2000-2025 - A Quarter Century of Film Favourites

Cinema established itself as the art form of the 20th century and, despite the rise of TV, remained a dominant force in entertainment and popular culture throughout. But what of the past twenty-five years, with its technological shifts and renewed challenges from other media? I'll get into the highs and lows of cinema's recent history some other time. For now, here are some thoughts on my favourite films - one for each year of the century so far - hopefully illustrating that the medium is still tolerably healthy.

Okay, rules... I've made one definitive pick for each year, even when several films feel equal in my affection. All choices are based on the UK release schedule. And yes, I'm starting with the year 2000 - even though technically speaking it rounded off the 20th century - because it's the first recent year to start with a 2. I'm making no big proclamations about all these films being the best/most influential/most important... They're just (currently and therefore subject to change) the films I like most.

Here goes. 

2000 - Magnolia

(Honorable Mention - O Brother, Where Art Thou?)

With a UK release in early 2000, Magnolia now feels like the end of the 1990s for me - representing the grown-up, challenging, and innovative cinema that made that my preferred movie decade. This kaleidoscope of human flouderings and failings is to date my favourite film of all time and an example of what I once labelled here as an 'imperfect 10'. Any shortcomings and nitpicks stem from the bold, adventurous nature of Paul Thomas Anderson's storytelling. The way the camera, the editing, and the score weave a clutch of intimate human stories into a meaningful whole never fails to impress me. Plus, it includes my most loved performances of Tom Cruise (whose portrait of a misogynist self-help guru now seems scarily prescient), John C. Reilly (as a well-meaning cop in love with the wrong person), and the late, lamented Philip Seymour Hoffman (effectively playing an angel in human form). Plus there's the way Anderson incorporates the songs of Aimee Mann. And a climax of literally Biblical proportions.

2001 - Moulin Rouge!

(Honorable Mention - Mulholland Drive)

How wonderful life is with this - Baz Luhrmann's third feature - in the world. The Aussie filmmaker's tale of love between a poet and a courtesan during Paris's Belle Epoque is wildly silly and occasionally cringing (I'm thinking of you, 'Elephant Love Medley'), but overall feels nothing short of rapturous. Luhrmann reinvented the concept of the movie musical with his anachronistic use of Elton John and Madonna tunes in a late 19th-century setting, while overpowering audiences using his dizzying visual style. The way he can flip from comic to romantic to tragic on a French centime is, for me, unsurpassed, never more so than during the song (It's a little bit funny...) with which Christian wins Satine's heart. Intoxicating, hilarious, heartbreaking.

2002 - Minority Report

(Honorable Mention - Memento; Monsoon Wedding)

Steven Spielberg has directed seventeen films this side of 2000, and this is up there with the very best. Minority Report does all the things I love about speculative science fiction and does them well. The extrapolation of contemporary technology to create a convincing future world, one that's coloured in with Blade Runner levels of detail (only much shinier)... The exploration of an intriguing moral conundrum - specifically, what if you could predict and therefore prosecute crimes before they actually took place? And reflection on the era in which the futuristic film is made. It's all here in a narrative powered by the director at the peak of his technical prowess. From the moment Tom Cruise's Pre-Crime detective falls foul of the technology he operates, the film barely pauses for breath, while remaining totally coherent throughout. It also boasts a typically great support performance from Samantha Morton as 'pre-cog' Agatha. Pure entertainment.

2003 - The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King

(Honorable Mention - City of God)

Let me be honest here and subvert my own rules if only slightly. My favourite films for this year and the previous two were the episodes of Peter Jackson's phenomenal The Lord of the Rings trilogy. But similar to what the US Film Academy did at the next year's Oscars, I'm letting The Return of the King represent the entire hobbity project, thereby giving other movies deserved room to shine. Basically, the Rings films are the ones I've watched the most in my life. Jackson and his co-creatives didn't just climb the mountain of J. R. R. Tolkien's gargantuan text, they carved it out, creating something as beautiful as it was epic. The results filled me with joy and gave me some of the greatest theatrical experiences of my life. (I watched all three at the cinema with my completely enthralled dad). They're precious memories, and indeed precious box sets, full of moments both intimate and sweeping. And despite the production team's experimentation with CGI, much of these films still feel gratifyingly solid in a way that the subsequent Hobbit trilogy frequently did not. With the 25th anniversary of The Fellowship of the Ring on the horizon, it's definitely time for a rewatch.

2004 - Shaun of the Dead

(Honorable Mention - Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind)

There's a lovely story told on the Shaun of the Dead Blu-ray of an unimpressed supporting artist (that's 'extra' in old-school phraseology) mistaking Simon Pegg for a crew member and commenting, "Straight to video, this one". The observer in question was no doubt deceived by the production's modest £4 million budget and steadily recycled hoard of undead shamble-ons. What they couldn't envisage was how Edgar Wright's ginsu-sharp editing would shape his and Pegg's loving homage to the zombie genre into one of the best British films of the decade, kick-starting their now-famed 'Three Flavours Cornetto Trilogy' (more of which later). Both hilarious comedy and legit horror, Shaun is far better than anything that might be labelled 'spoof'. It's a love letter to George A. Romero (Night of the Living Dead), a love story, a spot-on satire of Gen-X slacker culture, the first of multiple Simon Pegg/Nick Frost on-screen bromances, and one of those films that, should you stumble on it while channel-hopping late at night, you'll inevitably watch to the end. How's that for a slice of fried gold?

