Top 20 Best Films Of 2023

While 2023 was a turbulent and stressful year for the film industry… it was also a fantastic year for the movies. It built on the momentum from 2022, when blockbusters came back with a vengeance after the lockdowns, and showed a lot of filmmakers going bigger and even taking some genuine risks. Not just delivering big-screen spectacle but actually pushing what certain genres were capable of conveying. What’s more, quite a few filmmakers that I’ve been ragging on for years like Eli Roth, Will Gluck, Guy Ritchie, and Tim Story redeemed themselves with some quality productions this year. Hell, I even got over my problems with David F. Sandberg; regardless of how disastrous that film turned out, this felt like a year where grudges could be forgotten and we were all working towards better days.

It was also a landmark year for yours truly, although if you were going just by what I put up on here, that might require some explanation. FilmInk kept me good and busy through the year, giving me more work than any other year previous, and… honestly, that I got given so many big-name features to look at (quite a few of which will show up on this list) was a solid reassurance that my editor trusted me to get this shit right.

Also, I finally met one of my personal goals and got one of my write-ups up on the review wall at the Dendy Newtown, a cinema I frequent and that tends to have the better selection of all of the cinemas in my ‘area’ (it’s still a bit of a trek from here in the suburbs).

So, as a last hurrah for a pretty damn good year for both myself and the artistic field I’ve dedicated my time to examining, let’s take a gander at my picks for the Top 20 Best Films of 2023. But first…

Top 20 Worst Films Of 2023

2023 was a very turbulent year for the film industry. In an event that I wouldn’t be surprised if it was the basis for its own movie later on down the line, the impeding threat of artificial intelligence on people who actually work to create things led both of the major Hollywood unions, the Writers Guild of America and the Screen Actors Guild, to jointly go on strike. Deals have since been struck, but between codifying the frankly surreal situation that the industry is in right now post-COVID, and the delays and marketing muffles that resulted from the strikes, it’s a situation that will likely ripple out into 2024 and beyond.

That defining moment goes some way to explain how weird the bad moments of the year had gotten (not saying that media creatives wanting a fair wage and job security is a bad thing, but them being in the position of needing to negotiate for them sure as fuck is). Films with decent and even high expectations fell short, filmmakers try to go big and just wound up embarrassing themselves, and fan-favourite franchises, IPs, and even entire sub-genres hit such a low point that I found myself completely souring on them. Truly, this was a time of sudden, jarring changes.

Compared to last year’s list, there’s also more entries on here that go beyond mere dissatisfaction and right into active irritation and even anger at times, meaning that quite a bit of what’s on here is likely worse than what showed up there. So, let’s join together and flip off the previous year’s trash as it shrinks in the rear view, with a look at my picks for the Top 20 Worst Films of 2023.

Top 20 Best Films Of 2022

2022 was when blockbusters felt big again. Not just being cynically marketed as blockbusters and event releases, but being designed and built from the ground-up as features meant to be seen on the big screen. While cinemas have been slowly starting to open back up over the latter months of 2021, now they were starting to get the right kind of material to bring audiences back. Sure, some of it came in the form of bog-standard fare that made an impact just because they reminiscent of the norm pre-COVID, like rom-coms, period dramas, and B-action flicks, but a lot of the better films of this year, and indeed a good amount of the entries on this list, had the sense of grandeur that made going back to the cinemas worth doing, regardless of whoever else may or may not be in attendance.

Hell, even beyond the return of the spectacle on the big screen, when they were able to break the general air of disappointment that kept invading the year’s releases, 2022 provided a lot of amazing stories and experiences. Directors behind some terrific work in previous years returned to show off new high points in their respective careers, niche genres and filmmaking styles got to share in the mainstream spotlight, and that Self-Insert theme that spread through so much of the year’s worst films? Even that led to some great works of cinematic art.

So, to round off our look at a pretty damn good year for the movies, here are my pick for the 20 best films of 2022.

Top 20 Worst Films Of 2022

2022 saw the world slowly start to return to normal (or whatever can be considered ‘normal’ for us nowadays) after COVID threw everything out of whack across 2020 and 2021. Public spaces were opening back up, the collective mood was much less dire, and the cinemas were bringing back the big tentpole blockbusters that usually mark the year as it passes. At a time when the life expectancy of the physical cinema was beginning to look like it’s on its death knell, between streaming and their closure during lockdown, film releases began to feel like events again. And on top of that, some of those event releases turned out really damn good, and we’ll absolutely be looking at a few of those when we get to the Best Of list.

