Top 10 Movies of 2024

Let's celebrate the best of a strange year

Hello! I’m back! I hope all the readers have had a wonderful Christmas and New Year. 2024 was a weird year for me to say the least and a lot of the films I saw in this year reflect a certain time and place in my life. So today, I decided to count down my ten favorite movies of last year! I saw 90 movies from the calendar year so I feel more than qualified now to make the list. There’s a few movies I haven’t seen, but atlas if I ever talk about those I’ll simply say they were one of my favorite movies of this said year.

To start with, I have two categories. The runner ups and the honorable mentions. Honorable mentions go to films that would ABSOLUTELY make my end of the year list if they were considered released in this calendar year. For me, that prize goes to Pablo Berger’s excellent animated film Robot Dreams.

Robot Dreams is one of the sweetest and most genuine films about connection, loss and moving on I’ve ever seen. This is a film that has no dialogue but is able to convey so much emotion in 90 minutes. If you’ve ever seen the underwater episode of Bojack Horseman, it’s like that feature length. This is a movie I didn’t get to see until this year, but it technically was nominated for best animated feature for the Oscars awarding films released in 2023. It is a film that would easily make my top five of this year, for it genuinely helped me in a really difficult time in my life where I experienced a similar connection and loss that the Dog and Robot do here. So this movie is an all timer for me and one that I cannot recommend strongly enough.

Let’s now go onto the runner ups. These are films that I loved but atlas could not quite crack the top ten. All of these I considered putting on the list at some point- and all are worthy as being discussed as some of the years best films.

These movies include Saturday Night, a wonderful slice of life vignette of the opening night of Saturday Night Live, Look Back, an emotional and aspirational anime film, Nickel Boys, a towering achievement of a movie, A Complete Unknown, which almost made this list, I loved this movie’s atmosphere and look at a transitional point in music history with a career best performance by Timothee Chalamet and Inside Out 2, which I think is another great film from the Pixar library that really emotionally resonated with me - but maybe too much.

Now, onto the top ten!

10. Wicked (dir. Jon M. Chu)

There’s a few movies a year you can say captured the movie zeitgeist and completely took over the cultural conversation, and Wicked is certainly one of the biggest films of last year. Being a huge fan of the original Broadway musical, I’ve been skeptical of a film adaptation of Wicked for years because how are you supposed to capture the scale and intimacy of the original musical on the big screen? The relationship one makes with live theatre vs film is a totally different experience and a lot of musical adaptations fail to understand this distinction. Thankfully, director Jon M. Chu decides to take a purely filmic approach to the source material. The emotions here are a little more nuanced and the film takes its time to establish time and place. With lavish production design, beautiful renditions of these timeless songs and great performances from Cythia Erivo and Ariana Grande, this movie totally won me over in the end. I chose it in this spot because to be entirely honest, I was just so relived by how much I liked the film and how much it won me over despite my initial hesitations. I’m really excited to see what part two brings.

9. Nosferatu (dir. Robert Eggers)

Nosferatu was easily one of my most anticipated films of last year. Director Robert Eggers has continued to impress me with his filmography. When I heard he was attached to make a new Nosferatu remake, I was instantly sold. Eggers continued to deliver on what he is known for. Nosferatu is an eerie, atmospheric film with impeccable production design and haunting cinematography. The way Eggers is able to adapt this story and make it feel more modern while never loosing the timely feel is a stroke of genius. The film is genuinely unnerving and the thematics, making a story about a woman struggling for her own autonomy is more relevant now than it ever has been. Lily Rose-Depp gives an amazing performance, she should be in contention for this years award season. She is able to channel some of the depth in Isabelle Adjani’s performance from the 1981 cult classic film Possession and that’s the highest compliment I could give a performance. This film captures gothic romance atmosphere at it’s finest and I found it to be one of scariest movies of last year - whenever Eggers makes a movie it’s almost guaranteed it’ll show up on my best of the year list.

