This was always going to be an odd year.
Following the 2023 SAG-AFTRA strikes, the effects on films and television in active production were both immediate and noticeable. Questions surrounding the use of generative AI (GenAI) as a tool remained a hot topic, with its presence felt in everything from Robert Zemeckis’ Here—with its reliance on de-aging technology—to the interstitials in the horror film Late Night with the Devil. Nine of the top ten grossing films at the US domestic box office were sequels. (Wicked is the other one — but it’s only Act One, after all!)
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Despite these challenges, there were still some bright spots. The mid-budget theatrical film, once thought lost to the era of streaming, staged a quiet comeback with gems like Love Lies Bleeding, I Saw the TV Glow, and The Substance earning devoted followings.
Meanwhile, at the blockbuster end of the spectrum, some massive swings led to both hits and misses. Among the hits, Disney-Pixar’s Inside Out 2 became the highest-grossing animated film of all time. On the other hand, bold gambles like Francis Ford Coppola’s Megalopolis and Kevin Costner’s multipart Horizon saga aimed high but ultimately failed to connect with audiences. Cinema is having a definite moment.
As we approach the year’s end, I’ve put together a list of my favourites from the past 12 months. As I say every year, if it’s not here, it’s either because I haven’t seen it, it didn’t get a local release or it didn’t resonate with me as much as it did with others. My full ranked list of over 160 new releases is available on Letterboxd, so feel free to follow and share your thoughts there.
The Top
Challengers
Luca Guadagnino’s Challengers skillfully blends desire, mystery, and competition into a gripping exploration of love, set against the unlikely backdrop of tennis. From the dissonant, pounding score by Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross to the emotionally charged matches that substitute for traditional sex scenes, the film pulses with tension. Guadagnino and writer Justin Kuritzkes keep audiences guessing as layers of the characters unfold, while standout performances from Zendaya and O’Connor elevate the drama. Culminating in an intense final match, the film offers a sweet release with its closing embrace, leaving us both satisfied and reflective. Read my full review.
Inside Out 2
It’s hard to imagine a more heartfelt or warmly told exploration of anxiety and mental health than this. Building on the excellent foundation of its predecessor, Disney/Pixar delivers one of their finest films in years, effortlessly swinging between imaginative fantasy and grounded emotional moments—who else could create a film where the central goal is the establishment of a sense of self? (Favourite line: “Anxiety’s got you all chained to desks drawing nightmares.” Representing these issues on screen is crucial for audiences of all ages). In less than a decade, the animation has reached staggering new heights—shifting from photorealism to outlandish style, while embracing a conscious bricolage of influences to nod to both the past and future of the medium. I’m at risk of gushing, but this is truly something special.
I Saw the TV Glow
Jane Schoenbrun’s I Saw the TV Glow is a haunting psychological horror that intertwines 90s pop culture nostalgia with a deeply personal allegory for the transgender experience and the complexities of coming out. Through themes of identity and visibility, the film subtly incorporates motifs of pink, blue, and white—echoing the transgender flag—to underscore its message, making it a rare and poignant exploration of such experiences on screen. Drawing inspiration from Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me and Donnie Darko, it follows two students whose shared obsession with a mysterious TV show fractures as their lives take increasingly divergent paths. Justice Smith delivers a standout performance as time and reality unravel in a film that feels destined for repeat analysis. Read my full review.
The Substance
Quite possibly the audience favourite of the set if social media is anything to go by. Coralie Fargeat’s The Substance delves into the dark side of Hollywood’s obsession with youth and beauty, particularly the industry’s marginalisation of ageing actresses. The film follows Elisabeth Sparkle (Demi Moore), an Academy Award-winning actress turned TV aerobics instructor, who, after being fired on her 50th birthday, discovers a mysterious drug that creates a perfect, younger version of herself. With sharp body horror and pointed social commentary, the film critiques unattainable beauty standards while exploring Elisabeth’s painful descent into self-doubt and obsession with her idealised counterpart. Read my full review.
