1895–1919 — Cinema Begins

• Workers Leaving the Lumière Factory 1895 — France (Lumière brothers)
• The Arrival of a Train at La Ciotat 1896 — France (Lumière brothers)
• A Trip to the Moon — France 1902 (Georges Méliès)
• The Great Train Robbery — USA 1903 (Edwin S. Porter)
• Fantasmagorie — France 1908 (Émile Cohl)
• L'Inferno — Italy 1911 (Francesco Bertolini, Adolfo Padovan & Giuseppe de Liguoro)
• Cabiria — Italy 1914 (Giovanni Pastrone)
• The Birth of a Nation — USA 1915 (D.W. Griffith)
• Intolerance — USA 1916 (D.W. Griffith)
• The Immigrant — USA 1917 (Charlie Chaplin)

1920–1929 — Silent Cinema

• The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari — Germany 1920 (Robert Wiene)
• The Kid — USA 1921 (Charlie Chaplin)
• Nosferatu — Germany 1922 (F.W. Murnau)
• Laborer's Love — China 1922 (Zhang Shichuan)
• Safety Last! — USA 1923 (Fred C. Newmeyer & Sam Taylor)
• Sherlock Jr. — USA 1924 (Buster Keaton)
• The General — USA 1926 (Buster Keaton)
• The Adventures of Prince Achmed — Germany 1926 (Lotte Reiniger)
• Metropolis — Germany 1927 (Fritz Lang)
• Napoléon — France 1927 (Abel Gance)
• The Jazz Singer — USA 1927 (Alan Crosland)
• The Passion of Joan of Arc — France 1928 (Carl Theodor Dreyer)
• Steamboat Willie — USA 1928 (Walt Disney)
• Man with a Movie Camera — USSR 1929 (Dziga Vertov)
• Pandora's Box — Germany 1929 (G. W. Pabst)

1930–1939 — Sound and Colour

• The Blue Angel — Germany 1930 (Josef von Sternberg)
• M — Germany 1931 (Fritz Lang)
• City Lights — USA 1931 (Charlie Chaplin)
• Dracula — USA 1931 (Tod Browning)
• Frankenstein — USA 1931 (James Whale)
• Scarface — USA 1932 (Howard Hawks)
• King Kong — USA 1933 (Merian C. Cooper and Ernest B. Schoedsack)
• It Happened One Night — USA 1934 (Frank Capra)
• The Goddess — China 1934 (Wu Yonggang)
• Triumph of the Will — Germany 1935 (Leni Riefenstahl)
• Modern Times — USA 1936 (Charlie Chaplin)
• Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs — USA 1937 (Walt Disney Productions)
• The Adventures of Robin Hood — USA 1938 (Warner Bros)
• The Wizard of Oz — USA 1939 (Victor Fleming)
• The Rules of the Game — France 1939 (Jean Renoir)
• Gone with the Wind — USA 1939 (Victor Fleming)

1940–1949 — Classical Cinema

• The Great Dictator — USA 1940 (Charlie Chaplin)
• Rebecca — USA 1940 (Alfred Hitchcock)
• Fantasia — USA 1940 (Walt Disney Productions)
• Pinocchio — USA 1940 (Walt Disney Productions)
• Citizen Kane — USA 1941 (Orson Welles)
• The Maltese Falcon — USA, 1941 — John Huston (John Huston)
• Dumbo — USA 1941 (Walt Disney Productions)
• Casablanca — USA 1942 (Michael Curtiz)
• Bambi — USA 1942 (Walt Disney Productions)
• Meshes of the Afternoon — USA 1943 (Maya Deren & Alexander Hammid)
• Meet Me in St. Louis — USA 1944 (Vincente Minnelli)
• Double Indemnity — USA 1944 (Billy Wilder)
• It's a Wonderful Life — USA 1946 (Frank Capra)
• Gilda — USA 1946 (Charles Vidor)
• Bicycle Thieves — Italy 1948 (Vittorio De Sica)
• The Red Shoes — UK 1948 (Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger)
• Hamlet — UK 1948 (Laurence Olivier)
• Late Spring — Japan 1949 (Yasujirō Ozu)
• The Third Man — UK 1949 (Carol Reed)

1950–1959 — Golden Age

• Sunset Boulevard — USA 1950 (Billy Wilder)
• Cinderella — USA 1950 (Walt Disney Productions)
• Awaara — India 1951 (Raj Kapoor)
• Singin' in the Rain — USA 1952 (Gene Kelly and Stanley Donen)
• Ikiru — Japan 1952 (Akira Kurosawa)
• Tokyo Story — Japan 1953 (Yasujirō Ozu)
• Roman Holiday — USA 1953 (William Wyler)
• Seven Samurai — Japan 1954 (Akira Kurosawa)
• Godzilla — Japan 1954 (Ishirō Honda)
• The Ten Commandments — USA 1956 (Cecil B. DeMille)
• The Seventh Seal — Sweden 1957 (Ingmar Bergman)
• Wild Strawberries — Sweden 1957 (Ingmar Bergman)
• Vertigo — USA 1958 (Alfred Hitchcock)
• The 400 Blows — France 1959 (François Truffaut)
• Ben-Hur — USA 1959 (William Wyler)

