The Best Films of 2024
The films that broke the form
Who controls the narrative?
Filmmaking today is defined as much by what we see as what we don’t see - the films that are quashed in boardrooms for not fitting a proven formula. Some examples from the recent past…
The film Union, about a labor union formed at an Amazon warehouse in Staten Island, premiered at Sundance earlier this year and still doesn’t have distribution. No streamer or studio has shown an interest in releasing it.
Clint Eastwood’s Juror #2, perhaps the legendary 94-year-old’s final film, was recently released in less than 50 theaters nationwide - effectively buried by Warner Bros despite the star’s legacy with his home studio. Meanwhile, Bong Joon-ho’s Mickey 17 continues to ping-pong around WB’s release calendar.
Netflix has scrapped projects by Nancy Meyers and David Lynch before they entered production in recent years, and WB scrapped Batgirl and Coyote vs. Acme in post-production.
Two films by Academy Award winning directors - Kevin Costner’s Horizon: An American Saga and Francis Ford Coppola’s Megalopolis - wouldn’t have seen the light of day unless they were self-funded.
Aversion to risk is nothing new in Hollywood, but films during the era of the Hayes Code didn’t have to compete with social media - which has become both more uncensored and (thanks to advanced algorithms) addictive. The stated intention to avoid controversy in post-strikes Hollywood leads not only to more lackluster product, but will also continue to push audiences and creators away to other more open forums for expression.
There’s no question that the refusal to let in new artistic voices has contributed to the decline of film as a medium in the popular consciousness. Even with shorter attention spans and second screens, audiences deserve more - or at least a world in which characters don’t announce their every onscreen action in case the viewer wasn’t paying attention. And with a year of bigger mergers and acquisitions in store for 2025, those waiting for a the ‘70s-style destruction of the current model (of big-budget sequels and algorithm-driven background noise) are still waiting…
The films I’ve selected this year as my “Best of” list feel like escapees in an increasingly homogenized film landscape. It’s a list of studio rejects, achievements by auteurs, and those precious new voices. It was a year that proved there always be artists innovating within the frame - their work just needs the proper sunlight.
Here are my top ten films for the year 2024…
1. NICKEL BOYS
Whenever a filmmaker radically experiments with form, there will always be a critic ready to accuse them of gimmickry. The 12 years-long shoot of Boyhood, the “unbroken” shots of Birdman and 1917 - these are examples of formal leaps that were taken in bad faith by many. I understand the impulse to see such techniques as bells and whistles distracting from storytelling…
Then again, when a filmmaker finds the perfect delivery device for their narrative, it’s exhilarating.
The central device of Nickel Boys is a unique act of transposition - adapting the text of the Colson Whitehead novel to film language. Rather than being a cheap trick, RaMell Ross’s decision to shoot the film entirely in first-person perspective allows the story’s themes to reverberate.
Nickel Boys begins as the story of Elwood Curtis - a Black teenager growing up in 1960s Florida. Ross’s device allows his camera to absorb the texture of the Jim Crow South through Elwood’s eyes - the everyday details, such as a slipping fridge magnet or a character’s reflection in a shop window. Media that Ellwood consumes - like the Sidney Poitier film The Defiant Ones - get the fullscreen approach as he replays moments in his head. The confined perspective references avant garde cinema - experimental filmmakers James Benning, Stan Brakhage - as well as Ross’s fly-on-the-wall documentary roots.
Due to a misunderstanding, Elwood is sent to an infamous reform school - Nickel Academy. It’s there he meets Turner, a fellow student and orphan. This is when Ross deliberately frustrates his own rules. By switching from Elwood’s perspective to Turner’s, Ross begins a game of tag between his two protagonists. The characters of Elwood and Turner are doubles (their true connection becoming clear as the movie progresses) - yet we rarely see them in the same frame. We only see glimpses of Elwood through Turner’s eyes, and vice versa. These two are intrinsically linked by Ross’s device - a fact that is crucial in setting up the film’s final twist (which will go unspoiled here).
