The Movies canon

Sourced and screened.

Every film chosen by hand and annotated for why it matters.
Browse all 731 films or filter by genre, director, place, and year.

Psycho

Directed by Alfred Hitchcock
1960

The film that invented modern horror: Hitchcock broke an unspoken rule about how a story is meant to behave, and every thriller since has been working in the space he opened.

★ 9.5

Rear Window

Directed by Alfred Hitchcock
1954

Suspense has never been constructed more purely, and the real subject is the audience: Hitchcock traps you in one room with a man who cannot stop watching his neighbors.

★ 9.3

The Birds

Directed by Alfred Hitchcock
1963

Alfred Hitchcock threw live gulls at Tippi Hedren for five days and gave the film no conventional score: only electronic shrieks, a quiet California town, and crows gathering on a schoolyard jungle gym.

★ 6.4