TOP 100 FOREIGN FILMS | BEST FOREIGN FILMS

The Bicycle Thief is a 1948 Italian neorealist film directed by Vittorio De Sica. One of the best foreign language films ever filmed, it tells the story of a poor man searching the streets of Rome for his stolen bicycle, which he needs to be able to work. It stars Lamberto Maggiorani as the poor man searching for his lost bicycle and Enzo Staiola as his son. The movie has been critically regarded as one of the best movies ever produced.

The Bicycle Thief (Ladri di biciclette)!
Top Foreign Films

M is a 1931 German drama-thriller directed by Fritz Lang and written by Lang and his wife Thea von Harbou. It was Lang's first sound film, although he had directed over a dozen films previously. The film has become a classic which Lang himself considered his finest work - definitely belongs to any top foreign films list.

M (1931)!
Top Foreign Films

The Umbrellas of Cherbourg is one of the best foreign language films - a musical film made in 1964. It was directed by Jacques Demy, and stars Catherine Deneuve and Nino Castelnuovo. The music was written by Michel Legrand. The film dialogue is all sung as recitative, even the most casual conversation.

The Umbrellas of Cherbourg (Les Parapluies de Cherbourg)!
Top Foreign Films

Aguirre, the Wrath of God is an independent 1972 German film written and directed by Werner Herzog. Klaus Kinski stars in the title role. Aguirre was given an extensive arthouse theatrical release in the United States in 1977, and remains one of this director's most famous films. You will find this in any sensible list of best foreign movies.

Aguirre, the Wrath of God (Aguirre, der Zorn Gottes)!
Top Foreign Films

The Dreamlife of Angels is a 1998 French drama film directed by Erick Zonca. One of the highly acclaimed foreign films to adorn any top 100 foreign films list.

The Dreamlife of Angels (La vie revee des anges)!
Top Foreign Films

Grand Illusion is a 1937 war film directed by Jean Renoir. One of the top foreign films of all times, the story concerns class relationships among a small group of French officers who are prisoners of war during World War I and are plotting an escape.

Grand Illusion (La Grande Illusion)!
Top Foreign Films

Seven Beauties is a 1975 Italian language film written and directed by Lina Wertmuller. A masterpiece that certainly belongs to my list of top 100 foreign films without reservation.

Seven Beauties (Pasqualino Settebellezze)!
Top Foreign Films

My Favorite Season is a 1993 French drama film directed by Andre Techine. The story concerns a matriarch Berthe (Marthe Villalonga) who goes to live with her daughter Emilie (Catherine Deneuve) and her family. It won the award for Best Foreign Language Films at the 1996 Boston Society of Film Critics Awards.

My Favorite Season (Ma Saison Preferee)!
Top Foreign Films

The Decameron is a 1971 film by Italian director Pier Paolo Pasolini - definitely has its unique place in my top foreign films collection. It's the first movie of Pasolini's Trilogy of life, the others being The Canterbury Tales and Arabian Nights.

The Decameron!
Top Foreign Films

Run Lola Run is a 1998 German thriller film written and directed by Tom Tykwer. The story follows a woman who needs to obtain 100,000 Deutsche Mark in 20 minutes to save her boyfriend's life. One of the best foreign movies ever.

Run Lola Run (Lola Rennt)!
Top Foreign Films

The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie is a 1972 surrealist film directed by Luis Bunuel. The film concerns a group of upper class people attempting - despite continual interruptions - to dine together. A masterpiece that should adorn any top foreign films list.

The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie (Le charme discret de la bourgeoisie)!
Top Foreign Films

The Good, the Bad and the Ugly, a must in my best foreign language films list, is a 1966 Italian epic spaghetti western film directed by Sergio Leone. Leone explains that "the killings in my films are exaggerated because I wanted to make a tongue-in-cheek satire on run-of-the-mill westerns... The west was made by violent, uncomplicated men, and it is this strength and simplicity that I try to recapture in my pictures."

The Good, The Bad and the Ugly (Il buono, il brutto, il cattivo)!
Top Foreign Films

Once Upon a Time in the West is a 1968 epic spaghetti Western film directed by Sergio Leone. The film opens at an isolated train station in Arizona. The station master is changing the expected arrival time of a train to show that it will be late. Three gunmen arrive at the station with an ambience of tension and foreboding...for the rest, just watch it. Yes - in my top foreign films collection.

