Forget the top 10 of 2008! To offer a glimpse into the personal taste in movies of your humble reviewer, I present my Top 10 personal favorites. I donít feel I have the right proclaim these as the 10 best films (just too subjective), but all the films listed below, I believe, are truly great. Each made a profound impact on me when I saw them and played a role in developing my love and appreciation for great movies.

1. 2001: A Space Odyssey (Kubrick)
Kubrickís, haunting, out of time masterpiece is both profoundly influential, yet impossible to duplicate. Iíve ranked it first as much for its daring as its artistry. Few other films dare to address the big, unanswerable questions: mankindís place in an infinite universe; the existence of God; what it means to be human (and can a computer become more ìhumanî than its flesh and bone operators). With this work, Kubrick is walking with Shakespeare and the ancient Greek dramatists as much as with contemporary film directors.

2. Citizen Kane (Welles)
This work by an arrogant, brilliant 26 year old is the dividing line between old movies and everything since. Wells seems to be opening new doors for the art form with every scene. However, ìKaneî has become such a film school staple that many film buffs have forgotten a simple, but important point: ìKaneî is not only historically significant, but it still works as a very entertaining movie-dramatic, often quite funny and profoundly moving.

3. Vertigo (Hitchcock)
Hitchcockís greatest film is this intense, deeply personal masterpiece about the eternal battle of the sexes and our inability to force our own happiness. Perhaps the single greatest scene in film history is when Judyís metamorphosis into Madeline is complete. The thousand different emotions on Judy/Madelineís beautiful face (Kim Novakís superb performance is woefully underrated) when she reappears before James Stewart never fails to overwhelm me.