Of course, with that return to normalcy also came the return of the usual bleh-ness of mainstream cinema, where a lot of the year wound up just being ‘okay’ or slightly-less-than, and I say that as someone who still liked most of what I saw this year. There was a larger amount of disappointment to the year’s produce as well, where I found myself really looking forward to films that wound up falling short.

Hell, this might be the first time I actively went out of my way not to watch movies, turning down FilmInk commissions to review Amsterdam and the new Fantastic Beasts sequel because, quite literally, you couldn’t pay me to give any kind of attention to the shitpersons at the heart of those productions. As such, this list won’t be as vitriolic as in past years, since most of what I consider this year’s worst films land more on the underwhelming and disappointing side of things than outright making me angry. Oh, rest assured, some of these still got me riled up, but not nearly as many as I was expecting.

But even with how many I passed on, I still managed to watch enough films to fill up this list. As such, let’s go over my picks for the Top 20 Worst Films Of 2022.

Top 20 Best Films Of 2021

2021 was definitely a disappointing year in a lot of ways, and one of the harder ones to deal with in many others, but honestly… forget how I ended my last list: For all the bad that happened, I’m glad that 2021 happened the way it did. I went through a lot of difficulties with my own work and life situation, true, but the latter half of the year had me reaping the rewards for the previous eleven years’ worth of grinding I’ve put into this little endeavour of mine. Not only did Universal Studios start contacting me directly to go to preview screenings, but I finally stopped being an intern with FilmInk as I have been for the last few years, and became a paid contributor. After spending so long doing all of this, resigning myself to this just being a hobby, I achieved one of my life goals and have made it as a professional writer.

In light of all that, and for as sour as my Worst list turned out, I find it difficult to really hate the last twelve months. As such, rather than doing my usual Best Worst Film Of The Year mention (which, for the second year in a row, went to an After sequel), I’m going to start this off with a quick rundown of ten things (in no particular order) that I loved seeing this year… that aren’t attached to films already in the list proper.

1.       Symbolic BDSM in an R.L. Stine adaptation

2.       Twitter Cinema

3.       Gay Venom

4.       James Wan going completely bugfuck

5.       Hugh Dennis in a James Bond movie

6.       Ridley Scott releasing two of his best films in a single year

7.       Chloé Zhao releasing two of her best films in a single year (Eternals was fucking brilliant, I don’t care what anyone else says)

8.       In a sea of nostalgia bait, a much-needed reality check

9.       A collaboration between Troma Studios and Saban Entertainment (well, damn near it, anyway)

10.   A new Clint Eastwood movie that didn’t make me feel like I would rupture a major artery

Yeah, a lot of good shit happened at the movies in 2021, when all the big fuck-off blockbusters that the studios had been sitting on for well over a year finally saw public release, along with some killer indie features. So, before we completely leave 2021 in the rear view, let’s take one last look at some of the best that the year’s cinema had to offer. Here are my picks for the twenty best films of 2021. (By the way, *SPOILERS* for Spider-Man: No Way Home ahead)

Top 20 Worst Films Of 2021

Like a rubbish sequel to an already miserable original, 2021 was not a great year. More of the same time-haze where every day just seemed to blur into each other from the isolation, only it seemed to hit me harder the second time around because I wound up with a bad case of quarantine brain. I spent a fair amount of the year in creative burnout, meaning that I wound up seeing significantly fewer films than usual. And yet, because running on half power (or no power, as was the case for a few days in December) still isn’t enough to stop me, I still managed to see enough films to fill out my usual end-of-year list.

Sure, making such a list is just pointing at unpleasant things from the past just to point out how unpleasant they are, and it’s not as if the world is deprived of things to feel bad about these days. But quite frankly, making fun of bad movies with this annual list is pretty much the only joy I get out of still remembering that these features happened at all. One of the side effects of writing about every new film I see is that my memory of them is tied to something tangible, and they tend to be easier to recall as a result. And since forgetting about wrong things is a pretty sure-fire way to ensure that they keep happening, I reckon it’s worth taking some time to reflect on what I can only hope will be mistakes that are learnt from rather than repeated. As such, let’s take a look at my picks for the Worst Films of 2021.

Top 20 Best Films Of 2020

So… yeah, 2020 has not been a good year. But let it not be said that we didn’t get something good out of it. When the layman’s access to streaming services was at its most vital, a lot of legendary filmmakers teamed up with Netflix and the like to keep the art alive in this particularly rough patch. Not only that, but because all the major studios were busy salvaging their blockbuster titles for when people could actually get to cinemas and watch them (which became more and more of a distant memory as this year dragged on), everyone got a break from the flood of superhero movies that have clogging the market of late, and a lot of independent studios stepped up to the plate and filled in the gap with some truly stunning pieces of cinema.