8. Dune Part 2 (dir. Denis Villenueve)

Before making this list, I was thinking that maybe 2024 was a more underwhelming year for movies. That is until I realized how many movies did make an impact on me, it was just a weird year to contextualize a lot of them for me. Dune Part 2 is certainly one of those movies. This movie came out in February of last year, genuinely a time in my life I desperately needed the escapism movies bring. Dune Part 2 was also consistently the only interesting thing playing in theatres, so I saw this movie three times in cinemas. It’s almost three hours long - but the visual fantasia this movie was by the third time I watched it, it just felt like a nice embrace of amazing visual nirvana juxtaposed with euphoric sound. This movie just made me feel a lot of things, even outside the context of the story and characters. Thankfully, the movie is a lot more than just pure eye candy, it’s also a deep story that’s a dissection of faith and the scary paths one can take for power. How the road to hell is paved with good intentions. It’s a towering epic of a movie and a total cinematic achievement, I liked it even more than the first installment which I also loved. I am ready for the third film, it’s great when blockbuster epics are masterfully crafted like this one is.

7. A Real Pain (dir. Jessie Eisenberg)

A Real Pain is a movie that will always resonate with me when reflecting back on the year 2024. I watched the film first at virtual Sundance Film Festival in January, the night of one of the most memorable days of my entire life. To be honest, it was such an insane “feels like I was in a movie” type of days that it did distract me a bit from getting the full impact of A Real Pain, but I did enjoy the movie. I saw the movie again when it came out in theatres this Fall, in a completely different place in my life (emotionally and physically)- I had first watched the movie in my room in Davenport Florida and that fall was watching it at my local movie theatre in Springfield Missouri. The movie, about two cousins meeting up to mourn their grandmother in a tour through Poland- felt like it met me at the exact right spot it needed to. A Real Pain is a movie about grief, it’s about being there for someone because you see the good in them - even if they can be a bit much. If you ever cared about someone so much that it hurts, this movie will resonate with you. It also gave me a new appreciation for where I was in life because simply, the real pain is that we don’t have things figured out and we are all learning and growing and that looks messy a lot of the time. Through a layered and introspective screenplay written by Eisenberg and two of the best performances of the year by Eisenberg and Kieran Culkin, A Real Pain is one of the most authentic movies I saw in 2024 and one that will always hold a special place for me.

6. Memoir of a Snail (dir. Adam Elliot)

I’ve seen Memoir of a Snail twice now and the first time watching it, I just thought “why am I doing this to myself”? Not because the movie was bad, it’s a wonderful film, but it’s one of the most depressing movies I’ve ever seen. The film however, offers up one of the most cathartic endings I’ve seen in a movie this year. This movie might have been my biggest cry of 2024, but, getting to that final resolution is hard. However, Adam Elliot does a terrific job finding humor in the darkest of places. In worse hands, the way Elliot implements humor into a film with this dark of subject matter could have felt really insensitive- but he finds it as a way to bring a bit of breathing room into this story. I love his quirky sense of humor and the pathos he is able to find in his eccentric characters. It’s also nice to see adult animation being embraced, animation is not a genre but an art form that can convey even the darkest (and most hopeful) aspects of the human condition. This film has a monologue in it that is one of my favorite moments of any movie this year. One of those moments that gave me goosebumps because of what was being conveyed, that sometimes despite what life throws at us we are the ones that keep ourselves in the biggest glass jars. Snails don’t go over their tracks, they keep moving forward. What a lovely piece of filmmaking. 2024 was a terrific year for animation, this and another animated movie made this list that I will talk about later on.