2005 - King Kong

(Honorable Mention - The Aviator)

It's another Peter Jackson production. (Call me a PJ fanboy, and I'll wear that t-shirt with pride.) Speaking once more of love-letters, this remake of the most iconic ape movie in cinema history is a homage to every aspect of Merian C. Cooper's 1933 original. Having lovingly recreated Depression-era New York and sailed his band of ill-prepared Tinseltown adventurers into the fogs of Kong Island, Jackson takes his audience on one of the modern era's most exhilarating cinematic theme-park rides. What makes this movie so memorable, however, is the reframing of the Kong/Ann Darrow story, establishing a heart-rending, empathetic bond between standard-sized woman and gigantic primate. It makes for less screaming from the radiant Naomi Watts and more sobbing from the audience, once Kong falls prey to human greed. You don't yell in fear of the 25-foot ape as he breaks free; you damn well cheer him on, right to that final, fateful showdown atop the Empire State Building. Such a shame beauty and this beast didn't have more time together.

2006 - Little Miss Sunshine

(Honorable Mentions - Children of Men; Pan's Labyrinth)

Some choices are brutal. I mean, look at those honourable mentions. Any one of these three films earns a spot on my favourite-films-of-all-time list - this was one hella good year! But, finally, I've gone with the one that I've watched (and that warms my heart) the most. It's a narrative miracle that a story beginning with so much familial dysfunction, self-harm, and skewed thinking can end in a place of such deep, anarchic joy, especially given the sequence of disasters that occur along the way. But that's why the Hoovers are my favourite movie family of all time (apologies to the Addamses and the Von Trapps). With its deeply sardonic sense of humour, a handful of rich character performances, and the funniest vehicle ever to complete a movie road trip (apologies to Herbie and Jake and Elwood's Bluesmobile), Little Miss Sunshine never fails to make me grin while feeling better about the whole human experience. And its wisdom is eternal: better to lose with style than never to try at all.

2007 - Zodiac

(Honorable Mention - Hot Fuzz)

It takes a skilled director (and indeed, skilled writers) to take a true-crime story, where the crimes in question were never resolved, and turn it into a satisfying thriller. But that's what David Fincher does with the story - not so much of San Francisco's notorious Zodiac killer, but of the obsession of those trying to catch him. It's a Ruffolo/Downey Jr/Gyllenhaal triple whammy, and they're all at their best as three very different men trying to crack the case, along with John Carroll Lynch in his creepy supporting turn as suspect Arthur Leigh Allen. Those expecting the horrors of Fincher's harrowing Se7en get something much more purely psychological, as the killer's madness infects those in his pursuit. A taut script with direction to match, plus David Shire's eerie score, make this one of Fincher's best.

2008 - There Will Be Blood

(Honorable Mentions - The Dark Knight; WALL-E)

I didn't know what to make of this much-lauded Paul Thomas Anderson film, the first time I saw it. It was such a far cry from Magnolia (see above) that I felt something akin to let down. But you've got to respect a director who can reinvent his own style as completely as this. Subsequent viewings have confirmed for me what a tour de force this is, with its masterful cinematography, vivid recreation of the early 20th-century California oil fields, and barnstorming performances by both Daniel Day-Lewis and (suck it, Quentin Tarantino) Paul Dano. Playing two very different types of self-made man in a world of capitalist excess, the escalating rivalry between them is raw, unfiltered, and totally mesmerising. It's a film deeply admired by Christopher Nolan, whose work resembles There Will Be Blood in its scope and commitment to in-camera effects. But more of that later...

2009 - Slumdog Millionaire

(Honorable Mention - Up)

I went to an advanced screening of this one with my pal Jen, and it knocked us both out with its pace, its verve, and its originality. Then we laughed later about posters hyping it as 'the feel-good movie of the year'. This story of a young man's attempt to reconnect with his lost love through appearing on India's Who Wants to Be a Millionaire deals with police torture, race murder, and child mutilation among other delights before delivering on any of the promised good feelings. That it succeeds in carrying its audience through such dark times is thanks to the screenplay's magical realism (this is a tale all about destiny), Danny Boyle's thrilling direction, and an invigorating score by A. R. Rahman. The film made a movie star out of Dev Patel, in a foolishly optimistic but undeniably compelling love story that drags you through the emotional wringer before plastering a smile all over your tired face.

2010 - The Social Network

(Honorable Mention - Inception)

David Fincher again. It says a lot about his style, I think, that my favourite film of his doesn't deal with serial killers (real-life or fictional) or bare-knuckle organisations you don't talk about. The creation of a social media site, however iconic, didn't seem to promise great cinema - but put a script by The West Wing's Aaron Sorkin into Fincher's hands, and you get a result every bit as dynamic as Se7en or Fight Club. Sorkin's writing shapes the story of how Mark Zuckerberg launched Facebook into a fast-talking study of friendship and betrayal, and Fincher's crisp direction matches the dialogue beat for beat. Jesse Eisenberg is cast perfectly as the website's co-creator, his character journey compelling and rich with complexity, but it's Andrew Garfield who supplies the story's heart as best friend and Facebook co-founder Eduardo Saverin. It's sharp, witty, and endlessly quotable, and the soundtrack by Messrs Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross doesn't hurt either. That Sorkin has taken over directorial reins and is bringing us 'spiritual sequel' The Social Reckoning later this year is reason for much celebration.

2011 - True Grit

(Honorable Mention - Bridesmaids)

Yes, I know that the Coen Brothers' other literary adaptation - No Country for Old Men - received all the plaudits, landing them a trio of well-deserved Oscars, but my preference is for this one. Maybe it's because of their dark take on the source material, Charles Portis' 1968 novel, or maybe because the characters allow them to be a bit more 'Coens-y' than in No Country. It could be due to the Brothers' reunion with the Dude himself, Jeff Bridges, in the role of Deputy U. S. Marshall Rooster Cogburn on which John Wayne put his stamp in 1969. (Don't take me down with a Colt revolver, but I prefer Bridges' performance.) Or perchance it's the chemistry between the leads, with Matt Damon playing against type as puffed-up Texas Ranger Le Boeuf (his preferred pronunciation 'Le Beef'), and a 14-year-old Hailee Steinfeld as precocious and vengeful Mattie Ross. Ultimately, I think it's because this True Grit is truer to the novel and truly representative of the western genre, while retaining a true Coen feel. Along with a lot of grit.

