1940s

His Girl Friday (1940)

1940
1. The Shop Around the Corner (Ernst Lubitsch, United States)
2. His Girl Friday (Howard Hawks, United States)
3. The Great Dictator (Charles Chaplin, United States)
4. Remember the Night (Mitchell Leisen, United States)
5. Rebecca (Alfred Hitchcock, United States)
6. The Philadelphia Story (George Cukor, United States)
7. Pinocchio (Hamilton Luske and Ben Sharpsteen, United States)
8. The Mortal Storm (Frank Borzage, United States)
9. Foreign Correspondent (Alfred Hitchcock, United States)
10. London Can Take It! (Humphrey Jennings, United Kingdom)

1941
1. How Green Was My Valley (John Ford, United States)
2. Citizen Kane (Orson Welles, United States)
3. Sullivan's Travels (Preston Sturges, United States)
4. Hellzapoppin' (H. C. Potter, United States)
5. Ornamental Hairpin (Hiroshi Shimizu, Japan)
6. Remorques (Jean Grémillon, France)
7. The Devil and Daniel Webster (William Dieterle, United States)
8. Hold Back the Dawn (Mitchell Leisen, United States)
9. The Shanghai Gesture (Josef von Sternberg, United States)
10. Suspicion (Alfred Hitchcock, United States)

1942
1. The Magnificent Ambersons (Orson Welles, United States)
2. Listen to Britain (Humphrey Jennings and Stewart McAllister, United Kingdom)
3. Aniki Bóbó (Manoel de Oliveira, Portugal)
4. There Was a Father (Yasujiro Ozu, Japan)
5. Cat People (Jacques Tourneur, United States)
6. The Palm Beach Story (Preston Sturges, United States)
7. Went the Day Well? (Alberto Cavalcanti, United Kingdom)
8. The Loyal 47 Ronin (Kenji Mizoguchi, Japan)
9. To Be or Not to Be (Ernst Lubitsch, United States)
10. Gentleman Jim (Raoul Walsh, United States)

1943
1. Day of Wrath (Carl Theodor Dreyer, Denmark)
2. The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp (Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger, United Kingdom)
3. Shadow of a Doubt (Alfred Hitchcock, United States)
4. I Walked with a Zombie (Jacques Tourneur, United States)
5. Meshes of the Afternoon (Maya Deren and Alexander Hammid, United States)
6. Les Anges du péché (Robert Bresson, France)
7. Air Force (Howard Hawks, United States)
8. Ossessione (Luchino Visconti, Italy)
9. Heaven Can Wait (Ernst Lubitsch, United States)
10. Wild Flower (Emilio Fernández, Mexico)

1944
1. Ivan the Terrible, Part I (Sergei Eisenstein, Soviet Union)
2. To Have and Have Not (Howard Hawks, United States)
3. Meet Me in St. Louis (Vincente Minnelli, United States)
4. Laura (Otto Preminger, United States)
5. Lifeboat (Alfred Hitchcock, United States)
6. The Miracle of Morgan's Creek (Preston Sturges, United States)
7. María Candelaria (Emilio Fernández, Mexico)
8. Hail the Conquering Hero (Preston Sturges, United States)
9. At Land (Maya Deren, United States)
10. The Curse of the Cat People (Robert Wise and Gunther von Fritsch, United States)

1945
1. Les Dames du Bois de Boulogne (Robert Bresson, France)
2. They Were Expendible (John Ford, United States)
3. Rome, Open City (Roberto Rossellini, Italy)
4. Leave Her to Heaven (John M. Stahl, United States)
5. The Southerner (Jean Renoir, United States)
6. Children of Paradise (Marcel Carné, France)
7. I Know Where I'm Going! (Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger, United Kingdom)
8. The Clock (Vincente Minnelli, United States)
9. Detour (Edgar G. Ulmer, United States)
10. The Bells of St. Mary's (Leo McCarey, United States)

1946
1. My Darling Clementine (John Ford, United States)
2. A Matter of Life and Death (Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger, United Kingdom)
3. Notorious (Alfred Hitchcock, United States)
4. Paisan (Roberto Rossellini, Italy)
5. Canyon Passage (Jacques Tourneur, United States)
6. Utamaro and His Five Women (Kenji Mizoguchi, Japan)
7. Cluny Brown (Ernst Lubitsch, United States)
8. Beauty and the Beast (Jean Cocteau, France)
9. The Girl I Loved (Keisuke Kinoshita, Japan)
10. Ivan the Terrible, Part II (Sergei Eisenstein, Soviet Union)

1947
1. Monsieur Verdoux (Charles Chaplin, United States)
2. Antoine and Antoinette (Jacques Becker, France)
3. Black Narcissus (Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger, United Kingdom)
4. The Love of Sumako the Actress (Kenji Mizoguchi, Japan)
5. Record of a Tenement Gentleman (Yasujiro Ozu, Japan)
6. Out of the Past (Jacques Tourneur, United States)
7. The Exile (Max Ophüls, United States)
8. The Lady from Shanghai (Orson Welles, United States)
9. The Unsuspected (Michael Curtiz, United States)
10. Phoenix (Keisuke Kinoshita, Japan)

1948
1. Letter from an Unknown Woman (Max Ophüls, United States)
2. Spring in a Small Town (Fei Mu, China)
3. La Terra Trema (Luchino Visconti, Italy)
4. Red River (Howard Hawks, United States)
5. Germany Year Zero (Roberto Rossellini, Italy)
6. Fort Apache (John Ford, United States)
7. Children of the Beehive (Hiroshi Shimizu, Japan)
8. Moonrise (Frank Borzage, United States)
9. The Red Shoes (Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger, United Kingdom)
10. They Live by Night (Nicholas Ray, United States)

1949
1. Late Spring (Yasujiro Ozu, Japan)
2. Kind Hearts and Coronets (Robert Hamer, United Kingdom)
3. Crows and Sparrows (Zheng Junli, China)
4. I Was a Male War Bride (Howard Hawks, United States)
5. White Heat (Raoul Walsh, United States)
6. Rendezvous in July (Jacques Becker, France)
7. The Reckless Moment (Max Ophüls, United States)
8. Mahal (Kamal Amrohi, India)
9. The Third Man (Carol Reed, United Kingdom)
10. Mr. Shosuke Ohara (Hiroshi Shimizu, Japan)

Les Dames du Bois de Boulogne (1945)

The Decade's Ten Best (in alphabetical order): Les Dames du Bois de Boulogne (Bresson), Day of Wrath (Dreyer), His Girl Friday (Hawks), Ivan the Terrible, Part I and II (Eisenstein), Late Spring (Ozu), Letter from an Unknown Woman (Ophüls), A Matter of Life and Death (Powell and Pressburger), My Darling Clementine (Ford), The Shop Around the Corner (Lubitsch), Spring in a Small Town (Fei).