Love Lies Bleeding
You know when a movie completely floors you because you didn’t see any of it coming? Love Lies Bleeding is that film. From the moment Clint Mansell’s haunting soundtrack pulls you into a moodily lit scene, this film has its claws deep in you. Surprising on nearly every level, the two impeccable lead performances (backed by stellar supporting turns) anchor director Rose Glass and co-writer Weronika Tofilska’s gripping narrative. It’s chilling, violent, fantastical, and utterly unpredictable—especially that ending. Sidebar: at this point, Dave Franco is getting way too good at playing complete pieces of crap.
All We Imagine Is Light
From the overlapping voices at the start of Payal Kapadia’s film, Mumbai is beautifully framed as a place of introspection amidst its chaotic vibrancy. The city’s transient nature is reflected in both the voices and the bustling nightlife, inviting deep contemplation. Cinematography by Ranabir Das enhances this immersive experience. The intimate narrative centres on two contrasting characters: nurse Prabha (Kani Kusruti), whose unspoken desires simmer beneath the surface, and her more openly free-spirited roommate Anu (Divya Prabha). Their journey to a beachside village allows them to explore their desires away from the city’s pressures. With a dreamlike conclusion that resists easy resolutions, the film suggests that sometimes, embracing the illusion is the only way to preserve sanity. Read my full review.
Bird
Andrea Arnold transports us into the world of 12-year-old Bailey (Nykiya Adams), living with her single father Bug (Barry Keoghan) and brother Hunter (Jason Buda) in North Kent. As her father’s impending marriage to Debs (Joanne Matthews) pushes Bailey into rebellion, her life takes a turn with the arrival of Bird (Franz Rogowski), a mysterious free spirit who draws her into unexpected places. Like Arnold’s earlier works, especially Fish Tank, BIRD explores complex relationships between youth and distracted parents, with Adams’ standout performance at the heart of a film grounded in raw emotion and heightened by moments of magical realism. Rogowski’s impish Bird and Keoghan’s well-meaning, chaotic Bug bring life to the story, while Robbie Ryan’s cinematography captures both the harshness and beauty of the world Arnold so vividly creates. Read my full review.
Nosferatu
Over 100 years after F.W. Murnau’s Nosferatu, Robert Eggers draws on this rich visual tradition to craft something uniquely his own, paying homage to the past while forging fresh ground in Bram Stoker’s vampire mythos. The German Expressionism of Murnau is evident in the stark black-and-white tones that occasionally burst into splashes of colour. It’s there as Orlok’s shadowy fingers stretch across a patchwork cityscape and in the jagged staircases and skewed angles, evoking the 1922 designs of artist Albin Grau. As the film races towards its dawn conclusion, the grotesqueries of vampiric imagination are thrust into the light of day, exposing their absurdity alongside their terror—cementing Gothic horror firmly back at the top of the cinematic mantle where it belongs. Read my full review.
The Wild Robot
Echoing the Ugly Duckling narrative that Chris Sanders often favours, the story of this film weaves in a powerful message about nurture versus nature, chosen families, and the profound impact they can have on one’s life. The animation is stunning, with a hand-painted, deliberately “unfinished” look that creates a rich, warm environment—inviting and full of life. With nods to the original books, Miyazaki, and even Pixar’s earlier works, this is a world we just want to linger in. It’s mind-boggling that DreamWorks is making something like this while shifting away from their in-house production model, but quality animation—especially of this calibre—is expensive!
Dune Part 2
Despite a long-held belief that Dune was unfilmable, Denis Villeneuve proved quite the opposite in 2021. It wasn’t just that previous filmmakers hadn’t understood the premise or had access to the right level of special effects; they perhaps lacked the capacity to give the material the breathing space it needed. The intricacies of building not just a narrative but an entire mythology are daunting for any storyteller. Bringing Frank Herbert’s vision to screen has vexed many filmmakers before Villeneuve, and will no doubt continue to challenge future remakes and reimaginings. Still, the boldness of a film that questions the very foundations of prophecy, religion, and holy wars will not be lost on viewers in 2024. Read my full review.