2012 - Moonrise Kingdom

(Honorable Mention - Skyfall)

Director/writer/creator Wes Anderson inspires both love and hate from the film community. I'm in a position where I frequently feel the love but can appreciate the reasons behind the hate - sometimes his showy cleverness and theatricality are just too much. For me, Moonrise Kingdom and its follow-up The Grand Budapest Hotel pitch it just right in terms of content and style. Both are beautifully crafted shaggy-dog stories, and Moonrise has an especial charm along with genuine hilarity, telling as it does a unique coming-of-age story between a rebellious, book-loving girl and a runaway Boy Scout. Aside from its engaging 13-year-old leads, it has the usual gallery of deliciously deadpan adult performances (Bill Murray, Tilda Swinton, Ed Norton, etc. etc). A particular delight, however, is Bruce Willis fully embracing the Anderson method along with clear-frame retro glasses, as Police Captain Sharp. Charming from start to meticulously crafted finish, this is one to wholeheartedly love.

2013 - The World's End

(Honorable Mention - The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug)

Of the films making up the Wright/Pegg 'Cornetto Trilogy', The World's End is sometimes viewed as the slightly disappointing final entry. Not in my book. If Shaun of the Dead is the most heartfelt and Hot Fuzz the funniest, then The World's End is the smartest of the trio. It's also significantly more mature than the others in its central conceit - a group of middle-aged friends are cajoled into re-attempting a legendary pub crawl from their teen years by the one member who's never moved on, thus testing (like Jay Gatsby) whether you can repeat the past. And that's before the big genre twist thirty minutes in. What I love about this film is how even when events take an apocalyptic turn, the pub crawl and all it signifies for Simon Pegg's tragicomic Gary King remains the spine of the story. The central ensemble is great value, totally convincing as a group of estranged school friends in various gradations of drunkenness. Plus, the flipping of the established comic/straight-man roles (Nick Frost this time acting as Pegg's foil) works a treat. Don't let anyone tell you otherwise - this film wraps up the ice-cream-flecked project just perfectly.

2014 - The Babadook

(Honorable Mention - Dawn of the Planet of the Apes; The Grand Budapest Hotel)

The term 'elevated horror' emerged around this time, expressly to describe films like this one. It's the kind of horror that rejects jump scares and gore in favour of unsettling ambience and smart, psychological concepts to cultivate fear. The first feature of Australian writer/director Jennifer Kent, The Babadook is one of the best-crafted and most rewatchable of the 'elevated' sub-genre. Essie Davis gives a magnificent performance as struggling single mother Amelia, whose latent resentment towards her own child (an unholy terror named Samuel) may or may not be manifesting as the terrifying creature of the title. Mister Babadook himself is straight out of a German Expressionist nightmare, and is all the more scary for the mere fleeting glimpses we see of him. A masterclass in slowly mounting dread, this is also a clever and psychologically coherent study in toxic parent-child dynamics that muddies the waters regarding who is driving who mad. The movie also includes the most disturbing child's pop-up book in the history of fiction. If it's in a word, or it's in a look, you can't get rid of...

2015 - Whiplash

(Honorable Mentions - Mad Max: Fury Road; The Martian)

Director Damien Chazelle would achieve mainstream success two years later with the much-feted La La Land, but many cinephiles rate this film as his best to date. Whiplash is not what you might expect from its 'talented young jazz drummer goes to music school' premise. The main difference is J. K. Simmons' Oscar-bagging performance as Terence Fletcher, a band instructor whose pursuit of excellence in his students incorporates emotional and sometimes physical abuse. It's more Marine Corps boot camp than music conservatory, and the twisted dynamic between Miles Teller's protégé and his mentor/nemesis is pure electricity throughout. Chazelle shoots this drama as a thriller, and the coaching sequences will have you clawing the sofa cushions they're so stress-inducing. The director has revisited the movie's core theme - the heavy price of ambition - since then, but never with as much heart-racing intensity. 

2016 - Sing Street

(Honorable Mention - Arrival)

I enjoy the work of Dublin-born musician-turned-filmmaker John Carney. He doesn't make musicals, he makes dramas about music - the people who write it and play it and produce it and succeed or fail at it, who fall in love with it and to it and who try to make their living from it... I love all his films, but none quite so much as I love Sing Street. His story of Conor, a lad growing up in 1980s Dublin who starts a band to impress a girl and to survive life in the school from hell, is one of the best coming-of-age narratives I've ever experienced. Original songs punctuate the film, each paying note-perfect homage to a musical genre of the era, while Conor and his friends undergo a style and character evolution that's both funny and charming. It's touching as a romance, a bromance, and a tale of brotherly love, while never shying away from the tougher aspects of teenage life. Endlessly rewatchable, this is - despite its heartfelt tribute to the '80s - a music movie for the ages.

2017 - Paddington 2

(Honorable Mentions - Moonlight; Dunkirk; Get Out)

Okay, bear with me. That's one heavyweight list of honourable mentions - I even placed two of them above my current choice on my favourite films list for 2017. But time and repeated viewings provide greater perspective, and I'm ready to die on the hill that says Paddington 2 is among the greatest films of the 21st century. And if you don't believe me, see what Pedro Pascal has to say in The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent: 'I cried through the entire thing. It made me want to be a better man.' I can't say I wept, exactly, but I found this film massively endearing and funny throughout. I've never seen a family film made with greater craft and attention to detail, nor have I seen one more attuned to the needs of the moment, with its message on the simple power of kindness. Sweet and sharp as the tang of an artisan orange marmalade, this is what happens when you make a child-friendly film with the care and passion of a Scorsese, a del Toro, or an Anderson (specifically Wes). It's like joy in a jar.

