The Ten Oldest "Certified Fresh" movies on Rotten Tomatoes

The movie review website Rotten Tomatoes has a "best of" section that lists their top movies.

The lists of best movies by year tend to be a bit skimpy up to the mid '80s, because a film needs to have at least 20 reviews before it qualify for a "best of" list, and the RT website tends to collect "Internet era" reviews.

But there's another RT accolade that's even harder for an old picture to attain: Certified Fresh.

As the site explains, "Rotten Tomatoes awards the Certified Fresh accolade to theater releases reviewed by 40 or more Tomatometer Critics (including 5 Top Critics) that score at least 75% or higher on the Tomatometer. A film remains Certified Fresh unless its Tomatometer falls below 60%. Reserved for the best-reviewed films, the Certified Fresh accolade constitutes a seal of approval, synonymous with quality."

A lot of old movies get good ratings on RT, but very few get enough reviews to get the "Certified Fresh" stamp. I think it's a good way to measure not just quality, but proof of continual pop culture heft for a classic to get this approval.

The "Certified Fresh" stamp is also a bit more fair than criteria for the the "best of" lists, which are always topped by movies that get 100% positive reviews. Thus a single negative review keeps Blood Simple, which would otherwise make the all time top ten list, out the top 100 all together.

So here are the top ten oldest pictures to get the "Certified Fresh" rating on RT:


Nosferatu (1922)
Metropolis (1927)
Dracula (1931)
King Kong (1933)
Modern Times (1936)
The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938)
Gone With the Wind (1939)
The Wizard of Oz (1939)
The Philadelphia Story (1940)
Fantasia (1940)