2024/2025 Movies
The movie list almost died this year. I was so busy for the entire last month of the school year that I didn’t even start the list. I thought it was maybe time to let it go, especially since no one was exactly clamoring for it (well, that’s not completely true - Dan asked when it was coming out, and was bummed that it wasn’t - so Dan, it is either to your credit, or your fault, that the list is making a belated return). It didn’t help that this year was probably my least favorite year of movies in the 20 years I’ve been doing the list. In fact in I actually left the top 5 spots blank, because there was not a single movie I watched (for the first time) that I thought was good enough to be considered a “top 5” movie. There were still some that I enjoyed, and this year my favorite things that I watched were actually TV shows (see the bonus list at the bottom).
The first few movies on the list this year are all ones that I thought were awful or really did not enjoy, including a few by excellent directors and a couple of Best Picture nominees.
35. Anora While this might not have been the absolute worst movie I watched this year (there were a lot of movies I disliked), it is my least favorite Best Picture winner ever. (Click here for my complete rankings of Best Picture winners) The movie was billed as a modern day Cinderella story. Well, if “modern day” means that Cinderella is a hooker that uses a lot of drugs and Prince Charming is the irredeemable son of a Russian billionaire, then count me out of watching any more modern day fairy tales. And no, that twist in the movie does not make it a good movie. All of the characters are self-absorbed jerks and I truly cannot understand why so many people thought this was good.
34. The Instigators I think this is supposed to be a comedy, but I am not positive because it is not funny in any way. Two low level thugs (Matt Damon and Casey Affleck) go on the run with their therapist after a robbery gone wrong. It feels like Damon and the Afflecks keep going to the well of stories about working class people from the Northeast, but they have completely run out of ideas.
33. Trap If you are foolish enough to watch a recent movie made by M. Night Shamalayan then you shouldn’t be surprised when it is bad, so I guess I got what I asked for. In Trap, Josh Hartnett is a dad that takes his daughter to see a pop star’s concert. But the dad is also a serial killer and the whole concert is a trap to catch him. This is the dumbest movie of the year.
32. Conclave What I liked: There is some good acting, and there is some intrigue at the politics that go into voting for and selecting a new pope. What I didn’t like: Why do so many movies that deal with religious belief have to be about scandal? Scandal over sexual misdeeds. Scandal over dirty politics. Scandal over gender. Is it possible to make a movie about faith and religion that doesn’t involve some sort of scandal, or would that be too nuanced? Also, this is very boring.
31. The Menu Ralph Finnes plays a world famous chef at a destination restaurant. The guests include just about every kind of rich jerk you would expect at a special meal that costs thousands of dollars. I get that it’s supposed to be a sendup of rich people and fancy restaurant culture but it was just too much.
30. Drive Away Dolls The Big Lebowski. True Grit. No Country for Old Men. Fargo. O Brother Where Art Thou? Raising Arizona. I will watch any movie directed by Ethan Coen because he has made some of the best movies of the last 50 years. But he has also made some that I thought were awful, and Drive Away Dolls might be the worst.
29. Nosferatu A lot of critics really liked Robert Eggers re-telling of this classic vampire story. But a lot of critics also liked his other movies, The Lighthouse and The Witch, which I thought were also bizarre and disturbing. Maybe I just need to stop watching his movies.
28. Didi A coming of age story about a Taiwanese-American boy in the early 2000’s. Normally I love this kind of movie. But normally you find yourself rooting for the main character despite their awkwardness and occasional bad choices. In Didi I couldn’t stand Chris, the main character and if you aren’t at least sort of rooting for the protagonist in a coming-of-age story, it feels pretty depressing.
27. The Bikeriders Jeff Nichols has made some movies that I’ve really enjoyed, like Take Shelter and Mud. This was his biggest budget movie with a cast I really like (Austin Butler, Tom Hardy, Michael Shannon, and LO’s own Karl Glusman). It’s the story of the Vandals motorcycle gang in 1960’s Chicago, but unfortunately it’s not good in any way. The midwestern accents of Tom Hardy and Jodie Comer almost single handedly make the movie unwatchable. Tom Hardy feels like he’s doing his best Marlon Brando without actually having any substance to his character, and the whole thing feels like an homage to a 60’s movie that is trying so hard to be cool that it isn’t actually cool at all. A major disappointment.
