What Was the Best Year in Film History?

What was the best year in film? It's a tough question to answer as almost every year has many great films from blockbusters, to indie films, to foreign films. We've found 7 years worth discussing among many honourable mentions. Whether it's years that were the best an era had to offer, or influential years that shaped the films that are made even today, or just years that had an amazing lineup.

In this video we'll be going through each era of film, making sure each one is represented. The best year of silent films, the studio system, the late Golden Age of Hollywood, New Hollywood, Blockbuster decades and the year that had some of the greatest of films...

Chapters:
00:00 - Intro
00:44 - The Impressive Lineup
03:41 - The Best of an Era
04:56 - Studio System
06:15 - Best Decade?
07:41 - New Hollywood
09:06 - Most Influential
10:45 - Highest of Highs

Best Film Years. The Matrix. Fight Club. The Sixth Sense. Metropolis. Napoleon. The Wizard of Oz. Gone with the Wind. 12 Angry Men. Paths of Glory. Bonnie and Clyde. The Graduate. Taxi Driver. The God Father Part 2. Movie Brats Steven Spielberg. Chinatown. Dog Day Afternoon. Jaws. Blockbusters today. Star Wars. Close Encounters. Pulp Fiction. Forrest Gump. Shawshank Redemption. The Lion King. Shrek. 2019. 2014. 2007. 1999. 1927. 1939. 1954. 1957. 1959. 1967. 1972. 1974. 1975. 1976. 1977. 1982. 1986. 1987. 1994. 2001.

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#filmhistory #filmindustry #bestyear

[tobiasbaumgartner]

1999 had Matrix, fight club, eyes wide shut, sixth sense, the green mile, magnolia, toy story 2 and being John Malkovich

[nielslauridsen]

For me it has to be 1993;
- Schindler's List
- Jurassic Park
- Wallace & Gromit: The Wrong Trousers
- Tombstone
- Batman: Mask of the Phantasm
- Groundhog Day
- The Fugitive
- Stalingrad
- The Nightmare Before Christmas
- Dazed and Confused
- What's Eating Gilbert Grape
- Mrs. Doubtfire
- Falling Down
- True Romance
- Carlito's Way
- The Age of Innocence
- In the Line of Fire
- The Remains of the Day
- Philadelphia
- In the Name of the Father
- Gettysburg
And Super Mario Bros.

[jp]

1984 was iconic = Ghostbusters, Terminator, Karate Kid, Gremlins, NeverEnding Story, Temple of Doom, Beverly Hills Cop, Footloose, This Is Spinal Tap, Romancing the Stone, A Nightmare on Elm Street, Splash, The Natural, Red Dawn, Last Starfighter, Sixteen Candles, Top Secret, Purple Rain, Amadeus, Once Upon a Time in America, Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind, etc...

1994 was legendary = Shawshank Redemption, Pulp Fiction, Forrest Gump, Lion King, Leon: The Professional, Natural Born Killers, Ed Wood, Speed, True Lies, The Crow, Interview with the Vampire, Drunken Master 2, The Mask, Stargate, Legends of the Fall, Heavenly Creatures, Fist of Legend, Clear and Present Danger, Maverick, Clerks, Dumb & Dumber, etc...