Once Upon a Time in the West (C'era una volta il West)!
Top Foreign Films

Contempt (French: Le Mepris) is a 1963 film directed by Jean-Luc Godard. A must watch fr anyone who wants to explore the top 100 foreign films of all times.

Contempt (Le mepris)!
Top Foreign Films

Breathless is a 1960 film directed by Jean-Luc Godard. Godard's first feature-length film is among the inaugural films of the French New Wave and came straight into my list of top foreign films. It derived from a scenario by fellow New Wave director, Francois Truffaut, and the film was released the year after Truffaut's The 400 Blows and Alain Resnais's Hiroshima, Mon Amour.

Breathless (A bout de souffle)!
Top Foreign Films

Ali: Fear Eats the Soul is a 1974 West German film written and directed by Rainer Werner Fassbinder. The film won two awards at the 1974 Cannes Film Festival and is considered to be one of Fassbinder's most powerful works - definitely belongs to any top 100 foreign films collection.

Ali: Fear Eats the Soul (Angst essen Seele auf)!
Top Foreign Films

The Tin Drum is a 1959 novel by Günter Grass. A superb work that is widely regarded as one of the best foreign language films worldwide.

The Tin Drum!
Top Foreign Films

Rocco and His Brothers is a 1960 Italian and French film directed by Luchino Visconti. Set in Milan, it tells the story of an immigrant family from the South and its disintegration in the society of the industrial North. A great saga that belongs to my list of best foreign films without reservation.

Rocco and His Brothers!
Top Foreign Films

The Wages of Fear is a 1953 drama film directed by Henri-Georges Clouzot, starring Yves Montand, and based on a 1950 novel by Georges Arnaud. When a South American oil well owned by an American company catches fire, the company hires four European men, down on their luck, to drive two trucks over mountain dirt roads, while carrying the nitro-glycerine needed to extinguish the fire.

Wages of Fear!
Top Foreign Films

The Butcher is a 1970 French drama / thriller film written and directed by Claude Chabrol. Helene is a confident, slightly naive young teacher who is adored by her pupils at the school where she works and lives. She meets the local butcher, Popaul, at a wedding ceremony, and they strike up a close but platonic relationship. The film examines how Helene handles her suspicion of Popaul as a series of women in the small town fall victim to an unknown murderer.

The Butcher!
Top Foreign Films

Padre Padrone (1977) is an Italian film directed by Paolo and Vittorio Taviani. The Tavianis used both professional and non-professional actors from the Sardinian countryside. The drama was originally filmed by the Taviani brothers for Italian television but won the 1977 Palme d'Or prize at the 1977 Cannes Film Festival.

Padre Padrone!
Top Foreign Films

Diary of a Country Priest is a 1951 French film directed by Robert Bresson, and starring Claude Laydu. It was closely based on the novel of the same name by Georges Bernanos. Published in 1937, the novel received the Grand prix du roman de l'Academie francaise. It tells the story of a young, sickly priest, who has just arrived in his first parish, a village in northern France. The novel has been translated to English by Pamela Morris and was published the same year as the French original.

Diary of a Country Priest!
Top Foreign Films

Closely Watched Trains is a 1966 Czechoslovak film directed by Jiri Menzel. The film is based on a story by Bohumil Hrabal. It is a coming-of-age story about a boy working at a train station in German-occupied Czechoslovakia during World War II. It was filmed in Barrandov Studios, Prague.

Closely Watched Trains!
Top Foreign Films

The night of the shooting stars is a 1982 film directed by Paolo and Vittorio Taviani. It is the night when dreams come true in Italian folklore. In 1944, a group of Italians flee their town after hearing rumours that the Nazis plan to blow it up and that the Americans are about to arrive to liberate them.

Night of The Shooting Stars!
Top Foreign Films

Nuovo Cinema Paradiso is a 1988 Italian film written and directed by Giuseppe Tornatore. It was internationally released as Cinema Paradiso in France, Spain, the UK and the U.S. The film intertwines sentimentality with comedy, and nostalgia with pragmaticism. It explores issues of youth, coming of age, and reflections (in adulthood) about the past. The imagery in each scene can be said to reflect Salvatore's idealised memories about his childhood. Cinema Paradiso is also a celebration of films; as a projectionist, young Salvatore develops the passion for films that shapes his life path in adulthood.

