+ Netflix Top 25 in Classics +

Top 25 by genre, published by Netflix every 2 ...

Last Update: Thu Jun 18 22:55:46 2009

+ 001- The Godfather + Director Francis Ford Coppola brings Mario Puzo's multigenerational crime saga to life in this Oscar-winning epic. When an [...] killers. Amid betrayals and corruption, Michael launches a campaign of bloody revenge that continues through the film's two sequels.

+ 002- Casablanca + In this Oscar-winning classic, American expat Rick Blaine (Humphrey Bogart) plays host to gamblers, thieves and refugees at his [...] and her fugitive husband (Paul Henreid) can escape to America. But the spark that brought the lovers together still burns brightly.

+ 003- One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest + The first movie since It Happened One Night to win all five major Academy Awards (picture, director, actor, actress, [...] to an asylum and inspires his fellow patients to rebel against the authoritarian rule of head nurse Mildred Ratched (Louise Fletcher).

+ 004- Citizen Kane + Orson Welles reinvented movies at the age of 26 with this audacious biography of newspaper baron Charles Foster Kane (in [...] America's most influential men. A complex and technically stunning film, Citizen Kane is considered one of the best movies ever made.

+ 005- Monty Python and the Holy Grail + Beware the knights who say "Ni." The Python comedy clan skewers King Arthur and his knights as they quest far and wide for the [...] the hands of the mighty king himself. (Cleese's protestation after every sword whack that "It's just a scratch" is still hilarious.)

+ 006- Chinatown + Private eye J.J. Gittes (Jack Nicholson) uncovers intricate dirty dealings in the Los Angeles waterworks and gets his nose [...] Los Angeles in this brilliant detective thriller. And Robert Towne's onion-like script reveals itself one complex layer at a time.

+ 007- To Kill a Mockingbird + Set in a small Alabama town during the Depression, this adaptation of Harper Lee's Pulitzer Prize-winning novel follows Atticus [...] children, Jem and Scout (Phillip Alford and Mary Badham), soon learn lessons about race, class, justice and the pain of growing up.

+ 008- Seven Samurai + Akira Kurosawa's heroic tale of honor and duty begins with master samurai Kambei (Takashi Shimura) posing as a monk to save a [...] together they build a militia with the villagers while the bandits loom nearby. Soon the raids begin, culminating in a bloody battle.

+ 009- The Godfather: Part II + Racking up Oscars for Best Picture, Best Director (Francis Ford Coppola) and Best Supporting Actor (Robert De Niro), the second [...] to head of a powerful crime family, and charts his son's (Al Pacino) ascension to don as the family extends its operations to Cuba.

+ 010- The Graduate + Dustin Hoffman (in his first major film role) turns in a landmark performance as a naïve young man recently graduated [...] Mike Nichols won a Best Director Oscar, and Simon and Garfunkel achieved immortality with a score that includes "Mrs. Robinson."

+ 011- A Clockwork Orange + Teenage miscreant Alex DeLarge (Malcolm McDowell) wanders aimlessly amid a bleak, futuristic urban landscape. Along with his [...] nihilistic orgies of violence. A Clockwork Orange, based on Anthony Burgess' novel, is as powerful as when it was released in 1971.

+ 012- The Third Man + After arriving in post-World War II Vienna, unemployed pulp novelist Holly Martins (Joseph Cotten) learns that his friend Harry [...] this classic film noir thriller earned an Academy Award nomination for director Carol Reed and won an Oscar for Best Cinematography.

+ 013- Lawrence of Arabia + Director David Lean's Oscar-winning epic tells the true-life story of warrior-poet T.E. Lawrence (Peter O'Toole), who helped [...] underscores the clash between cultures -- and within one man -- that changed the tide of war. Alec Guiness and Anthony Quinn co-star.

+ 014- Dr. Strangelove + When a fanatical U.S. general (Sterling Hayden) launches an air strike against the Soviets, they raise the stakes by [...] Peter Sellers (who steals the show and copped an Oscar nod playing three roles), George C. Scott, Slim Pickens and James Earl Jones.

+ 015- Breakfast at Tiffany's + In this Blake Edwards-directed adaptation of Truman Capote's novel, fortune hunter Holly Golightly (Audrey Hepburn) finds [...] (Buddy Ebsen) shows up on the scene, revealing Holly's past. The film received Oscars for best song ("Moon River") and best score.

+ 016- Rear Window + As his broken leg heals, wheelchair-bound L.B. Jeffries (James Stewart) becomes absorbed with the parade of life across the [...] one of them disappears, Jeffries suspects foul play -- and suddenly he finds himself in the center of the action with nowhere to run.

+ 017- On the Waterfront + Winner of eight Oscars, director Elia Kazan's classic morality tale stars Marlon Brando as Terry Malloy, a has-been boxer who [...] from testifying in a corruption case, but has second thoughts when the victim's sister (Eva Marie Saint) urges him to take a stand.

+ 018- Harold and Maude + A self-absorbed, death-obsessed teen (Bud Cort) and a geriatric, high-on-life widow (Ruth Gordon) find love in this comical [...] (natch). The seemingly mismatched pair forms a bond that turns into a highly unconventional -- but ultimately satisfying -- romance.

+ 019- Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid + Legendary outlaws Butch Cassidy (Paul Newman) and the Sundance Kid (Robert Redford) display perfect comedic timing and charisma [...] find easier pickings there. But trouble finds the fugitives wherever they go, and soon, the charming desperadoes are on the run again.

+ 020- Midnight Cowboy + Hayseed hustler Jon Voight comes to Manhattan to earn cash as a freelance sex stud. There, he meets seedy gimp Ratso Rizzo [...] didn't win a Best Actor Oscar, his Ratso characterization - the vilified butt of everyone's jokes - is absolutely heartbreaking.

+ 021- Deliverance + Four suburban friends take a canoeing trip down a Georgia river, but what starts as a lighthearted adventure becomes a voyage [...] enthralling, existential action epic that earned three Academy Award nominations: Best Picture, Best Director and Best Editing.

+ 022- The Producers + In this hysterical farce, rapacious but lovable producer Max Bialystock (Zero Mostel) hasn't had a hit in years. Quite by [...] play ever written, "Springtime for Hitler." Inspired, manic performances and Brooks's lively direction make The Producers a true gem.

+ 023- A Streetcar Named Desire + After losing the family plantation to creditors, aging Southern belle Blanche DuBois (Vivien Leigh) travels to New Orleans [...] Oscars for their work in this sizzling adaptation of Tennessee Williams's classic rumination on carnal attraction and faded gentility.

+ 024- Vertigo + Don't look down! One of Alfred Hitchcock's darkest and most compelling films tells the story of police detective Scottie [...] obsession … and that's just the beginning! Two highlights: a mesmerizing Bernard Herrmann score and a haunting final shot.

+ 025- The Bridge on the River Kwai + Director David Lean's sweeping epic is set in a Japanese World War II prison camp where British POWs are forced to construct a [...] to the project, and his American rival (William Holden), who vows to destroy it. The POWs' whistling work theme became legendary.