"Children of Paradise" (directed by Marcel Carné, 1945) My college girlfriend dragged me to this epic backstage romance -- set in the Parisian theater world of the late 19th century -- assuring me that it was the greatest movie ever made. You might agree with her, if you're precisely the sort of softie whose top-10 cultural experiences include productions of "A Chorus Line" and "Hedwig and the Angry Inch." Filmed in Nazi-occupied France, "Children of Paradise" is the last and loveliest gasp of the lavish, poetic style of French studio filmmaking. Watch it while snuggled under a blanket with you-know-who on a rainy Sunday afternoon. An influence on every tragic screen romance to follow, although I can't think of one to match it.

"The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie" (directed by Luis Buñuel, 1972) Combine Marx, Freud, Jung, Sartre and Monty Python (the latter of whom, of course, Buñuel more or less predates). Serve with fine cognac and Cool Whip. A group of upper-middle-class Parisian suburbanites trying to have dinner are continually interrupted by sexual misadventure, the misbehavior of their social inferiors and an invasion of soldiers who want to smoke pot and discuss their dreams. The profound influence of film's greatest surrealist is most easily seen in his flourishes of absurdist comedy, but "Discreet Charm" is also a haunting and serious work, and seems almost as cinematically daring today as 30 years ago. (A fine DVD edition comes with marvelous, if miscellaneous, extras.)

"8 1/2" (directed by Federico Fellini, 1963) Yet another case where the director's most agreeable work may lie elsewhere: Fellini escapes his narcissism more effectively in "La Strada" and the devastating "Nights of Cabiria," and "La Dolce vita" is more fun. But "8 1/2" invented -- or at least perfected -- the self-referential films-about-filmmaking tradition later continued by Woody Allen, Peter Greenaway, Robert Altman and countless others. An unmatched work of pure cinema, it can seem breathtaking and massively self-indulgent at virtually the same moment, but even in 1963 that was sort of the point. Marcello Mastroianni is of course irresistibly stylish as Fellini alter-ego Guido Anselmi.

"A Face in the Crowd" (directed by Elia Kazan, 1957) For those of you who thought that corrosive critiques of the crypto-fascist media state belonged strictly to the postmodern era. "A Face in the Crowd" offers the best work of both director Kazan and screenwriter Budd Schulberg, who might not have been best pals when you consider that Kazan infamously sang like a canary to the House Un-American Activities Committee, while Schulberg was a true-blue radical. Andy Griffith (yes, that Andy Griffith) plays an Arkansas hobo who is catapulted to TV superstardom and becomes the mouthpiece for a creepy right-wing political movement. This cynical magnum opus is a shattering indictment of many things that hadn't happened yet: TV as a method of creating and shaping mob mentality, the Reagan presidency, Ross Perot and Jesse Ventura, the media machinery that builds up celebrities only to destroy them. (See also Frank Capra's "Meet John Doe," made 16 years earlier and almost as amazing.)

"Fanny and Alexander" (written and directed by Ingmar Bergman, 1982) Bergman fans may well be wondering where "The Magician," "Smiles of a Summer Night," "Wild Strawberries," "Cries and Whispers" and "Scenes From a Marriage" are. Essentially, they're all here, in this great comic melodrama about theater, childhood, family, magic, ghosts and God that provided the capstone to a magnificent career. ("The Seventh Seal" isn't here, however, which I myself can't quite believe. I still recommend it, but it isn't as central to the film canon as it once was.) Bergman is still alive and still directing films for television, of course, but he has stayed away from cinema on this scale. The onetime consensus that Bergman is the greatest of all filmmakers has long since fractured; the recent Sight and Sound critics' poll failed to place him in the top 10 (while the directors' poll placed him at No. 8). But he will always be the greatest filmmaker of his type -- which is to say the greatest moralist and the greatest dramatist -- and I'm confident that as critical fashions ebb and flow, "Fanny and Alexander" will ultimately be seen as the kind of overflowing, enduring work that outlasts everything around it and its own unfashionability, like the novels of Balzac or Dickens or the plays of Chekhov or Ibsen. (In the meantime, it's not even available on DVD, although that will apparently be rectified soon.) As should be obvious, the tradition Bergman inaugurated continues to reverberate throughout upscale world cinema, from Lars von Trier to Abbas Kiarostami to "American Beauty," "You Can Count on Me," "In the Bedroom" and almost anywhere else you care to look.

"Nosferatu the Vampire" (U.S. title of "Nosferatu, eine Symphonie des Grauens," directed by F.W. Murnau, 1922) It's truly appalling that the entire silent tradition is represented on my list only by this movie and the next one -- I've got no Chaplin or Buster Keaton or Harold Lloyd, no "Metropolis" or "Greed" or "Cabinet of Dr. Caligari," no "Birth of a Nation" or "Intolerance." (I freely concede, for example, that silent comedy remains an important influence on many filmmakers and performers, from Jerry Lewis to Jim Carrey. Ultimately, though, I guess I'm not that interested.) Still, Murnau's genuinely spooky "Nosferatu" is a fine choice on its own terms -- it not only invented the vampire movie, it's one of the rare silent classics that can hold a contemporary audience transfixed through its entire running time. As the title suggests, it's a beautifully composed symphony of light and darkness, coffins, rats and the unspeakably creepy visage of Max Schreck as Count Orlok the vampire. (Fans should also catch Werner Herzog's great 1979 version with Klaus Kinski, but skip the arch and befuddled "Shadow of the Vampire," which fictionalizes the making of Murnau's film.)

"The Passion of Joan of Arc" (directed by Carl Theodor Dreyer, 1928) You could make a half-convincing case that this silent, black-and-white Euro-classic, telling the story of Joan's trial and execution in a series of unbearably intense close-ups, doesn't really belong here, and that its influence on film history -- most directly expressed through high-art gods Bresson, Bergman and Tarkovsky -- has largely faded. I'm not buying it. Driven as much by Maria Falconetti's unforgettable performance as by Dreyer's technique, "The Passion of Joan of Arc" set a kind of aesthetic gold standard for the movies, and established once and for all that emotional impact didn't depend on a huge budget and lavish scenery. Furthermore, if we can't clearly see Dreyer's influence that's because it's everywhere: commercials, made-for-Lifetime movies, those contemplative scenes in John Woo films.

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