5. Hundreds of Beavers (dir. Mike Cheslik)

Hundreds of Beavers is not only the best comedy I’ve seen this decade, it’s one of the best comedies I’ve ever seen period. This is one of the funniest movies I’ve ever seen. Seeing this in a packed audience at the Enzian Theatre in Maitland Florida is one of the single greatest movie going experiences I had this year. Hundreds of Beavers is a complete and total triumph. This movie is an hour and forty minute black and white slapstick epic that has no dialogue in it. You can tell the film is inspired by the likes of Buster Keaton, Charlie Chaplin and Tex Avery and contextualizes these influences in the modern day seamlessly. This incredibly low budget film doesn’t feel like it should even exist, it’s genuinely a miracle this movie got made. It has such a campy sense of humor but as a piece of filmmaking, it’s one of the most audacious movies I’ve seen in quite sometime. It’s directed and edited to perfection. This movie is the definition of a fun time but is also one of the most inspirational movies I saw last year as an aspiring filmmaker myself. It’ll be on regular rotation for me for the rest of my life.

4. The Beast (dir. Bertrand Bonello)

The Beast came out at the Toronto International Film Festival in 2023 and I had a few people tell me, “this is absolutely a movie you will love” and one of my biggest regrets now is not catching it at that film festival on the big screen. I saw the film when it premiered on the Criterion Channel this year and haven’t been able to stop thinking about it since. This is one of the densest movies I’ve seen in quite sometime. The subject matter is heavy and the surreal nature of the film only adds to the films feeling of disassociation. The film feels like this generations Inland Empire, the type of movie David Lynch would make if he was able to direct right now. For that reason alone, I fell for it fast. The production design is lush and the films visual language left me in a state of hypnosis. The film is a darker take on a film like Charlie Kauffman’s Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. The film explores AI, which sees human emotion as a threat. It finds itself in the mind of a woman named Gabrielle, who is trying to purge any strong feelings from her past lives so she can be the purest version of herself. This leads down one of the darkest and most existential odysseys I saw on film this year. This movie is creepy, subversive and fascinating. It’s a movie about the fear of desire and how that can corrupt the mind and how self actualization could truly become the mind killer. It’s a film I would love to dissect even more at some point but it’s one that stayed with me long after it was over and I think it’s the most overlooked film of this year.

3. The Wild Robot (dir. Chris Sanders)

Recent years have had me in a bit of a weird spot when it comes to animated movies. Growing up, I always wanted to work for Disney and even more specifically Pixar. The early 2000’s run of Pixar films is the reason I’m even writing this post right now and the reason I wanted to get into film in the first place. That being said, in recent years it feels like creativity has dried up in the Disney company and a lot of their films feel more like cooperate products instead of someone having a genuine idea for a movie. Meanwhile, Dreamworks, which I always saw as the second rate animation studio that occasionally made a really good movie has been on a string of making really artistically sound pieces of filmmaking that have really connected with me. First with Puss in Boots The Last Wish, my favorite animated film of the decade and now with The Wild Robot. One of the last great original Disney films was made over twenty years ago and it was called Lilo and Stitch (I’m sure you’ve heard of it). The film was directed by Chris Sanders, who went on to develop another movie called Bolt, but his idea for the film was so subversive they rejected it and he left the company and joined Dreamworks, creating another classic you’ve probably heard of, How to Train Your Dragon. I give you all of this background to set up the fact that Chris Sanders is one of my personal heroes, How to Train Your Dragon is one of my favorite movies so my expectations for Wild Robot were high. I saw this movie at it’s world premiere in Toronto Canada and immediately knew that we had a classic on our hands. The Wild Robot is the single best looking CGI animated movie I’ve ever seen. Every single frame in this movie feels like a masterpiece. Along with this films incredible aesthetic appeal is a moving story about motherhood. This is only a movie that will grow on me the older I get and one day when I become a father it will hold a lot more weight with me as well. It is a film about how we really aren’t programmed to be a certain thing - we all contain multitudes. It’s one of the best family movies in recent years and another example of how animated movies can both resonate with kids and adults alike, and that this isn’t just a genre but an art form for expression.

