BFI Flare: London LGBT Film Festival Reveals Its Top 30 LGBT Films of All Time

To mark its 30th anniversary, the BFI Flare: London LGBT Film Festival has done something it’s never done before – surveying a list of experts to put together a list of the top 30 LGBT movies of all time. That list has now been released, ahead of the festival’s March 16th opening.

Topping the list is a very new movie, Carol, which despite only having hit cinemas a few months ago impressed those asked so much that it’s been voted the top LGBT movie ever. Carol was closely followed by Andrew Haigh’s Weekend and Wong Kar-Wai’s Happy Together, with Ang Lee’s Brokeback Mountain and Jennie Livingston’s Paris Is Burning rounding out the top five.

The list is a mix of well-known film, such as Sidney Lumet’s Dog Day Afternoon, and lesser seen movies like Celine Sciamma’s Tomboy. It certainly makes for an interesting selection, and should give you a few ideas for movies to seek out.

Carol’s director, Todd Haynes commented on his film coming top of the list, “The Festival has long supported my work, from Poison and Dottie Gets Spanked in the early 1990s through to Carol which is screening on 35mm later this week in BFI Flare’s Best of Year programme. I’m so proud to have Carol voted as the top LGBT film of all time in this poll launched for the Fest’s 30th edition. Carol is in illustrious company with so many films I love, from Brokeback Mountain and Un Chant d’ Amour to Happy Together and My Own Private Idaho.”

In 2015 Carol had its UK premiere at BFI London Film Festival as the American Express Gala, when lead actor Cate Blanchett was awarded a BFI Fellowship. Carol was recognised throughout the 2016 award season, being nominated for six Oscars, nine BAFTAs and has won Best Film with five other top prizes at the Gay and Lesbian Entertainment Critics Association awards. It premiered at the 2015 Cannes Film Festival where it won the Queer Palm and Rooney Mara won Best Actress. Carol returns to the big screen at this year’s BFI Flare at a special screening of a 35mm print celebrating the best films from the past year, along with Tangerine which placed 11th in the poll.

The poll’s results represent films from a diverse range of nationalities, identities and sexualities across eight decades. Female directors are represented by ten films across the poll dating back to Leontine Sagan’s Mädchen in Uniform (1931), a German production co-directed with Carl Froelich and placed in joint 14th position alongside Show Me Love and Orlando, also directed by female filmmaker Sally Potter.

To create the list, over 100 film experts including filmmakers, critics, writers and programmers such as Joanna Hogg, Mark Cousins, Peter Strickland, Richard Dyer, Nick James and Laura Mulvey, as well as past and present BFI Flare programmers, were asked to have vote. The poll’s results represent 84 years of cinema and 12 countries, from Thailand and Japan to Sweden and Spain.

Take a look at the full list below (with more information available on the BFI Flare website).

1. Carol (Todd Hayes, USA 2015)
2. Weekend (Andrew Haigh, UK 2011)
3. Happy Together (Wong Kar-wai, Hong Kong / Japan / South Korea 1997)
4. Brokeback Mountain (Ang Lee, USA / Canada 2005)
5. Paris Is Burning (Jennie Livingston, USA 1990)
6. Tropical Malady (Apichatpong Weerasethakul, Thailand / France / Germany / Italy 2004)
7. My Beautiful Laundrette (Stephen Frears, UK 1985)
8. All About My Mother (Pedro Almodóvar, Spain / France 1999)
9. Un Chant d’Amour (Jean Genet, France 1950)
10. My Own Private Idaho (Gus Van Sant, USA 1991)
11=. Tangerine (Sean Baker, USA 2015)
11=. The Bitter Tears of Petra von Kant (Rainer Werner Fassbinder, Germany 1972)
11=. Blue Is the Warmest Colour (Abdellatif Kechiche, France / Belgium / Spain 2013)
14=. Mädchen in Uniform (Leontine Sagan & Carl Froelich, Germany 1931)
14=. Show Me Love (Lukas Moodysson, Sweden / Denmark 1998)
14=. Orlando (Sally Potter, UK / Russia / Italy / France / Netherlands 1992)
17. Victim (Basil Dearden, UK 1961)
18. Je, tu, il, elle (Chantal Akerman, France / Belgium 1974)
19. Looking for Langston (Isaac Julien, UK 1989)
20=. Beau Travail (Claire Denis, France 1999)
20=. Beautiful Thing (Hettie Macdonald, UK 1996)
22=. Stranger by the Lake (Alain Guiraudie, France 2013)
22=. Theorem (Pier Paolo Pasolini, Italy 1968)
22=. The Watermelon Woman (Cheryl Dunye, USA 1996)
22=. Pariah (Dee Rees, USA 2011)
22=. Mulholland Dr. (David Lynch, France / USA 2001)
27=. Portrait of Jason (Shirley Clarke, USA 1967)
27=. Dog Day Afternoon (Sidney Lumet, USA 1975)
27=. Death in Venice (Luchino Visconti, Italy / France 1971)
27=. Pink Narcissus (James Bidgood, USA 1971)
27=. Sunday Bloody Sunday (John Schlesinger, UK 1971)
27=. Tomboy (Céline Sciamma, France 2011)
27=. Funeral Parade of Roses (Toshio Matsumoto, Japan 1969)