Cinema Paradiso!
Top Foreign Films

Nights of Cabiria (1957) is an Italian film directed by Federico Fellini. Fellini's wife, Giulietta Masina, plays Cabiria Ceccarelli, a feisty but naive prostitute in Ostia, then a seedy section of Rome. The name Cabiria is borrowed from the 1914 Italian film Cabiria, while the character of Cabiria herself is taken from a brief scene in Fellini's earlier film The White Sheik. The American musical and movie Sweet Charity is based on Fellini's screenplay.

Nights of Cabiria!
Top Foreign Films

Last Tango in Paris is a 1973 Italian film directed by Bernardo Bertolucci which portrays a recent American widower who takes up an anonymous sexual relationship with a young, soon-to-be-married Parisian woman. It stars Marlon Brando, Maria Schneider and Jean-Pierre Léaud. The film's raw portrayal of sexual violence and emotional turmoil led to international controversy and drew various levels of government censorship.

Last Tango in Paris!
Top Foreign Films

Black Orpheus is a 1959 film made in Brazil by French director Marcel Camus. It is based on the play Orfeu da Conceicao by Vinicius de Moraes, which is an adaptation of the Greek legend of Orpheus and Eurydice, setting it in the modern context of a favela in Rio de Janeiro during the Carnaval. The film was an international co-production between production companies in Brazil, France and Italy.

The film is particularly renowned for its soundtrack by bossa nova legend Antonio Carlos Jobim, featuring songs such as "Manha de Carnaval" (written by Luiz Bonfa) and "A felicidade" that were to become bossa nova classics.

Black Orpheus!
Top Foreign Films

Beauty and the Beast is a 1946 French romantic fantasy film. Directed by French poet/filmmaker Jean Cocteau, the film belongs to any list of top foreign films.

Beauty and the Beast!
Top Foreign Films

The Shop on Main Street is a 1965 Czechoslovak film about the Aryanization programme during World War II in the Slovak State. The film won the 1965 Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film, and Kamiska was nominated in 1966 for Best Actress in a Leading Role. The film was also entered into the 1965 Cannes Film Festival.

The Shop on Main Street!
Top Foreign Films

The 400 Blows is a 1959 French film directed by Francois Truffaut. One of the defining films of the French New Wave, it displays many of the characteristic traits of the movement. The story revolves around Antoine Doinel, an ordinary adolescent in Paris, who is thought by his parents and teachers to be a trouble maker.

The 400 Blows!
Top Foreign Films

The Samurai is a 1967 French minimalist crime drama/thriller film directed by French filmmaker Jean-Pierre Melville. The film's protagonist Jef Costello is played by Alain Delon. You will find this film in any sensible best foreign movies list.

The Samurai!
Top Foreign Films

8 1/2 is a 1963 film directed by Italian director Federico Fellini. Co-scripted by Fellini, Tullio Pinelli, Ennio Flaiano, and Brunello Rondi, it stars Marcello Mastroianni as Guido Anselmi, a famous Italian film director. Shot in black-and-white by cinematographer Gianni di Venanzo, the film features a soundtrack by Nino Rota with costume and set designs by Piero Gherardi.

8 1/2!
Top Foreign Films

Nosferatu is a German Expressionist vampire horror film, directed by F. W. Murnau, starring Max Schreck as the vampire Count Orlok. The film, shot in 1921 and released in 1922, was in essence an unauthorized adaptation of Bram Stoker's Dracula, with names and other details changed because the studio could not obtain the rights to the novel (for instance, "vampire" became "Nosferatu" and "Count Dracula" became "Count Orlok").

Nosferatu!
Top Foreign Films

Belle de jour is a 1967 French film starring Catherine Deneuve as a woman who decides to spend her days as a prostitute while her husband is at work. A terrific creation, this will adorn any list of best foreign language films.

Belle de Jour!
Top Foreign Films

Amelie is a 2001 romantic comedy film directed by Jean-Pierre Jeunet and starring Audrey Tautou. A masterpiece that shpould be part of any top foreign films collection, the film is a whimsical and idealized depiction of contemporary Parisian life, set in Montmartre. It tells the story of a shy waitress who decides to change the lives of those around her for the better, while struggling with her own isolation.

Amelie!
Top Foreign Films

L'avventura is a 1960 Italian film directed by Michelangelo Antonioni and developed from his initial scenario. Monica Vitti and Gabriele Ferzetti star. The film is noted for its careful pacing which puts a focus on visual composition and character development, along with its unusual narrative structure which, taken altogether, "systematically subverted the filmic codes, practices and structures in currency at its time."