2018 - First Man

(Honorable Mentions - The Shape of Water; Avengers: Infinity War; Mission: Impossible - Fallout)

Space travel movies appeal to me, and this one I find especially potent, based as it is on real events - those heady days of the Apollo program, where the sky was no longer the limit, and the cosmos had become the final frontier. Ryan Gosling is Neil Armstrong, stoic to a fault as the eponymous first man on the moon, with Claire Foy as his supportive yet far from meek wife Janet. The adventure and wonder of space travel is powerfully conveyed along with the height of its stress levels and its stakes. Writer Josh Singer's narrative has dynamism and grit, and Justin Hurwitz's rhapsodic score fuels the story the way liquid hydrogen fuelled Apollo 11 (I looked it up). There's also a sadness that permeates the film, not least because of the family tragedy Armstrong carries deep within him. First Man cemented the critical reputation that Damien Chazelle had built with Whiplash and La La Land. And while it proved a box office disappointment (along with his subsequent grand folly Babylon), at least it shot for the moon creatively speaking.

2019 - Once Upon a Time in... Hollywood

(Honorable Mention - Avengers: Endgame)

Just when I thought I was never going to love another Quentin Tarantino film quite as much as Pulp Fiction, along came this one - his extended love-letter to the cinema of 1960s Hollywood. Leonardo DiCaprio gives a top-tier performance as action star Rick Dalton, whose career is fading along with Hollywood's Golden Age, while Brad Pitt has never been cooler in his role as Rick's stunt-double and loyal friend Cliff Booth. Meanwhile, Margot Robbie represents the doomed innocence of the cinematic era in her role as equally doomed Sharon Tate - although maybe not, with Tarantino in charge of her story... It's a sprawling and loquacious tale (as you'd expect), but what makes it stand out is how steeped it is in a specific kind of nostalgia - 1969 painstakingly crafted through the lens of the filmmaker's memory. Rick's endeavours to recapture a moment of his former glory on a TV shoot have both hilarity and pathos, while Cliff's odyssey into the home of the Manson Family is quietly chilling. As for the finale - it's perfectly set up, brutal, and brilliant. Plus, the QT needle-drops have never worked better. More real-world grounded (for the most part) than the auteur's other work, this is an immersive and often outrageous tribute to a bygone entertainment world.

2020 - Parasite

(Honorable Mention - 1917)

1917 was the first title that I scored as 10 on this blog, so it was going to take quite some film to beat it as my favourite of that year. Parasite is that film. As a satire on wealth inequality, it's tough to match, and yet it's so much else besides. Director Bong Joon Ho charts how the scrappy, impoverished Kim family insinuate themselves into the lives of the Parks, who exist in the most privileged echelon of Seoul society. But that's only the start of this twisted, genre-shifting tale. Spiky social comedy morphs into Hitchcockian thriller territory, before this drama takes its most shocking turns. The contrasting rich/poor production designs are evocatively created, with the Parks' state-of-the-art super-home built from the foundations up for the film. But it's a third-act climate metaphor for the city's social divide that really steals your breath. As for that ending... wow. Brilliantly conceived and expertly executed, Parasite just stole it from Sam Mendes' First World War odyssey as my 2020 topper. 

2021 - Dune: Part One

(Honorable Mention - Spider-Man: No Way Home)

I'm not one to cry 'snub' every time awards bodies fail to give some film I love its due, but the fact that Denis Villeneuve hasn't received a Best Director nomination for either of his Dune episodes to date is a travesty - a travesty, I tell you! Described in the past as unfilmable (David Lynch's 1984 adaptation may prove or disprove that assertion, depending on your take), Frank Herbert's 1965 science-fiction epic found its perfect fit in the French-Canadian director, whose commitment to visual authenticity turned huge SF projects Arrival and Blade Runner 2049 into such arresting cinema. His Dune films to date have looked convincing in every gorgeously composed frame, with multiple worlds and weird technologies depicted as if they exist for real. The plot complexities are streamlined to render Herbert's sprawling narrative accessible, and each movie boasts a roster of fine actors at the top of their game. Plus, Villeneuve had the good fortune that composer Hans Zimmer decided on a trial separation from Christopher Nolan to create a grand, interplanetary music-scape for the Dune-iverse. Roll on the concluding Dune: Part Three in December of this year.

2022 - Top Gun: Maverick

(Honorable Mentions - The Batman; Everything, Everywhere, All At Once)

A couple of friends, having been less than enthused by Top Gun: Maverick, asked me to sell them on why it's a worthy choice for film of the year. What could I say?  There's no analysing the movie for deeper meaning - everything great about it is up there on the screen or blasting from the surround-sound speakers. What I really love about Tom Cruise's return to the TG military flight school, though, is how real it all is. With a clutch of Mission: Impossible films behind him, and a name rebuilt on doing the stunts for real, Cruise worked with director Joseph Kosinski to create a heightened and visceral action-cinema experience. They did all they could to fly viewers through the sunlit skies at Mach 10 along with the actors, the on-screen G-forces driving us deep into our luxury recliner seats. Undergoing such thrills as part of a laughing and gasping IMAX crowd felt liberating after the pandemic years. The movie was also a rattling good adventure and a superbly realised exercise in nostalgia, while providing something fresh and new. So if you came out of a screening feeling the same kind of buzz as me, that makes me happy. If not... well, I hope you found your post-Covid cinematic buzz somewhere else.

2023 - Oppenheimer

(Honorable Mentions - John Wick: Chapter 4; Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse)

I hope that Christopher Nolan never stops thinking big (and I have faith he won't). The reasons Oppenheimer turned out to be such a critical and box office success are common, I think, to all his films. The first is that every Nolan movie is a passion project. Having been given a copy of J. Robert Oppenheimer biography The Modern Prometheus at the Tenet wrap party, he immersed himself in the book and saw biopic potential in it. Secondly, the filmmaker commits to big dramatic swings. Thus, his Oppenheimer takes two alternating viewpoints - first and third person, in colour and black-and-white respectively - and shifts partway through from scientific race-against-time thriller to full-on political drama, while never losing sight of the moral conundrum at the movie's centre. Finally, he knows how to find the dynamism and flow in whatever film he's making, whether comic-book adventure, science-fiction epic, or weighty historical drama. And so his three-hour story of the so-called 'father of the atomic bomb' has a momentum that carries you from those opening raindrops on water to that final, devastating Cillian Murphy close-up in what feels like half the time. That's got to be worth a few Oscars. Say, seven?