Detractors will say that Ross’s unique way of shooting minimizes the actors in the frame. However, I was struck by how much of the film’s emotional power is owed to this one choice. There is a bond that the audience forms with these characters by sharing their perspective - we feel the outside forces shaping their lives, and understand their choices. Ross is also selective about the moments we see - for instance, we don’t witness the beatings at Nickel Academy, or the “sweat box.” Cutting away from these linchpin events underscores their impact - and shifts the focus to what becomes an unsettling normalcy at the abusive school.
A more straightforward adaptation of Whitehead’s novel may have been just as successful in conveying the film’s basic narrative. However, Ross’s courage to break the form allows for a greater depth of feeling, one that only the film language can capture. The fact that Ross was entrusted to take such risks with Whitehead’s material speaks to the magic that can occur in adaptations across mediums.
2. CHALLENGERS
Challengers bottled adrenaline better than any film this year - capturing the the feeling of leaning forward in your chair in the theater, fingertips hovering over your seat rests. As with all Luca Gudagnino films, this story set in the tennis world deals in desire. However, after films where the tone and color palette skewed more dour (Suspiria, Bones and All), Challengers is Luca’s “pop” album - his sexy, unabashed movie star vehicle.
Zendaya is Tashi Duncan, a driven tennis prodigy who forms a decades-long love triangle with fellow tennis champions and best friends Art and Patrick. The film focuses exclusively on the trio and their shifting dynamics as love and rivalry become blurred (as do the lines of friendship between Art and Patrick).
Despite having the trappings of a sports film, Challengers is an old-fashioned relationship drama shot through with tension. Every conversation is performed to the period with zest and swagger, as Zendaya, Faist, and O’Connor take full bites out of their dialogue (Luca and writer Justin Kuritzkes also teamed on the Daniel Craig-starring Queer later in the year). By giving them such a runway, Luca proves that these three actors will be on movie screens for a long, long time.
Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross’s nonstop electronic score is as essential to the vibe as Luca’s free-moving camera (which he lobs around the tennis court with abandon). A film with energy this high can dissipate after the credits roll, but Challengers is every bit as memorable as your greatest night out.
3. THE SUBSTANCE
Since the release of The Substance this fall, it has been revealed that Universal dropped the movie from its slate due to its riotously unhinged ending, enabling its pickup by MUBI. Thank goodness - because if there’s a version of The Substance that didn’t scare off test audiences, I don’t want to see it.
Director Coralie Fargeat’s vision is uncompromising, and her control of the frame is absolute.
Fargeat imprints her stamp on every frame in a way that historically mostly male directors have been afforded (an equivalent would be Wes Anderson’s museum piece shots). The camera placement, the score, and the performances are all deliberately managed to craft a sense of unease. It is a film of tightly manicured surfaces - of skin and spandex - that are stretched until they erupt in blood and bone.
The premise couldn’t be simpler - and one of the film’s greatest strengths is how it forgoes exposition. Elizabeth Sparkles (Demi Moore) has aged out of her hit television program. In a bid for relevancy, she tries “the Substance” - a chemical that allows her to live as a youthful version of herself (but with a gory twist).
In a twist of meta-casting, second generation Hollywood star Margaret Qualley (Andie MacDowell’s daughter) plays Elizabeth’s younger self. Qualley has proven herself both uniquely game and versatile this year as a presence in Ethan Coen’s Drive-Away Dolls and Yorgos Lanthimos’ Kinds of Kindness. She’s made quite a resumé in a short time, and The Substance has her fully committed to the lunacy.
This is an all-caps movie - no time for subtlety (as embodied by Dennis Quaid’s loathsome Hollywood producer). If you’re on Fargeat’s wavelength, prepare to cackle through every over-the-top development.
4. DUNE: PART TWO
I wrote extensively about Dune: Part Two earlier in the year. Then, I admired the film’s cynicism - its clever handling of the hero’s journey and commitment to the unhappy ending in a major blockbuster franchise (true to the original Frank Herbert text).