The best of the rest
Megalopolis
Francis Ford Coppola has taken some big swings in his career, resulting in colossal misses and certified classics in unequal measure. This might be the biggest swing of them all—a collision of sound, vision, and existential ideas. It doesn’t all work, but it also somehow works perfectly, which may be the enigma that we’ll be unpicking long after this gnarled branch we call civilisation has withered off the tree of life. Coppola’s willingness to experiment on a scale this grand after sixty years of filmmaking is something I continue to admire, especially in a film that combines the canvas of a blockbuster with the intimacy of live installation art. If this is his swan song, then it is surely one for the greatest hits package. Read my full review.
Horizon: An American Saga – Part 1
It’s hard to recommend something that’s only part of a grander story, but one has to admire the sheer perspiration of it all. It’s the very antithesis of modern event filmmaking, stubbornly refusing to lay out everything at once and gently asking us to return for more every six months or so. It’s going to be wonderful witnessing Costner manifest his own destiny regardless of how it all turns out. As of December 2024, the second chapter is yet to have a non-festival release. Read my full review.
Memoir of a Snail
How can something so bleak be so uplifting? The answer, of course, is Adam Elliot, who has cornered the market on exactly this kind of tale. In his inimitable, painstaking stop-motion style, Elliot presents another character whose woes shape them but don’t define them, driving the story forward with a mix of humour and heartbreak. I can’t help but feel a certain Australian pride in seeing ‘Chiko roll’ added to the global vernacular.
Monkey Man
A studio release from a first-time director with a $10 million budget, predominantly in Hindi, shouldn’t feel like such a rarity—but Patel’s ferocious debut defies expectations with staggering confidence. While it’s tempting to draw comparisons to established action franchises, as many have done with the John Wick series, Monkey Man stands apart precisely because of what it dares to do differently. It’s a rare action film with a distinct point of view, weaving culture into the very fabric of the narrative rather than relegating it to a decorative backdrop. The result is as exhilarating as it is devastating, delivering a gut punch that lingers long after the credits roll.
Look Back
This isn’t just another animated film. Kiyotaka Oshiyama has delivered a beautifully crafted story about the enduring nature of art and friendship that happens to be animated. The joy of finding someone who matches and jumpstarts your creative energy will resonate with every artist. When the narrative takes a tragic turn, a brief Sliding Doors moment reveals the lasting impact of our connections along the way.
Kinds of Kindness
Yorgos Lanthimos delivers of a triptych of his idiosyncratic weirdness, assembling his troupe of actors to do what they do best. It will be really interesting to see if these twisted tales stand up to repeat viewings. The second and third stories in particular land on such singular points of semi-shock that it will be almost impossible to replicate them. Read my full review.
Nickel Boys
This one admittedly took me longer to connect with than expected, largely due to the unique first-person POV photography, the film’s length and lyrical abstraction that RaMell Ross employs. Yet Colson Whitehead’s novels—from The Underground Railroad to Harlem Shuffle—are always filled with richly layered characters, and it’s hard to imagine a better way of translating that prose into visual form. Through the snapshot portrait of memory, we witness decades of institutional hardship and the unshakable bonds of friendship. The documentary elements, the statistics, and the recollections serve to “give witness,” as adult Elwood puts it.
Eephus
A heartfelt tribute to America’s pastime and communal experiences sure takes its sweet time — and there’s absolutely nothing wrong with that. The sun may be setting on the fictional Soldier’s Field, yet the game of baseball remains. Read my full review.
