-
The Best Films of the 2020s Decade (so far)
The greatest films of the 2020s so far, from the growth of auteur television to boundary-pushing metamodernism.
-
The New Boy (2023)
As the mystical powers of one mute Indigenous Australian boy begin to emerge within a 1940s Catholic orphanage in The New Boy, Warwick Thornton delicately weaves a magical realist allegory of spirituality, assimilation, and colonialism’s stranglehold on ancient cultures, set against the backdrop of the beautifully unfathomable outback.
-
Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse (2023)
Even as Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse hurtles through universes of conflicting pop art aesthetics, the archetypal hero conventions it deconstructs binds them together within a set ‘canon’, all the while pushing against such restrictive notions of fate with a meta-modernist humour and hyper-kinetic animation.
-
Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 (2023)
As far as storytelling in the MCU goes, the creative tonal balance and cartoonish playfulness of Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 makes for a terrific send-off to the franchise’s most colourfully eccentric series, as James Gunn faces his oddball characters up against painfully tragic pasts.
-
Infinity Pool (2023)
Brandon Cronenberg’s overarching metaphor in Infinity Pool may not be particularly subtle, but it is overwhelmingly visceral in its technicolour, cyberpunk nightmares, centring a cabal of reckless vacationers who psychologically dehumanise themselves through the masochistic torture of locals – and their own clones.
-
Beau is Afraid (2023)
Beneath the comic absurdity of Beau is Afraid’s existential nightmare, Ari Aster delineates a surreal path leading to the source of our self-destructive shame, turning one man’s trip to his mother’s house into an epic, psychological odyssey of Freudian terror and incredible formal invention.
-
John Wick: Chapter 4 (2023)
With its staggering set pieces and consequential narrative stakes, John Wick: Chapter 4 ends this series on a majestic cinematic high, not just confirming Chad Stahelski’s well-earned position among our great modern action directors, but also his talents as a storyteller communicating through striking theological symbolism.