Top 100 films of all time, according to Les Cahiers du Cinema

Not one British-made film has made it on to the French cinema magazine Les Cahiers du Cinema's list of the 100 best films of all time. But here are the hundred German, Spanish, Italian, Russian, not to mention American and French films, that did make the cut.

Eleven out of the top 20 films were French-made, including 'Singin in the Rain'' (1952) starring Gene Kelly

Eleven out of the top 20 films were French-made, including 'Singin in the Rain'' (1952) starring Gene Kelly

Citizen Kane - Orson Welles

The Night of the Hunter - Charles Laughton

The Rules of the Game (La Règle du jeu) - Jean Renoir

Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans (L'Aurore) - Friedrich Wilhelm Murnau

L'Atalante - Jean Vigo

M - Fritz Lang

Singin' in the Rain - Stanley Donen & Gene Kelly

Vertigo - Alfred Hitchcock

Children of Paradise (Les Enfants du Paradis) - Marcel Carné

The Searchers - John Ford

Greed - Erich von Stroheim

Rio Bravo - Howard Hawkes

To Be or Not to Be - Ernst Lubitsch

Tokyo Story - Yasujiro Ozu

Contempt (Le Mépris) - Jean-Luc Godard

Tales of Ugetsu (Ugetsu monogatari) - Kenji Mizoguchi

City Lights - Charlie Chaplin

The General - Buster Keaton

Nosferatu the Vampire - Friedrich Wilhelm Murnau

The Music Room - Satyajit Ray

Freaks - Tod Browning

Johnny Guitar - Nicholas Ray

The Mother and the Whore (La Maman et la Putain) - Jean Eustache

The Great Dictator - Charlie Chaplin

The Leopard (Le Guépard) - Luchino Visconti

Hiroshima, My Love - Alain Resnais

The Box of Pandora (Loulou) - Georg Wilhelm Pabst

North by Northwest - Alfred Hitchcock

Pickpocket - Robert Bresson

Golden Helmet (Casque d'or) - Jacques Becker

The Barefoot Contessa - Joseph Mankiewitz

Moonfleet - Fritz Lang

Diamond Earrings (Madame de…) - Max Ophüls

Pleasure - Max Ophüls

The Deer Hunter - Michael Cimino

The Adventure - Michelangelo Antonioni

Battleship Potemkin - Sergei M. Eisenstein

Notorious - Alfred Hitchcock

Ivan the Terrible - Sergei M. Eisenstein

The Godfather - Francis Ford Coppola

Touch of Evil - Orson Welles

The Wind - Victor Sjöström

2001: A Space Odyssey - Stanley Kubrick

Fanny and Alexander - Ingmar Bergman

The Crowd - King Vidor

8 1/2 - Federico Fellini

La Jetée - Chris Marker

Pierrot le Fou - Jean-Luc Godard

Confessions of a Cheat (Le Roman d'un tricheur) - Sacha Guitry

Amarcord - Federico Fellini

Beauty and the Beast (La Belle et la Bête) - Jean Cocteau

Some Like It Hot - Billy Wilder

Some Came Running - Vincente Minnelli

Gertrud - Carl Theodor Dreyer

King Kong - Ernst Shoedsack & Merian J. Cooper

Laura - Otto Preminger

The Seven Samurai - Akira Kurosawa

The 400 Blows - François Truffaut

La Dolce Vita - Federico Fellini

The Dead - John Huston

Trouble in Paradise - Ernst Lubitsch

It's a Wonderful Life - Frank Capra

Monsieur Verdoux - Charlie Chaplin

The Passion of Joan of Arc - Carl Theodor Dreyer

À bout de souffle - Jean-Luc Godard

Apocalypse Now - Francis Ford Coppola

Barry Lyndon - Stanley Kubrick

La Grande Illusion - Jean Renoir

Intolerance - David Wark Griffith

A Day in the Country (Partie de campagne) - Jean Renoir

Playtime - Jacques Tati

Rome, Open City - Roberto Rossellini

Livia (Senso) - Luchino Visconti

Modern Times - Charlie Chaplin

Van Gogh - Maurice Pialat

An Affair to Remember - Leo McCarey

Andrei Rublev - Andrei Tarkovsky

The Scarlet Empress - Joseph von Sternberg

Sansho the Bailiff - Kenji Mizoguchi

Talk to Her - Pedro Almodóvar

The Party - Blake Edwards

Tabu - Friedrich Wilhelm Murnau

The Bandwagon - Vincente Minnelli