Ghostlight
Alex Thompson and Kelly O’Sullivan’s work unfolds at a measured pace, exploring the grieving process of a small family unit with an authenticity that never feels forced. That’s thanks to a strikingly natural family dynamic, with lead Keith Kupferer co-starring alongside his actual daughter, Katherine Mallen Kupferer, and real-life wife, Tara Mallen. It feels like an American version of Ken Loach—with a slightly more hopeful ending.
Struggle Without End (Ka Whawhai Tonu)
Told almost entirely in Te Reo Māori, Michael Jonathan’s film not only articulates the conscious erasure of cultural practices and language by colonisers in Aotearoa New Zealand and beyond, but does so within the setting of an engaging coming of age/war film.
Flow
At its best, animation achieves what live action never could, crafting boundless worlds with real emotions. Without a single line of dialogue, Flow exemplifies this power. Gints Zilbalodis and his team conjure an extraordinary universe from the first breathtaking frames. The blend of computer-generated animation, a watercolour aesthetic, stunning reflections of water and light, and deeply felt characters makes this utterly captivating. As the water rises, so does the tension, each peril and perfection revealed with jaw-dropping artistry around every corner.
Disney Minus journey
For whatever reason, I’m chronologically working my way through all of Disney’s output. Throughout 2023, I’d watched over 300 films the studio put out between 1933 and 1950. This year, I hit the 1950s deluge: features, shorts and the ‘new’ field of television meant that I ‘only’ covered 1950-1961 this year. That equates to around 250 films – but I watched over 200 hours more content than I did the previous year, thanks to an additional 400+ TV episodes and bonus features.
Starting with the short film Wonder Dog (1950), this year I watched Disney return to animated classics like Cinderella, Alice in Wonderland, Sleeping Beauty and 101 Dalmatians. I entered the live action field with Treasure Island and stayed there through a raft of adventure stories, a decade of westerns and on to the Hayley Mills years with Pollyanna and The Parent Trap.
On the small screen, I saw Walt enter the homes of millions on this new invention called television to plug his new endeavour: a theme park in California called Disneyland. The medium made heroes of Davy Crockett and Zorro for a new generation, introduced the Mouseketeers to the world and took viewers into space and beyond.
While my viewing has slowed down a bit thanks to this deluge, I’m looking forward to working my way up to the 70s and 80s next year and inching closer to the Disney of my own childhood. After my next Disney Cruise, of course.
The Future
I had a conversation recently with someone who said there’s no point going to the movies. “It’s all superheroes,” they claimed.
This time last year, I found myself lamenting the endless declarations of cinema’s impending doom. This year, even Forbes chimed in with, “People want the theatrical experience, but they’re building those theaters at home.” Honestly? That tracks with my own post-pandemic habits more than I’d like to admit.
I’ve always argued that the films beyond the studio assembly line are still out there—you just need to dig a little. That said, I’m aware of how much of a privilege it is to say that from the vantage point of a city-dweller with access to festivals, media invites, and voting screeners. Discovering these gems often feels like a scavenger hunt, made easier thanks to platforms like Letterboxd. But for every gem I know to search for, there are countless others hiding further afield.
Looking ahead, though, I find my excitement leaning heavily on franchise fare. Michelle Yeoh leads Star Trek: Section 31, and that alone justifies the hype. Elio shines as one of Disney-Pixar’s increasingly rare original offerings. Bong Joon-ho’s Mickey 17 teams up with Robert Pattinson, and if that’s not a reason to anticipate, what is? Danny Boyle returns to his zombie universe with 28 Years Later, while Mission: Impossible gears up for its massive conclusion in The Final Reckoning.
Throw in James Gunn’s Superman, Maggie Gyllenhaal reimagining James Whale with The Bride!, Edgar Wright tackling The Running Man, and Yorgos Lanthimos remixing Save the Green Planet! under the moniker Bugonia, and 2025 looks like a cinematic feast.
As for me, The Reel Bits continues to be just one slice of the things I do. Next year, I plan to embrace more work-life balance, explore new places, and give myself permission to slow down.
See you at the cinema—or wherever you build it.
