Spike Lee shares his list of 100 movies every filmmaker should see

Last Updated on August 2, 2021

With Spike Lee‘s OLDBOY coming later this year and a Kickstarter campaign underway to get his not-BLACULA vampire movie made, the versatile director also has made time to teach his craft to students at New York University. Contributors to his Kickstarter were given a treat today when Lee shared this:

I’ve Been A Professor At The NYU Graduate Film For The Past 15 Years.The 1st Day Of Every Class I Hand Out My List Of Films That I Feel You Must See If You Want To Make Films. Please Look At This List And See What You Might Have Missed. As I Tell My Students If You Want Your Film “Game” To Be Tight You Must Have Seen Great Movies, World Cinema, It Just Can’t Be Hollywood Films. Educate Yourself. Learn. Grow. Evolve. Make Great Films.

Peace, Onward And Upward,

Spike Lee.

The list is varied both in genre, era, and language. Some of these are well known to even the average movie-goer (TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD, THE GODFATHER, MAD MAX) while others are more obscure and likely titles recognized by ardent cinephiles (ROME OPEN CITY, MIRACLE IN MILAN). Some of the titles are surprising to me, but they also show that Spike Lee is a student of his craft and is informed about the history of movies.

Take a look at the list and see how many of these you have seen.

OLDBOY opens October 25, 2013. Spike Lee‘s Kickstarter campaign ends August 21st and is currently a million dollars short of reaching his goal of $1.25 million.