Luke McKernan

Lead Curator, News and Moving Image, British Library
UK

Voted for

FilmYearDirector
The Lady of the Dugout 1918W.S. Van Dyke
Open all Night1935George Pearson
ROBINSON CRUSOE1953Luis Buñuel
Black Girl1965Ousmane Sembène
SKRIVÁNCI NA NITÍCH1990Jirí Menzel
KO TO TAMO PEVA1980Slobodan Sijan
Every Picture Tells a Story1984James Scott
Atlantic Rhapsody 52 myndir úr Tórshavn 1989Katrin Ottarsdóttir
La camarista2018Lila Avilés
The Last Black Man in San Francisco 2019Joe Talbot

Comments

The Lady of the Dugout

1918

A reformed outlaw brings about forgiveness.

Open all Night

1935 United Kingdom

In a London hotel, the old must give way to the young.

ROBINSON CRUSOE

1953 Mexico

A shipwrecked man rebuilds the world as he understands it.

Black Girl

1965 Senegal, France

Trapped in France, a Senegalese maid fights for her identity.

SKRIVÁNCI NA NITÍCH

1990 Czechoslovakia

In a scrapyard, dissidents philosophise and find hope in the darkness.

KO TO TAMO PEVA

1980 Yugoslavia

A motley group on a bus to Belgrade face up to random disasters.

Every Picture Tells a Story

1984 United Kingdom

A child looks around him and becomes an artist.

Atlantic Rhapsody 52 myndir úr Tórshavn

1989

Over 24 hours a society tells its interconnected stories.

La camarista

2018 Mexico, USA

A chambermaid has her small dreams but finds only disappointment.

The Last Black Man in San Francisco

2019

A young man reclaims a romantic building as his true home.

Further remarks

The films I have chosen are not obviously ‘great’, but they exemplify for me what is great about film itself. Each one shows supremely well that our realities are dreamworlds. On any other day I could have picked a different ten that might have served just as well, but these ten each please me for their originality, their modesty, and their visual understanding.