Jeanne Dielman, 23 quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles (1975), directed by Chantal Akerman, has topped the British Film Institute's Sight and Sound poll.



Chantal Akerman:



It is the first time a work directed by a woman has reached the top ten. The poll, which runs every decade, has been criticised for a lack of diversity.

The winning spot was held for 40 years by Orson Welles' Citizen Kane.

It was overtaken in 2012 by Alfred Hitchcock's Vertigo.

Jeanne Dielman, released in 1975, is the story of a Belgian widow who turns to prostitution to make ends meet, but kills one of her clients. The film runs for almost three and a half hours.

Though not as well-known outside the world of film criticism as previous winners, it has been lauded as a "masterpiece", and a ground-breaking piece of feminist film.


Chantal Akerman, the Belgian director, died in 2015 aged 65.

Lillian Crawford, a film critic and writer who contributed to the poll, said the film was the "essential text" in feminist cinema.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-63829976