By taking away the spectacle of violence, Glazer’s film shows another side of one of history’s greatest atrocities. The scale of the human catastrophe sets in not because it’s represented, but because the characters don’t seem to notice it at all.

Spencer is an act of psychological horror, a kind of ghost story, and a survivalist picture carried by an uncannily immersive Kristen Stewart, in the best performance of her career.

The Power of the Dog doesn’t just mark Campion’s return — it’s the best movie of 2021 so far. This psychological Western’s themes of isolation and toxic masculinity are an ever-tightening lasso of seemingly innocuous events, and they import more horror and meaning on every closer inspection, corralling viewers under an unforgettable spell.

The journey Zhao has crafted is marvelous, exploring literal peaks and valleys as well as emotional ones.

American Utopia will last past the current moment, past the pandemic, but in the cultural context of its upcoming release, it feels both like an electric current and a balm.

If only every film could achieve the sublime tenderness of First Cow.

How to Blow Up a Pipeline is the rare movie that effectively weaponizes a radical political message by marrying it to conventional genre storytelling. It feels like a game-changer: the kind of movie that will inspire artists and budding activists alike for generations to come.

Because the romance takes a back seat in favor of the main character’s growth, with the primary climax focused inward, Suzume ends up with a particularly unique and beautiful romantic arc.

Every aspect of Wolfwalkers is thoughtfully, beautifully rendered, and the story is full of twists that keep things unpredictable until the finale. It’s one of the most impressive films of the year, and the best animated film of 2020 thus far.

It’s enjoyable on the surface level, but it’s also a layered existential poem. It’s Wes Anderson at his most mature and magical — and at his most singular, in a way no one else can capture — especially not AI.

Dick Johnson Is Dead is the best reminder possible to cherish your loved ones while they’re still living — to take that extra photo or video as something to hang onto once they’re gone.

Lowery more than catches an attentive audience’s attention with this film. His dazzling visuals, brilliant spectacle, and petrifying sequences are enrapturing. Likewise, Patel finally lays claim to the leading-man mantle so often bequeathed to him, yet so rarely earned.

Vinterberg’s ending offers an unlikely sense of catharsis, even though it isn’t truly happy, turning the film into something fresh and affecting. On top of all that, the film provides the opportunity to watch Mikkelsen give perhaps his best performance yet.

In spite of the heavy odds stacked against it, 28 Years Later: The Bone Temple is one of those perfect middle entry movies: It elevates what came before and throws down the gauntlet for whatever might follow.

It’s a movie that commands attention, with everything going on across the screen and in the script. The action plot augments the family conflict and vice versa, with every moment of the story pushing those plots forward. It’s an utter delight from start to finish that brings the best of animation and the internet to life.

It’s an agitprop romance, one of the most effective mass media diagnoses of the current moment that finds countless things to be angry about, and proposes fighting them all with radical, reckless love. On top of all that, it is also a kick-ass work of sci-fi action — propulsive, gorgeous, and yet still intimate — that revisits the familiar to show audiences something very new.

With all these elements working in dreadful harmony, Kurosawa has made far and away one of the best horror movies of the year so far, and he sets a more complete and frightening tone in less than half the run time of most of those movies.

The pall of death automatically makes The Trip to Greece a more somber affair than its predecessors, but doesn’t make it devoid of fun.

The new comedy Barb & Star Go to Vista Del Mar cashes in all the mainstream cred accrued by writer-actors Kristin Wiig and Annie Mumolo after the phenomenon of Bridesmaids, then puts it toward the greatest use of all: silly, bizarre, ecstatic jokes.

Everything Everywhere’s multiverse is a remarkably flexible metaphor. It’s equally suitable for expressing some common frustrations the audience may relate to, about botched choices and wasted opportunity. But it’s just as suited for setting up a series of ridiculously kickass action sequences where literally anything is possible, because the characters aren’t bound by reality or causality.

Encanto is a masterpiece that makes the Disney musical-with-a-splash-of-magic formula soar.

What makes Little Women particularly refreshing is that Gerwig treats the four March sisters as equals, rather than as right or wrong for wanting different things.

Challengers is a sharp and snappy movie, full of big emotions expressed through fast-paced dialogue in some scenes and through silent, sensual physicality in others, all shot with creative verve and aggressively in-your-face energy. Everyone in this movie is chasing sex and success, and conflating those things with each other in unashamedly provocative ways.

Candace Against the Universe does everything Phineas and Ferb does and then some. It’s a natural evolution of the show for Disney Plus, relishing in the series’ perfectly timed humor, updating reference points for the fun of it, and adding an emotional layer that resonates

With a bright visual style and specific, evocative storytelling, Turning Red is an incredibly special addition to the Pixar canon, and one of its best films.

