The 48 Best British Films of All Time

Ealing comedies, kitchen-sink realism and Technicolor fantasies line up against nineties swagger and modern crowd-pleasers. Decades of national cinema, and plenty of room to argue about what deserves the crown.

1. 1
   The Third Man

   Carol Reed's 1949 noir in shadowy postwar Vienna, with Orson Welles as Harry Lime and a zither score, voted number one in the BFI's 1999 poll.
   1000pts
2. 2
   A Hard Day's Night

   Richard Lester's 1964 Beatles comedy that invented the modern music-film style.
   672pts
3. 3
   Lawrence of Arabia

   Lean's 1962 desert epic starring Peter O'Toole as T.E. Lawrence, winner of seven Oscars.
   605pts
4. 4
   Get Carter

   Mike Hodges' 1971 gangland revenge thriller with Michael Caine prowling Newcastle.
   564pts
5. 5
   Monty Python's Life of Brian

   The 1979 biblical satire about a man mistaken for the Messiah, bankrolled by George Harrison.
   564pts
6. 6
   The Wicker Man

   Robin Hardy's 1973 folk-horror tale of a devout policeman on a pagan Scottish island.
   518pts
7. 7
   The 39 Steps

   Alfred Hitchcock's 1935 wrong-man spy chase across the Scottish Highlands.
   518pts
8. 8
   Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels

   Guy Ritchie's 1998 debut, a fast-talking London crime caper.
   518pts
9. 9
   The Servant

   Joseph Losey's 1963 Harold Pinter-scripted power game between a rich young man and his manservant.
   518pts
10. 10
    A Matter of Life and Death

    Powell and Pressburger's 1946 fantasy of an RAF pilot pleading for his life before a celestial court.
    518pts
11. 11
    Distant Voices, Still Lives

    Terence Davies' 1988 memory piece about a working-class Liverpool family, told through pub songs.
    465pts
12. 12
    Passport to Pimlico

    Ealing's 1949 comedy in which a London district discovers it legally belongs to Burgundy.
    465pts
13. 13
    Kes

    Ken Loach's 1969 story of a Barnsley schoolboy who trains a kestrel, a landmark of social realism.
    465pts
14. 14
    The Lavender Hill Mob

    Ealing's 1951 caper in which a timid bank clerk plots to smuggle gold out as Eiffel Tower souvenirs.
    465pts
15. 15
    Peeping Tom

    Michael Powell's 1960 voyeur-killer thriller, reviled on release and later reclaimed as a masterpiece.
    403pts
16. 16
    Gandhi

    Richard Attenborough's 1982 biopic with Ben Kingsley, winner of eight Academy Awards.
    403pts
17. 17
    Local Hero

    Bill Forsyth's 1983 gentle comedy of an American oilman charmed by a Scottish fishing village.
    403pts
18. 18
    Paddington 2

    Paul King's 2017 family comedy in which the marmalade-loving bear is framed for theft.
    403pts
19. 19
    Four Weddings and a Funeral

    Mike Newell's 1994 Richard Curtis romantic comedy with Hugh Grant, a global hit.
    403pts
20. 20
    The Killing Fields

    Roland Joffe's 1984 drama about a journalist and his Cambodian interpreter under the Khmer Rouge.
    403pts
21. 21
    If....

    Lindsay Anderson's 1968 public-school rebellion with Malcolm McDowell, winner of the Palme d'Or.
    403pts
22. 22
    Don't Look Now

    Nicolas Roeg's 1973 grief-haunted thriller set in wintry Venice, with Julie Christie and Donald Sutherland.
    403pts
23. 23
    Black Narcissus

    Powell and Pressburger's 1947 drama of Anglican nuns unravelling in a Himalayan convent, a peak of Technicolor photography.
    403pts
24. 24
    This Is England

    Shane Meadows' 1983-set 2006 drama about a boy drawn into a skinhead gang.
    330pts
25. 25
    Billy Elliot

    Stephen Daldry's 2000 drama about a miner's son who wants to dance ballet during the 1984 strike.
    330pts
26. 26
    Monty Python and the Holy Grail

    The Python team's 1975 Arthurian spoof of coconuts, killer rabbits and the Black Knight.
    330pts
27. 27
    Brief Encounter

    David Lean's 1945 railway-station romance between two married strangers, set to Rachmaninoff.
    330pts
28. 28
    Withnail and I

    Bruce Robinson's 1987 cult comedy about two out-of-work actors on a disastrous Lake District holiday.
    330pts
29. 29
    Goldfinger

    The 1964 James Bond adventure with Sean Connery, the Aston Martin DB5 and a plot to irradiate Fort Knox.
    330pts
30. 30
    The Italian Job

    The 1969 heist comedy with Michael Caine, three Minis and a cliffhanger ending.
    330pts
31. 31
    Trainspotting

    Danny Boyle's 1996 Edinburgh heroin comedy-drama that defined Cool Britannia cinema.
    242pts
32. 32
    Shaun of the Dead

    Edgar Wright's 2004 zombie romantic comedy about a slacker hiding out at the Winchester pub.
    242pts
33. 33
    Brazil

    Terry Gilliam's 1985 dystopian satire of a daydreaming clerk trapped in a bureaucratic nightmare.
    242pts
34. 34
    Secrets & Lies

    Mike Leigh's 1996 Palme d'Or winner about a woman tracing her birth mother.
    242pts
35. 35
    Zulu

    Cy Endfield's 1964 dramatisation of the defence of Rorke's Drift, Michael Caine's breakthrough.
    242pts
36. 36
    Chariots of Fire

    Hugh Hudson's 1981 Best Picture winner about two British runners at the 1924 Paris Olympics.
    242pts
37. 37
    The Full Monty

    Peter Cattaneo's 1997 comedy about laid-off Sheffield steelworkers who form a strip act.
    242pts
38. 38
    Saturday Night and Sunday Morning

    Karel Reisz's 1960 kitchen-sink drama with Albert Finney as a rebellious Nottingham factory worker.
    242pts
39. 39
    The Remains of the Day

    Merchant Ivory's 1993 drama with Anthony Hopkins as a butler who suppresses his feelings and his doubts about his master.
    242pts
40. 40
    The Bridge on the River Kwai

    Lean's 1957 prisoner-of-war epic about a British colonel's obsession with building a railway bridge for his captors.
    242pts
41. 41
    The Ladykillers

    Ealing's 1955 comedy about a gang of crooks outwitted by their sweet elderly landlady.
    242pts
42. 42
    The Long Good Friday

    John Mackenzie's 1980 London gangster thriller with Bob Hoskins as a crime boss whose empire collapses over one Easter weekend.
    242pts
43. 43
    The King's Speech

    Tom Hooper's 2010 Best Picture winner about George VI's struggle with a stammer.
    242pts
44. 44
    28 Days Later

    Danny Boyle's 2002 digital-video horror of a deserted London overrun by the rage-infected.
    242pts
45. 45
    Kind Hearts and Coronets

    Ealing's 1949 black comedy in which Alec Guinness plays eight doomed members of one aristocratic family.
    0pts
46. 46
    Odd Man Out

    Carol Reed's 1947 thriller following a wounded Irish gunman through one long night in Belfast.
    0pts
47. 47
    Great Expectations

    Lean's 1946 Dickens adaptation, famous for Pip's terrifying graveyard meeting with the convict Magwitch.
    0pts
48. 48
    The Red Shoes

    Powell and Pressburger's 1948 Technicolor ballet melodrama about a dancer torn between art and love.
    0pts

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