Maybe they made them an offer they couldn't refuse. Or maybe the British public just like their actors tough. Either way the tough guys came out on top last night as Al Pacino was voted the greatest movie star of all time.

He was joined at the top of the poll by Robert De Niro, his co-lead in The Godfather, Part II, who was in second place.

In the poll conducted by Channel 4 to establish the greatest 100 film stars, Pacino, 63, emerged as the actor considered the best ever.

After the mobsters came the light relief. Third placed was Tom Hanks.

The poll, in which 25,000 people took part, shows the grip that American actors and Hollywood have on the affections of British filmgoers.

Sir Anthony Hopkins is the best placed British actor, but he was only able to achieve seventh place. Sean Connery and Ewan McGregor followed in eighth and ninth.

The list of candidates was compiled and edited by a panel of film critics and film-makers, with voting taking place on the Channel 4 website and by text over a six-week period. The countdown was screened in two parts, on Sunday and last night.

Certainly, the list shows that tough guys appear to have a special place in our hearts. Also in the top 20 were Samuel L Jackson, Mel Gibson and Clint Eastwood.

By contrast, the public's appreciation of female actors seems lukewarm. Less than a quarter of those in the top 100 are women.

The best placed woman was Audrey Hepburn, still feted for films such as Breakfast at Tiffany's. She was ranked 13th. Sigourney Weaver, best known for the Alien sci-fi series, is next best but is ranked at 20. Oscar winner Halle Berry was 99th. Catherine Zeta-Jones, who won an Oscar for her role in the musical Chicago, was unplaced but her husband, Michael Douglas, came in at 100.

Nicole Kidman came out the best from her separation from Tom Cruise. She was number 21, compared to Cruise's 32.

Cary Grant, the urbane star of North By Northwest records the highest posthumous entry by achieving number 10 in the list.

The highest charting non-Oscar winner, at number five, is Harrison Ford, a favourite with audiences for his performances as Han Solo in three Star Wars movies. Ford is also popular for his roles as the archaeologist Indiana Jones.

Producer John Piper said: "The list reveals a few surprises. The final top five demonstrates that there are now modern greats who are recognised up there alongside those classic movie stars."

Pacino was twice nominated for an Oscar for his performances in the Godfather films. For all the plaudits, he has won just one Academy Award, for his role as a blind army colonel in the 1992 film The Scent Of A Woman.

Pacino made his film debut with a minor role in the 1969 flop Me, Natalie, a tale of a young girl's adventures in New York's Greenwich Village. He returned to the screen in 1971 in Panic in Needle Park, in which he played a junkie. While the film was not a success, he earned rave reviews.

His next film was Francis Ford Coppola's epic The Godfather in 1972 where he played Michael Corleone, the son of a mafia boss reluctantly thrust into the family business.

1 Al Pacino

2 Robert De Niro

3 Tom Hanks

4 Kevin Spacey

5 Harrison Ford

6 Jack Nicholson

7 Anthony Hopkins

8 Sean Connery

9 Ewan McGregor

10 Cary Grant

11 Samuel L Jackson

12 James Stewart

13 Audrey Hepburn

14 Steve McQueen

15 Brad Pitt

16 Paul Newman

17 Mel Gibson

18 Clint Eastwood

19 Robin Williams

20 Sigourney Weaver

21 Nicole Kidman

22 Johnny Depp

23 Jodie Foster

24 Dustin Hoffman

25 Susan Sarandon

26 Russell Crowe

27 Morgan Freeman

28 Denzel Washington

29 Julia Roberts

30 Marlon Brando

31 Christopher Lee

32 Tom Cruise

33 Nicolas Cage

34 Christopher Walken

35 Bruce Willis

36 Humphrey Bogart

37 Cate Blanchett

38 Katharine Hepburn

39 Marilyn Monroe

40 Gary Oldman

41 Jackie Chan

42 Gene Hackman

43 Jack Lemmon

44 Michael Caine

45 Bette Davis

46 John Travolta

47 Jim Carrey

48 John Cusack

49 Bruce Lee

50 Charlie Chaplin

51 Will Smith

52 Sidney Poitier

53 Harvey Keitel

54 Arnold Schwarzengger

55 Kate Winslet

56 John Wayne

57 Peter Sellers

58 Meryl Streep

59 John Malkovich

60 Jude Law

61 Robert Redford

62 Robert Downey Jr

63 Clark Gable

64 James Dean

65 Cameron Diaz

66 Gene Kelly

67 Eddie Murphy

68 Ingrid Bergman

69 River Phoenix

70 Richard Burton

71 Woody Allen

72 George Clooney

73 Hugh Grant

74 Angelina Jolie

75 Meg Ryan

76 Richard Gere

77 Elizabeth Taylor

78 Oliver Reed

79 Vivien Leigh

80 Dennis Hopper

81 Fred Astaire

82 Judy Garland

83 Ralph Fiennes

84 Doris Day

85 Daniel Day Lewis

86 Grace Kelly

87 Winona Ryder

88 Juliette Binoche

89 Gwyneth Paltrow

90 Gerard Depardieu

91 Julie Christie

92 Amitabh Bachchan

93 Kevin Costner

94 Leonardo DiCaprio

95 Uma Thurman

96 Wesley Snipes

97 Burt Reynolds

98 Jane Fonda

99 Halle Berry

100 Michael Douglas