The Best Ensemble Casts of All Time?

Some very good choices especially 'Around the World', 'Lovely war' and 'Mad, mad World'.
I'd like to add 'The Busy Body', 'Enter Laughing' , 'His Girl Friday 'and 'Sullivan's Travels.

How about all those goofy Airport & Towering Inferno flicks?

For sheer acting power, I'd have to say 12 Angry Men.

For star power, I'll go with How The West Was Won:

Jimmy Stewart, Richard Widmark, Eli Wallach, Gregory Peck
Henry Fonda, John Wayne, Robert Preston, Debbie Reynolds, Walter Brennan, Andy Devine, Lee J Cobb, Carolyn Jones, Thelma Ritter, Russ Tamblyn, Agnes Moorehead, Raymond Massey, Harry Morgan

AND narration by Spencer Tracy!!!!!

Beat that!

George Peppard, Karl Malden, Carroll Baker,

Kevin Costner is bleh in JFK, but the rest is GREAT.

Tommy Lee Jones, Donald Sutherland, Sissy Spacek, Kevin Bacon, Gary Oldman, Joe Pesci, Jack Lemmon, John Candy, Walter Matthau, Laurie Metcalf, Jay O. Sanders, Edward Asner, etc.

Everyone outside of Costner was incredible.

The key question is, however, is it any better????

I gotta question: I see lots of favorable mentions of JFK in this forum and I just wonder how many of y'all were actually around and following news events back when Garrision was making all of his wild charges? Having lived through all of that hoopla, I have a poor opinion of Garrison and therefore have seen that movie (I also have a poor opinion of Stone and generally avoid his films whenever possible). But I'm slightly curious as to how many of you younger movie fans buy into Garrison's and Stone's version of the assassination.

Murder by Death is a great choice, not only for the cast but for all the mystery characters they portrayed. Peter Falk practically repeated his Philip Spade-Sam Marlowe character in another funny mystery spoof with a great cast, The Cheap Detective.

Hmm, The Usual Suspects comes to mind straight away when thinking about the best ensemble casts. I mean how many films can get Gabriel Bryne, Kevin Spacey and Benico Del Toro all together as criminals!?! Top film with a top cast.

Honourable mention must go to Christopher (Amazing) Nolan's Batman Begins . Now that's one HELL of a cast in Christian Bale, Michael Caine, Gary Oldman, Liam Neeson, Cillian Murphy, Tom Wilkinson, Ken Wantanabe, Jeremy Theobald etc. That cast alone will make me see ANY film.

* Buy into the theory...always have.

* Didn't particularly like the movie

* Thought the cast was brilliant

That's my thoughts

I think JFK is a milestone. It's so good because it shows that alternative to the official version of the Kennedy assassination is possible. While it questions the idea of Oswald as the lone assassin, it is also filled with lots of wild conspiracy ideas. But Stone presents them beautifully and uses his whole register as a filmmaker. With JFK, Stone raises questions around the concept of "truth" and encourages us to not accept the official version of it so easily. The question isn't if you buy into Garrison's and Stone's version but if you are able to question the official version fed to you by your government and those protecting it.

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Gosford Park - Michael Gambon, Maggie Smith, Helen Mirren, Clive Owen, Kelly MacDonald, Jeremy Northam, Kristin Scott-Thomas, Stephen Fry, Emily Watson, Derek Jacobi, Richard E. Grant, Ryan Philppe...and probably a good few more I don't remember.

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Suspect's Reviews

It's certainly no worse.

I like The Fearless Vampire Killers actually, though it has been years since I've seen it.

Has anyone mentioned Crash or bloody Magnolia yet? Good. Don't.

I can't look beyond Altman for the way he could use a large cast: M*A*S*H, Nashville, The Player, Short Cuts, Gosford Park to name but a few. Heck even Pret-a-Porter was watchable and archly funny in places.

Big Dead Bob was the daddy...

EDIT - Does Nichols' Catch 22 count as an ensemble piece?

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Hmm, as much as I love some of the first movies mentioned, a lot of these never struck me as ensemble films. For me you've gotta get more than like 3 stars for it to even qualify. Also, certain films epitomize the category better for giving each of those stars near equal screen time. That's just my pedestrian definition. When I think of ensemble films I immediately think of Robert Altman, but my favorite ensemble is probably Christopher Guest's comedy troupe from Waiting For Guffman or Best In Show.

I can't believe no one has mentioned the cast of goodfellas. Also casino came close but not quite goodfellas

Hmm, wouldn't say that Goodfellas is that much of an ensemble. Maybe Casino more is a bit more, but definitely not Goodfellas. Just not big enough. Nothing can beat Batman Begins in terms of the size and quality of an ensemble. Nolan really knew what he was doing there.

Prestige, Christopher Nolan called and said you left your panties at his house last night.

Just kidding. But seriously, what's with your Nolan obsession?

Lol, nice one. Nah, I don't' have a Nolan obession, I just think that he is the best director working in films right now. Also, he's still quite young for a director and will have a few more masterpieces, i'm sure. He'll be up there with Stanley Kubrick, honestly. Plus he's from my home town of London

This is my first post here. Two favorite ensemble casts:

12 Angry Men (1957)
Don's Plum (2001) <------ really underrated

Oh, now we get to the heart of it all LOL