1939 Union Pacific (Cecil B DeMille) – Judged and awarded in a special ceremony in 2002

1946 Portrait of Maria (Emilio Fernández), The Turning Point (Fridrikh Markovitch Ermler), La symphonie pastorale (Jean Delannoy), The Last Chance (Leopold Lintberg), Men Without Wings (František Čáp), Rome, Open City (Roberto Rossellini),Lowly City (Chetan Anand), Torment (Alf Sjöberg), Lost Weekend (Billy Wilder), The Red Earth (Bodil Ipsen and Lau Lauritzen)

1949 The Third Man (Carol Reed)

1951 Miss Julie (Alf Sjöberg), Miracle in Milan (Vittorio De Sica)

1952 Othello (Orson Welles), Two Cents Worth of Hope (Reno Castellani)

1953 The Wages of Fear (Henri-Georges Clouzot)

1954 Gate of Hell (Teinosuke Kinugasa)

1955 Marty (Delbert Mann)

1956 The Silent World (Jacques-Yves Cousteau and Louis Malle)

1957 Friendly Persuasion (William Wyler)

1958 The Cranes are Flying (Mikhail Kalatozov)

1959 Black Orpheus (Marcel Camus)

1960 La dolce vita (Federico Fellini)

1961 The Long Absence (Henri Colpi), Viridiana (Luis Buñel)

1962 Keeper of Promises (Anselmo Duarte)

1963 The Leopard (Luchno Visconti)

1964 The Umbrellas of Cherbourg (Jacques Demy)

1965 The Knack …and How to Get it (Richard Lester)

1966 A Man and a Woman (Claude Lelouch)

1967 Blow-Up (Michelangelo Antonioni)

1969 If… (Lindsay Anderson)

1970 M*A*S*H (Robert Altman)

1971 The Go-Between (Joseph Losey)

1972 The Working Class Goes to Heaven (Elio Petri), Il Caso Mattei (Francesco Rosi)

1973 The Hireling (Alan Bridges), Scarecrow (Jerry Schatzberg)

1974 The Conversation (Francis Ford Coppola)

1975 Chronicle of the Years of Fire (Mohammed Lakhdar-Hamina)

1976 Taxi Driver (Martin Scorsese)

1977 Padre Padrone (Paolo Taviani and Vittorio Taviani)

1978 L’Albero degli Zoccoli (Ermanno Olmi)

1979 Apocalypse Now (Francis Ford Coppola), Die Blechtrommel (Volker Schlöndorff)

1980 All That Jazz (Bob Fosse), Kagemusha (Akira Kurosawa)

1981 Man of Iron (Andrzej Wajda)

1982 Missing (Costa-Gavras), Yol (Yilmaz Güney)

1983 Narayama Bushiko (Shohei Imamura)

1984 Paris, Texas (Wim Wenders)

1985 When father was away on business (Emir Kusturica)

1986 The Mission (Roland Joffé)

1987 Under the Sun of Satan (Maurice Pialet)

1988 Pelle the Conqueror (Bille August)

1989 Sex, lies and videotape (Steven Soderbergh)

1990 Wild at Heart (David Lynch)

1991 Barton Fink (Joel Coen and Ethan Coen)

1992 The Best Intentions (Bille August)

1993 Farewell My Concubine (Chen Kaige), The Piano (Jane Campion)

1994 Pulp Fiction (Quentin Tarantino)

1995 Underground (Emir Kusturica)

1996 Secrets & Lies (Mike Leigh)

1997 Taste of Cherry (Abbas Kiarostami), The Eel (Shohei Imamura)

1998 Eternity and a Day (Theo Angelopoulos)

1999 Rosetta (Luc Dardenne and Jean-Pierre Dardenne)

2000 Dancer in the Dark (Lars von Trier)

2001 The Son’s Room (Nanni Moretti)

2002 The Pianist (Roman Polanski)

2003 Elephant (Gus Van Sant)

2004 Fahrenheit 9/11 (Michael Moore)

2005 The Child (Luc Dardenne and Jean-Pierre Dardenne)

2006 The Wind that Shakes the Barley (Ken Loach)

NOTE: Between 1939 and 1954 and 1964 and 1974, the award was called the Grand Prix du Festival International du Film

Editor's choice

• Dark Knight storms to $155m record
• The Times Proms Podcast: episode one
• The End: the worst movie endings ever