The Best of the Rest: 2024 in Film

The Oscar nominees have been announced, and the final sprint to Academy glory has begun. But what about all the other movies that were left hanging? Fear not! I saw plenty of films whose names weren’t called last week, and plenty of them are worth your time:

High-Wattage Star Power:

Challengers (A-): Despite the movie’s obvious pop trappings, I was blown away by the construction of its screenplay, technical craft, performances and intertwining of character and thematic depth. There’s a ton of intrigue in this stupid tennis love triangle that also reveals itself to be a study of the pursuit of perfect competition and how one needs to fully unleash their desires to unlock it. That said, it never strays from its highly entertaining and accessible setting (again, a tennis love triangle) and is totally committed to its aesthetic; film is a visual medium, and director Luca Guadagnino captures every drop of sweat, every flexing muscle, and every fabric of the tennis ball sumptuously and thrillingly.

The Bikeriders (B): This long-delayed feature by Mike Nichols is based on a series of photographs of a biker gang in the 1960’s and is appropriately an aesthetically wonderful outing, even if its storytelling is a little slight. You may hear reviews comparing this movie to GoodFellas due to its structure and 60s-set depiction of a masculine world, but this film is far inferior. Nichols does explore the disaffected (and implies a sexually complicated) form of post-Vietnam masculinity that drew these men to find common purpose by defying the law together, and its three leads of Austin Butler, Jodie Comer, and Tom Hardy are terrific, but I was really left wanting. That said, I would immediately recommend this movie to anyone who might be interested based on its description – it’s a very, very solid watch.

Hit Man (B): What a charmer! This is a very fun, low-key crime comedy with an awful lot of great chemistry between its two leads, played by Glen Powell (who also co-wrote the script) and Adria Arjona. There are enough themes around identity, false identity, and assumed identity to prove that this film has something on its mind, though the film feels at war with itself for how seriously it should take itself. Vacillating between low stakes and life-and-death stakes is tricky work that the movie isn’t quite suited for, but for most of its runtime is a loose and fun adult romantic dramedy, the likes of which get rarer by the day.

Babygirl (B): Nicole Kidman takes on her most explicitly daring material in quite some time, that sets its sights on the current moment. Writer/Director Halina Reijn dances her way through narrative threads concerning feminine middle age, sexual fulfillment, and post-#metoo office politics with a mi of satire, suspense, and a twinge of sadness. Even a lean cast and modest production stands as a bitter reflection of our times when it’s this exciting, risky, and yes, risqué.

Twisters (B-): THIS is what blockbusters should be. Sure, not every beat registers and the plotting either gets predictable or a little too out there (the story hinges on our characters developing technology to dissolve tornadoes), but it takes itself seriously and knows what it’s about. My wife was very excited about, and a big fan of, the film’s dedication to a country music soundtrack to reflect its setting, and while that’s not exactly my favorite genre I appreciate how it’s utilized to create an attitude.

The Fall Guy (C+): This remake of a TV show stars Emily Blunt and Ryan Gosling as a film director and stuntman, respectively, who are under pressure to finish a movie and solve the disappearance of the film’s star. The movie absolutely coasts off their chemistry, which is predictably strong, and is on paper a celebration of the craft of filmmaking and the folks who don’t always get the spotlight. However, it looks, feels, and acts like the most rote of all modern blockbusters, which signals a celebration of the wrong stuff for me; a script that’s less wisecracky and action that feels less antic and more practical would have gone far.

Off the Beaten Path

La Chimera (A-) Alice Rohrwacher wrote and directed this Italian/English production that marked Josh O’Connor’s second starring role, and second excellent performance, this year. O’Connor plays a British expat with a penchant for locating tombs to loot, and the story follows his exploits with his crew in pursuit of not just treasure, but the memory of a lost love. It’s a very tender story of grief and moral reckoning with enough stylistic flourish to fit 10 films inside it; by keeping away from the trappings of a crime or adventure film in favor of a character study, Rohrwacher has crafted something special.

The Beast (A-) Perhaps the greatest mindf*** of the year, which is very high praise. Bertrand Bonello spins a romance/horror/drama centered on how two characters (Lea Seydoux and George Mackay) keep colliding across the years as different versions of the same soul. He applies a remarkably flexible style to give each segment a unique feel, but despite the obvious intention revealed through repeated beats and tropes, there is something thrillingly elusive at the heart of this tale. One thing is clear: love and fear are integral to the human experience, and not distant from each other at all.

I Saw the TV Glow (A-) Writer/director Jane Schoenbrun is on the shortlist of young indie filmmakers to watch. Their second feature film saw them expand their exploration of the transfixing and alienating effects of mass media found in We’re All Going to the World’s Fair and broadening their scope to spin not just a trans metaphor for the ages, but one of the most brutally isolating coming-of-age stories I’ve ever seen. Their experience with gender identity need not be ours for us to tap into this movie; it is utterly transfixing, occasionally creepy, but suffocatingly heartbreaking through and through.

Evil Does Not Exist (B+) Ryusuke Hamaguchi’s followup to Drive My Car, a critical success with Western Audiences, winner of Academy Awards, and among my favorite films of the young decade, is far less immediately accessible yet thoroughly rich. The story, of a corporation encroaching on a small and nature-centered community, operates more as an excuse for Hamaguchi to unleash powerful and foreboding visual poetry that is as effective as any traditional plot-forward endeavor.

Hundreds of Beavers (B+) Gosh, what a gem. This romp is a stylized, black and white, rudimentary looking (though genuinely sophisticated) story of a furtrapper in the colonial Northwest who must kill hundreds of beavers. One of the film’s many ingenious ideas is that every critter on his target list is played by a human in a full-sized mascot costume, which is never addressed. That’s just a taste of the deceptively stupid humor at play in this celebration of all things slapstick; the joy here is as pure as it gets.

