When it comes to movies, the British couldn't give a damn for art, my dear British cinema-goers put sci-fi before arthouse in a titanic poll for star film

THE RESULTS of the biggest ever poll of the public's favourite movies has put Star Wars, Titanic and Gone With the Wind in the top three slots, disappointing the cineastes who announced the winners.

The actor-director Lord Attenborough and the film critic Barry Norman could hardly disguise their disgust when announcing that 160,000 votes from the public had put Grease 30 places ahead of Citizen Kane and Pretty Woman 11 places ahead of Lawrence of Arabia. The voters had found no place for Woody Allen, Charlie Chaplin or Powell and Pressburger films in the top 100, but did include such forgettable fare as Dirty Dancing, Armageddon and The Rock.

Announcing the "Movies of the Millennium" poll, which was commissioned by the satellite channel Sky Movies, Lord Attenborough declared: "I think we both agree, it is a very surprising poll, not so much the top 10, but the top 100 and the ones that didn't make it in. It's incredible, extraordinary, that Titanic should be the number two movie of all time. I'm speechless; there are several hundred films I'd put ahead of it."

Mr Norman declared it was "disgraceful" that Woody Allen had not made it into the top 100 and that there was no Spencer Tracy, no James Cagney and only one foreign language film on the list. He said many of the films were on the list because they were recent releases: "I think there is a generation of cinema-goers who believe movies began with Star Wars."

In all, 54 of the top 100 films were released in the Eighties and Nineties, while films from the Thirties to the Seventies managed just 46 places between them. George Lucas' sci-fi adventure was number one by a long margin, attracting 35 per cent of the total votes.

The voting for the poll was not restricted to Sky viewers - voting forms were available in video retailers and cinemas.

Celebrities were also allowed to vote. Lord Attenborough said he would have voted for Charlie Chaplin's The Gold Rush and the Marlon Brando classic On The Waterfront. Woody Allen departed as far from the British public's taste as possible by voting for Jean Renoir's 1937 masterpiece, Grand Illusion.

William Hague voted for The Full Monty, the story of what Tory economic policies did to Sheffield steel workers, Brief Encounter and Close Encounters of the Third Kind. Sports minister Tony Banks showed his eclecticism by voting for Sergei Eisenstein's Ivan the Terrible and the computer-animated children's film Toy Story.

Stephen Spielberg was the most successful director, with seven of his films in the top 100.

There were also regional variations in the poll: in Scotland Braveheart made it to number four, compared to polling at 14 across the country as a whole.

t Creditors of the collapsed Barings Bank hoping to snatch Nick Leeson's share of the profits from the film of his story, Rogue Trader, are likely to be disappointed. The film has taken less than pounds 1m at the box office and is likely to be pulled from screens this week.

The film, whose executive producer was Sir David Frost, cost more than pounds 8m to make having been shot on location in Singapore, Malaysia and Indonesia. It also starred two of Britain's hottest stars, Ewan McGregor, who played Leeson, and Anna Friel, who played his then wife, Lisa.

Liquidators working on behalf of the numerous creditors who lost out in the bank's pounds 850m collapse in 1995 have already obtained a court order freezing any royalties Leeson makes from the film.

However a spokesman for Granada Films, which made the film, told Sunday Business newspaper: "If Nick Leeson makes any money from this film it will be peanuts."

The Celebrity Selections

KENNETH BRANAGH

Brief Encounter (1945), Manhattan (1979), Black Narcissus (1947)

Branagh picks two films with stunning looks and two with great dialogue. Woody Allen's love affair with New York is the one with both. It is the acting that makes Brief Encounter shine. Trevor Howard is probably the English character actor Branagh would like to be; Black Narcissus is the film he'd like to have directed.

RALPH FIENNES

Andrei Rublev (1966), Colonel Redl (1984), High Noon (1952)

Quite the most pretentious list of favourites you are likely to find. Andrei Tarkovsky's Soviet-era Andrei Rublev tells the story of a 15th- century icon painter in a pithy three-and-a-half hours. Colonel Redl, Istvan Szabo's Hungarian follow-up to Mephisto, needs repeated viewing. Fiennes rescues his reputation by also choosing the definitive Western.

JANE HORROCKS

Some Like it Hot (1959), The English Patient (1996), Grease (1978)

The choice of Grease indicates that Bubbles from Ab Fab may have more in common with Horrocks than previously thought. It is easier to believe Tony Curtis and Jack Lemmon are women in the brilliantly funny Some Like it Hot than that John Travolta and Olivia Newton John are teenagers in Grease. The English Patient is already a classic.

CERYS MATHEWS

Fanny & Elvis (1999), The Sound of Music (1965), The Wizard of Oz (1939)

The Catatonia singer chooses a film released only this year and one that never should have been released. Fanny & Elvis is another forgettable British romantic comedy. No one ever quite forgets seeing The Sound of Music, with its bad songs and stagy direction. The Wizard, however, reveals Mathews' loveable side.

SIR IAN MCKELLEN

Monsieur Hulot's Holiday (1953), Les Diaboliques (1954), Gods and Monsters (1998)

The first and lightest of Jacques Tati's Hulot trilogy, M.Hulot's Holiday was a sweet comedy made great by tricks with sounds and camera angles. Les Diaboliques is a classic, and scary, thriller but Sir Ian blows his whole list by choosing his own most recent film. Modesty should come before publicity.

The Top 10

1. Star Wars (1977)

2. Titanic (1998)

3. Gone with the Wind (1939)

4. Casablanca (1942)

5. It's a Wonderful Life (1946)

6. The Godfather (1972)

7. The Sound of Music (1965)

8. Blade Runner (1982)

9. Schindler's List (1993)

10. The Full Monty (1997)