L'avventura!
Top Foreign Films

Forbidden Games is a 1952 French language film directed by Rene Clement and based on Francois Boyer's novel, Jeux interdits. It has a very unique place in my best foreign films list.

Forbidden Games!
Top Foreign Films

Amores perros is a 2000 Mexican film directed by Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu. It is an anthology film containing three distinct stories which are connected by a car accident in Mexico City. Each of the three tales is also a reflection on the cruelty of humans toward animals and each other, showing how they may live dark or even hideous lives. Amores Perros was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film in 2000 and won the Ariel Award for Best Picture from the Mexican Academy of Film.

Amores Perros!
Top Foreign Films

Mon Oncle is a 1958 film comedy by French filmmaker Jacques Tati. The first of Tati's films to be released in colour, Mon Oncle won the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film, a Special Prize at the 1958 Cannes Film Festival, and the New York Film Critics Circle Award for Best Foreign Language Film, receiving more honors than any of Tati's other cinematic works.

Mon Oncle!
Top Foreign Films

Vagabond is a 1985 drama film directed by Agnes Varda, featuring Sandrine Bonnaire. It describes the story of a young woman, a vagabond, who is found frozen in a ditch.

Vagabond!
Top Foreign Films

Alias Betty (Betty Fisher et autres histoires) is a 2002 French crime drama film directed by Claude Miller, featuring Sandrine Kiberlain and Nicole Garcia. It has to be one of the to foreign films of all times.

Alias Betty!
Top Foreign Films

Shoot the Piano Player is a 1960 French film directed by Francois Truffaut, starring Charles Aznavour. Wow! This should be in any top 100 foreign films list, no exception!

Shoot the Piano Player!
Top Foreign Films

The Rules of the Game is a 1939 film directed by Jean Renoir about upper-class French society just before the start of World War II. The Rules of the Game is often cited as one of the best foreign language films in the history of cinema.

The Rules of the Game!
Top Foreign Films

Accattone is a 1961 Italian film written and directed by Pier Paolo Pasolini. Despite being filmed from an original screenplay, academics perceive Accattone as a cinematic rendition of Pasolini's earlier novels, particularly Boys of Life and A Violent Life. It is Pasolini's first film as director, employing what would later be seen as trademark Pasolini characteristics; a cast of non-professional actors hailing from where the movie is set, and thematic emphasis on impoverished individuals.

Accattone!
Top Foreign Films

Play Time is French director Jacques Tati's fourth major film, and generally considered to be one of his better films. Shot in 70 mm, Play Time is notable for its enormous set, which Tati had built specially for the film, as well as Tati's trademark use of subtle, yet complex visual comedy supported by creative sound effects; dialogue is frequently reduced to the level of background noise.

Play Time!
Top Foreign Films

Y tu mama tambien (literally "And your mother, too", released in English-speaking markets under the original title in Spanish) is a 2001 Mexican film directed by Alfonso Cuaron and written by Carlos Cuaron. The film is a coming-of-age story about two teenage boys taking a road trip with a woman in her late twenties. The film is set in 1999, against the backdrop of the political and economic realities of present-day Mexico, specifically at the end of the uninterrupted 71-year line of Mexican presidents from the Institutional Revolutionary Party, and the rise of the opposition headed by Vicente Fox.

Y Tu Mama Tambien!
Top Foreign Films

Umberto D. is a 1952 Italian neorealist film, directed by Vittorio de Sica. Most of the actors were non-professional, including Carlo Battisti, who plays the title role. It tells the story of Umberto Domenico Ferrari (Carlo Battisti), an old man in Rome who is desperately trying to keep his apartment on a small state pension, but whose landlady (Lina Gennari) is attempting to drive him out to fit her social lifestyle.

Umberto D.!
Top Foreign Films

A Prophet is a 2009 French crime film directed by Jacques Audiard. The film won the Grand Prix at the 62nd Cannes Film Festival.

A Prophet!
Top Foreign Films

Boyfriends and Girlfriends is a 1987 comedy film directed by Eric Rohmer. The film stars Emmanuelle Chaulet, Sophie Renoir, Anne-Laure Meury.

Boyfriends and Girlfriends!
Top Foreign Films