Empire magazine has declared Steven Spielberg's 1975 shark thriller Jaws the greatest film of all time, a decision that has left chief film critic Larushka Ivan-Zadeh of Metro newspaper flabbergasted. In a scathing response, she calls the list 'staggeringly wrong,' not because the films are poor, but because they are overwhelmingly safe, mainstream, and male-dominated.
The Empire List: A Who's Who of Hollywood
The updated list of the 100 greatest films features heavy hitters like The Godfather at #2, Goodfellas at #7, The Shawshank Redemption at #3, and multiple entries from the Star Wars and The Lord of the Rings franchises. Directors such as Spielberg (seven films), Christopher Nolan (five, including Inception at #6 and The Dark Knight at #10), Martin Scorsese, James Cameron, Francis Ford Coppola, and Quentin Tarantino dominate. Ivan-Zadeh describes the list as 'the daddy of all lists,' compiled by someone methodically circling the Radio Times for Christmas viewing.
Why Jaws Is Not the Greatest
While acknowledging Jaws as a 'flawless masterpiece of suspense, craft, and populist terror,' Ivan-Zadeh argues it is not the greatest film ever. Even Spielberg himself has said he considers Schindler's List his best work. She suggests that the concept of 'best' can be split into 'greatest' and 'favourite,' citing Yasujiro Ozu's Tokyo Story (1953), Billy Wilder's Some Like It Hot (1959), and Chantal Akerman's Jeanne Dielman (1975) as contenders for the former. Her personal favourite is the folk horror The Wicker Man (1973), which she calls 'the movie I've actually rewatched, in all its versions, more than any other.'
A Lack of Diversity and Spark
The critic points out that the list includes only a handful of female-directed films, clustered near the bottom, and just six foreign-language films out of 100. She argues that a great list should provoke, irritate, and start conversations, not settle them. She compares it to Quentin Tarantino's recent claim that no good films have been made since the pandemic, a statement that, while 'deranged,' sparked debate. Ivan-Zadeh counters with films like The Zone of Interest, Backrooms, and One Battle After Another as examples of post-pandemic cinema worth discussing.
The Purpose of a List
Ivan-Zadeh concludes that the best lists should make cinema feel bigger, not smaller. They should be a discovery and a prompt that the greatest film of all time might be one we haven't seen yet. She invites disagreement, noting that the fun of such lists is in the argument they start, not the answer they provide.
