Lucia Harper

Choosing a top 50, under any circumstances it tough, but choosing a subjective top 50 is the toughest of the lot because I can put aside minor details like high art, exquisite cinematography, provocative themes et al, leaving the field wide open.

For today, I put myself in a state of mind in which I chose movies I would watch and have watched, repeatedly. You won't find any Bicycle Thieves, Third Men, Conformists or Children of the Paradise on this Subjective Top 50. They are safely ensconced on the Best Top 50 List. The following 50 movies have given me many hours of pleasure. It's evident that I hold the ability to make me laugh above all other qualities.

• All That Heaven Allows (1955) .. Douglas Sirk
• All the President's Men (1976) .. Alan J. Pakula
• Auntie Mame (1958) .. Morton DaCosta
• Babe (1995) .. Chris Noonan
• The Band Wagon (1953) .. Vincente Minnelli
• Beau Geste (1939) .. William A. Wellman
• Broadcast News (1987) .. James L. Brooks
• Dazed and Confused (1993) .. Richard Linklater
• The Family Way (1966) .. Roy Boulting
• Field of Dreams (1989) .. Phil Alden Robinson
• The Ghost and Mrs. Muir (1947) .. Joseph L. Mankiewicz
• The Graduate (1967) .. Mike Nichols
• Grosse Pointe Blank (1997) .. George Armitage
• Groundhog Day (1993) .. Harold Ramis
• Heaven Can Wait (1943) .. Ernst Lubitsch
• High Fidelity (2000) .. Stephen Frears
• High Society (1956) .. Charles Walters
• Hope and Glory (1987) .. John Boorman
• I See a Dark Stranger (1946) .. Frank Launder
• It Should Happen to You (1954) .. George Cukor
• Leave Her to Heaven (1945) .. John M. Stahl
• A Letter to Three Wives (1949) .. Joseph L. Mankiewicz
• Local Hero (1983) .. Bill Forsyth
• The Long Goodbye (1973) .. Robert Altman
• Lost in America (1985) .. Albert Brooks
• Manhattan (1979) .. Woody Allen
• Marathon Man (1976) .. John Schlesinger
• Miller's Crossing (1990) .. The Coen Brothers
• Montenegro (1981) .. Dusan Makavejev
• Nobody's Fool (1994) .. Robert Benton
• The Palm Beach Story (1942) .. Preston Sturges
• The Pick-up Artist (1987) .. James Toback
• Please Don't Eat the Daisies (1960) .. Charles Walters
• Radio Days (1987) .. Woody Allen
• A Room with a View (1985) .. James Ivory
• Small Soldiers (1998) .. Joe Dante
• The Solid Gold Cadillac (1956) .. Richard Quine
• Swing Time (1936) .. George Stevens
• Three Days of the Condor (1975) .. Sydney Pollack
• Tootsie (1982) .. Sydney Pollack
• Topsy Turvy (1999) .. Mike Leigh
• Trust (1990) .. Hal Hartley
• Turtle Diary (1985) .. John Irvin
• Two for the Road (1967) .. Stanley Donen
• Ulee's Gold (1997) .. Victor Nunez
• The Uninvited (1944) .. Lewis Allen
• Who Framed Roger Rabbit? (1988) .. Robert Zemeckis
• Withnail & I (1987) .. Bruce Robinson
• Wonder Boys (2000) .. Curtis Hanson
• Young at Heart (1954) .. Gordon Douglas

Runners-up:
Babette’s Feast (1987)
Big Night (1996)
Bugsy Malone (1976)
Cabaret (1972)
Far from the Madding Crowd (1967)
Funny Face (1957)
Ladyhawke (1985)
Liebestraum (1991)
My Beautiful Laundrette (1985)
Sunday Bloody Sunday (1971)