2024 - Anora

(Honorable Mentions - Dune: Part Two; The Substance)

My introduction to filmmaker Sean Baker was 2017's The Florida Project, so I knew going into Anora the kinds of character that interested him - those struggling on the margins of American society, whether sex workers, street hustlers, or victims of extreme poverty. In the case of Anora, it's Ani (the title refers to her), an exotic dancer and escort in a Manhattan gentlemen's club who falls for Ivan, the son of a Russian oligarch. What begins as a decadent fantasy takes a twist into romantic territory, before Ivan's parents get wind of the affair and move to stop it, pushing the story into different territory altogether. If you approach Baker's award-winning film as a more raw, chaotic, and bittersweet take on Pretty Woman, you'll have some idea what to expect. Anora has wild eroticism and flashes of heightened romance, along with uncomfortably funny slapstick, ferocity, despair, poignancy, and an unforgettable Take That needle drop. It's all here in one film, and much of it (not the Take That part) is due to Mikey Madison's virtuoso, Oscar-bagging lead performance. Gal's going places. Whether or not Ani is... only watching the movie will reveal.

2025 - Sinners

(Honorable Mention - The Ballad of Wallis Island)

Ryan Coogler's Sinners is a rich and heady brew. Yes, the director cites 1996's From Dusk Till Dawn as one of his influences, but set in Jim Crow-era Mississippi and tackling issues of race, culture, and spirituality, it's entirely its own vampire-fanged beast. One year on from its lengthy run in cinemas, its sounds and images remain vivid in the memory. Michael B. Jordan passing a cigarette to his twinned self within the frame. Jack O'Connell scuttling grotesquely towards the homestead of his first victims. Miles Caton cutting loose with original blues song 'I Lied To You', while the camera weaves through space and time in one cinema's most memorable one-shots... ever. These are just a few of the film's manifold and multi-layered delights. Its tale of the Smokestack brothers and their one-night-only (but what a night), bloodsucker-besieged juke joint will stay with me a long, long time. When does a horror film become more than a horror film? When it has the vision, depth, and craft of Sinners. 

2026 - ?????

So that, for what it's worth, is my list. It may not stay my list - there's any number of highly praised 21st-century films I've yet to catch up with. But for now, I hope it raises a few smiles along with a few eyebrows, and provokes a bit of good-natured debate. If it doesn't suggest to you the best that modern cinema has to offer, or if you feel I need a total taste-overhaul, then your viewing recommendations will be gratefully received. Aside from that, here's to the cinematic century so far and, more importantly, to what lies ahead.

Film Review - The Odyssey (15)

 Promise me you will come back.

The phrase 'go big or go home' seems to apply uniquely to Christopher Nolan. No one would have blamed him, following his awards and box-office juggernaut Oppenheimer, for scaling things down and returning to the more intimate thrillers of his early career like Memento and Insomnia. Instead, he opted to adapt one of the foundational stories of world literature, a tale as sweeping as any epic produced in the Golden Age of Hollywood and populated by gods and monsters besides. The word 'odyssey' has come to describe stories from Gulliver's Travels to The Lord of the Rings, even featuring in the subtitle of Kubrick's 2001 - originating, as it does, in this ancient and momentous quest narrative. And it's to this massive challenge that the British-American filmmaker has applied his energies.

The 'quest' in question, as you probably remember from your schooldays, is deceptively simple - that of Greek warrior Odysseus to find his way home to his island kingdom Ithaca following the Trojan War. But this proves - in Nolan's film as in Homer's millennia-old poem - as arduous and frustrating as the war itself, with similarly devastating loss of life. Matt Damon plays the complicated hero, wrangling one deadly setback after another on behalf of himself and his crew, while wife Penelope (Anne Hathaway) and son Telemachus (Tom Holland) who has yet to meet his father, wait and hope for his return. Their situation is complicated by a rabble of young and wealthy suitors, led by Robert Pattinson's sneering Antinous, who have descended on Odysseus' palace to compete for his wife and his wealth. From the film's beginning, the stakes for the estranged family are clear.

The Odyssey is a tale for which Nolan's formidable talent has been honed over twelve other features, to the point where it's equal to the venture's sheer scale. This is a vast movie, the first one shot exclusively - as has been widely noted - with IMAX cameras. The effect is one of complete immersion in each location, be it ocean, icy wasteland, or volcanic isle, as well as soul-searching close-ups of the kind that proved so affecting in Oppenheimer. Another IMAX virtue is how it showcases the project's detail in all its authenticity. The earthiness of each scene is striking, making ancient myth remarkably relatable. Even the most fantastical elements of sea monsters and sirens convince due to the director's much-praised embracing of practical effects. (Green screen is nowhere, CGI used only to enhance what was achieved in camera.) This is an epic you feel as much as hear and see.

As with his previous Oscar-winning adaptation, Nolan digs deep into the source text, finding a clear and compelling narrative thread. Odysseus's story is more than just a sequence of strung-together incidents. It's about one flawed individual's struggle with destiny, a fight that turns him increasingly at odds with his compatriots and more despairing of his life's meaning. It's about the cruelty of war, how the effects of conflict live in a soldier's bones long after the fighting has ended. And it's about family loyalty - the resistance under pressure to compromise those ties of love. The gods make occasional, subtle appearances, but this Odyssey is first and last a human tale. It's told in as non-linear a fashion as Homer's poem, so that the film's opening act may disorient some. Stick with it, though, and the narrative thrust rewards handsomely in a final stretch that ties the story and its themes together.

