This is part three of my yearly rundown of the movies of the prior year.
Here's a breakdown of the films I watched in 2024.
Before you ask me "Did you watch (name of movie)?", you can check this handy spreadsheet for what I watched and when.
So, here's the ground rules (before y'all start complaining):
These are The Best movies *to me*. Thus, they were my favorite movies in 2024. These used to be The Krypto Awards, but I got tired of photoshopping pictures of Krypto.
I'm not going to pretend that liking movies isn't subjective and/ or that something is objectively "the best". This is not a timed foot-race with precision cameras. What you see below is just what I liked, and, pals, what I think doesn't matter to anyone but me, so cool your jets.
These are movies I saw for the first time in 2024. It doesn't mean the movies were released in 2024. Watching only new movies is for chumps and dilettantes. New releases are good, but my FOMO for being part of a cultural moment around a movie is non-existent in 2024.
Now, this year's list is not going to be mind-boggling. I went down a path of seeking out movies that are considered classics and remain well known and well-liked. And I did this across a few genres. So, if you saw me saying "I think this Orson Welles is onto something..." you may be right in guessing that I am not breaking new ground here.
Best Noir and Mystery
Saboteur
It's Hitchock. I don't know what you people want out of me. This movie was not as good as his work that would come soon, but it's sure getting there. You can see how a bit of Cary Grant sure adds to a movie, but this one is damn good. I mean - here it is, on the list.
High and Low
An Akira Kurosawa flick - this study of an actually decent, wealthy guy caught in an impossible situation when his chauffer's son is kidnapped by mistake instead of his own son. A taught, thoughtful thriller on class, our duty to others and a dozen other things. A great watch.
M
I had to edit this post, because I forgot to say "M is amazing". It is.
No Way Out
Widmark and Portier directed by Mankiewicz? Get out of here. An intense thriller in which a young, Black doctor deals with a racist blaming him for his brother's death.
Pickup
I dunno. It's a poverty row film, and it's been a while, but I liked this one a lot. Maybe it was just Beverly Michaels' character, but I'd watch this one again in a heartbeat.
Best Sci-Fi/ Action/ Adventure
Alphaville
Shocker. The famous sci-fi/ noir film by Truffaut Godard (whoops! Thanks, Howard!) is good.
Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire
This movie is the opposite of "good" in one way, and 100% entertaining and therefore "great" in a different way. If you want absurdity on screen, this is the movie for ME. If zero gravity giant monster battles aren't your thing, I understand. We're just two very different people.
Yojimbo/ Sanjuro/ The Hidden Fortress
All classics in their own right, and all Kurosawa, I can't recommend any of them enough. I had a great time with all three, even if Yojimbo was my favorite. But the movies all had so much to offer, were so rich and, frankly, a great time at the movies. Toshiro Mifumbe is now to me what Wesley Snipes was to 1992 me (ie: if he's in it, I'll watch it).
Comedy
Bottoms
From the first minute of this movie to the last, I was dying. A real YMMV treat, but Marshawn Lynch as the faculty advisor to an all-girl high-school fight club set up so two girls can try to meet/ maybe have sex with girls in their school was just absolutely bonkers. Star turns by Rachel Sennott and The Bear star Ayo Edebiri.
Poor Things / The Favourite
Comedy? Sci-Fi? Drama? I don't know. This movie deserved every bit of praise it got. Beautiful, sharp, pointed... I loved every frame of it, and every performance in it. - I'll also throw The Favourite a mention, because it should probably be here next to this movie. There. I edited the entry. Now they're both there. Emma Stone, amirite?
Doc
The Spectacular Failure of the Star Wars Hotel
Come for me for saying this is a movie, but it is absolutely a four-hour-doc that's maybe one of the most crucial pieces of media on modern capitalism and the consumer experience produced by an independent content maker. And just because it's framed by a YouTuber wearing an array of Star Wars hats doesn't mean it's not as cutting as anything put out anywhere as a doc the past few years.
Burden of Dreams
I am unsure if the fact that I liked the doc made around Fitzcarraldo better than the film itself is why Fitzcarraldo didn't make my first pass. But this doc is bizarre and amazing in it's truthfulness in a bizarre scenario as Werner Herzog tries to make his movie against a 1000 issues he didn't really have to face, but he sure chose to - not least of which is casting Klaus Kinski as his lead.
Drama
Dead End
A well made melodrama on a set the size a city block, it's a great look at what happens when gentrification happens a little too fast and the swells are bumping up against the hoi polloi. A 1930's release, it's a reminder of how the economics of the Depression impacted folks - some doing fine in their towers, and some living in squalor. A young Humphrey Bogart, Sylvia Sidney and a fleet of others.
Babette's Feast
My spite watch! A remarkable, small film about a refugee living in a coastal town who is able to thank her protectors with a remarkable dinner that is a life-changing experience.
Diary of a Lost Girl
Louise Brooks at her best, as a girl who is beset with a series of misfortunes, but triumphs through real grit.
