Time to call “cut” on 2024! I could do without a sequel for this one, but as somebody once said, life’s like a schlocky movie–even if you wouldn’t watch it again, no sense walking out in the middle. And as far as films themselves go, I saw plenty this year that gave me a fine occasion to kick back, lock in, and enter a world more dramatic, ecstatic, or kick-ass than the daily grind (plus, can’t beat theater popcorn butter!). I didn’t manage to catch some folks’ favorite pictures, like Anora or A Different Man, but among those I did, these are…. my Top Ten Films of 2024.
#10) The Beekeeper
How long can one man look the same and play the same character? Every action star must confront the question, but for my ticket stub, Jason Statham is so far so good. Which brings us to The Beekeeper, written by Kurt “we have The Wachowskis at home” Wimmer and directed by David “Suicide Squad could’ve been great bro” Ayer, a thinly sketched yet enthralling honey of a B-movie. True, the lore of our titular badass isn’t confusing so much as unfinished, presupposing audience familiarity with “secret assassin underworld” franchises like John Wick in lieu of actually developing its premise. However, with his trademark sneer and pugilist’s build, Statham shoots, slices, and immolates his way through a cadre of Saturday morning cartoon-tier villains in fight scenes that left me buzzing with excitement. Phone scammers, crypto bros, PMCs—make up a guy to get mad at, and “Adam Clay” is here to put them down. The brawls are good, but the sets are no slouch either, from neon-drenched call centers to yellow and/or grid-like environs which slyly symbolize the societal “hive” our hero seeks to protect. There’s plenty of memorable nemeses too, both colorful (a colleague with a minigun; a merc with a prosthetic leg) and subdued (Josh Hutcherson as a twisted tech mogul; the Jeremy Irons). Wimmer’s script has a lot of glib “wait, what’d they just say?” dialogue, but it balances comedy and violence well, while still raising genuine awareness of elder abuse and cybercrime. Who knows if this’ll get a sequel, but if it does, I’ll bee there!
#9) Beetlejuice Beetlejuice
For a while there, it felt like Tim Burton forgot how to direct a clever, colorful horror-comedy, but he’s got the juice again. As legacyquels go, Beetlejuice Beetlejuice checks all the boxes: a prior protagonist’s descendant in a similar pickle, copious lampshading for absent major characters, and elevating its predecessor’s events to the realm of myth. Fortunately, all the players are game: Jenna Ortega is at her most adorkable, Winona Ryder’s Lydia Deetz remains a goth girl crush for the ages, with Catherine O’Hara as her mother still a blowhard artiste, and Willem Dafoe makes his long-overdue Burton debut as an undead cop. And at the risk of saying his name too frequently, Michael Keaton doesn’t disappoint: the actor may be over 70, but he disappears back into the title role with horny, gruesome, one-liner-addicted aplomb. The plot’s a bit hit-and-miss, if not in service of the anarchic mood then at least as an apparent result of overcooking this script for the last three decades. Monica Belluci, Franken-babe though she may be, gets little to do, while Oretega juggles subplots with both a charming boy and the loss of her father, neither of which resolve with much fanfare. Fortunately, there’s more great comedy—and music!—to pick up the slack, from a cover of “MacArthur Park” to a “Soul Train” which dives headlong into the obvious pun. Makeup and production design throughout are wonderful; I delighted especially in mixed-media flashbacks like a claymation plane crash and a black-and-white Italian interlude, as well as the darkly funny image of a house covered in a mourning shroud. Yeah, the logic of the afterlife makes no sense, but why should it? Being along for the ride was still a spooky good time.
