| highest ranked film | |
| Celine and Julie Go Boating (1974) | |
| Le samouraï (1967) | |
| The Time to Live and the Time to Die (1985) | |
| Don't Look Now (1973) | |
| Beauty and the Beast (1946) | |
| Star Wars (1977) | |
| Peeping Tom (1960) | |
| Night of the Living Dead (1968) | |
| The Battle of Algiers (1965) | |
| Carrie (1976) | |
| The Terminator (1984) | |
| White Heat (1949) | |
| The Umbrellas of Cherbourg (1964) | |
| Laura (1944) | |
| The Exorcist (1973) | |
| Nanook of the North (1922) | |
| Bride of Frankenstein (1935) | |
| Harold and Maude (1972) | |
| Earth (1930) | |
| Brazil (1985) | |
| The Man With a Movie Camera (1929) | |
| Shock Corridor (1963) | |
| The Wages of Fear (1952) | |
| Ashes and Diamonds (1958) | |
| Do the Right Thing (1989) | |
| Le million (1931) | |
| Jeanne Dielman, 23 Quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles (1975) | |
| Shane (1953) | |
| Napoléon (1927) | |
| Bonnie and Clyde (1967) | |
| Halloween (1978) | |
| Picnic at Hanging Rock (1975) | |
| The Travelling Players (1975) | |
| Sweet Smell of Success (1957) | |
| My Neighbour Totoro (1988) | |
| Breaking the Waves (1996) | |
| Man of the West (1958) | |
| Black God, White Devil (1964) | |
| The Graduate (1967) | |
| Talk to Her (2002) | |
| King Kong (1933) | |
| Kiss Me Deadly (1955) | |
| Point Blank (1967) | |
| Stranger Than Paradise (1984) | |
| The Piano (1993) | |
| Pandora's Box (1928) | |
| The Art of Vision (1964) | |
| Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956) | |
| Boogie Nights (1997) | |
| Freaks (1932) | |
| Naked (1993) | |
| West Side Story (1961, with Jerome Robbins) | |
| Yi Yi: A One and a Two (2000) | |
| Edward Scissorhands (1990) | |
| The Deer Hunter (1978) | |
| Kes (1969) | |
| In the Realm of the Senses (1976) | |
| This Is Spinal Tap (1984) | |
| High Noon (1952) | |
| Floating Clouds (1955) | |
| The Last Picture Show (1971) | |
| Lacombe, Lucien (1974) | |
| Heat (1995) | |
| Cabaret (1972) | |
| The Spirit of the Beehive (1973) | |
| Raise the Red Lantern (1991) | |
| Wavelength (1967) | |
| JFK (1991) | |
| The Cloud-Capped Star (1960) | |
| Breakfast at Tiffany's (1961) | |
| Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937) | |
| The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1919) | |
| Sátántangó (1994) | |
| The Mother and the Whοre (1973) | |
| Fantasia (1940, as a co-director) | |
| Back to the Future (1985) | |
| Triumph of the Will (1935) | |
| Seventh Heaven (1927) | |
| Midnight Cowboy (1969) | |
| Shoah (1985) | |
| The Wind (1928) | |
| All the President's Men (1976) | |
| A Night at the Opera (1935) | |
| Tootsie (1982) | |