I collected over 20 lists of “Best Movies of 2008” and combined them into one big meta-list.  The numbers in bold indicate how many of the original lists the movie was on.  An asterisk means I’ve seen it.

19
WALL-E – Andrew Stanton*

15
Milk – Gus Van Sant*

12
The Dark Knight – Christopher Nolan
Rachel Getting Married – Jonathan Demme*

10
Synecdoche, New York – Charlie Kaufman

9
The Wrestler – Darren Aronofsky

8
Happy-Go-Lucky – Mike Leigh*
Man On Wire – James Marsh*
Slumdog Millionaire – Danny Boyle*
Wendy and Lucy – Kelly Reichardt*

6
Doubt – John Patrick Shanley*
Encounters at the End of the World – Werner Herzog*
4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days – Cristian Mungiu*
Frost/Nixon – Ron Howard
Iron Man – Jon Favreau
My Winnipeg – Guy Maddin

5
A Christmas Tale – Arnaud Desplechin
The Edge of Heaven – Fatih Akin*
Revolutionary Road – Sam Mendes
Silent Light – Carlos Reygadas
Vicky Cristina Barcelona – Woody Allen*
Waltz with Bashir – Ari Folman*

4
Che – Steven Soderbergh
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button – David Fincher
Frozen River – Courtney Hunt*
Paranoid Park – Gus Van Sant
Snow Angels – David Gordon Green
The Visitor – Thomas McCarthy

3
Ballast – Lance Hammer
Burn After Reading – Joel & Ethan Coen
The Fall – Tarsem Singh
Flight of the Red Balloon – Hsiao-hsien Hou*
In Bruges – Martin McDonagh
I’ve Loved You So Long – Philippe Claudel
Let The Right One In – Tomas Alfredson*
The Reader – Stephen Daldry*
Reprise – Joachim Trier
Standard Operating Procedure – Errol Morris*
Tropic Thunder – Ben Stiller
Trouble The Water – Carl Deal & Tia Lessin

2
The Bank Job – Roger Donaldson
Chop Shop – Ramin Bahrani
The Class – Laurent Cantet
Forgetting Sarah Marshall – Nicholas Stoller*
Funny Games – Michael Haneke
Pineapple Express – David Gordon Green
Quantum of Solace – Marc Forster
Seven Pounds – Gabriele Muccino
Shotgun Stories – Jeff Nichols
Still Life – Zhangke Jia
Stuck – Stuart Gordon
Surfwise – Doug Pray*
Tell No One – Guillaume Canet*
W. – Oliver Stone