26. The Substance Even though I really disliked this movie, it might’ve been the most interesting movie of the year. Demi Moore plays an aging TV star who gets ahold of a mysterious substance that allows her to transform into a younger version of herself for a week at a time. A lot of the movie is great. It is a powerful statement about beauty standards for women in the entertainment industry. In fact, I thought that the Best Actress award this year was a perfect demonstration of what the movie is trying to say.. Demi Moore is amazing in her role - the movie would not have been the same without her in it, but I think that dozens of people could’ve played the role of Anora that won Mikey Madsen best actress and the movie would’ve been essentially the same. But the last couple of years (Madsen this year, Emma Stone last year) the Academy seems to reward young, pretty women that are willing to expose themselves playing prostitutes, while Demi Moore who plays a truly unique role lost out to the younger version. So why didn’t I like the movie? Well, the second half goes completely off the rails, and the last scene is one of the most disgusting scenes I’ve ever seen. I had to fast forward. A different version of this movie could’ve easily been in my top 10.
All the movies in this section were at least mildly entertaining. Not necessarily great movies, but I enjoyed watching them.
25. Alien: Romulus At this point all of the Alien movies are recycling some version of the same story. At least it’s an entertaining story.
24. Carry On The setup here isn’t particularly believable, with a bad guy trying to get a lethal bioweapon past security and onto an airplane. But at least it’s fast paced and the actors (Taron Edgerton and Jason Bateman as the bad guys) have fun with their roles.
23. The Gorge A fun setup with Miles Teller and Anya Taylor-Joy as marksmen on either side of a mysterious gorge, sent into the wilderness to protect civilization from the dangerous creatures living in the depths of the gorge. The second half peters out a bit once they venture into the gorge to fight the bad guys.
22. Civil War An intense portrait of the United States at war. It’s surprisingly apolitical, but still disturbing. Bonus points for having LO grad Karl Glusman in a small role as a sniper.
21. Woman of the Hour Based on the true story of a serial killer that was a contestant on (and won) The Dating Game. Anna Kendrick directs and stars as an aspiring actress that goes on the show. The movie highlights the many ways her character deals with innuendo and sexism as a female in the entertainment industry, before she even “wins” a date with a serial killer.
20. Mickey 17 Robert Pattinson plays an expendable, a clone sent out to do the most dangerous jobs on a newly formed space colony. He’s considered expendable because each time he dies he can just be re-printed and start all over again. I really wanted to like this movie, but it just didn’t quite work. There is an excellent cast but the characters (and plot) are just so over the top it’s hard to suspend disbelief. Hard to believe that this movie was made by the same director that made Parasite.
19. The Treasure of Foggy Mountain When a group of friends finds a map to a legendary buried treasure, they set out on an adventure to find it. It’s not very good,, but I laughed pretty hard and it follows an enjoyable formula. I think this was the only true comedy I watched this year.
18. Horizon Part 1 of Kevin Costner’s Western epic. It bombed in the theater but found a pretty big audience on Netflix. This would’ve felt more at home in the 80’s when Clint Eastwood was in his heyday, but it was still interesting.
17. Juror Number 2 Nicholas Holt plays a juror in a murder case that realizes once the trial begins that he is connected to the case and that what he says or doesn’t say could determine what happens to the defendant. An interesting moral dilemma.
16. Last Breath When a deep sea diver is stranded on the ocean floor, Woody Harrelson and his team spring into action to try to save him. Totally predictable but still entertaining. Based on a true story.
15. Black Bag A Steven Soderberg movie, Michael Fassbender and Cate Blanchett play married intelligence agents. Someone in the agency is suspected of being a double agent. Everyone is spying on everyone else.
The movies from here on down are probably the only ones that I would feel comfortable recommending. All good enough to be around the top 20 in a typical year, with a few very good movies but none that I loved.
14. Aftersun A young father and his middle-school aged daughter spend a summer vacation together. Equally poignant and sad. Great acting.
13. Rebel Ridge Aaron Pierre plays an ex-Marine who ends up on the wrong side of a small-town sheriff that confiscates the money he’s planning to use to post bail for a relative. Way better than I thought it would be, great pacing and good characters. Pierre seems like a future action star.
12. The Zone of Interest The movie follows a commandant at Auschwitz and his family at their home just outside the concentration camp. It’s hard to watch because you have an unsettled feeling throughout the entire film. The family goes about their daily lives, trying to live like a normal family in the countryside, but just beyond the tall walls of their home you hear the sounds of human suffering. Shouts, periodic gunshots, and always the sound of the furnaces burning in the background. It highlights our ability to normalize and rationalize almost anything, even genocide. Extremely well done, but it’s not an easy movie to watch.
11. The Brutalist I don’t know that I loved everything about the Brutalist, but it was certainly one of the most interesting movies I watched all year. I enjoyed the first half more than the second, but the excellent acting, epic scope, complex characters and terrific score all added up to make it one of the best movies I watched this year.
