The first of the AFI 100 Years... series of cinematic milestones, AFI's 100 Years... 100 American Movies is a list of the 100 best American movies, as determined by the American Film Institute from a poll of more than 1,500 artists and leaders in the film industry who chose from a list of 400 nominated movies.
A 460-minute version aired as a 10-part series on TNT, narrated by James Woods and hosted by American talents as follows: Another version of the same 460-minute program was produced by Monique De Villiers and John Heyman from A World Production company to British television and market featuring different interviews and each segment being hosted by British talents in the following order: As with awards, the list of those who vote and the final vote tally are not released to the public, nor the criteria for how the 400 nominated films have been selected.
On June 26, 1998, the Chicago Reader published an article by film critic Jonathan Rosenbaum which offers a detailed response to the movies in the AFI list, as well as criticism of the AFI's appropriation of British films, such as Lawrence of Arabia (albeit with aforementioned American funding) and The Third Man.
Rosenbaum also produced an alternative list of 100 American movies that he felt had been overlooked by the AFI.
[2] Rosenbaum chose to present this alternative list alphabetically since to rank them according to merit would be "tantamount to ranking oranges over apples or declaring cherries superior to grapes."