Love Lies Bleeding (B): The second feature from Rose Glass is a scummy, psychedelic noir story with a real nasty edge and dark streak of humor to it. The white trash 80’s setting and tonality evoke the Coen’s debut Blood Simple, while Ed Harris’ supporting turn as the villainous Lou Sr. feels dropped out of a Tarantino movie; however, this film maintains enough of a unique vision to be something truly original. It’s bizarre, alluring, sexy, repulsive, and overall, just radical if a bit slight.

Solid Recommendations:

Rebel Ridge (B): If I was giving out awards, this movie would be my most pleasantly surprising of the year. I came away from Amazon’s The Underground Railroad struck by Aaron Pierre but never would have expected him to ascend to action star; based on this film, more studios ought to take notice. Writer/Director/Editor Jeremy Saulnier more than capably spins the tale of a rogue highly trained professional martial artist taking on a corrupt small-town sheriff’s department that touches on real life injustices of asset forfeiture with a racial context that makes it extremely topical. This film also just delivers the bareknuckled goods, with the audience rallying behind each of hero Terry’s small victories. If there’s a thinking man’s beat-‘em-up, this is it.

Furiosa (B): The long-awaited prequel to 2015’s Mad Max: Fury Road is already primed for reclamation, since it failed at the US box office and was deemed a disappointment. Writer/director George Miller spun a sprawling saga of revenge that embraced a mythic type of storytelling and expanded on the lore of the Wasteland, and the comparative “slowness” informed the filmmaking – even in its action scenes, shots are dragged out over an impossible amount of time. While I ding this film for sacrificing its central story in favor of telling the Tale of the Wasteland, some of the film’s key sequences, its protracted final chapter, and Chris Hemsworth’s liberated and deranged performance have stayed with me. Witness!!!

Juror #2 (B) An easy recommendation for fans of courtroom dramas and murder mysteries, this latest outing from Clint Eastwood feels flung out of a different era. Nicholas Hoult stars as the eponymous juror who realizes within minutes of the trial starting that he may have been involved in the death at the center of the trial. What follows is a character study that is well-paced, well-acted, pretty well-written, and as always, capably mounted by Eastwood. The question of “what happened” gets answered very early; the more nagging questions of “what to do now” and “what’s the right thing” power the remainder of the runtime.

Civil War (B): Due to its subject matter and release in an election year, this was always going to be one of the more notable films of 2024; I just wish it was better. Alex Garland wrote and directed this film that follows a group of journalists following the rebel army’s final push to Washington D.C., and while he conjures up some arresting imagery and powerful sequences, his film is both packed with ideas but devoid of any conclusions. I appreciate the use of an Apocalypse Now structure featuring road trip stops that reveal different facets of the conflict, and that in this film they’re basically all just war crimes, but that’s basically all this film has to say about war. This film doesn’t even have anything to say about journalism, painting its characters as both thrill-seekers and deadened parasites out to capture the ultimate shot; having it both ways means having it none.

Snack Shack (B-): Coming of age dramedies of genuine quality feel rarer and rarer. Writer/Director Adam Rehmeier clearly intended to capture the feeling of growing up in America’s heartland in the early 90’s, and while he delivers fresh enough dialogue to make good on this, he abandons the fresh energy of the opening 30-40 minutes to deliver a frustratingly conventional “indie” approach. The performances are mostly strong (Labelle is on fire), the music choices are a result of too much obvious worship at the altar of Scorsese, and the filmmaking is overall sturdy.

Monkey Man (B-): Star Dev Patel delivered a very stylish, very uneven debut that still gives me hope he’ll get behind the camera again. This is a bare-knuckled action story that’s got some excellent sequences but suffers from pacing and plotting issues. I appreciate its thematic boldness confronting real-life marginalization that occurs in India…in the second half, where the movie reframes itself around them. A few things I can say with confidence: Dev Patel can carry an action film as a star, can mount a production like this behind the camera, and should get another shot.

Thanks for the Effort:

Megalopolis (C): Francis Ford Coppola, he of The Godfather and Apocalypse Now fame, self-financed this passion project he had been longing to make for nearly his whole career, and the result is one of the most baffling things I’ve seen in a long time. An absolutely loaded cast featuring Adam Driver takes on a half-baked sci-fi story set in “New Rome”, an alternate version of New York City that serves as a satirical version of our own reality. Occasionally in this misfire, Coppola pulls out all the filmmaking stops and left me awed; most of the time, my awe was inspired by the script whose incoherence – and stunningly bluntly poor dialogue – is already destined for future cult reclamation.

Horizon: Chapter 1 (C): Kevin Costner’s long-gestating, mostly self-financed epic four-part saga of 19th-century westward expansion kicks off with something of a misfire for me. It’s three hours long and episodically kicks off three different plotlines, so each really feels like the first hour of a six-hour series; if he gets to complete the project, and I hope he does, as a 12-hour experience this may prove to be worth it. As it stands, this three-hour installment hardly feels like a movie, though it does feature lovely photography, a few well-mounted scenes, and decent performances.

Drive-Away Dolls (C): This slight, breezy outing by Ethan Coen is a fun hang without much depth. It’s a story of two lesbian friends traveling south at the end of 1999 when they accidentally become mixed up with a criminal plot revolving around a scandalous mysterious briefcase. It’s light in tone and awful light in depth, and yet I wouldn’t be shocked if it became a cult classic film one day, assuming someone will curate midnight screenings of it.