'82 was a great year for sci-fi films = ET, Blade Runner, Tron, The Thing, Wrath of Khan.
'85 was a defining year for teen movies = Back to the Future, Breakfast Club, St. Elmo's Fire, The Goonies, Weird Science, Real Genius, Teen Wolf, Just One of the Guys, Legend of Billie Jean, Fright Night.
'87 was a strong year for action flicks = RoboCop, Predator, Lethal Weapon, Running Man, Project A 2, City on Fire.
'88 was an incredible year for animation in cinema = Akira, My Neighbor Totoro, Grave of the Fireflies, Land Before Time, Who Framed Roger Rabbit.
'92 was huge for dialogue in motion pictures = Quentin Tarantino's Reservoir Dogs, Aaron Sorkin's A Few Good Men, David Mamet's Glengarry Glen Ross.
'93 was the most competitive for supporting actor performances on the big screen = 66th Oscar nominees: Tommy Lee Jones (The Fugitive), Ralph Fiennes (Schindler's List), John Malkovich (In the Line of Fire), Leonardo DiCaprio (What's Eating Gilbert Grape), Pete Postlethwaite (In the Name of the Father). Snubs: Val Kilmer (Tombstone), Ben Kingsley (Schindler's List), Sean Penn (Carlito's Way), certain actors in True Romance.
'95 was phenomenal for the silver screen's crime genre = Se7en, Heat, Usual Suspects, Casino, La Haine.
'97 was another exciting one for action and/or sci-fi = Starship Troopers, Fifth Element, Face/Off, Con Air, Air Force One, Men in Black, Contact, Gattaca, Conspiracy Theory, Tomorrow Never Dies.

[jamesa.romano]

I think 1939 is generally accepted as the all time greatest year just because of how many genre defining works were released that year in addition to Gone With the Wind and Wizard of Oz, and I'm inclined to agree. Actually I see alot of similarities between the 1939 and 2019 in terms of how great a year for movies it was only for the world to basically be thrown into chaos the following year upending the movie industry, although 2019 was generally the greatest year in terms of raw box office numbers (seeing the most films reach the billion dollar mark in a single year), while the number of films in '39 that have stood the test of time on artistic merit alone is pretty staggering. Heck, Wizard of Oz didn't even make all that much money (it didn't outright flop but it was nowhere near the box office powerhouse that GWTW was).

There's 1967 which had The Graduate, Bonnie and Clyde, Guess Whose Coming to Dinner, The Jungle Book, You Only Live Twice, Wait Until Dark and The Dirty Dozen (all classics). I don't see 1962 in the conversation as much as I'd have thought and that was the year that saw Lawrence of Arabia, To Kill a Mockingbird, The Manchurian Candidate, The Longest Day, Long Day's Journey into Night, Whatever Happened to Baby Jane, Cape Fear, Gypsy, The Miracle Worker and Lolita (which I personally hate but is still a Kubrick so ergo a classic) - the first three of which turn up regularly in the list of greatest films of the 20th Century, and the others also being genre-defining works with longevity as classics in their own right.

My personal pick would probably be 1959 but for less obvious reasons. That year you had Ben-Hur, Some Like It Hot, North by Northwest, and Sleeping Beauty (which actually tanked on release and nearly sent Disney into bankruptcy but which is now considered a work of art) coupled with smaller releases like Imitation of Life, Porgy and Bess, Black Orpheus, Anatomy of a Murder, and Diary of Anne Frank that year which were either impactful in the long-term or had major artistic merit. Sort of like a cross roads from the big studio epics of the decade into the more quiet topical films of the 1960's

EDIT: Just found out there's an entire book on 1962 titled "Cinema '62: The Greatest Year at the Movies" by Stephen Farber and Michael McClellan that lays out a pretty good argument so I'm not alone on that opinion lol

[tomosmarland]

1960 will always be an influential year to me

.The Apartment
.Psycho
.La Dolce Vita
.Breathless
.L'avventura

[Plllhgrr]

For me it’s 2014
Oscar films
Whiplash
Foxcatcher
Birdman
The Grand Budapest hotel
Comic book movies
Captain America winter solider
Guardian of the galaxy
Xmen days of future past
Animation
The Lego movie
How to train a dragon 2
Big hero six
Comedies
The Interview
Bad neighbour
22 jump street
Action/adventure
Interstellar
Edge of tomorrow
Fury
Dawn of the planet of the apes
The Equalizer
Thriller
Gone girl
Nightcrawlers
Locke
John wick
WHY IS THIS YEAR SO UNDERRATED?

