Holy Cow... I am going to get some flack for this choice! But here goes... Scorsese, Tarantino, Anderson, Cameron, Spielberg, Stone, Coen, Soderbergh, Crowe, Figgis, Mamet, Howard, Darabont, Scott, von Trier, Lee, Minghella, Altman, LaBute, Demme... all of them have contributed to this decade which is criminally underrated in the annals of film history.

Critics tend to have a blinkered vision when it comes to assessing decades of film... the more recent years are undervalued because they lack a historical and nostalgic perspective.

Filmmaking today is also undervalued because more bad films are being made today than at any other time.  But that fact should not count against the quality of the elite films.

I may be a lonely voice with this argument but I believe that more quality films were released in the 1990's than in any other. Time will prove me right.

# 2 - The 1950's:

This was the decade of Hitchcock, Wilder & Kurosawa. Of the thirty best films I've seen from the 50's, over half were helmed by one of those three directors. This was the golden age of the movie star... more than any other decade, the films were driven by star power.

# 3 - The 1940's:

"Casablanca", "Citizen Kane", "The Third Man"... it seems that would be evidence enough of the quality. However, even in eliminating those pillars, the prolific number of classics that emerged from this decade demand that it be considered one of the best eras in film history.

# 4 - The 1960's:

The decade that changed films... they became more exuberant, more daring, more experimental. The anti-hero was born and the rebel movie star was a la mode. Studios began to lose their long held power and the result was a decade of film helmed by the artists rather than the executives. Independent films of the 90's did a similar thing and introduced a new era in movies.

# 5 - The 2000's:

This decade will likely move up the list as the years go by... At least, I hope so! It has been very good so far! It doesn't hurt that 2002 & 2004 will rank as two of the greatest years of all time.

# 6 - The 1970's:

The gritty realism of this decade was a refreshing change from the glamour and gloss of the previous 20 years. "The Godfather", "Papillon", "The Sting", "Rocky", "The Conversation", "The French Connection", etc... all represented a raw and powerful style of filmmaking that make this decade a memorable one. The first half of the decade was far superior to the second which signalled the imminent arrival of the wasteland of film known as the 1980's.

# 7 - The 1930's:

To be honest, this decade suffers from a lack of films... I haven't seen that many from the 1930's (about 40 in all) because there are fewer films available to be seen seventy years on.  I concede that this ranking may be a tad unfair.

# 8 - The Dreaded 1980's:

Without question, this is the worst decade ever. More trash was spewed out each year in the 80's than ever before, and hopefully we will never repeat that again. More importantly, the lack of great films is stunning... you were lucky to see five 'great' films in a year. The Oscar winners in the 1980's were consistently sub par and the biggest blockbusters were usually hideous. This was the decade that bore the term 'SEQUELITIS'... it seemed every other movie in the theatres had the number 3, 4 or 5 after its name. I can't decide which was worse, 80's fashion or 80's film???

I KNOW, I KNOW... I IGNORED THE 10's and 20's.

DEAL WITH IT!