Classic is still The Godfather of all movies, say film fans

IT was an offer film fans couldn’t refuse – the opportunity to vote for the greatest movie of all time.

They chose Francis Ford Coppola’s gangster epic The Godfather, charting the Corleone family’s rise to power in New York.

Next on the list compiled through a poll of 20,000 readers of Empire movie magazine was George Lucas’s The Empire Strikes Back, followed by Christopher Nolan’s Batman film The Dark Knight, featuring Heath Ledger’s Oscar-winning performance as The Joker.

The Shawshank Redemption, Pulp Fiction and Goodfellas also feature in the top ten while the Ryan Gosling and Emma Stone-starring La La Land is at 62 on the 100-strong list, less than six months after it was released.

Older hits such as Casablanca, One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest and Some Like It Hot are also among the all-time favourites chosen by the magazine’s readers.

Empire’s editor-in-chief Terri White heaped praise on the poll’s overall winner, saying: ‘It’s fantastic to see The Godfather continue to elicit such affection from movie lovers.’

Ms White continued: ‘In addition to perennial favourites such as Star Wars [No 9 on the list] and The Shawshank Redemption, it’s also encouraging to see a number of recent releases have already found a place among cinema-goers’ most cherished films.’