A Star Is Born - George Cukor

Mr. Hulot's Holiday - Jacques Tati

America, America - Elia Kazan

El - Luis Buñuel

Kiss Me Deadly - Robert Aldrich

Once Upon a Time in America - Sergio Leone

Daybreak (Le Jour se lève) - Marcel Carné

Letter from an Unknown Woman - Max Ophüls

Lola - Jacques Demy

Manhattan - Woody Allen

Mulholland Dr. - David Lynch

My Night at Maud's (Ma nuit chez Maud) - Eric Rohmer

Night and Fog (Nuit et Brouillard) - Alain Resnais

The Gold Rush - Charlie Chaplin

Scarface - Howard Hawks

Bicycle Thieves - Vittorio de Sica

Napoléon - Abel Gance

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Michael Jackson 'converts to Islam and changes name to Mikaeel'

By Graham Tibbetts

Michael Jackson wore an abaya, a traditional Arab women's veil, in Bahrain Photo: REUTERS

The singer, who was raised as a Jehovah's Witness, converted to Islam in a ceremony at a friend's house in Los Angeles.

He is said to have sat on the floor and worn a small hat while an imam officiated.

According to The Sun, the ceremony took place while Jackson, 50, was recording an album at the home of Steve Porcaro, a keyboard player who composed music on his Thriller album.

The former Jackson 5 star was counselled by David Wharnsby, a Canadian songwriter, and Phillip Bubal, a producer, who have both converted.

A source said Jackson had appeared a "bit down" and added: "They began talking to him about their beliefs, and how they thought they had become better people after they converted. Michael soon began warming to the idea.

"An imam was summoned from the mosque and Michael went through the shahada, which is the Muslim declaration of belief."

Last year his brother, Jermaine Friday, suggested Jackson would convert having taken an interest in Islam since Friday's conversion in 1989.

"When I came back from Mecca I got him a lot of books and he asked me lots of things about my religion and I told him that it's peaceful and beautiful," said Friday.

"He read everything and he was proud of me that I found something that would give me inner strength and peace.

"I think it is most probable that Michael will convert to Islam.

"He could do so much, just like I am trying to do. Michael and I and the word of God, we could do so much."

Original here

Guns N' Roses album to debut on MySpace

Guns N' Roses fans who have waited 17 years to hear the rock band's new album are mere hours from having their patience rewarded with a free Web debut before it goes on sale next week.

Guns N' Roses' Chinese Democracy will make its debut on the band's MySpace page starting Thursday, according to a Reuters report Wednesday. Fans will be able to stream the album for free before it goes on sale Sunday in an exclusive deal with Best Buy. Listeners, however, will not be able to download tracks from the site.

Also reported to be debuting Thursday was Electric Arguments by Paul McCartney's side project group, The Fireman. However, Eliot Van Buskirk at Wired.com noted that NPR Music got the jump on MySpace by beginning its streaming of the album Tuesday.

The News Corp.-owned social network launched its MySpace Music service in September with the backing of the four largest recording companies. The service represents the most significant challenge to Apple--at least in terms of firepower--in some time. The site offers free streaming music and sells unprotected MP3 downloads, ringtones, and merchandise.

MySpace has long been a place where bands market their wares to the Web. According to MySpace, 65 percent of its users already have streaming music on their profiles and 6 billion songs are played every month.