It’s the single funniest movie of 2024, delivering punchline after punchline through its acute understanding of slapstick comedy and cinematic language. It’s the kind of singular cinematic experience destined to be a midnight cult hit.

A brutal and bleak movie, Hell Hath No Fury delivers a mean, hard-hitting punch in a 90-minute package. Ultimately, there are no heroes in this story, only survivors.

Baumbach takes the time to make room for their opposing viewpoints and experiences, and he creates a richer film for it. Marriage Story is beautifully bittersweet. There are no winners or losers in Charlie and Nicole’s separation, and no heroes or villains, either.

The final shot of Céline Sciamma’s Portrait of a Lady on Fire is overwhelming. It’s a culmination of the two hours that have preceded it, but it’s more than just the end of a movie. It’s an entire life cycle of a love affair.

Green’s approach to stories — finding larger truths rather than focusing on the most sensational aspects — vaults The Assistant into extraordinary territory, as it sheds light not only on the actions of abusers in power, but on the people around them, who can’t or won’t do anything to change the status quo.

It’s familiar, without being cliche or tied to any existing media. At the same time, it’s innovative, in a way that celebrates its familiar genre tropes, instead of snarking at them.

This Emma fully earns its titular period, as well as an early place on any list of 2020’s most enchanting films.

Night of the Kings occasionally strays too far into fantasy (and CGI), even though the more grounded scenes are what truly make the film sing. Still, it’s a stunning work. Lacôte’s tribute to the power of stories is a powerful story in and of itself, celebrating oral traditions and the rituals we create for ourselves in order to make life just a little more bearable.

Dune: Part Two is exactly the movie Part One promised it could be, the rare sequel that not only outdoes its predecessor, but improves it in retrospect… One of the best blockbusters of the century so far.

The clarity and care with which Hittman handles a relatively straightforward story lends Never Rarely Sometimes Always an urgency greater than it would have if she tried to moralize about making proper care more easily accessible to (and less stigmatized for) women.

Even as Howard screws himself over with blustery bravado, it’s hard not to root for him. It’s a testament to Sandler’s performance, categorically the best of his career, but also to the Safdies’ skill behind the camera.

Petite Maman is the work of an unusually sensitive filmmaker, and it speaks to Sciamma’s skill as a director that she’s able to express the nuances of this complicated dynamic through such simple actions and words.

Camera movements in perfect concert with the action plus fluid, grounded choreography performed by a former national champion kickboxer combine for a mesmerizing experience that easily would have been the best action movie of 2023 if it had come out just a week earlier.

Shelby and Miles’ story is compelling, but Mangold digs deeper to find the motor that propels Ford v Ferrari across the finish line.

By inhabiting the worst periods of his life, LaBeouf delivers one of the best performances of the year.

Diop’s film isn’t brash or loud, but it’s still stunning, capturing the migrant story and its effects in a new light.

Soul feels like the best Pixar movies used to feel — deeply humanistic, with both silly, kid-friendly humor and a sincere solemnity that feels entirely adult. Docter and Powers weaponize all of this in a story that literally and directly questions the meaning of life.

The second Enola Holmes movie is the rare sequel that improves on the first. The first had its strengths, most notably Brown’s magnificent acting, but director Harry Bradbeer and screenwriter Jack Thorne seem more certain of the theme and the characters this time around.

I’m Your Man offers a perspective on humanity that’s equally whimsical and melancholy, and its intimacy is a welcome change of pace in science fiction, a genre that too often mistakes violence and colonialism as the only drivers of drama.

The entire 104-minute show is performed in a single “room,” so it comes down to the sheer strength of Schreck’s writing and performance to hold an audience’s attention. Schreck more than pulls it off.

It’s a heartwarming, surprisingly poignant, movie that also makes its point by putting a variety of animals into natty human clothes.

Bayona’s approach to the “triumph of the human spirit” arc — often a broad, four-quadrant, feel-good cinematic flattening of real events — is both scrutinous and rigorous. It turns the concept inside out, presenting the ordeal of 571’s survivors as a murky scenario that we’ve been granted secret, intimate access to.

The craft Miller brought to Fury Road’s relentless chases is now channeled into wondrous stillness, a canvas meant to capture the sheer yearning at the heart of a story. The desire to be known by and know others more fully. One could call that love.

It’s a psychedelic, bombastic rock opera, but amid all the energy, Yuasa ponders what stories have been lost as society’s more controlling elements attempt to control how art is made and distributed.

Finding self-identity through the guidance of her ancestors, Beyoncé lays bare that celebrating Blackness isn’t just an appreciation of the past. Black Is King is a reclamation of our thriving future.

