Ranking All Of Director Alain Resnais’s Movies
“What are Alain Resnais’s Best Movies?” We looked at all of Resnais’s directed filmography and ranked them against one another to answer that very question!
We took all of the movies directed by Alain Resnais and looked at their Rotten Tomato Critic, Rotten Tomato User, IMDB, and Letterboxd scores, ranking them against one another to see which movies came out on top. The movies are ranked in our list below based on which movies have the highest overall score between all 4 review sites in comparison with all of the other movies by the same director. The process is all very scientific with no flaws at all.
The full ranking chart is also included below the countdown on the bottom of the page.
Happy Viewing!
The Top Film’s Of Alain Resnais
23 ) I Want to Go Home
Review Website Ranks:
- Rotten Tomatoes Critic: 15
- Rotten Tomatoes Users: 18
- IMDB User Review Score: 23
- Letterboxd User Score: 21
Joey Wellman, an American cartoonist from Cleveland now largely forgotten at home, visits France with his partner Lena to attend an exhibition in Paris about the comic strip (bande dessinée) which features his work. He also hopes to be reconciled with his daughter Elsie who has been a student in Paris for two years, in flight from the American culture of which she sees her father as a typical example. Elsie is naively infatuated with French literature, and is trying to secure an introduction to the brilliant university professor Christian Gauthier, an expert on Flaubert but also an enthusiast for comic books. The meeting of father and daughter goes badly, but Elsie is persuaded to join Joey and Lena for the weekend at the country house of Gauthier’s mother, Isabelle. During a comic-themed masquerade party, all of the characters are made to reconsider their present and past relationships.
21 ) Lest We Forget
Review Website Ranks:
- Rotten Tomatoes Critic: 15
- Rotten Tomatoes Users: 20
- IMDB User Review Score: 12
- Letterboxd User Score: 23
Contre l’Oubli (Against Oblivion) is a compilation of 30 French filmmakers, Alain Resnais and Jean Luc Godard among them, who use film to make a plea on behalf of a political prisoner. Jean Luc Godard and Anne Marie Mieville’s film concerns the plight of Thomas Wanggai, West Papuan activist who has since died in prison. The short films were commissioned by Amnesty International.
21 ) Cinétracts
Review Website Ranks:
- Rotten Tomatoes Critic: 15
- Rotten Tomatoes Users: 20
- IMDB User Review Score: 21
- Letterboxd User Score: 14
A series of 41 documentary shorts, directed (without credit) by several famous French filmmakers and each running between two and four minutes. Each “tract” espouses a leftist political viewpoint through the filmed depiction of real-life events, including workers’ strikes and the events of Paris in May ’68.
20 ) Life of Riley
Review Website Ranks:
- Rotten Tomatoes Critic: 10
- Rotten Tomatoes Users: 16
- IMDB User Review Score: 21
- Letterboxd User Score: 21
In the midst of rehearsals for a new play, amateur dramatics proponents Colin and Kathryn receive the shattering news that their friend George is fatally ill and only has a few months to live.
19 ) Wild Grass
Review Website Ranks:
- Rotten Tomatoes Critic: 13
- Rotten Tomatoes Users: 19
- IMDB User Review Score: 18
- Letterboxd User Score: 14
Marguerite loses her wallet, and it’s found by Georges, a seemingly happy head of family. As he looks through the wallet and examines the photos of Marguerite, he finds he’s fascinated with her and her life, and soon his curiosity about her becomes an obsession.
18 ) The Year 01
Review Website Ranks:
- Rotten Tomatoes Critic: 15
- Rotten Tomatoes Users: 10
- IMDB User Review Score: 20
- Letterboxd User Score: 17
The film narrates a utopian abandonment, consensual and festive of the market economy and high productivity. The population decides on a number of resolutions beginning with “We stop everything” and the second “After a total downtime will be revived-reluctantly-that the services and products including lack will prove intolerable. Probably: water to drink, electricity for reading at night, the TSF to say “This is not the end of the world, this is an 01, and now a page of Celestial Mechanics”. The implementation of these resolutions is the first day of a new era, Year 01. The Year 01 is emblematic of the challenge of the 1970s and covers such diverse topics as ecology, negation of authority, free love, communal living, rejection of private property and labor.
16 ) Not on the Lips
Review Website Ranks:
- Rotten Tomatoes Critic: 11
- Rotten Tomatoes Users: 15
- IMDB User Review Score: 17
- Letterboxd User Score: 17
A musical drawing room farce set in Paris in October, 1925. Gilberte, in middle-age, flirts with men but loves her husband Georges, wishing he were more demonstrative. He’s negotiating a deal with an American, Eric Thomson, who turns out to be Gilberte’s first husband from an annulled and secret stateside marriage. Along with her sister Arlette, Gilberte begs Eric not to tell Georges about the marriage. Meanwhile, a young artist, Charly, pursues Gilberte while Arlette tries to match him with the young Huguette, who loves him. Will Eric play along or try to re-win Gilberte’s affection? Can Gilberte play one off against another? And who will manage to kiss whom on the lips?