8 1/2, La Strada, La Dolce Vita
Hey, this Federico Fellini fella makes good movies! The kids would surely call him "underrated". Maybe I'm the right age now to be moved deeply by stories like these, but moved I was, over and over as I dug into these films. If I ever worried Fellini would be an academic exercise instead of a visceral experience... for shame.
Holiday
The Best Christmas Pageant Ever
This is the anti-Red One of Christmas movies, centering the experience of Christmas not on pro-surveillance-state paramilitary adventuring, but spends 90 minutes showing what the spirit of Christmas is - and it is not "fuel for Santa's magic". I am not surprised so many film reviewers struggled with the simple story aimed at kids more than adults (and maybe didn't understand this is a kids movie), but given that most Holiday movies treat Christmas as an emergency or seem to have no idea how millions of people celebrate the season, it's nice to see a version of reality reflected in a lovely, comedic film.
Horror
Carnival of Souls
I wasn't expecting anything, and genuinely thought this might be MST3K fodder as I'm not sure this movie hasn't fallen out of copyright, but instead I was treated to a creepy, surreal fever dream of a movie with a singular star in Candace Hilligoss.
Vampyr
Not everyone's cup of tea - another surreal horror experience. A vampire movie made before we set down all the hard rules about what a vampire movie should be. Freaky and phenomenal.
Noferatu, a Symphony of Horror and Nosferatu
Including the 1922 movie was a cheat. I'd seen this whole movie in bits, but hadn't sat all the way through in one shot before. But, yeah, I like Lugosi, but he's not scary, is he? A great pairing with Vampyr, the OG Nosferatu is not something to watch if you're out of sorts. The 2024 remake was fantastic, and most of the reviews I've seen of it seemed to have missed what Eggers made.
Ghostwatch
This 1990's BBC special is everything Late Night With The Devil wished it had been, but worked. A real War of the Worlds moment for 1990's England.
Special Mentions
I don't know if these are great, classics, or whatever... but I found them entertaining.
Lisa Frankenstein
The fact so many critics hated this should tell you, this movie is great. People will talk about 1980's retreads, but this truly felt like a cult 1980's film that somehow showed up in 2024. One oddity of things like Heathers being passed down, remade, etc.. is that I think the mean-spirited context in which they were made gets lost. But back in the day, we knew how to make a sociopathic comedy, and this is a return to form.
Re-Animator/ From Beyond
Shout to the folks who worked on these films. Wildly entertaining horror that manages to bring that Lovecraftian nonsense.
Music By John Williams
This one stuck with me even more than the Jim Henson doc. I was truly moved. But that's music, I think.
Merrily We Go To Hell
I thought we were watching a comedy, and then we weren't, and this melodrama was, frankly, very, very good.
Fitzcarraldo
Look, this movie was amazingly good, but it just wasn't my favorite. It is completely bonkers and worth a watch.
The Big Knife
On sheer Ida Lupino looking marvelous-nous, this should be a favorite. It's worth seeing some time. I dug it.
Pit Stop
Who knew a movie about dirt track crash 'em up derbies would be so intriguing? JAL knew. Thanks for the rec, man.
House on Telegraph Hill
Sooo close to being a favorite. A good thriller-noir.
Godzilla vs. Biollante
Coming soon to Criterion, this is the movie that *really* set the Heisei era into full motion, imho.
The Far Country
Entirely enjoyable, completely fabricated story of the Klondike gold rush and trying to set up civilization in an uncivilized place. Ruth Roman and Jimmy Stewart.
I dunno. Some Chabert stuff.
This is just a shout out to Lacey Chabert, who was in approximately 300 movies I think I saw this year. She's in more movies that any human has time to make, so I fear her wizardly powers. And she hung in there when her peers all fled to join Candance Cameron Bure at her knock-off Hallmark channel. Are these movies good? Usually not. Is Chabert okay? She gets the job done. Who knew that of the Party of Five cast, I'd be spending an insane number of hours this holiday with Chabert?
My Favorite Movie of 2024: Seven Samurai
To be honest, I watched so many good movies this year, my list is sprawling, and it could have been on a different day, I might have selected a different film as my favorite of 2024. And maybe when I look back at this list in the future, I'll be surprised by my selection.
Kurosawa is back on the list for his fifth movie. And for the second year in a row, I tapped a Japanese movie as my favorite. So... get with it, rest of the world.
I am not not a beret-wearing film-guy who wants to lecture you on Kurosawa. I am no expert. This was the year I finally watched some of his work that wasn't Rashomon or Dreams, so I am coming at you as a guy who likes action movies and dramas, and war movies and comedies... and this movie is all of that.
An incredible achievement, there's a reason Seven Samurai endures with the reputation it has. I can throw superlatives at this movie all day, discussing the intricacies of story, of concepts, character... performances, commentary on humanity, Japanese culture... It's all in there, and far smarter people than me have written on the movie endlessly. As they should.
Americans will know the story from the Western-styled remake, The Magnificent Seven, which honestly does a good job of transposing quite a bit of the original. But with a 3.5 hour run-time, Seven Samurai manages to bring an epic to the screen that overshadows the Western, and has more to say.
If ever you've got the 3.5 hours, it's worth the investment.
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