And in honour of the features that helped keep my sanity intact during one of the scariest periods of my relatively short lifespan to date, let’s close out le grand shitshow not by reliving the shite, but by holding up the jewels that still managed to find their way to audiences in the midst of all this chaos. These are my picks for the Top 20 Best Films Of 2020. But first…

Top 20 Worst Films Of 2020

2020 was a shit year. Duh. However, this was a shit year even beyond the metrics that other recent years have been shit, like the one-two-punch to our ideal of cultural heroes over 2016-2017. As terrifying as it already is to be under constant threat of plague all bloody year thanks to COVID-19, the extent to which it affected our lives and even our entertainment was something else entirely. It felt like large-scale hubris for 2019, the Omnicorp-isation of Disney, and then in comes a plague no-one seemed properly prepared to deal with, that threw a monkey wrench into a system everyone was far too confident could withstand whatever came at it.

The release schedule was in a continual state of shuffling throughout, meaning that a lot of big-name productions got delayed ‘til next year, and with varying degrees of lockdown worldwide, cinema attendance took a sharp dive, to the point that not only were there more classic movies being shown than anything new just to fill up the cinemas that were still open, but a lot of independent cinemas likely won’t survive if this continues for much longer. And at a time when all we had was our screens to alleviate the cabin fever, it felt like we were more in need of entertainment than ever.

As a result of all this, a lot of what makes up the worst that 2020’s cinema had to offer comes down to a matter of releasing anything and everything that could be spared just to keep butts in seats and eyes on screens, meaning that there was quite a bit of disposable garbage that filled in the margins. Not only that, but there were a lot of astonishingly miscalculated attempts to say something meaningful so that this year wasn’t a total waste as a pop culture moment, which only ended up making this whole situation feel even worse. And since all that time indoors gave me plenty of space to write up more reviews than any previous year, there are quite a few movies that surely deserve to be on this list, but only just missed the cut. Jeff Wadlow should be counting his blessings that Fantasy Island got passed up because, as you’re about to see, I have no mercy in stock for the 20 that made it in. As such, let’s stop waffling on and get into my picks for the 20 Worst Films Of 2020.

Top 20 Best Films Of 2019

I’ve gotten into some of the prevailing themes that tie a lot of 2019’s cinematic releases together over the course of these lists. The overwhelming sense of disappointment, the harbingers of what could be even worse movies to come out in the new decade, the inevitable efforts that manage to defy just how much of a letdown the year turned out; that kind of thing. But the main thing I got out of 2019 was that it was the end of the decade that made me the critic I am today.

It has been a wild ride these last ten years, and not only has this blog gone through some major changes in that time in regards to format and length (why I ever thought a 1000-word minimum for my reviews was a good idea is beyond me; I blame Principal Vernon), it has exposed me to films that have helped to shape and give form to my perspective of the entire world. And man, did 2019 give me a lot to think about in that regard, to the point where it might hold some of the most personally formative features of my entire ‘career’. So let’s close out our look at this bizarre year with a countdown of my top 20 favourite films of 2019.

Top 10 Most Surprising Films Of 2019

With how low 2019 set expectations not just for its art but for its world at large, it’s a matter of basic probability that there were going to be a few pleasant surprises to make it to theatres and home streaming. Not only that, but what made for pleasant surprises were quite varied, from films that I had given hope on being any good to films that had potential value that very few other contemporary releases could ever hope to carry, right down to a couple that pretty much defy description. So, as we ease ourselves out of the thick haze of frustration of the last couple lists, let’s take a look at the top 10 most surprising films of 2019.

Top 20 Worst Films Of 2019

Where 2018 as a year was characterised by filmmakers looking back on the past and seeing where they could improve, 2019 was characterised by filmmakers looking back and seeing how much worse they could do. The main theme with the worst of 2019 was films that made me look at films I had written off years ago as bad ideas, and making me realise I didn’t know how good I had it because the new take is that much worse. These are the films that defied the prevailing sense of disappointment that populated the rest of the year, but only because the main response was “how did you screw up this badly?!” Strap in for some raw anguish fuel as I count down the top 20 worst films of 2019.