16 ) Life Is a Bed of Roses
Review Website Ranks:
- Rotten Tomatoes Critic: 11
- Rotten Tomatoes Users: 16
- IMDB User Review Score: 16
- Letterboxd User Score: 17
In this whimsical fable, Resnais deftly interweaves three story lines: the creation of an early-20th-century utopia; romantic high jinks at a school conference; and a fantasy sparked by F/X pioneer Georges Méliès.
15 ) Private Fears in Public Places
Review Website Ranks:
- Rotten Tomatoes Critic: 15
- Rotten Tomatoes Users: 20
- IMDB User Review Score: 12
- Letterboxd User Score: 12
In Paris, six people all look for love, despite typically having their romantic aspirations dashed at every turn.
14 ) You Ain’t Seen Nothin’ Yet
Review Website Ranks:
- Rotten Tomatoes Critic: 9
- Rotten Tomatoes Users: 12
- IMDB User Review Score: 18
- Letterboxd User Score: 14
From beyond the grave, celebrated playwright Antoine d’Anthac gathers together all his friends who have appeared over the years in his play “Eurydice.” These actors watch a recording of the work performed by a young acting company, La Compagnie de la Colombe. Do love, life, death and love after death still have any place on a theater stage? It’s up to them to decide. And the surprises have only just begun…
13 ) Stavisky…
Review Website Ranks:
- Rotten Tomatoes Critic: 6
- Rotten Tomatoes Users: 13
- IMDB User Review Score: 15
- Letterboxd User Score: 17
Irresistible charm and talent helps Serge Alexandre alias Stavisky, small-time swindler, to make friends with even most influential members of French industrial and political elite during the early 30s. But nothing lasts forever and when his great scam involving hundreds millions of francs gets exposed result is an unprecedented scandal that almost caused a civil war.
12 ) Love Unto Death
Review Website Ranks:
- Rotten Tomatoes Critic: 15
- Rotten Tomatoes Users: 13
- IMDB User Review Score: 12
- Letterboxd User Score: 8
Elisabeth and Simon have been deeply in love for two months when Simon momentarily dies, but comes back to life. Simon does not want any further medical tests, but the couple are forced to grapple with the possibility of his death. They eventually tell their close friends Jérôme and Judith Martignac about the event. The Martignacs are both clerics, and Judith has just been giving a funeral service for a villager who committed suicide, though Jérôme would have nothing to do with suicide..
10 ) Mélo
Review Website Ranks:
- Rotten Tomatoes Critic: 15
- Rotten Tomatoes Users: 11
- IMDB User Review Score: 11
- Letterboxd User Score: 8
Pierre Belcroix and Marcel Blanc are violinists and lifelong friends living in Paris in the 1920s. While Marcel has become famous and Pierre has not, both are happy with their lives. Pierre is happily married to Romaine, a stylish young flapper. However, Marcel meets and falls in love with her, which Marcel little suspects.
10 ) Far from Vietnam
Review Website Ranks:
- Rotten Tomatoes Critic: 15
- Rotten Tomatoes Users: 20
- IMDB User Review Score: 5
- Letterboxd User Score: 5
In seven different parts, Godard, Klein, Lelouch, Marker, Resnais and Varda show their sympathy for the North-Vietnamees army during the Vietnam-war.
9 ) Same Old Song
Review Website Ranks:
- Rotten Tomatoes Critic: 13
- Rotten Tomatoes Users: 7
- IMDB User Review Score: 9
- Letterboxd User Score: 12
Odile is a business executive looking for a new, bigger apartment. Her younger sister Camille has just completed her doctoral thesis in history and is a Paris tour guide. Simon is a regular on Camille’s tours because he’s attracted to her. Camille has fallen for Marc, and they begin an affair. Nicolas is also looking for an apartment, since he hopes to eventually have his family join him in Paris.
8 ) Smoking / No Smoking
Review Website Ranks:
- Rotten Tomatoes Critic: 15
- Rotten Tomatoes Users: 1
- IMDB User Review Score: 5
- Letterboxd User Score: 8
“Smoking” and “No Smoking” are two segments of the film which are based on closely connected plays. The original plays covered eight separate stories, which have been pared down to three each for these movies. At a certain point in the story of each segment, the five female characters (all played by Sabine Azema) and the four male characters (all played by Pierre Arditi) have their lives skillfully recapped in terms of “what might have happened” if they had made or failed to make certain choices. For example, “No Smoking” focuses chiefly on the relationship between the mild-mannered Miles Coombes and his infinitely more aggressive and ambitious wife, Rowena.
7 ) Je T’Aime, Je T’Aime
Review Website Ranks:
- Rotten Tomatoes Critic: 8
- Rotten Tomatoes Users: 6
- IMDB User Review Score: 9
- Letterboxd User Score: 3
Recovering from an attempted suicide, a man is selected to participate in a time travel experiment that has only been tested on mice. A malfunction in the experiment causes the man to experience moments from his past in a random order.
