Akerman's accolade: 70s cult classic is first work by female director to top BFI's list of greatest films

It was heralded in 1976 as "the first masterpiece of the feminine in the history of cinema" by Le Monde.

- Nadia Khomami

Nearly 50 years later, Chantal Akerman's Jeanne Dielman, 23 Quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles is the first feature by a female film-maker to be named the greatest film of all time by the British Film Institute.

Akerman's 70s classic, which follows the meticulous daily routine of a middle-aged widow over three days - including having sex with male clients for her own and her son's subsistence - topped the BFI's decennial poll this year, pushing Alfred Hitchcock's Vertigo to second place and Orson Welles' Citizen Kane to third.

The Belgian film-maker was 25 when she shot the experimental, groundbreaking film starring Delphine Seyrig in the main role, and it has since become a cult classic -provoking years of analysis and debate.

"Jeanne Dielman challenged the status quo when it was released in 1975 and continues to do so today," said Mike Williams, the editor of the BFI's Sight and Sound magazine, which has conducted the poll every decade since 1952. "It's a landmark feminist film, and its position at the top of the list is emblematic of better representation in the top 100 for women film-makers."