As for his team, Nolan draws on creatives he has assembled over multiple cinematic adventures to craft what might be his ultimate. Damon, ripped but ruined, anchors proceedings with a physical performance that's heroic in its own right. Other stand-outs are Hathaway, girding Penelope's patience with steely determination and simmering fury, and Pattinson, enjoyably slimy in his villain role. Nolan newcomer John Leguizamo adds emotional weight as Odysseus's loyal mentor Eumaeus, and as for Samantha Morton - her contribution to the film won't be forgotten by anyone who sees it. Ever. Meanwhile, cinematographer Hoyte van Hoytema complements the realism of the director's vision with his naturally lit and stark camerawork, while Ludwig Göransson scores the action sequences with strange, heart-pounding intensity. In short, no one here's on their B-game.

The movie has stoked online controversy (stemming exclusively from those who haven't seen it) regarding issues of historical accuracy, casting choices, anachronistic dialogue... The furore is so much hot air. In a project this ambitious, tackling such an ancient and morally complex source text, expect creative choices that raise eyebrows along with various technical nitpicks. Not everything is going to work for every viewer. It's literally astonishing, however, how much does. This doesn't purport to be the definitive adaptation of Homer's famous work, but it's a damn good one. And if you happen upon a more awe-inspiring feat of filmmaking this year, let me know. Because that I want to watch. 

Memorable Moment(s): (1) The logistics of delivering a Trojan horse. (2) Make sure your stew isn't spiked... (3) The most faithful friend of all. (This bit made me cry.)

Ed's Verdict: 9.5/10. Nolan's done it again. His Odyssey calls to mind Lawrence of Arabia's immensity and the ingenuity of special effects legends from Ray Harryhausen to Rick Baker. It's also got thrilling action, a rich emotional core, and one very hungry cyclops. A 2026 biggest-screen must-see.

Filmic Forays 2023 Preview - Twenty Most Anticipated Films

I set about writing this feature with some trepidation. The last time I listed my most anticipated films of the forthcoming year was January 2020, three months before all of the UK's cinemas closed. When they opened again during the summer I was too covid-phobic even to go see Tenet, one of titles that had enthused me the most pre-pandemic. (I finally saw it when it came out on blu ray the following year, and it was almost worth the wait.)

Anyway, barring further global catastrophe - and were in the Reaming Twenties, so let's not tempt fate too far - I intend to view and report back on all the titles listed below. Here's hoping that the greater part of them live up to my expectations, and that their combined success provides the film industry and all our favourite movie theatres with the cash transfusion they continue to need. In case you're wondering, the first few of my picks were all released in North America and elsewhere during 2022, hence their inclusion. Enough said. Let's leap right in. 

1. Till (6th January)

This promises to be uncomfortable New Year viewing, focused as it does on the fight for justice in the aftermath of the notoriously racist crime from 1950s Mississippi. Danielle Deadwyler plays the campaigning mother of murdered Emmett Till, with Chinonye Chukwu as co-writer and director. The film has garnered critical praise and high audience scores, but hasn't scored the kind of box office that makes a hit. Let's see if the imminent awards season can create some additional buzz around around this weighty drama. Either way, it's on my early-2023 radar.

Verdict: TBA

2. Tár (13th January)

Tár has got all the buzz for which an arthouse movie could wish, most of it due to a front and centre performance that many people are calling the best of Cate Blanchett's career. This from the actress who gave us Kathryn Hepburn and Galadriel, Blue Jasmine and Carol, to name-check a mere handful of her greatest hits. Here she's in the spotlight as Lydia Tár, celebrated composer and glass ceiling-shattering conductor of a major European orchestra, the sins of whose past are threatening to unravel all the success in her present. It's written and directed by Todd Field, who's yet to do anything less than really, really good, so count me in for this character-based ride.

Verdict: TBA

3. Babylon (20th January)

Sad to say, filmmaker Damien Chazelle has already crashed and burned with this one. Riding high on the twin box office successes of Whiplash and La La Land, and the critical plaudits won by First Man, he's gone for broke with Babylon, a period epic depicting the excess and debauchery of silent era Hollywood. At three hours plus, however, this has turned out to be a project very few people want to see, on the big screen at any rate. Seems I'm one of those few. Everything I've watched of Chazelle's I've more than enjoyed, and First Man (his emotional Apollo 11 space odyssey) was my favourite film of 2018. Babylon may ultimately go down as the director's great cinematic folly, but with Brad Pitt, Margot Robbie and a host of others spiralling into hedonistic 1920s destruction, I'm up for every last minute of this courageous theatrical bomb.

Verdict: TBA

4. The Fabelmans (27th January)

In his mid-seventies, Steven Spielberg goes from the expansive genre storytelling of the past few years (Ready Player One, West Side Story) to the most intimate and personal film of his fifty-year-plus career. It's not actually called The Spielbergs, but with the mirror it purportedly holds up to his family background and formative years as an aspiring young filmmaker, it might as well be. The trailer hints at all kinds of cinematic magic, and since 2021's awards-baiting Sharks and Jets reboot showed this maestro at the top of his game, we can expect something of insight and beauty, and doubtless with a good sprinkling of sentimentality. The pairing of Michelle Williams and Paul Dano as those Spielberg-y parents is likewise no bad sign. Get ready, this side of the Atlantic, to be charmed.

Verdict: TBA

5. The Whale (3rd February)

I won't lie - I approach any Darren Aronofsky film with as much apprehension as anticipation. While it'll no doubt be made with technical finesse and carry a heavyweight dramatic punch, The Whale will very possibly leave a residual taste in my mouth that'll ensure I never watch it again. I'm always glad I ran the newest Aronofsky gauntlet, for sure, but those evenings simply don't exist where a re-viewing of Requiem for a Dream or Mother! seems like a good plan. The Whale is proving as divisive as everything else the director has done (you've got to admire that commitment to envelope-pushing content and execution), but Brendan Fraser is being hailed as a comeback hero in his role as a reclusive and dangerously obese academic, in process of facing up to the consequences of his life choices. It's also got Stranger Things star Sadie Sink and The Menu's Hong Chau for added dramatic clout. I genuinely am keen to see this one. If I end up wanting to repeat the experience, I'll let you know.  

