Star Wars Gets Beaten By Wizard Of Oz As The Most Influential Film Of All Time

The news might come as a bit of a shock to many, but it turns out that Star Wars isn't the most influential film in Hollywood history. Instead, the honor goes to Judy Garland's 1939 film, Wizard of Oz.

According to a new report by Telegraph, University of Turin researchers have just recently developed a computer programme that measures the success of a film outside the usual standards that they're measured by. Instead of using box office earnings, positive film reviews and accolades as the basis for its measure of success, the algorithm creates its list based on how many times a film is referenced in other movies and how many spin-offs it's created.

Now, after assessing more than 47, 000 films, these researchers obtained some pretty surprising results. The classic 1939 movie The Wizard of Oz managed to top the list, beating Star Wars: Episode IV – A New Hope and Psycho by Alfred Hitchcock.

"The success of a film is usually measured through its box office revenue or through the opinion of professional critics; such measures, however, may be influenced by external factors, such as advertisements or trends, and are not able to capture the impact of a film over time," said the researchers.

According to the team, "the best movies are simply the ones that sell more, like any other product."

The top ten films according to the program's algorithm are as follows:

1. The Wizard Of Oz (1939)

2. Star Wars (1977)

3. Psycho (1960)

4. King Kong (1933)

5. 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)

6. Metropolis (1972)

7. Citizen Kane (1941)

8. The Birth of A Nation (1915)

9. Frankenstein (1931)

10. Snow White And The Seven Dwarfs (1937

While this new study might tick off avid Star Wars fans, readers ought to remember the basis of the list – the references and spinoffs that's been produced after it. Sure, Star Wars might be a pretty definitive science fiction movie, but The Wizard of Oz is a classic which has been remade more than a dozen times in various forms. Besides, second place isn't that bad, is it?

Star Wars: Episode IX hits cinemas December 20, 2019.

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