Top 10 Most Disappointing Films Of 2019

The 2010s, the decade that made me into the critic I am today, has officially concluded. And man, did it conclude on a whopper because 2019 was not a good year for movies. It certainly had its highlights, and we’ll definitely be getting into those later on this week, but for the most part, it was one marked by near-consistent disappointment. Middling features, underperforming productions that should’ve done better than they ultimately did, and Disney dominating the box office even more than any year previously; it’s been getting worrisome. So, to kick off our look at one of the bleaker years in recent cinema history, let’s count the top 10 films that, for one reason or another, didn’t match up with my expectations.

Top 20 Best Films Of 2018

2018 was a fucking great year for movies. Not only that, it felt like there was some unified intent in the collective unconscious to finally get shit right, revising and correcting whole swathes of cinematic history in its wake. I could have made this a Top 40 list, and it still would’ve involve making some painful cuts because the best the year had to offer was just that damn good. Time for one last trip in reminiscence as I look at my picks for the top 20 best films of 2018.

Top 10 Most Surprising Films Of 2018

For a few years now, I’ve been making it a point to highlight the most surprising films of the year; the ones I went into not expecting anything worthwhile, yet walked away impressed in one way or another. I usually take the time to list the most disappointing films as well, but in a showing of just good 2018 was for films, the disappointments were honestly few and far between. As for the surprises, they’re not just surprisingly good; most of them came from filmmakers I never would have expected to be capable of anything as watchable as the films I’m about to get into. Here are my picks for the 10 most surprising films of 2018.

Top 20 Worst Films Of 2018

While most of the cinematic world was collectively deciding to get its shit together, some filmmakers had other ideas. Specifically, they had some truly baffling, who-in-the-hell-thought-these-were-good ideas, the results of which gave us some outright garbage movies. I am somewhat thankful that this list was relatively easy to draw up, since there weren’t that many films that qualified for the absolute worst of the year. But man, the ones that did made for some truly despicable moments. Let’s get to burning this garbage pile as I get into my Top 20 Worst Films of 2018.

Top 100 Favourite Films: #10-1

#10: Do The Right Thing – The Doomsday Clock of racial tension

This film genuinely gives me chills every time I watch it. The depiction of a tight-knit Brooklyn community in the midst of a record-breaking heatwave highlights so many real-world racist attitudes that it feels less like it’s painting a specific target and more like it’s depicting, with blinding honesty, how much everyone gets caught up in it. While community connections run deep, prejudices run even deeper, to the point where some people hold onto these bigoted beliefs because… well… it’s all that they know.

Top 100 Favourite Films: #20-11

#20: Ouija: Origin Of Evil – Even The Other Side has rules

This is one of those films that instantly sounds like a bad idea. The 2013 film Ouija was such a horror non-event that it’s surprising that anyone even cared enough to remember it, let alone try and expand on it. Add to that the influence of producers like the annoyingly prolific Jason Blum of Blumhouse Productions and the reliably dismal Michael Bay, whose studio Platinum Dunes have made the words “horror” and “prequel” synonymous with “run” and “hide”. Enter director/co-writer Mike Flanagan, fresh off of an already unprecedented success with Oculus, who did something that no-one would have expected from a production with this starting point: He put the effort in to make it work.

Top 100 Favourite Films: #30-21

#30: Monty Python’s The Meaning Of Life – Life is absurd, go out with a song

While most people go with the religious satire of Life Of Brian or the absurdist masterpiece of The Holy Grail as far as the best Monty Python has to offer, my heart has always lied with the dark horse in this race. I’ve always been more interested in their sketch work, like the Trade Descriptions Act or the ever-popular Dead Parrot, than their lengthier narratives and this film shows them at the height of that mode.

Top 100 Favourite Films: #40-31

#40: Terminator 2: Judgment Day – Grabbing the metallic throat of destiny

Watching “classic” films for me has always come with a certain amount of baggage. I feel like, because a given feature has garnered legendary status since its initial release, I’m under some obligation to at least understand why, let alone agree with the masses. This film is one of the major exceptions to that, as not only was it instantly clear why this film has held up as well as it has, I also fell in love with the thing pretty damn quickly.

Top 100 Favourite Films: #50-41

#50: The Shawshank Redemption – It pays to play the long game

A man is sent to prison for a crime he didn’t commit. For the next ten years, he bides his time inside Shawshank Prison, making allies where he can and waiting for the moment when he can finally escape his confines. Frank Darabont, co-writer of the previously-discussed Nightmare On Elm Street 3, has a penchant for bringing the works of Stephen King to the big screen, but he tends to stick to the less recognisably-Kingian stories. From this to The Green Mile to his later work with The Mist, he not only chose decidedly different material but also showed a startingly amount of understanding of the text to bring it roaring to life on screen. This film, more so than anything else he has touched to date, accomplishes that goal.