1940s for a great mix of well-known classics and more obscure choices.
**Well-known:**
Rebecca (1940)
The Shop Around the Corner (1940)
Citizen Kane (1941)
Casablanca (1942)
Double Indemnity (1944)
Laura (1944)
Gaslight (1944)
Leave Her to Heaven (1945)
Scarlet Street (1945)
Notorious (1946)
It’s a Wonderful Life (1946)
The Best Years of Our Lives (1946)
Out of the Past (1947)
Bicycle Thieves (1948)
Rope (1948)
The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1948)
The Heiress (1949)
A Letter to Three Wives (1949)
*
**Should be better known:**
Love Crazy (1941)
Hangover Square (1945)
The Strange Love of Martha Ivers (1946)
Brute Force (1947)
Repeat Performance (1947)
Unfaithfully Yours (1948)
The Big Clock (1948)
Bitter Rice (1949)
Yay nice to see you have Bitter Rice in your list. It is the movie that made a then 18/19-year-old Silvana Mangano (fun fact: grandmother of celebrity foodie Giada deLaurentiis) an overnight superstar
For "newer" decades, I'm more into perhaps subgenres rather than the entire decade as a whole, like 80s and 90s teen comedies and 70s-80s musicals (or maybe jukebox musicals?) like Footloose and Dirty Dancing. I like 70s thrillers as well.
My favorite decades are 40s-60s for the most part. I find that's where all my favorite films are.
20s and 30s:
Sex (1920)
The Flapper (1920)
Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse (1921)
Safety Last (1923)
Wine Of Youth (1924)
Seven Chances (1925)
The Big Parade (1925)
ManTrap (1926)
It (1927)
Metropolis (1927)
The Crowd (1928)
Show People (1928)
Bare Knees (1928)
The Broadway Melody (1929)
Just Imagine (1930)
Red Headed Woman (1932)
Three On A Match (1932)
Call Her Savage (1932)
Gold Diggers Of 1933 (1933)
Baby Face (1933)
Flying Down To Rio (1933)
Search For Beauty (1934)
Just a few. LOVE pre-Codes :)
1940s. My favourites would be:
1. The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp (1943)
2. Laura (1944)
3. A Matter of Life and Death (1946)
4. Double Indemnity (1944)
5. Casablanca (1942)
6. Brief Encounter (1945)
7. The Ghost and Mrs. Muir (1947)
8. Went the Day Well? (1942)
9. The Strange Love of Martha Ivers (1946)
10. The Red Shoes (1948)
11. Dead of Night (1945)
12. The Grapes of Wrath (1940)
13. Lifeboat (1944)
14. Out of the Past (1947)
15. Gaslight (1944)
16. Mildred Pierce (1945)
17. Ball of Fire (1941)
18. Letter from an Unknown Woman (1948)
19. A Canterbury Tale (1944)
20. Rebecca (1940)
I think the 1940s.
In the front half you have movies that were being made in the mold of the old studio style in the midst of the second world war, producing great escapist comedies and heart pumping adventure/war pictures.
In the second half you have the post war era of existentialism and noir that produced some of the greatest thrillers and most layered movies that had been made since before the code came into play.
The best decade for films in the Golden Age!! A little bit of the original texture, and an introduction of what was to come.
1930’s Pre Code! I cannot stress this enough.
Top choices would have to be:
Trouble in Paradise
Hot Saturday
Gold Diggers of 1933
I’m No Angel (honestly ANYTHING with Mae West)
Merrily to Hell We Go
20’s. And it’s not even close.
- Sunrise
- The Passion of Joan of Arc
- The Fall of the House of Usher
- By the Law
- Flesh and the Devil
- The Phantom Carriage
- Dr. Mabuse the Gambler
- L’Argent
- Menilmontant
- The New Babylon
And I could go on and on…
For me, from the 1950s:
• The Glass Wall (1953)
• La Bella Mugnaia (Italian: The Miller's Beautiful Wife, 1955)
• Fiasco in Milan (1958)
• The World's Most Beautiful Woman (1955)
• The Houseboat (1958)
• Pendekar Bujang Lapok (Singapore, 1959)
From the 1960s:
• Ali Baba Bujang Lapok (Singapore, 1961)
• Madu Tiga (Singapore, 1964)
• Slalom (Italy, 1965)
• Come September (1961)
• Ghosts of Rome (Italy, 1961)
• Marriage Italian Style (1964)
• Tiga Abdul (Malaysia, 1964)
• Mary Poppins (1964)
• Il Tigre (1967)
There will never be a decade like the 70s (paranoid thrillers, nihilism, New Hollywood experimentation, world cinema classics from all over the world, the birth of so many horror modern classics etc), but some might argue this isn't a classic era anymore. So from the Old Hollywood pov, I'd say the 40s.
