@Abel: I take his point to be that the films aren’t even from the U.K.
BLUE by Derek Jarman and Morvern Callar by Lynne Ramsay are my favourites.
@Bruce
This is England not a UK film? Slumdog Millionaire not a UK film? I’m not sure that was his point!
Comrades by a long shot.
Naked a distant second.
I agree with anyone that said Comrades
and It’s so good to hear so many people saying it
I think Distant voices, Still Lives is there too…along with Naked
Withnail and I
Intermission
Shaun of The Dead
Hitchhiker’s Guide to The Galaxy
28 Days Later
Trainspotting
In the Loop!
this is england
No love for Patrick Keiller’s documentaries here?
Comrades
Street of Crocodiles
Of Time and the City
Stealing a Nation
The Piano Tuner of Earthquakes
The Wrong Trousers
Howards End
Sleep Furiously
Topsy Turvy
Orlando
The Power of Nightmares
Blue
Hope and Glory
there is some love for Patrick Keiller! though it’s a bit disheartening to see how few fans he has on here..
London and Robinson in Space are brilliant, and I’m dying to see this:
good choices, by the way, Kenji.
agree with BLUE, Sleep Furiously, Comrades, Street of Crocodiles and Of Time and the City definitely.
I’d add
The Last of England
Better Things
Unrelated
Black Sun
Anchoress
This Filthy Earth
The Arbor
Another Year
Yes, i thought The Arbor was interesting, as a play on film-theatre-documentary and artifice/reality, and also as a very credible look at life on British working class estates, sexism, racism, violence, drugs in the last few decades. A pity social workers could still have ended up the scapegoats when there were a lot of social issues raised with problems caused by many other sources, like govt policy and social attitudes encouraged by the media
In answer to Jay Leighty’s question about Britishness/Englishness, there’s a Channel 4 news item on the subject, on youtube (not embeddable) entitled, The English are Germans The Welsh are real Britons.
i also liked
A Fish Called Wanda
Hedd Wyn
Eldra
The War on Democracy
Flatworld
Red Road
Fish Tank
Last Resort…
but not so many of the Guardian list, which has macho tendencies and a desire to be cool with working class/gangster grit
I think Alan Clarke needs to be better represented. Though his films certainly aren’t for everyone, and the fact that he did most of his work for television probably doesn’t help matters when it comes to these magazine polls. But I’m a big fan of films such as Elephant (1989), which is arguably his masterpiece, Christine (1987), and Made in Britain, clearly an inspiration for Meadows’ This Is England.
Secrets and Lies is placed high on the Guardian list and won at Cannes but i can’t abide the café meeting between Brenda Blethyn and her daughter who was adopted, and as often with Leigh some of the characters grate.
arsaib, I agree. Elephant is a favourite of mine
Waerdnotte
@Dimitris
It would interesting to know what you consider some of the better UK films have been over the last 25 years.