With months of reflection, Denis Villeneuve’s ambitious epic only seems more of an accomplishment, and the casting of Timothée Chalamet and Zendaya way back in 2019 seem like more of a coup. The fact that Denis Villeneuve saw Call Me by Your Name and imagined Chalamet giving Paul’s speech to the Fremen war council shows how deep his long-in-the-works vision ran.
There are so many moments in Dune: Part Two that capture the imagination - including Paul’s first sandworm ride and Austin Butler’s deliciously ruthless villain Feyd-Rautha. This installment of the Dune saga moves beyond the first film’s world building - showing us the rapid rise of a strongman in Paul Muad'Dib Atreides. It is a film about the dangers of fanaticism, of extremists who are useful until they can’t be controlled.
Denis Villeneuve recently commented that he believes all of his films revolve around “cycles of violence.” In Dune, there is an inevitability to the rise of the Fremen revolution - foretold by the Bene Gesserit. There are warnings unheeded and precedents broken. It is a fitting film for an anxious moment in our culture - a start to 2025 that feels like a precipice.
5. NOSFERATU
Nosferatu is a sustained nightmare.
A recurring image in Robert Eggers’ adaptation of the 1922 silent film is characters suddenly waking, struggling to untangle dreams from their reality. The darkness follows them into the most intimate spaces - there’s no rest from the vampire Count Orlok. Similarly, Nosferatu never lets us stop for a peaceful breath - even this year’s Longlegs cannot match Eggers’ film with its suffused dread.
Nosferatu also represents a loosening of Eggers’ style while maintaining his impeccable craft. The Witch and The Lighthouse had more tightly controlled aesthetics (and historical accuracy), whereas this film takes visual cues from the vampire’s German expressionist origins. Count Orlok (Bill Skarsgård, who deserves more accolades for his wholly transformative performance) takes the form of a shape in curtains, of a hand stretched over the expanse of a German village. He is death and disease in all its forms.
But it’s Lily-Rose Depp, and how Eggers centers her performance, that proves the film’s secret weapon. She inhabits Ellen Hutter with searing emotion anguish, attributing her mania to real feeling - of shame, of longing. Hutter, who conjures the vampire in a moment of weakness, battles for control over her body and soul. Depp shudders and contorts under Orlok’s spell - she cries over being death’s mistress, then succumbs to the ecstasy of his control. She never repeats a note, while giving dimension to women throughout history who have been dismissed as “mad.”
Nosferatu, based on the box office, appears to be the breakthrough that The Northman was originally expected to be for Eggers. Given his track record, he deserves to be a name brand in filmmaking.
6. I SAW THE TV GLOW
Jane Schoenbrun, in their short directorial career, has provided the clearest vision of what the future of cinema can accomplish. They represent a generation of filmmakers raised by the Internet - fascinated by the relationship between physical beings and their avatars. With the micro-budgeted We’re All Going to the World’s Fair, Schoenbrun made a film about the horrors of Internet rabbit holes - a testament to modern malaise. With I Saw The TV Glow, they travel further back in time to show the origins of this generation’s screen obsession.
I Saw the TV Glow is about a cult TV show that has a transformative impact on the lives of ‘90s high schoolers Owen and Maddy. Fellow Buffy the Vampire Slayer fans will recognize The Pink Opaque as a similar lo-fi fantasy teen show - touching a nerve even with cheesy special effects. The show provides a gateway for the two teens - one that expands their minds while alienating them from their small town.
The film captures a moment for Millennials when all of media wasn’t at our fingertips, a time of subcultures before subreddits. Anyone who has passed a comic book under a desk or excitedly connected with someone over an underseen cultural object will recognize the thrill of finding your community. The cult of The Pink Opaque also serves as an allegory for the trans experience long before access to information enabled trans visibility (Schoenbrun identifies as transfeminine and nonbinary). In a narrative that skips through years, Schoenbrun underscores the tragedy of living without acknowledgment to your true self - of wasting away under a lie.
For an individual who is influenced so much by the Internet, the layers of meaning in Schoenbrun’s work - the fact that it is so personal, yet so capable of being filtered through another’s personal experience - would break any algorithm. Their focus on mood over plotting, their mystifying image-making - these are the hallmarks of a confident artist just coming into their power.
