Vertigo is Sight & Sound's Greatest Film of All Time

World-renowned directors vying for the top spot on the list.

Since 1962, the Sight & Sound Magazine of the British Film Institute polls directors, critics, and scholars of film--846 total people--to determine the 50 greatest films of all time. Each person polled submits a top 10 list of films, and the lists are combined and tallied. According to acclaimed film critic Roger Ebert: “It is by far the most respected of the countless polls of great movies--the only one most serious movie people take seriously." The top ten is usually not a surprise, as movies like Citizen Kane that are already renowned as the greatest movies of all time usually comprise the top spots in the same positions. However, in August 2012, when the Sight & Sound poll was once again released, Alfred Hitchcock’s Vertigo had replaced Orson Welles’ Citizen Kane as the number one “greatest movie of all time.” Citizen Kane had held the position for 50 years.

Citizen Kane was knocked out of the #1 spot it held for 50 years.

2012 was the first year the poll had been conducted after the internet had become the main place to discuss film, so Ian Christie speculates that the rise of Vertigo could mark the rise of a new era in film. This year, S&S also began including critics who had published the bulk or entirety of their work online instead of following a more elitist, print-focused attittude. 2012 was also the second time that the separate poll of directors--346 in 2012--was performed, and the director’s choices are quite a step away from the choices of the critics and scholars.

Hitchcock's Vertigo is now considered the greatest film of all time.