The explosive fury of Bacurau’s slow-burn climax is a gratifying payoff to the film’s suspense, but without the deliberate measures taken to make the rest of the story count, it’d ring hollow.

Sleep feels like a major debut by a filmmaker who is ready to defy conventions and entertain audiences. It belongs alongside those great Korean horror films, even while standing apart.

It’s a sharp, exciting movie — one that finally gives YA dystopias the ending that the genre trend deserves.

In spite of its heavy subject matter, it’s also one of the most electrifying and downright fun historical dramas to come out of Hollywood in years.

It’s a hell of an achievement, and the rare case where a remake feels like an act of fervent fandom.

It’s very difficult to walk away from You Won’t Be Alone without wanting to fill a notebook with its words and recollections of its images. It’s a film of wonder, of watching, mimicking, and soaking in awe.

The film’s experimental nature makes it tougher to swallow than a conventional biopic, but also more interesting and rewarding to engage with. Great performances help keep the whole enterprise anchored — Hawke and MacLachlan are wonderful as men caught in conflict with each other — and the anachronisms provide food for thought long after the film has ended.

The maze Kaufman is leading us through is a mystery, as he never pulls back far enough to show us the whole thing. But as itchy and claustrophobic as the paths are, they ultimately lead to a sense of hope.

Not only is it a fun fantasy movie, it’s a great adaptation of a gaming session. And it’s an invitation into a new and more visual version of a world dedicated players already love — and that the filmmakers seem to love, too.

Rather than copying the core premise of the short story, Bonello’s French- and English-language adaptation uses James’ dense, descriptive prose to weave detailed textures and sensations in each of his timelines.

Not only do Wright and Dinklage fashion an unrequited anguish worth crying over, again and again. Cyrano is the best movie musical of the last decade.

Director David Dobkin doesn’t land every single beat, but he taps into that well of carefree exultation so potently that the movie’s stumbles hardly register.

It’s a short film, but its portrayal of inspiration, self-evident in both its artistry and homage, is simply enormous.

An existential mystery-thriller that vacillates between the farcical and the macabre, Taylor’s film isn’t just a rumination on the legacy of gentrification and the exploitation of minorities, but a poignant and darkly funny meditation on the power of one’s own choices and the necessity of cooperation in the face of oppression.

One of the many things that makes Boys State entertaining as well as relevant is the way Moss and McBaine capture these kids’ different facets, and track how their combined ambition and naïveté play into the big picture.

By focusing on specific individuals and the shared starting ground of Camp Jened, the filmmakers find a concrete thread to follow rather than getting lost in how much history there is to cover. More importantly, they bring a personal, empathetic touch to the story that makes it feel immediate, relatable, and like a call to further action.

In spite of its compactness and intimate focus, Oldroyd maintains enough ironic distance that the audience is never fully immersed in Eileen’s subjective viewpoint. In the way he lingers on details and nervous fidgets, the director invites the audience to speculate about what’s really going on with Eileen.

It’s a laugh riot, with the potential to go down as one of the decade’s smartest and funniest comedies.

The Fabelmans is Spielberg exercising his vast filmmaking knowledge to compose a story where his entire heart is stapled across the screen. It’s beautiful, evocative, enthralling blockbuster filmmaking, perfectly tuned to remind viewers of the power that can reside within a movie.

It’s a movie designed for people who like their future-fiction thoughtful and relevant, and for people who enjoy the runaway-train feeling of having no idea where a given story could possibly go next.

Barbie the doll has to be everything for everyone, and she’s never succeeded. Barbie the movie has been asked to perform the same impossible trick — and just like I still feel a sentimental attachment to Barbie, I feel an overwhelming fondness and admiration for the movie’s daring attempt to make it work.

Godzilla Minus One is the throwback movie that longtime Godzilla fans have been waiting for.

This is how In the Heights won me over. Because in spite of its flaws — like lopsided twin romantic subplots where the lead characters are overshadowed by their best friends, or cloying lyrics that play on both the literal and figurative meanings of “powerless” — it’s ultimately a work of affection for both its subject and its medium.

Phantom in the Rain lives up to the bar set by the original anime series, with a toothy, spooky mystery featuring a suave protagonist, visuals so lush they sometimes border on overwhelming, and the skillful blending of cutting-edge and traditional animation to great effect.

If this movie is well and truly a wrap for The Venture Bros., though, Radiant Is the Blood of the Baboon Heart could not be any more worthy or fitting of a farewell to one the greatest animated comedies to air on television.

It starts as a crime caper, makes a pit stop among the sitdowns and power-jockeying of gangster films, and somehow manages to tie its many disparate threads together in a period drama about the destruction of an American city. It’s all the more dazzling that it does all this while being slickly entertaining and assured

Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba the Movie: Mugen Train is a brilliant encapsulation of the series’ strengths and appeal, filled with moments of pulse-pounding action, heady emotional gravitas, and fantastic character-affirming moments of levity and humor.