#8) Monkey Man
Action flicks were in fine form indeed this year, but unlike The Beekeeper, it didn’t take a veteran heavy to carry ‘em all. Case in point: Monkey Man, a brutal yet pensive, politically charged thriller starring former Slumdog Millionaire/Chappie sidekick Dev Patel. In presenting a downtrodden man who shoots, stabs, and car-chases his way through the criminals that’ve wronged him, the clearest point of comparison for Patel’s directorial debut is again John Wick—yet in all the best ways, this vengeful simian couldn’t be further from Keanu’s iconic hitter. Our hero doesn’t have street cred, gold coins, or even more than one gun—he’s an orphan from the slums, living a dual life as a bare-knuckle brawler and a waiter at an “elite” club. He’s a man on a mission, yet in making that mission not just vengeance but also justice for groups marginalized by right-wingers, Monkey Man steps out of its bloodbath with a moral resonance greater than its contemporaries. Most fights feel a little cramped, but there’s still enough head-spinning camerawork and choreography to make each appropriately frantic. It all builds to a climax among 2024’s best, where Patel literally lights up goons with fireworks before going to town with a dinner knife. An exciting score and soundtrack top it all off, from bumpin’ rap beats to a humble drummer who sets the pace during a training montage. It’s not perfect—tragic-backstory flashbacks get a touch samey, for one—but Patel still made a picture which both honors and confronts Indian culture while leaving room for red-blooded martial arts mayhem. Whether he doubles down on his badass potential or sticks with dramas, I can’t wait to see what Dev-elopments are next.
#7) Bad Boys: Ride or Die
Between COVID burning their threequel’s box office and Will Smith’s post-Slap spiral, I was worried we might never see Miami’s finest again. Much to my delight, however, this year brought us Bad Boys: Ride or Die, an irresponsible, silly, yet relentlessly thrilling buddy-action flick! Mononymous duo Adil & Bilall return for another commendable homage to Aughts Michael Bay: fast cars, neon colors, beautiful women, and absurd beatdowns, just the way I like it. High-contrast Florida remains a dazzling stage, which the directors pepper with kinetic flourishes like drone shots, POV shootouts, and—surprisingly—a couple fantasy sequences. From its tropical sets to stars old enough to be my dad kicking extrajudicial ass in the name of family, and even a BBQ outro, one could write this off as Fast & Furious Lite—but Vin Diesel wishes he had half the charm Smith’s still rocking, while an R rating lets shootouts and dialogue get that much more audacious. Some of the junior “AMMO” squad is still here, but no matter, for I rejoiced at moments like a prison transport crash evocative of Uncharted and the stepson ascending from meek punchline to stone-cold killer when his home is set upon by goons. The only major flaw is, unfortunately, a load-bearing one carried over from its predecessor: the dude playing Mike’s son is a vacuous walking plot device. Look past that, the tired callbacks, and the enthusiastic copaganda, though, and you’ve still got an energetic, hilarious, and skillful return to form for the Bad Boys!
#6) Dune: Part Two
2021’s Dune ensnared the senses with director Denis Villeneuve’s new take on the oft-maladapted sci-fi novel, the first of a quiet duology. With such a strong introduction, then, perhaps it was inevitable for the follow-up to feel like a downgrade. Aside from a few cutaways to greener environs and a monochrome gladiatorial match—the standout sequence—this film is brought to you by the colors brown and gray, and I found myself intermittently confused about who was where, why, how, and for how long. Meanwhile, Hans Zimmer’s score is more often loud than memorable, while dialogue oscillates between portentous muttering and melodramatic hollering. That said, I came to Dune: Part II for that which made its predecessor, and on which it delivered in spades: spectacle. Costume and set design continue to run circles around every other major franchise, the CGI is believable and engrossing, action sequences are captivating, and we’ve got another batch of sexy weirdos with all kinds of drama: Léa Seydoux as a Bene Gesserit talent scout, Florence Pugh as a fretful royal, and Austin Butler as the baldest lunatic yet. Meanwhile, I don’t think it’s even a question that Christopher Walken got cast because of the “Weapon of Choice” video, but dang is it good to see the man back in a blockbuster as… well, the Emperor of the Universe! Yeah, when Timothée Chalamet starts putting the moves on Zendaya and yelling about ruling the planet, it doesn’t do anti-colonial critiques of the story any favors—especially with yet another cliffhanger ending. But whether it’s freedom fighters blowing up Harkonnen tech, Paul riding a sandworm for the first time, or just eye contact with Rebecca Ferguson in general, I lost track of how many times I had to fight back the urge to pump my fist in the air like a concertgoer. It’s kinda repetitive, it’s confusing, it’s three hours long, and one of the characters is a psychic fetus… but hey, when I go to see a picture shot in IMAX, it’s not for the safe and simple.