5 ) Muriel, or the Time of Return
Review Website Ranks:
- Rotten Tomatoes Critic: 5
- Rotten Tomatoes Users: 8
- IMDB User Review Score: 5
- Letterboxd User Score: 5
A chamber drama about a widow and her son who live in an antique shop in Boulogne. The widow invites a man whom she loved twenty-two years earlier to visit. Her son is haunted by Muriel, a young woman whose death he may have caused while serving as a soldier in Algeria. As in Resnais’ earlier films, memory is deflected, fragmented, enshrined, and imagined.
5 ) The War Is Over
Review Website Ranks:
- Rotten Tomatoes Critic: 1
- Rotten Tomatoes Users: 9
- IMDB User Review Score: 5
- Letterboxd User Score: 8
A group of Spanish refugees try to organize protests from France. Their network is under constant threat by the police and some of them have recently been arrested. The main character (played by Yves Montand) dedicated his whole life to the battle but he feels forever estranged. He doesn’t find his place nor in his adoptive country (France) nor in love. But this film is not about the story, it’s all about style. Alain Resnais has an original approach in this film and this is the thing that makes this film worth watching.
4 ) Providence
Review Website Ranks:
- Rotten Tomatoes Critic: 7
- Rotten Tomatoes Users: 3
- IMDB User Review Score: 2
- Letterboxd User Score: 5
Clive Langham spends one tormenting night in his bed suffering from health problems and thinking up a story based on his relatives. He is a bitter man and he shows, through flashbacks, how spiteful, conniving and treacherous his family is. But is this how they really are or is it his own vindictive slant on things?
3 ) Last Year at Marienbad
Review Website Ranks:
- Rotten Tomatoes Critic: 4
- Rotten Tomatoes Users: 4
- IMDB User Review Score: 2
- Letterboxd User Score: 1
Takes place in a chateau, an ambiguous story of a man and a woman who may or may not have met last year at Marienbad.
2 ) My American Uncle
Review Website Ranks:
- Rotten Tomatoes Critic: 1
- Rotten Tomatoes Users: 4
- IMDB User Review Score: 2
- Letterboxd User Score: 3
Prof. Henri Laborit uses the stories of the lives of three people to discuss behaviorist theories of survival, combat, rewards and punishment, and anxiety. René is a technical manager at a textile factory and must face the anxiety caused by corporate downsizing. Janine is a self-educated actress/stylist who learns that the wife of her lover is dying and must decide to let them reunite. Jean is a controversial career-climbing writer/politician at a crossroads in life.
1 ) Hiroshima Mon Amour
Review Website Ranks:
- Rotten Tomatoes Critic: 1
- Rotten Tomatoes Users: 2
- IMDB User Review Score: 1
- Letterboxd User Score: 1
The deep conversation between a Japanese architect and a French actress forms the basis of this celebrated French film, considered one of the vanguard productions of the French New Wave. Set in Hiroshima after the end of World War II, the couple — lovers turned friends — recount, over many hours, previous romances and life experiences. The two intertwine their stories about the past with pondering the devastation wrought by the atomic bomb dropped on the city.
Alain Resnais’s Best Movies
Alain Resnais Review Website Filmography Rankings
| Film | RT Critic | RT User | IMDB | Letterboxd | Overal Rank |
| Hiroshima Mon Amour | 1 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 1 |
| My American Uncle | 1 | 4 | 2 | 3 | 2 |
| Last Year at Marienbad | 4 | 4 | 2 | 1 | 3 |
| Providence | 7 | 3 | 2 | 5 | 4 |
| Muriel, or the Time of Return | 5 | 8 | 5 | 5 | 5 |
| The War Is Over | 1 | 9 | 5 | 8 | 5 |
| Je T’Aime, Je T’Aime | 8 | 6 | 9 | 3 | 7 |
| Smoking / No Smoking | 15 | 1 | 5 | 8 | 8 |
| Same Old Song | 13 | 7 | 9 | 12 | 9 |
| Mélo | 15 | 11 | 11 | 8 | 10 |
| Far from Vietnam | 15 | 20 | 5 | 5 | 10 |
| Love Unto Death | 15 | 13 | 12 | 8 | 12 |
| Stavisky… | 6 | 13 | 15 | 17 | 13 |
| You Ain’t Seen Nothin’ Yet | 9 | 12 | 18 | 14 | 14 |
| Private Fears in Public Places | 15 | 20 | 12 | 12 | 15 |
| Not on the Lips | 11 | 15 | 17 | 17 | 16 |
| Life Is a Bed of Roses | 11 | 16 | 16 | 17 | 16 |
| The Year 01 | 15 | 10 | 20 | 17 | 18 |
| Wild Grass | 13 | 19 | 18 | 14 | 19 |
| Life of Riley | 10 | 16 | 21 | 21 | 20 |
| Lest We Forget | 15 | 20 | 12 | 23 | 21 |
| Cinétracts | 15 | 20 | 21 | 14 | 21 |
| I Want to Go Home | 15 | 18 | 23 | 21 | 23 |