We’re All Going to the World’s Fair isn’t just a movie about connecting, it’s about becoming. It’s a powerful acknowledgement of how confounding and frightening young adulthood can be. But it’s also a film about hope.

It’s difficult to believe The Lost Daughter is Gyllenhaal’s feature directorial debut. The rhythms of the narrative, the assured visual language, the precise performances she pulls from each actor moves with the confidence of a veteran filmmaker.

The film is an excellent feature-length Hilda episode, but the 84-minute runtime also allows it to raise the stakes of the low-key series appropriately, tackling some of the enduring mysteries at the core of Trolberg.

The film’s fantasy elements look absolutely beautiful, and they naturally include shots of the classic impossibly delicious-looking Ghibli food. But they come with a kind of wistfulness for days gone by, paired with a full, unsentimental realization that there’s no getting them back. Which all feels like a director taking one last look at his career before bowing out. How Do You Live? has all the makings of a perfect swan song.

By probing at the ways people are on their best behavior while inherently personifying the worst effects of capitalism and greed, and knowing when to abandon modesty for brutality, Jones and Williams turn The Feast into one of the year’s most smartly conceived, plainly effective horrors.

Perkins has made a film that’s both more horrifically violent than his contemporaries’ projects and also unapologetically funny.

Director Jon M. Chu blows away all expectations and deftly avoids the movie adaptation pitfalls that could’ve worked against Wicked. The movie celebrates its musical-ness, instead of begrudgingly accepting it. It’s nothing short of wonderful.

While the procedural story takes up a fair bit of screen time, the emotional story is the center of the film, and the one that’s likely to stick with audiences longest and most clearly. As a story, it lacks the verve and dynamism of his early action films. As a portrait of obsession and regret, it’s remarkably sophisticated and satisfying.

Most musicals translate emotion into song. This one takes that a step further, translating emotion into a daring central gimmick. It’s experimental and explosive.

With this project, Rugna breaks plenty of horror rules and literally writes his own, turning his film into 2023’s most unnerving horror release — and a welcome revival for a subgenre that seemed like it was on its last spindly, clawed, wall-climbing legs.

Fire and Ash bursts with genre details and imaginative flourishes, in a way that has me worried Cameron might be cramming in every idea as he goes out in a blaze of glory (despite promises of Avatar 4 and 5).

Inside Out 2 is full of passion and empathy, letting the audience in on Riley’s inner struggle without always painting her as the hero, even in her own story.

DC League of Super-Pets isn’t groundbreaking, but it’s a perfect way for DC Comics fans to introduce their kids to their favorite characters and their adorable and surprisingly competent sidekicks.

Street Gang certainly doesn’t tell the whole story of Sesame Street’s early years — it can’t begin to. But it’s an absorbing, nostalgia-courting start, and for people with fond memories of the show, it’s an unbeatable chance to approach it as an adult, and understand their own childhoods a little better in the process.

Roth and Scorsese carefully seed Killers of the Flower Moon’s script with context, texture, and detail, even when they’re avoiding exposition and making sure every scene has a dramatic point. It’s an incredibly lived-in movie.

Day Shift’s peculiar blend of action, comedy, and horror doesn’t feel like a choice made with the intention of bringing in the widest possible audience. This film’s mixing of cinematic flavors harkens back to a time when big releases could have highly specific, off-kilter vibes, most likely aimed at a niche audience.

At a time when horror can feel like a studio executive’s dumping ground for cheap work and attempts at genre-bending may make less business sense, it’s a thrill to see a director like Kostanski go for broke on an absurd pitch and take the execution as seriously as Ridley Scott would on a historical epic.

Any insta-doc could have found folks who profited from the short squeeze, and shown the material goods or comfortable lifestyle their profiteering bought. Rise of the Players instead puts viewers in the investors’ seat at the poker table, making real their tension, self-doubt, and anxiety over holding onto a stock the experienced players say is worthless.

Whatever its intentions, Annette is remarkable. It’s an exhilarating collision of cinema, live concerts, stage shows, and celebrity culture, shaken up and let loose with abandon. Its message might be lost, but the emotions still hit hard, particularly in a finale that strips away the flash and artifice to concentrate on something pure, painful, and unforgettable.

On-Gaku: Our Sound is a story of musicians who can’t play music, but still find gratification in the act of creating. It’s a deadpan buddy comedy about amateur passion, produced through the raw power of an animator’s amateur passion.

It’s about perseverance and the power of working together toward a common goal. Those themes are universally relatable — as is the giddy thrill of watching racist forces of imperial oppression get exactly what’s coming to them.