#5) Love Lies Bleeding
Love Lies Bleeding is a dark, delirious, and outrageously sapphic crime thriller. In pivoting from slow-burn scares to turn-of-the-90s New Mexico, Rose Glass branches out from her prior effort Saint Maud, and yet the director’s style remains omnipresent, from bursts of gnarly gore to a climax which glides on the razor’s edge between magical realism and dream sequence. The cast, while small, looms large—literally, in the case of Katy O’Brian as “Jackie,” a bisexual bodybuilder with few qualms about either ‘roids or premeditated murder. Meanwhile, Kristen Stewart plays another horny little dweeb to perfection, Dave Franco is gone not a moment too soon as an abusive husband, and Ed Harris delivers another great villain performance as a mob boss with a thing for big bugs. The score is my choice mix of period-appropriate licensed tracks and an unsettling score (the talented Clint Mansell), while sound design is replete with all manner of pops and squelches for physical acts both brutal and intimate. Sets are varied and immersive, with a borderline bottomless pit in the desert being the standout, all the more so when rendered in blood-red flashbacks. Like many films under the A24 shingle, Love Lies Bleeding is a heady mix of horror, eroticism, abrupt violence, and odd fantasy—admittedly, it sometimes feels like Glass is working backwards towards those bullet points at the expense of coherence or pacing. However familiar its broad strokes may be, though, this is the kind of sleek, provocative, adults-only mid-budget picture that I’m elated to see regain prominence in theaters!
#4) The Substance
From Doctor Jekyll and Mr. Hyde to Freaky Friday, there’s a long tradition of tales where an aspirational body-swap goes bad. The latest to take a crack at it is writer-director Coralie Fargeat with The Substance, a grisly yet glitzy Hollywood horror story and the rare feminist fable that delights in buckets of gross-out practical effects! Dreams and dreamlike imagery sew long shots of Kubrickian corridors to hyperactive edits across a radiant L.A. which highlight the growing divide between our dual protagonists: Demi Moore as faded starlet “Elisabeth Sparkle” and a rarely clothed Margaret Qualley as the sensuous “Sue” birthed from her spine. When the rules of the titular injection are established early on, it’s easy to predict the tragedy to come, but one can’t be prepared for just how absurdly and grotesquely it plays out. I’m torn on the script, to that end; a lot of names are generic enough to feel like placeholders (a talk show called “The Show”), supporting performances are downright cartoonish (Dennis Quaid as a studio head/avatar of toxic masculinity), and Fargeat situates viewers in a world that’d seem to be present day yet a sexy fitness TV show is somehow a ticket to the A-List. Dated in spots or not, though, The Substance is overwhelmingly fresh: energetic, vicious, and righteously angry. It’s the progressive mashup of Resident Evil and The Nutty Professor that I never knew I needed!
#3) Dìdi
If I don’t have as much to say about writer-director-producer Sean Wang’s Dìdi despite its height on this list, maybe it’s just because I feel like I already lived it myself—the highs, the lows, and everything in-between. Late-Aughts coming-of-age pieces are finally here, and so am I for it! I may not have grown up in California or an Asian-American household, but while those elements are certainly core to the story of Dìdi, so too are the idiosyncrasies of being a teenage boy in 2008: causal homophobia among friends, skater culture, a whole Warped Tour’s worth of needle drops, and finding out the girl you’ve been DM’ing with isn’t all you hoped. The drama is grounded—conventional, even, but no less impactful for it—and like Everything Everywhere All at Once, deals in themes of intergenerational strife, regret, and the occasional comically surreal interlude, while still ending on a note of wistful hope. Props for Motion City Soundtrack dusting themselves off for that new single, too!
