OPINION: My Top Ten Movies of the Year

With 2024 finishing out into this horrifically cold January, it feels like a good time for retrospection. The movie world has seen a year which has been wildly positive for diversity on screen, more exposure to the arthouse and foreign films and a new army of creative directors fueling new modern hits.

However, last year was also plagued by the consequences of the 2023 labor disputes, stretching schedules and hurting the box office, especially in the early year. Before we look ahead, I think it’s worth remembering the jewels of the year.

If there was a theme to the top-scoring movies of the year, it’s anxiety and control of what life is and could be. It makes sense why the blunt depiction of anxiety in “Inside Out 2″ feels like a good intro for a top ten. The movie also relates how this anxiety can affect youth during their development, and also shows how to accept it as well.

“Longlegs” slowly won my heart more and more throughout the year, mostly through its unique palette of filmic tastes and for depicting a horror mystery dipped with supernatural juice. Combine it all with a clairvoyant detective, and I’m all in. The rock-and-roll spirit of the whole movie leads to a final discovery which I explored in detail in my column on the movie, which horror rarely gets to do in such artful detail.

The next movie not only depicts a hyper-specific place in type brushed with a fine-toothed comb of detail, but uses the accuracy to depict how the early introduction of social media was affecting the youth. “Didi” also is a heartfelt story of alienation and Asian-American experiences built in a microcosm which big-budget dramas and their wild swings could never replicate.

Not to say wild swings aren’t good either, which leads to the biggest swing on this list with “The Substance,” which concocts a devious grand slam of a brew with goopy body horror and cathartically angry filmmaking. Unsubtle for purposeful reasons and as loud and furious as it needs to be, I can’t think of another film which deserved to be seen in theaters with as many people as possible as “The Substance.”

Rounding out the first half of this list is “Kinds of Kindness,” the first time a Yorgos Lanthimos film truly clicked with me. With the triptych styling three distinctive and memorable stories about psychos desperate for connection with each other, it’s a deliberately alienating movie. For sticking through, a surrealistic popcorn feature with some of the year’s most bracing performances is given as a reward.

Rarely do theatergoers get an animated film which isn’t trying to exploit the usual kids corner, but “The Wild Robot” is truly artful, like a glitch in the typical production schedule. Combining hand-painted aesthetics and CG animation with a smart, blisteringly funny script and plenty of meditations on the trials of nature and the anxiety of parenthood, it’s still also sweet enough to appeal to all ages.

Wrapping your head around a family legacy which spans generations is hard to really comprehend. It’s harder to do so when you’re staring that legacy right in the face, and when that legacy is your ancestors survival of the Holocaust. This sort of anxiety is explored in “A Real Pain” through two delightfully funny cousins taking a tour of Poland, as they come to grips with their place in the world and their relationship with each other.

“Queer” could have been in the top spot for how much it wormed its way into my head and how it plays with the medium in the exact ways I find exciting. I love the story of a pervert doing everything in his power to figure out exactly what his relationship with a younger man really means, and the outlandish story plays to my tastes and has my favorite visual image of the year (a dance involving two people trying to crawl into each other’s skin).

One of the few in my top ten I didn’t write an extensive column on, mostly because of subject matter about a female sex worker who falls in love with a Russian billionaire’s son. But, “Anora” is the funniest movie of the year, with a maniacal energy in a devilishly good script complimented by equally energetic performances. It also lands at the end with a sympathetic sadness, uniquely tuned to the legacy of Sean Baker’s career of showing sympathy for sex workers. I just hope this year he’ll get his flowers.

Finally, it’s lazy and meaningless writing to say a movie changed your life, but “Sing Sing” really did contribute to my pursuing performance as a hobby this year with community theater. The story of incarcerated Black men participating in a theater program reminded me of long-forgotten feelings of catharsis I once had when I did theater in high school. It understands why performing is exciting and meaningful, and the relationships gained from working together to perform as someone else is as universal as it comes. It’s by far the best movie of the year.

Some other honorable mentions in alphabetical order: “Conclave,” “Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga,” “Hundreds of Beavers,” “Kneecap,” “Nosferatu,” “The Fall Guy,” “The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar and Three More” and “Wicked.”