Verdict: TBA


6. Women Talking (10th February)

Which women? Mara. Foy. Buckley. McDormand. Among others. And this isn't any old chit-chat. Women Talking is based on the novel of the same name by Miriam Toews, in which a devout female group in an isolated religious community confront deeply ugly truths about their existence there. Canadian Sarah Polley wrote the screenplay and, from the look of anything I've seen, has directed the hell out of it; her 2012 documentary Stories We Tell is excellent, which also bodes well. Embraced by critics, this has been so far ignored by US cinema-goers, arguably due to a Christmas release. (Festive subject-matter this is not.) There's also the matter of that uninspiring title for those not familiar with the book. Here's hoping it surmounts these obstacles on its UK debut, finding a more enthusiastic audience. I'll be there for sure.

Verdict: TBA

7. Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania (17th February)

Will 2023 be the year in which I resume my love affair with the Marvel Cinematic Universe? It's not that I actively disliked any of the content aired by the studio over the past twelve months, but there was an undeniable sense of market saturation and of quantity at the expense of both quality and overarching narrative coherence. Well, my Spidey sense tells me that the MCU is about to steady its course with Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania. Director Peyton Reid has steered the Ant-Man franchise through two entertaining heist/caper movies and is now taking it into epic micro-territory with one of Marvel's more heavyweight and layered casts. To the weaponised likability of Paul Rudd and to-die-for pairing of Michelle Pfeiffer and Michael Douglas is added Jonathan Majors in a potentially magnificent villainous turn as Kang the Conqueror. How much fun can an audience have in the Quantum Realm? Hopefully macro amounts.

Verdict: TBA

8. 65 (10th March)

I really like the look of this film - there's something about the colour palette in the trailer that I find really appealing. From all appearances it's a stripped down survival story (cast-wise at any rate) with Adam Driver and a young girl/daughter surrogate(?) struggling to stay alive, somehow having travelled 65 million years into a prehistoric past. Okay, maybe I just want to see a quality dinosaur pic following the travesty that was last year's Jurassic World: Dominion. But Driver is always good value, and the writing-directing team of Bryan Woods and Scott Beck originally conceived and drafted the screenplay that became A Quiet Place. So that's got to be a good sign. Hasn't it?

9 and 10. Pearl (17th March) / MaXXXine (TBC)

Ti West's X was one of my favourite horror films from 2022, and gosh darn it if he isn't in the latter stages of turning his '70s-style slasher into an unconventional trilogy. Pearl was released forever ago in North America, but over here we have to wait till March to see Mia Goth play the girlish version of her decrepit antagonist X role. This time the Texas Chain Saw milieu has been replaced with something more akin to an MGM studio-era classic (a twisted Wizard of Oz springs to mind), and Goth's performance has been widely hailed as breathtaking. As for MaXXXine, that one - release date included - remains shrouded in secrecy. All we know is that Goth will reprise her other X character, wannabe adult-movie starlet Maxine, into the 1980s. I have little if any idea what to expect and, with the same gifted team in charge, that's just how I like it.

Verdict: TBA

11. John Wick: Chapter 4 (24th March)

Did ever the killing of a house pet result in so much carnage as within the John Wick franchise? It seems a long time since Keanu Reeves' killing machine came out of self-imposed assassin's retirement to wreak vengeance on the perpetrators of that senseless dog-murder. Four films in and expect to find our antihero mired in the kind of glossy, balletic, high-octane violence that has become his trademark. The John Wick universe and its gloriously over-the-top mythology has expanded with each episode, production values escalating together with the choreographed mayhem's complexity. On realising at the end of part three that the film's Parabellum subtitle meant 'Prepare for war', I beamed, happy in the assurance that there would be more. Now that I've seen the trailer, I'm smiling again. We're mere months from re-immersion in this crazy world, and I for one couldn't be more glad.

Verdict: TBA

12. Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 3 (5th May)

In all honesty I'm not a huge fan of Guardians of the Galaxy Volume 2. I sensed, for much of the running time, that James Gunn's efforts to rebottle the first film's lightning simply weren't working. It was bigger and brasher, sure, but the humour felt forced and at points unnecessarily mean-spirited. Since then, however, the characters have been enjoyably developed elsewhere in the MCU, and the recent Guardians Holiday Special recaptured much of that original magic. The recent Vol. 3 trailer supplied both the lols and the feels while suggesting additional dramatic weight. This is to be the final outing for the disparate band of heroes and their dysfunctional-family dynamic, so consider my hopes renewed and my anticipation stoked.

Verdict: TBA

13. Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse (2nd June)

Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse wasn't on my radar back in 2018. While I enjoy the live-action Spider-Movies as much as most people, comic-book animation isn't my bag at all. It's a measure of how much I was impressed by this film's narrative imagination and wealth of creativity that its sequel has made this list. Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse promises to advance on its predecessor's spectacular visual craft, while spinning its multiversal myth-making into a significantly more complex web. With the cast list including a stupid amount of voice talent and the trailer exhibiting the same visual ingenuity and wit as first time around, I'll be surprised if this chapter doesn't out-smash the first on every conceivable level.

Verdict: TBA

14. Mission: Impossible - Dead Reckoning Part One (14th July)

Tom Cruise may be a divisive figure, but no one can deny his commitment to one film project after another and, frankly, his willingness to risk his own sky-highly-insured neck in service to quality mass entertainment. Top Gun: Maverick remains my unexpected favourite film of last year, and I've loved the previous two Christopher McQuarrie-directed Mission: Impossible episodes, so based on that alone the odds of a top blockbuster experience are strong. Add an impressive trailer, the addition of Hayley Atwell to an already crackling cast, and an on-set featurette involving the franchise's most inadvisable stunt to date, well - what reason not to salivate?

