Ridley Scott’s career is marked first and foremost by its sheer prolificness. There are very few directors of any age who work frequently enough to have two films coming out the same year. Scott’s done it three times in 2001, 2017, and 2021; and those later two times were when he was past the age of 80.
Since he made his debut with the swashbuckling period drama “The Duellists” in 1977, Scott has been a steady, constant presence at the cinema. His longest break has been two four-year gaps between releases — “1492: Conquest for Paradise” and “White Squall” from 1992 to 1996 and “The Martian” and “All the Money in the World” and “The Last Duel” from 2017 to 2021, the latter gap widened by the pandemic. More frequently, Scott only goes two or even just one year before dropping a new film, resulting in an impressively robust 28 filmography.
What’s even more notable about Scott’s body of work isn’t just its size but its variety. The director is probably best known for his science fiction work, as he practically defined two entire subgenres with the one-two punch of extraterrestrial horror “Alien” and cyberpunk noir “Blade Runner” in 1979 and 1982. He’s also well knwn for his historical epics, which include greats like “Gladiator” and “Kingdom of Heaven” and some…not so greats like “1492: Conquest of Paradise.”
But once you get into his films, you’ll find an incredible array of genres and tones that the English auteur has taken on. He’s made a feminist buddy road trip movie (“Thelma and Louise”), a psychological horror cannibal story (“Hannibal”), several war (“Black Hawk Down”) and crime (“American Gangster”) films, a “Rashomon” riff set in the Middle Ages (“The Last Duel”), and “The Counselor,” which is really in a genre of its own. When his latest film “Napoleon,” a biopic epic starring Joaquin Phoenix as the notorious French ruler, turned out to be more of a comedy and satire than anything else, it felt only fitting that Scott would surprise us.
With the amount of different types of films he’s made, it’s no surprise that Scott has a varied and deep taste in films with a great appreciation for the canonical classics like “Citizen Kane” mixed with some oddball picks like “Muriel’s Wedding.” In honor of “Napoleon,” IndieWire went through Scott’s interviews over the years to find the movies he’s shouted out as his absolute favorites. Read on for nine of Ridley Scott’s favorite movies, along with a TV show thrown in for good measure.
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“Citizen Kane” (1941)
Image Credit: Courtesy Everett Collection In 2014, Scott shared his three favorite films of all time in an interview with the BBC. One of the movies he selected was “Citizen Kane,” the Orson Welles masterpiece about the life and death of a notorious newspaper tycoon.
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“Lawrence of Arabia” (1962)
Image Credit: Courtesy Everett Collection Another film Welles selected in his BBC interview as one of his three favorites is “Lawrence of Arabia,” David Lean’s biographical epic about T.E. Lawrence and his involvement in the Arab Revolt during World War I. Released in 1962, the film is frequently considered one of the greatest of all time.
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“The Seven Samurai” (1954)
Image Credit: Courtesy Everett Collection The final film Scott selected as one of his three favorites in his BBC interview is “Seven Samurai.” Directed by Japanese film legend Akira Kurosawa, the film focuses on a group of Ronin who defend a village of farmers against bandits.
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“The Seventh Seal” (1957)
Image Credit: Courtesy Everett Collection During his interview with the BBC, Scott also referred to Ingmar Bergman as one of his favorite directors, calling the director’s 1957 film “The Seventh Seal” his favorite. The classic stars Max Von Sydow as a medieval knight who plays a game of chess with Death, who has come to take his life.
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“Summer With Monika” (1953)
Image Credit: Courtesy Everett Collection During his BBC interview, Scott recalled seeing one of Bergman’s films, “Summer With Monika,” at the National Film Theatre and being blown away. The film, a star vehicle for lead actress Harriet Andersson, focuses on two teenagers who have a passionate affair and abandon their families for each other.
“‘My God, how fresh and how real all the characters were,’” Scott recalled thinking. “There’s something very nice about all of those Scandinavian performances.”
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“Gilda” (1946)
Image Credit: Courtesy Everett Collection In a 2022 interview with Deadline, Scott told the story of the first film he ever saw with his mother: “Gilda,” Charles Vidor’s noir film which stars Rita Hayworth as one of cinema’s most iconic femme fatales.
“When Rita Hayworth takes the gloves off and sings ‘Put the Blame on Mame, Boys,’ I could never forget that and found Rita inordinately, spectacularly beautiful,” he said.
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“2001: A Space Odyssey” (1968)
Image Credit: Courtesy Everett Collection Stanley Kubrick’s epic space saga “2001: A Space Odyssey” is one of the most beloved science fiction films of all time, telling a story about mankind’s evolution filtered through a trippy story of apes, monoliths, evil computers, and giant babies. In a 2015 interview with Deadline, Scott spoke about how the design of the film was foundational, and continued to influence him and his science fiction work throughout his career.
“The design on ‘2001’ … that’s the threshold for everything being real. You look at ‘2001’ and you look at ‘Star Wars.’ Stanley’s design influenced everybody,” Scott said. “I’ve never shaken it off; it influenced me even with ‘Prometheus.’ Stanley really got it right. Stanley was like the Big Daddy, so I never got jealous of him.”
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“Muriel’s Wedding” (1994)
Image Credit: ©Miramax/Courtesy Everett Collection A cult favorite, Australian director P.J. Hogan’s “Muriel’s Wedding” focuses on a socially awkward woman (Toni Collette) who dreams of someday having a glamourous wedding. In a 2015 director’s roundtable with The Hollywood Reporter, Scott selected the film as the one movie he would put in a time capsule.
“I’ve seen it six times. It’s fantastic,” Scott said.
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“On the Beach” (1959)
Image Credit: Courtesy Everett Collection In 2015, Scott shared his five favorite science fiction films with Wired. One of the movies he chose was “On the Beach,” a post-apocalyptic film from Stanley Kramer. Set after a global nuclear war that has left Australia the only habitable place on earth, the film stars Gregory Peck and Anthony Perkins as soldiers on a mission to find a last hope for humanity.
“Very good, beautiful black and white movie,” Scott told Wired. “It’s when they’re really original that it counts. A jump forward, quantum leap.”
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“Killing Eve” (2018-2022)
Image Credit: ©BBC America/Courtesy Everett Collection Scott’s 2021 film “The Last Duel” stars Jodie Comer as a Middles Ages noblewoman whose rape trial becomes the impetus for a duel between her assailant and her husband. In an interview with Deadline, Scott said he cast Comer for the role based on her performance in “Killing Eve,” a TV show where she plays a Russian assassin.
“I became the biggest fan of Jodie because I kept watching ‘Killing Eve,’ which I think was always fantastic. The interplay between her and her nemesis, Sandra Oh, was so comedic and marvelous,” Scott said. “I just watched every show after that. Then I watch her evolve into this kind of Russian vernacular. She’s genius. I think she can do anything.”