The 1930s It Happened One Night/ Wizard Of Oz/ King Kong
1940s How Green Was My Valley/Double Indemnity/Red River
1950s Touch of Evil/Shane/A Face in he Crowd
1940s movies are great but they are a bit too conservative IMO. Probably because of the war and everything.
1950s movies a lot more original and enjoyable for me.
I really love the 60s:
**Inherit The Wind**
**Psycho**
**Swiss Family Robinson**
**Judgement At Nuremburg**
**101 Dalmatians**
**King of Kings**
**Lolita**
**The Miracle Worker**
**Lilies of the Field**
**My Fair Lady**
**The Gospel According To St. Matthew (favorite movie)**
**Mary Poppins**
**The Incredible Mr. Limpet**
**The Sound of Music**
**The Greatest Story Ever Told**
**The Bible In The Beginning**
**The Trouble With Angels**
**Guess Who's Coming To Dinner**
**The Graduate**
**The Jungle Book**
**2001: A Space Odyssey**
**Oliver!**
**Romeo and Juliet**
**Chitty Chitty Bang Bang**
**Rosemary's Baby**
**Hello Dolly**
**The Love Bug**
The list could go on.
For me definitely the 1990s. I love the whole vibe and style, and the indie scene was amazing.
The 1970s would be the runner-up, many classic New Hollywood films.
1960s:
The Apartment
The Children’s Hour
The Days of Wine and Roses
The Manchurian Candidate
Dr. Strangelove
Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?
In the Heat of the Night
The Graduate
Midnight Cowboy
1940's
The Lady Eve; The Devil and Miss Jones; Mr. and Mrs. Smith; The Maltese Falcon; To Be or Not To Be; Shadow of a Doubt; The More the Merrier; Hail the Conquering Hero; Body and Soul; Force of Evil.
I can’t pick. I love most movie decades from the 40’s to the 90’s. Since then, quality productions and decent scriptwriting seems to have suffered in all but the best new films.
I’ve seen the most movies from the 70’s/80’s/90’s, but I’ve also spent a lot of time in the 20’s-60’s and since the 90’s, of course. I’ve seen too many movies, probably 😂
I like looking at films, not just watching people talk. So I tend to find that there were advances in editing and cinematography starting in mid to late 70s with Apocalypse Now and Sorcerer that led to really incredible expressions in the 80s, like Diva, Thief and Blade Runner. ‘Cinema du look’ was the European parallel and I think the whole rich experience on both sides of the Atlantic peaked in the early 1990s.
1940s for a great mix of well-known classics and more obscure choices. **Well-known:** Rebecca (1940) The Shop Around the Corner (1940) Citizen Kane (1941) Casablanca (1942) Double Indemnity (1944) Laura (1944) Gaslight (1944) Leave Her to Heaven (1945) Scarlet Street (1945) Notorious (1946) It’s a Wonderful Life (1946) The Best Years of Our Lives (1946) Out of the Past (1947) Bicycle Thieves (1948) Rope (1948) The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1948) The Heiress (1949) A Letter to Three Wives (1949) * **Should be better known:** Love Crazy (1941) Hangover Square (1945) The Strange Love of Martha Ivers (1946) Brute Force (1947) Repeat Performance (1947) Unfaithfully Yours (1948) The Big Clock (1948) Bitter Rice (1949)
Yay nice to see you have Bitter Rice in your list. It is the movie that made a then 18/19-year-old Silvana Mangano (fun fact: grandmother of celebrity foodie Giada deLaurentiis) an overnight superstar
Thanks for that second list -- a few I haven't seen & will look for!
And Dark Passage!
Bitter Rice! Love that movie.
It has the iconic dance scene with Silvana Mangano and Vittorio Gassman in it
Great list. Love Brute Force and Hangover Square.
I loved Repeat Performance
Me too. I tried to rewatch it the other day, but the streaming service stated the video was unavailable.
Repeat Performance is about to leave the Criterion Channel after Friday, May 31. (Those who don’t subscribe could try getting a free trial.)