Verdict: TBA

15. Oppenheimer (21st July)

Christopher Nolan continues to alternate between fiercely conceptual science-fiction and 20th century historical drama. (Let's face it, the guy's unlikely ever to give us a romantic comedy.) Regular Nolan collaborator Cillian Murphy is this time is front and centre as the so-called Father of the Atomic Bomb, J. Robert Oppenheimer, and from what glimpses we've seen so far should be a mighty subatomic fusion of guilt and hubris in the role. He's not going to be left out to stew on his own, though, surrounded as he is by a support cast that includes Emily Blunt, Matt Damon, Florence Pugh, and Gary Oldman, along with Robert Downey Jr. in a turn that might redefine him post-Ironman. Of course the ultimate reason to get excited is the broad and start cinematic vision of the director paired with subject matter of such moment. Even in the trailer the sense of tragedy and awe is palpable. 

Verdict: TBA

16. Barbie (21st July)

No, I wouldn't have considered myself target audience for this one either. But then it turned out that Greta Gerwig - fresh from her Little Women success - is directing, having co-written the screenplay with partner Noah Baumbach of Marriage Story acclaim, and that Margot Robbie is starring as the iconic plastic heroine. There's also Ryan Gosling as Ken, which is fun. The nature of the film's concept remains an enigma, but a stand-out teaser trailer parodying Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey (think evolution of the doll') suggests that this will be as riotous in its entertainment value as the colour scheme is pink. Life in plastic might just prove - in this case at least - to actually be fantastic. It should be a blast finding out. (Barbie is due to open the same day as Oppenheimer, so I'll watch the Oppenheimer blast first. I might find myself in need of some platinum blonde optimism afterwards.)

Verdict: TBA

17. Dune Part Two (3rd November)

Did you see Dune Part One? Have you read all of the book? If the answer to both those questions is 'Yes', then I scarcely need to explain why this is my most hotly anticipated film release of 2023. Denis Villeneuve (he doesn't do rom coms any more than Christopher Nolan) shouldered the challenge of adapting Frank Herbert's science fiction tome for the big screen with Sisyphean levels of commitment, and while he achieved an epic creative success, he's had to begin all over again, the story's halves not having been shot back to back. Unlike Sisyphus, however, he's got a whole lot of help with the task. That includes technicians capable of making gargantuan sandworms and insect-like ornithopters appear utterly real, the stirring musical contributions of Mr Hans Zimmer, and an already fine cast that's been bolstered by the likes of Florence Pugh (yup, her again), Christopher Walken, and Elvis himself, Austin Butler. How excited am I? Enough to read the book a second time - or at least listen to it on Audible. It's long, so November should come around just in time.

Verdict: TBA

18. Beau is Afraid (TBC)

Having proceeded in order of release date, I now come to a dicey trio of choices - insofar as their arrival in theatres isn't carved in granite. Of course, most of 2020's solid dates had to be rechiselled, so let's not get hung up on such petty details. Beau is Afraid - I know all of three things about this project. 1. It's written and directed by Ari Aster. 2. It's the life story of a (probably) fictional entrepreneur. 3. Its crazily talented cast is headed up by one Joaquin Phoenix. To take those each at a time... Aster, whether you loved or hated Hereditary and Midsommar, is one of the most exciting newer filmmakers around today. The fact that he's branching out from horror to embrace a story this enigmatic is fascinating in itself. And 'The Phoenix' doesn't sign up for any old crap. Frankly, if Ari and Joaquin made a Christmas Hallmark film together, I'd watch it gladly - this film all the more. Whatever it damn well turns out to be.

Verdict: TBA

19. The Killer (TBC)

The big 2023 hitters continue - hopefully - with David Fincher's The Killer. Sadly, this does suggest that there's no third season of criminal psychology drama Mindhunter on the horizon, but with a talent like Fincher, we're glad of what we get. And this film promises to hark back to cold steeliness of crime films like Panic Room and Zodiac in its subject matter, while drawing on the writing skills of Andrew Kevin Walker, with whom the director worked on the ever memorable Se7en. Adapted from a French graphic novel series about a ruthlessly efficient assassin having a psychological crisis, it'll be headed up by Michael Fassbinder and Tilda Swinton. That's one great combination of elements. Now just let it happen this year...

Verdict: TBA

20. Killers of the Flower Moon (TBC)

Let's round things off with a forthcoming opus from that other latter day great, Martin Scorsese. 2019's The Irishman was a mammoth achievement and an elegiac companion piece to movies like Goodfellas and Casino, and Killers of the Flower Moon feels like it'll carry similar dramatic heft. Based on a non-fiction book about murders of Osage tribespeople linked to big business interests, and the very birth of the FBI, it sounds like Scorsese is digging deeper into the forces of violence and corruption that have helped shape the modern US than ever before. The cast (DiCaprio, De Niro, Jesse Plemons) is as heavyweight as you'd expect, Dune writer Eric Roth is on screenplay duties, and Scorsese has only developed his visual mastery of storytelling on an epic scale. Now in his early eighties, he's still fighting the good fight on behalf of mature American cinema. It's a privilege to have him still working at this rate, so bring on another magnificent creation.

Verdict: TBA

Inevitably it's the most fiercely promoted films that grab attention, and the titles that make up my end-of-year favourites might look very different to this one. Terrific smaller films will show as if from nowhere, while some of the supposed heavy hitters will fail to land any punch. This is always the way. But so long as the public buy more film tickets and keep those cinema doors open, I'll be happy enough for now. Here's to some great theatrical movie experiences along the way. 

Happy New Year, and happy watching.