1960–1969 — New Waves

• Psycho — USA 1960 (Alfred Hitchcock)
• Breathless — France 1960 (Jean-Luc Godard)
• The Housemaid — South Korea 1960 (Kim Ki-young)
• Breakfast at Tiffany's — USA 1961 (Blake Edwards)
• To Kill a Mockingbird — USA 1962 (Robert Mulligan)
• Cléo from 5 to 7 — France 1962 (Agnès Varda)
• Dr. No — UK 1962 (Terence Young)
• Lolita — UK/USA 1962 (Stanley Kubrick)
• 8½ — Italy 1963 (Federico Fellini)
• My Fair Lady — USA 1964 (George Cukor)
• Mary Poppins — USA 1964 (Robert Stevenson)
• The Sound of Music — USA 1965 (Robert Wise)
• Persona — Sweden 1966 (Ingmar Bergman)
• Daisies — Czechoslovakia 1966 (Věra Chytilová)
• The Good, the Bad and the Ugly — Italy/Spain/West Germany 1966 (Sergio Leone)
• Tokyo Drifter — Japan 1966 (Seijun Suzuki)
• Come Drink with Me — Hong Kong 1966 (King Hu)
• Bonnie and Clyde — USA 1967 (Arthur Penn)
• Dragon Inn — Taiwan/Hong Kong 1967 (King Hu)
• The Graduate — USA 1967 (Mike Nichols)
• 2001: A Space Odyssey — UK/USA 1968 (Stanley Kubrick)
• Rosemary's Baby — USA 1968 (Roman Polanski)
• Planet of the Apes — USA 1968 (Franklin J. Schaffner)
• Yellow Submarine — UK 1968 (George Dunning)
• Easy Rider — USA 1969 (Dennis Hopper)

1970–1979 — Cult Cinema & Blockbusters

• A Clockwork Orange — UK 1971 (Stanley Kubrick)
• Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory — USA (Mel Stuart)
• The Godfather — USA 1972 (Francis Ford Coppola)
• The Way of the Dragon — Hong Kong 1972 (Bruce Lee)
• Enter the Dragon — Hong Kong/USA 1973 (Robert Clouse)
• Jaws — USA 1975 (Steven Spielberg)
• The Rocky Horror Picture Show — UK/USA 1975 (Jim Sharman)
• Taxi Driver — USA 1976 (Martin Scorsese)
• Star Wars — USA 1977 (George Lucas)
• Saturday Night Fever — USA 1977 (John Badham)
• Grease — USA 1978 (Randal Kleiser)
• Superman — USA 1978 (Richard Donner)
• Autumn Sonata — Sweden 1978 (Ingmar Bergman)
• Drunken Master — Hong Kong 1978 (Yuen Woo-ping)
• The Butterfly Murders — Hong Kong 1979 (Tsui Hark)

1980–1990 — Global Cinema

• Raiders of the Lost Ark — USA 1981 (Steven Spielberg)
• E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial — USA 1982 (Steven Spielberg)
• Gandhi — UK/India 1982 (Richard Attenborough)
• TRON — USA 1982 (Steven Lisberger)
• Scarface — USA 1983 (Brian De Palma)
• Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence — Japan/UK 1983 (Nagisa Ōshima)
• Zu: Warriors from the Magic Mountain — Hong Kong 1983 (Tsui Hark)
• Ghostbusters — USA 1984 (Ivan Reitman)
• The Terminator — USA 1984 (James Cameron)
• The Karate Kid — USA 1984 (John G. Avildsen)
• Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind — Japan 1984 (Hayao Miyazaki)
• Shanghai Blues — Hong Kong 1984 (Tsui Hark)
• Back to the Future — USA 1985 (Robert Zemeckis)
• Police Story — Hong Kong 1985 (Jackie Chan)
• Tampopo — Japan 1985 (Juzo Itami)
• Taipei Story — Taiwan 1985 (Edward Yang)
• A Time to Live, a Time to Die — Taiwan 1985 (Hou Hsiao-hsien)
• A Better Tomorrow — Hong Kong 1986 (John Woo)
• Castle in the Sky — Japan 1986 (Studio Ghibli)
• Peking Opera Blues — Hong Kong 1986 (Tsui Hark)
• Dirty Dancing — USA 1987 (Emile Ardolino)
• Wings of Desire — West Germany/France 1987 (Wim Wenders)
• The Last Emperor — China/Italy/UK 1987 (Bernardo Bertolucci)
• Akira — Japan 1988 (Katsuhiro Otomo)
• My Neighbor Totoro — Japan 1988 (Studio Ghibli)
• Who Framed Roger Rabbit — USA 1988 (Robert Zemeckis)
• Beetlejuice — USA 1988 (Tim Burton)
• Die Hard — USA 1988 (John McTiernan)
• Batman — USA 1989 (Tim Burton)
• When Harry Met Sally... — USA 1989 (Rob Reiner)
• The Little Mermaid — USA 1989 (Walt Disney Pictures)
• A City of Sadness — Taiwan 1989 (Hou Hsiao-hsien)