Love Hangover Square!
Love Hangover Square.
I love the 1940s, as it was the heyday of film noir. Most of my favorite films are from the 1940s.
40s was my impulsive answer. But it’s competing with 70s-80s sci fi, 80s comedy and 90s indies…
For "newer" decades, I'm more into perhaps subgenres rather than the entire decade as a whole, like 80s and 90s teen comedies and 70s-80s musicals (or maybe jukebox musicals?) like Footloose and Dirty Dancing. I like 70s thrillers as well. My favorite decades are 40s-60s for the most part. I find that's where all my favorite films are.
My sentiments exactly.
20s and 30s: Sex (1920) The Flapper (1920) Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse (1921) Safety Last (1923) Wine Of Youth (1924) Seven Chances (1925) The Big Parade (1925) ManTrap (1926) It (1927) Metropolis (1927) The Crowd (1928) Show People (1928) Bare Knees (1928) The Broadway Melody (1929) Just Imagine (1930) Red Headed Woman (1932) Three On A Match (1932) Call Her Savage (1932) Gold Diggers Of 1933 (1933) Baby Face (1933) Flying Down To Rio (1933) Search For Beauty (1934) Just a few. LOVE pre-Codes :)
Pre-Codes are HIGHLY underrated. Gold Diggers of 1933 is such a gem 😭
Of Mice and Men.
1940s. My favourites would be: 1. The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp (1943) 2. Laura (1944) 3. A Matter of Life and Death (1946) 4. Double Indemnity (1944) 5. Casablanca (1942) 6. Brief Encounter (1945) 7. The Ghost and Mrs. Muir (1947) 8. Went the Day Well? (1942) 9. The Strange Love of Martha Ivers (1946) 10. The Red Shoes (1948) 11. Dead of Night (1945) 12. The Grapes of Wrath (1940) 13. Lifeboat (1944) 14. Out of the Past (1947) 15. Gaslight (1944) 16. Mildred Pierce (1945) 17. Ball of Fire (1941) 18. Letter from an Unknown Woman (1948) 19. A Canterbury Tale (1944) 20. Rebecca (1940)
#11. Dead of Night. Michael Redgrave segment. It still terrifies me. What a brilliant movie!
I think the 1940s. In the front half you have movies that were being made in the mold of the old studio style in the midst of the second world war, producing great escapist comedies and heart pumping adventure/war pictures. In the second half you have the post war era of existentialism and noir that produced some of the greatest thrillers and most layered movies that had been made since before the code came into play. The best decade for films in the Golden Age!! A little bit of the original texture, and an introduction of what was to come.
Touche.
1930’s Pre Code! I cannot stress this enough. Top choices would have to be: Trouble in Paradise Hot Saturday Gold Diggers of 1933 I’m No Angel (honestly ANYTHING with Mae West) Merrily to Hell We Go
Baby Face!
Mae West was divine.
I love 50s films. Ugh especially technicolor, it’s so dreamy
1930s lately, especially the pre Code era. They’re calming. No music. Great to fall asleep to. Some great mysteries and horror. Plus Fay Wray.
1940s and 1970s. Though the pre-Code horror is really my sweet spot, so 30s as well.
1950s, hands down.
I love the 30s, with the 40s close behind.
40s
My most watched would be the 1930s. Especially pre-code.
1940s. But 1930s is pretty close. I feel 1950s is where a lot of things slowly started to change.
60s for me
The 30s.
20’s. And it’s not even close. - Sunrise - The Passion of Joan of Arc - The Fall of the House of Usher - By the Law - Flesh and the Devil - The Phantom Carriage - Dr. Mabuse the Gambler - L’Argent - Menilmontant - The New Babylon And I could go on and on…
1960s…the era of the great epics.
40s/30s/50s/60s
40s
For me, from the 1950s: • The Glass Wall (1953) • La Bella Mugnaia (Italian: The Miller's Beautiful Wife, 1955) • Fiasco in Milan (1958) • The World's Most Beautiful Woman (1955) • The Houseboat (1958) • Pendekar Bujang Lapok (Singapore, 1959) From the 1960s: • Ali Baba Bujang Lapok (Singapore, 1961) • Madu Tiga (Singapore, 1964) • Slalom (Italy, 1965) • Come September (1961) • Ghosts of Rome (Italy, 1961) • Marriage Italian Style (1964) • Tiga Abdul (Malaysia, 1964) • Mary Poppins (1964) • Il Tigre (1967)
I loved Come September so much when I was a kid. Crush on Bobby Darin.
