Alexia Kannas
Lecturer in Cinema Studies, RMIT University
Australia
Voted for
| Film | Year | Director |
|---|---|---|
| Meshes of the Afternoon | 1943 | Maya Deren, Alexander Hackenschmied |
| Vertigo | 1958 | Alfred Hitchcock |
| Mulholland Dr. | 2001 | David Lynch |
| Wanda | 1970 | Barbara Loden |
| All That Heaven Allows | 1955 | Douglas Sirk |
| Letter from an Unknown Woman | 1948 | Max Ophuls |
| Jeanne Dielman, 23 Quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles | 1975 | Chantal Akerman |
| A New Leaf | 1970 | Elaine May |
| The Spirit of the Beehive | 1973 | Víctor Erice |
| Charulata | 1964 | Satyajit Ray |
Comments
My list materialised very quickly; this was a great surprise as these are not my necessarily my favourite films, and a useful definition of what constitutes 'greatness' continues to elude me. There's no Tourneur, or Franju or Bava here, and I guess I expected Billy Wilder or Charles Laughton to turn up. My heart said Fire Walk with Me, but the list says Mulholland Dr. I flirted with dropping Vertigo, but found in the end that I could not. The films I have listed are masterful explorations of desire, subjectivity, memory and temporality. They are also all, in one way or another, about women or girls.