#2) Civil War
Alex Garland’s work has always compelled me, even if I don’t necessary “get” it: Men was more like Meh, but scenes in the eldritch Annihilation haunt me to date, while Devs is a crazy-underrated series in conversation with his Ex Machina about how far is too far when it comes to technological leaps. Civil War is the director’s masterstroke: a harrowing dystopian vision that’s not quite fantasy, not technically alternate history, and not even really a war picture, yet packed with all of the rich worldbuilding, biting commentary, and indelible imagery that make great speculative fiction. Following a troupe of photojournalists in near-future America as they journey from NYC to DC to interview a dictatorial President, the writer-director keeps one foot firmly in his horror roots with scenes that are, to put it bluntly, really fucked up: a man torturing an old classmate in a carwash; bodies hanging from an overpass next to “GO STEELERS” graffiti; snipers firing at someone they can’t see or hear until no one’s firing back. It’s all as subtle as a bullet to the head, but the film isn’t about Left versus Right, as it’s never made concrete why this war started and who’s even fighting for what. One could call it playing coy to not alienate audiences, but it’s all in keeping with the premise: our protagonists don’t care—can’t care, lest they lose their jobs and their minds—so neither shall the audience. Whether it’s a rifle or a camera, Kirsten Dunst as a weathered photographer or Jesse Plemons as a bone-chillingly inquisitive white nationalist, all anyone can do is point and shoot. Another film might focus on a civilian or soldier, drop a voiceover about the titular conflict, but Garland goes instead for a road trip of haunting vignettes set across a bombed-out East Coast. The cinematography, editing, and command of tension are stellar, presenting both chaotic shootouts and abandoned outdoor spaces complemented by sound design which careens between dead silence, ear-splitting gunfire, and atonal pop songs. Only time (or at least the next four years) will tell how well Civil War ages, but here in 2024, its portrait of a divided nation rang out like a gunshot.
#1) I Saw the TV Glow
I don’t think anybody is what they want to be. Dissatisfaction is human, consciousness cursing us with the phantom pain of what could be or have been—and from it, a drive to either keep fighting or, if we’ve no one in our corner, collapse in agony. For some, however, that sense of being trapped is more literal. It’s in this limbo that I Saw the TV Glow sets its stage, and in so doing, writer-director Jane Schoenbrun presents the rare film which is horrifying and hopeful at the same time. It’s a story about stories, but not in a metafictional or self-satisfied way like many scripts; rather, it’s about the power of media to allow oneself to embrace their true identity. The queer subtext is unmistakable, but Schoenbrun speaks to anyone of their generation—Millennials and the otherwise VHS-adjacent—who’s ever wanted to be somewhere else, whether that’s another body or just another town. Scenes alternate between solemn dialogue and hypnogogic terror, while the soundtrack runs a flawless gamut of alt-rock and eerie ambiance, plus a heart-rending title theme. From fourth-wall breaks to interludes in a totally 90s supernatural TV show, The Pink Opaque, Justice Smith captivates as a teen struggling with a dysfunctional family (including Fred Durst, presaging his appearance in the far weaker Y2K) and social anxiety who stumbles into a tumultuous friendship with Brigette Lundy-Paine (whose climatic monologue should, in a just world, net an Oscar). It’s tempting to wonder if The Pink Opaque conspiracies which Lundy-Paine’s troubled fangirl spins are real, but as a bubble-bursting final act concedes, the feelings such media can stir matter more than any lore-ready singular “truth.” If things don’t make sense, if there’s no satisfying ending, if you go to bed full of regret and fear… just get up in the morning and keep searching. It’s okay. There’s still time.
Notes&Sketches 