7. ANORA
“Casting by Sean Baker.” If there’s one credit on Anora that speaks to Sean Baker’s commitment in portraying the misfit classes of American life, it’s the fact that he is responsible for selecting the sex workers, roommates, and Russian henchmen that populate the world of Anora.
Crucially, Baker saw the character of Ani - a sex worker who survives by being a consummate performer - in Mikey Madison. Madison, who has had roles in the likes of Scream and a Tarantino film, possesses a vulnerability under her steeliness - a closely guarded spark. Despite her armor, Ani has access to the same spontaneous joy as Vanya, the Russian oligarch’s son who she quickly marries in a secret Vegas ceremony.
Anora has all the highlights of Baker’s previous class-conscious work. There is the bawdy sex and comedy of Red Rocket, the joy in the darkness of The Florida Project, the banter and frankness of Tangerine. It contains three distinct acts that straddle these different tones - taking us (and Ani) on a whirlwind tour from romance to melancholy.
[SPOILERS AHEAD]
The film’s ending contains for me the most important film image of 2024, when Ani finally lets go of her dream of upward mobility. The extended denouement takes place after Ani’s marriage to Vanya has fully collapsed. Igor, a hired gun who shares Ani’s class struggles, drives her home from Vanya’s mansion to the apartment she shares with a roommate. This is it - the last stop of her fairy tale.
As Ani contemplates returning to her former life of scraping by, we watch the emotions crash across her face. She briefly retreats into old habits of her line of work - mounting Igor in his car - but she can’t hold the facade. The built-up effort to not lose her cool, to survive by performing, finally collapses. She breaks down in tears.
Why is this such a heartbreaking moment? Because Ani has a realization that many will never have. Many Americans have this notion that success is right around the corner, that someday their hard work will pay off despite the odds. Sean Baker’s characters often start with an American Dream which becomes a delusion. Ani loses what she thought was her winning lottery ticket, and in that moment she sees the rest of her life clearly ahead of her. She will never have the easy life of Vanya - for her, every victory will have to be hard-won. Ani will continue to struggle - and her movie will continue on and on.
8. MEGALOPOLIS
We live in an age where our elders refuse to cede power - risking all of our futures. It’s true in government just as it is anywhere there is a hierarchy. Either because they hope to return us to a bygone era based on their own nostalgia, or believe that “this is how it’s always been done,” these leaders have stagnated our society.
Director Francis Ford Coppola, at 85-years-old, offers a different template for the future in Megalopolis. In the film, he offers up the reins to the next generation - and invites us to pave the path forward. This message was so important to the man that he spent forty years and (at least) $120 million of his own money to imagine a utopia.
In Megalopolis, Cesar Catilina (Adam Driver) is a visionary architect of “New Rome” whose plans for a futuristic city comes into conflict with the old rule - represented by Mayor Cicero (Giancarlo Esposito). Surveying the architecture of the 20th century, it is littered with missed opportunities of the post-war era. Robert Moses created the modern New York with focus on highways and bridges - and disrespect for whole communities and neighborhoods. In Catilina, Coppola imagines not only building in new shapes - but with new substances (“Megalon”) - a clean break from the past of steel and cement. It is this radical vision that is met with outrage from all but Mayor Cicero’s daughter Julia, who falls in love with Cesar.
Coppola has become the type of artist where you can see his paint clearly on the canvas. His messaging is bold and sincere, with his epitaphs carved in stone - inspired by a classic Hollywood Roman epic. Performances and dialogue are arch and theatrical, with acting styles often clashing in the same scene (Shia LaBeouf and Aubrey Plaza work without guardrails). Coppola is committed to making choices in his filmmaking - to making the most innocuous romantic scene feel off-kilter, or to deploying special effects to realize a golden cityscape. It’s inspiring to watch a filmmaker who has worked for over half a century still try for a fresh perspective.
Megalopolis reflects the heart of an optimist. The wealth of ideas, the sheer willingness to conquer them, speak to the vitality of Coppola. The message of the film notwithstanding, Coppola’s commitment to stylization shows more daring than filmmakers half his age. If anything, being a pure creative, Coppola overextends - stretches too far. There’s never a half-measure in Megalopolis, for the better.