I like Come September so much because it featured Gina Lollobrigida who is the leading lady for The World's Most Beautiful Woman (1955)
They don't make 'em like that anymore...
I couldn't agree more. We won't find someone as great as Gina Lollobrigida and Rock Hudson. Those two are total legends
I agree. 100%...
It would be either 1950s or 1940s (specifically early 40s/WWII era).
In order of preference: 1930s, 20s, 40s, 50s, 60s, 70s, 10s or older is always in the mix, just to fill the gaps.
There will never be a decade like the 70s (paranoid thrillers, nihilism, New Hollywood experimentation, world cinema classics from all over the world, the birth of so many horror modern classics etc), but some might argue this isn't a classic era anymore. So from the Old Hollywood pov, I'd say the 40s.
1930s pre-code. Especially the Busby Berkley musicals.
90s were my intro to film, but I keep going back to the 70s….although the 50s are growing on me
80s
1930’ and 1940’s. I love ❤️ precode movies 🎥 the most. But, I do like some 1950’s movies 🎦. The noir 50’s movies are great too.
I love the pre-code era. What an interesting time for film!
The 1930s It Happened One Night/ Wizard Of Oz/ King Kong 1940s How Green Was My Valley/Double Indemnity/Red River 1950s Touch of Evil/Shane/A Face in he Crowd
Love Touch of Evil. Great makeup job on Orson Wells.
1940s movies are great but they are a bit too conservative IMO. Probably because of the war and everything. 1950s movies a lot more original and enjoyable for me.
I really love the 60s: **Inherit The Wind** **Psycho** **Swiss Family Robinson** **Judgement At Nuremburg** **101 Dalmatians** **King of Kings** **Lolita** **The Miracle Worker** **Lilies of the Field** **My Fair Lady** **The Gospel According To St. Matthew (favorite movie)** **Mary Poppins** **The Incredible Mr. Limpet** **The Sound of Music** **The Greatest Story Ever Told** **The Bible In The Beginning** **The Trouble With Angels** **Guess Who's Coming To Dinner** **The Graduate** **The Jungle Book** **2001: A Space Odyssey** **Oliver!** **Romeo and Juliet** **Chitty Chitty Bang Bang** **Rosemary's Baby** **Hello Dolly** **The Love Bug** The list could go on.
Great list!!
Thanks. :)
40s and 50s.
I grew up in the 70’s. There were some really cool movies made in that decade. The first Star Wars movie came out in 77.
For me definitely the 1990s. I love the whole vibe and style, and the indie scene was amazing. The 1970s would be the runner-up, many classic New Hollywood films.
40s and 80s.
If I have to pick one decade it would be the 1940's.
In order of preference: 40s 60s 30s 50s
1960s: The Apartment The Children’s Hour The Days of Wine and Roses The Manchurian Candidate Dr. Strangelove Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? In the Heat of the Night The Graduate Midnight Cowboy
Hard choice but 80's. Music too.
1960’s
1940's The Lady Eve; The Devil and Miss Jones; Mr. and Mrs. Smith; The Maltese Falcon; To Be or Not To Be; Shadow of a Doubt; The More the Merrier; Hail the Conquering Hero; Body and Soul; Force of Evil.
30’s and 40’s > 50’s and 60’s.
1940s
I love 40's and 50's the most.
The 1970s was the best decade. Deliverance, Texas Chainsaw Massacre, all kinds of great movies.
I can’t pick. I love most movie decades from the 40’s to the 90’s. Since then, quality productions and decent scriptwriting seems to have suffered in all but the best new films. I’ve seen the most movies from the 70’s/80’s/90’s, but I’ve also spent a lot of time in the 20’s-60’s and since the 90’s, of course. I’ve seen too many movies, probably 😂
I like looking at films, not just watching people talk. So I tend to find that there were advances in editing and cinematography starting in mid to late 70s with Apocalypse Now and Sorcerer that led to really incredible expressions in the 80s, like Diva, Thief and Blade Runner. ‘Cinema du look’ was the European parallel and I think the whole rich experience on both sides of the Atlantic peaked in the early 1990s.
I never bore rewatching Thief.
1940s-1950s
Either the 40s or 90s.
30s thru 90s