2. I Saw the TV Glow (dir. Jane Schoenbrun)

I first saw I Saw the TV Glow at the screening at SXSW Festival in Austin Texas. To say I was knocked out by it would be an understatement. There’s very few films that have moved me and inspired me more than this masterpiece. The film has become divisive, which I saw coming from the moment I saw it. Jane Schoenbrun isn’t making a traditional horror movie here. A lot of I Saw the TV Glow is unsettling and haunting - but grounded in true emotional trauma. I feel like I Saw the TV Glow is this generation’s Donnie Darko, which later got it’s own cult appraisal I believe this film will receive as well. This films retro grade aesthetic making it feel like the most eerie Nickelodeon 90’s show you’ve ever seen instantly hooked me. I felt transported by this film, like at points I was floating. I believe if you’ve ever felt lost in your own identity, not quite understanding your place in the world and connect deeply to pieces of media that have helped ground you in an uncertain world- I Saw the TV Glow will resonate with you on some level. It’s a very emotional movie I believe could help a lot of people understand they are not alone and one day they will discover their own identity - whatever that means on their terms. The film has been interpreted as a trans allegory since the director themselves is in that community and I certainly see the film resonating with that community. I think the beautiful thing about the film however, is it’s messages of isolation and the struggle for connection - feeling like at times you are outside of your own stream of consciousness is a universal theme. This film is the horror equivalent to a film like Sofia Coppola’s Lost in Translation, a film about a time in life where you feel like you are floating- not quite knowing where to go next. That time of uncertainty in life is scary and I haven’t seen a film perfectly capture that and how so many of us have a deep connection to the “tv glow” for that particular reason. This film will always hold a special place in my heart, and it’s an all time favorite for me. I said walking out of the screening for it at SXSW that “the film of the year came early” and it remained my film of the year for a large part of the year but atlas, another film I saw completely floored me.

1. The Brutalist (dir. Brady Corbet)

I saw The Brutalist at this years Toronto International Film Festival. It was one I debated even seeing at the festival since the film was a whopping three and a half hours long with a fifteen minute intermission. I love a great long film, but in Toronto you are already seeing so many movies I wondered if I could even fit it in my schedule. I ran to an eight am critics screening of the film and I was completely engrossed the whole time. The Brutalist is so engaging that I didn’t feel the runtime at all. The Brutalist is one of the boldest, largest and most epic movies to hit the big screen. This is the type of movie akin to classics like Gone with the Wind and Lawrence of Arabia that we don’t see much of nowadays. The movie is about an architect Laszlo (played by Adrien Brody in a career best performance), a holocaust survivor who flees to America to achieve his American Dream - to develop the brutalist architecture. When he meets a wealthy client who sees his vision, we see what happens when capitalism and greed corrupt the American dream and the human spirit. The Brutalist is a movie about the human spirit and about the blood, sweat and tears it takes to see your vision actualized. This film goes into some dark and emotional places I won’t spoil here but it’s a heavy movie. The grit and realism of the film - the themes of how heartless capitalistic structures can corrupt the human condition reminds me of Paul Thomas Anderson’s opus There Will Be Blood but the films spirit of awe through the eyes of a wide eyes protagonist is akin to the Frank Capra classic It’s a Wonderful Life. It’s a harrowing, gargantuan epic of a movie that reminded me why I love the theatrical experience in the first place. I walked out of the theatre like I was floating. Instead of feeling deflated after sitting for so long, I felt passionate and excited about the future of cinema. This movie made me excited about movies again, in an incredibly hard year for me this movie taught me one thing, sometimes it isn’t about the journey as much as it is about the destination. This film reminded me why this medium is so important, so we can continue to tell great stories about the human condition and understand the broader world around us. The Brutalist is the definition of a masterpiece and it is not only my favorite film of this year, but it is also one of my favorite movies of all time.

That is my list! What are some of your favorite movies this year? Write them in the comments below and make sure to subscribe for more articles in the new year!