10. Becoming Led Zeppelin The origin story for one of the all-time greatt rock bands. Has there ever been a band that emerged as fully formed from the start as Zeppelin? In a year they go from playing their first shows to a small room of teenagers to selling out massive concert halls. Worth watching just to listen to the music. How has there not been a full-blown Hollywood movie about this band?
9. Furiosa My favorite action movie of the year. It makes up for its flaws with non-stop, music-thumping action. I prefer Charlize Theron’s Furiosa to Anya Taylor-Joy’s, but no one does action quite like George Miller.
8. A Real Pain A Real Pain is the story of cousins that travel together on a Holocaust memorial tour. Kieran Culkin’s academy award winning character is “a real pain”, difficult, captivating, depressed, thoughtful, free-spirited and immature. It will resonate with anyone that has loved and lived with someone that is difficult to love.
7. A Complete Unknown Despite the fact that I couldn’t fully get into Timothy Chalamet as Bob Dylan, I really enjoyed watching the story of Dylan’s rise and the controversy around him “going electric”. It was especially fun to watch the movie right after going through my dad’s old record collection, which has albums by virtually every musician shown in the film.
6. Nickel Boys A unique adaptation of an excellent book by Colson Whitehead. Director RaMell Ross films from the viewpoint of the two main characters, young men that are incarcerated at Nickel Academy reform school. I found the first person perspective distracting at first, but it is essential to the telling of the story and eventually I grew to like it. Ross has a distinct artistic style. His previous film, Hale County This Morning, This Evening is a documentary about the Black community in Hale County, Alabama. The documentary doesn’t follow a narrative, but it has impressionistic visuals that immerse you in the story and the place he is filming. He brings the same style to this powerful story, and it makes for an impressive film.
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1. No top 5 movies this year.
Older movies I watched this year
RRR If you have not seen RRR yet at the Hollywood Theater, you need to put it on your calendar ASAP. A modern cult classic, I’ve seen it five times (and counting).
Tombstone RIP Val Kilmer. His portrayal of Doc Holliday is why this is considered a classic Western. An all-time great role.
Hero A classic martial arts movie directed by Zhang Yimou. One of the most beautiful movies of the last 25 years.
Aliens As good as the original. If the original Alien was a horror movie, Aliens is more of an action movie, but still an all-time great.
Alien: Covenant Not bad, but still recycling the same plot as the original two Alien movies.
Incendies I watched this because Dennis Villenueve (Dune, Arrival, Sicario) has become one of my favorite directors, and this was one of his first movies. It’s great, but man is it dark.
Bonus Section: My favorite TV shows I watched this year, in order.
1. Severance, Season 2. This is my favorite show, probably an all-time top 10 show for me. I still don’t really know what’s going on but it’s such a great mystery and the characters are so good.
2. Andor, Season 2. Not as great as the first season, but still great. The last few episodes were fantastic, and this is still my favorite of all the Star Wars shows.
3. Slow Horses, Season 3 British intelligence agency spy show. Every season so far has been really great.
4. Lost, Seasons 1-3. I rewatched all 75+ episodes from the first three seasons of an all-time favorite.
5. Bad Monkey Vince Vaughn plays a disgraced Florida detective that sets out to figure out the mystery of an arm that gets reeled in by a fishing boat. It’s funny with great dialogue, and has the greatest soundtrack to any TV show I’ve ever watched (all covers of Tom Petty songs).
6. The Lincoln Lawyer, Seasons 1-3 Entertaining courtroom show.
7. Dark Matter I swore I would never watch anything else about multiverses, but this was actually pretty good. Joel Edgerton plays a college physics professor who is confronted by different versions of himself that want his life.
8. All the Light We Cannot See Solid adaptation of one of my favorite books. I found it enjoyable even if it doesn’t quite capture the magic of the novel.
9. The Bear Season 3 The Bear is one of my favorite shows, but I really did not like season 3. It was too self indulgent, and at times it felt ridiculous (John Cena as one of the Fak brothers?). I’ve watched the first few episodes of Season 4 and have enjoyed it quite a bit more than Season 3.
10. The Acolyte and Skeleton Crew Two new Star Wars series on Disney +. I still love all things Star Wars, but both of these were disappointing.
11. You Would Do It Too The first few episodes of this show were great. An armed robbery on a bus in Barcelona goes wrong, and ends with the three robbers dead at the hands of a vigilante. None of the survivors on the bus will say anything to the police to help them identify who the vigilante is. By the end the series takes several twists and ends up being more melodrama than the tight thriller that the opening episodes promised.
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