[BeatRoot]

2003 was a year i look back on so fondly. Pirates, return of the king, master and commander, x-men 2, finding nemo etc

[JeffreyDeCristofaro]

1982 for me - and for many hardcore cinephiles - was THE greatest year in cinema. Such a STACKED year!!! Six films from that year ALONE are in my Top 💯 Favorite Films of All Time:

- E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial
- Blade Runner
- The Thing
- Conan the Barbarian
- Pink Floyd The Wall
- Poltergeist

And let's not forget THESE classics, just to name a few!!! Personal honorable mentions from my 200-300 favorite films marked with *:

- Tootsie
- Gandhi
- Yol
- My Favorite Year
- Fitzcarraldo
- Fast Times at Ridgemont High
- First Blood*
- The Verdict
- An Officer and a Gentleman
- Victor/Victoria
- 48 Hrs.
- Sophie's Choice
- The Year of Living Dangerously
- Star Trek II: The Wrath of Kahn*
- Annie
- The Secret of NIMH*
- Q - The Winged Serpent*
- The Beastmaster
- Creepshow*
- TRON
- The Dark Crystal
- Best Friends
- The Man From Snowy River

[travisspazz]

For me it's 2007.
The oscar movies were good, the blockbusters were good, the comedies were good.
Hell we even got a decent Die Hard movie! Sadly, the last one.

[jimmyboy]

1993 and 1994 are the years I feel the most nostalgic for, along with 1984-89 in movies during my lifetime.

[ZacharyPerron-mb]

2019 was one hell of a year for films! Especially before the dreaded pandemic! I had an AMC pass, and I feel like I went to the theaters numerous times that year! Toy Story 4, Joker, The Irishman, Once Upon A Time In Hollywood, Parasite, Ford Vs. Ferrari, Avengers Endgame, etc.

[Theboris]

One of my personal favorite is 2001 because todays Hollywood Blockbuster we owe it to Harry Potter, Shrek, The Lord of the Rings, Monsters Inc and more. But leaving a side the Blockbusters I would say 1957, 1999 and 1994.

[MrGmart]

1982 had E.T. the Extraterrestrial, Blade Runner, The Verdict, Fast Times at Ridgemont High, Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, Tootsie, Sophie’s Choice and Gandhi just to name a few.

[FragglevisionReturns]

2023 isn't done as of this writing but it's delivered a lot of bangers (even with a few of them delayed to next year because of the strikes). Besides the Barbenheimer phenomenon there's Killers of the Flower Moon, Anatomy of a Fall, Past Lives, Zone of Interest, Across the SpiderVerse, Poor Things, May December, The Holdovers, Asteroid City, The Iron Claw, The Boy and the Heron, Flora and Son, Dicks the Musical, Beau is Afraid, and so much more. Would also like to shout out Riceboy Sleeps, which released at festivals in 2022 but only released widely this year. Probably one of the best movies I've seen period.

[azohundred]

1939 and 1957 are probably my 2 favorite Golden Age Hollywood years as well. Glad to see them both mentioned here.

[camcabbas]

2009 deserves a shout at least: Inglorious Basterds, A Serious Man, District 9, Up, Moon, The White Ribbon, The Secret in their Eyes, Enter the Void, Antichrist, The Road, Mother, Thirst, Cell 211, Dogtooth, A Prophet, White Material, the list goes on

[LukeLovesRose]

There are a lot of winners there. 1994, 1999, 1939, the list goes on and on

[artirony]

1967 is probably my pick: The Graduate, Play Time, The Producers, Who's That Knocking On My Door, Le Samourai, The Story of a Three Day Pass, Dragon Inn, Bonnie & Clyde, In the Heat of the Night, Branded to Kill, Guess Who's Coming to Dinner, Cool Hand Luke, Belle de Jour, The Dirty Dozen, Weekend, and The Young Girls of Rochefort

[danicee]

I’d love to see a video discussing the best years for animated films and (if possible) best years for TV. There’s been so much released and they all inform/influence eachother, especially casting and thematically, and I’d love to see how they overlap.

[fakehappyfilms]

I think 2014 may just be my favorite.

- Interstellar
- Whiplash
- Gone Girl
- Nightcrawler
- John Wick
- Birdman
- Grand Budapest Hotel
- Edge of Tomorrow
- THE LEGO MOVIE