9. CIVIL WAR
Alex Garland began his career as a writer (he wrote 28 Days Later and Sunshine for Danny Boyle), but in his directorial career has shown an increasing interest in sensory experiences. Works such as Annihilation and his television show DEVS are examples of Garland’s sometimes impenetrable, always beautiful visual storytelling.
The reason Civil War is so powerful is because it omits so many of the details of who fired the first shot in the war that has fractured the United States. For the journalists who undertake a road trip to interview the embattled president, the history doesn’t matter - the focus is on surviving the “interesting times” of their present. Garland is clear that war is messy, and the values you begin with are often long forgotten by the time the sound of gunfire stops.
Garland is more fascinated by the on-the-ground perspective, embodied by aspiring photog Jessie (Cailee Spaeney). By joining her hero Lee Smith (a shellshocked and splendid performance by Kirsten Dunst) and the thrill-seeking Joel (Wagner Moura), Jessie bears witness to the physical and moral wreckage of the conflict. Garland presents the mass graves and uniformed militia as matter-of-fact - part of the fabric of a new reality.
Garland implicitly argues that the pundits and social media users in this country who feverishly predict civil war in the modern age don’t know what they’re asking for. War will wear you down, and it’s the bystanders who suffer the most in revolutions. The only reason war ever recurs is when people forget…
10. HORIZON: AN AMERICAN SAGA - PART 1
Costner stuffs this first act of his four-part saga (only half-produced as of this writing) with all the tropes of the American Western. There are men with no name, hookers with hearts of gold, war parties, wagon trains, and gun battles. In mortgaging his home to live out his dream of making a How the West Was Won-style epic, Costner has made a late-life crisis film that is at least fun to watch.
For me, the overwrought dialogue and soaring violin score are comfort food - as is the classic photography of Utah mountains. The collection of character actors who never really became movie stars (Sienna Miller, Luke Wilson, and more) are at least better served here than on the fifth Taylor Sheridan soap opera, as Costner’s work has a stateliness and gravitas that is a total throwback. He can also still film an action scene effectively - the raid on the town of Horizon being a standout.
You can feel Costner behind the camera philosophizing on the Old West - trying to square the circle of making a John Ford film with more modern thinking. A highlight is when Sam Worthington’s calvary soldier chides the townspeople of Horizon for settling in a valley claimed by Indigenous people - making clear, with exasperation, that the resulting brutality visited on them is their fault. The film fluctuates on whether it was courage or idiocy that inspired these settlers - Costner gives time to the evils and racism of Manifest Destiny as well as the desperation of the wagon trains driving westward expansion.
Horizon lists its faults in its title - it is a collection of plot threads that begin and don’t end. I’m glad it exists, and I’m glad it’s a movie that played in theaters - even if it means Part 2 is currently stuck in purgatory without a release date.
Honorable Mentions (Movies I Loved)
The Brutalist, Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga, Janet Planet, Wicked, Juror #2, A Complete Unknown, Didi, A Different Man
Movies I Liked
Love Lies Bleeding, Monkey Man, The Fall Guy, Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes, Inside Out 2, The Bikeriders, A Quiet Place: Day One, Longlegs, Twisters, Deadpool & Wolverine, Snack Shack, Alien: Romulus, Will & Harper, Emilia Perez, Conclave, We Live in Time, My Old Ass, A Real Pain, Music by John Williams, Made in England: The Films of Powell and Pressburger, Sweethearts, Rebel Ridge, Super/Man: The Christopher Reeve Story
Could Have Been Better
Drive-Away Dolls, Abigail, Hit Man, MaXXXine, Gladiator II, Beetlejuice Beetlejuice
Movies I Missed (& Plan to See)
Sing Sing, Hard Truths, Strange Darling, Babygirl, The Beast, Red Rooms, Evil Does Not Exist
Technically 2023 Films (That I Loved in 2024)
La Chimera, The Taste of Things, Fallen Leaves