice for sure. 1982 - A love marriage On some random day, I found this movie on YouTube called ' 1982 - A Love Marriage' set in an ordinary village and acted by ordinary people but it's worth watching for...