It might seem unusual that a seminary graduate would resonate so deeply with writer-director Jane Schoenbrun's extraordinary I Saw the TV Glow, though I can assure you it makes perfect sense. 

If one truly surrenders to it, the seminary journey is one of both academic exploration and spiritual surrender. It's a journey that makes one less sure and more open to asking often unanswerable questions and diving off life's universal cliffs. I resonated immensely with I Saw the TV Glow. It's easily one of my favorite films of 2024 and perhaps my very favorite film of the year thus far. It's bold, masterful, vulnerable, and exhilarating filmmaking with a pristine vision that is uncompromised. It's the kind of filmmaking we rarely see these days and a film that attracted the likes of Danielle Deadwyler and Fred Durst, playing Owen's always unsettled parents, the music of Phoebe Bridgers (and others in a remarkable soundtrack), and Emma Stone and her husband Dave McCary as producers for the film. 

It's clear that both Justice Smith and Brigette Lundy-Paine embraced Schoenbrun's invitation into this achingly naked filmmaking that bare's souls and demands surrender. Both are truly exceptional here, Smith's changed but not quite so much Owen powerful to watch over the course of his life and Lundy-Paine's Maddy nothing short of mesmerizing throughout. 

Schoenbrun's dialogue invites personal experience. While I have experienced it one way, you may very well experience it another. The filmmaking itself is unquestionably sublime, stunningly beautiful yet also unforgettably jarring. Eric Yue's lensing for the film embodies the film's nostalgia-tinged dissociation and universal glow. The original score by Alex G amplifies the film's sense of psychodramatic cliff-diving and Brandon Tonner-Connolly's production design feels like 90's suburbia meets Twilight Zone. Kudos must also be offered for Rachel Dainer-Best's intuitive and personal costume design, Paige Mitchell's strong set decoration, and Sofi Marshall's ability to capture the film's rhythms in editing. 

There is no comfort to be found in RaMell Ross's extraordinary adaptation of Colson Whitehead's Pulitzer Prize-winning The Nickel Boys. Intimately inspired by real-life events from the Arthur G. Dozier Florida School for Boys, Whitehead told a story that seemed a cinematic impossibility. Nickel Boys is a tall order for moviegoers because it requires a willingness to to be uncomfortable, a willingness to exist in the otherness of what it means to be Black in the United States. 

I will admit that I struggled to adapt to Nickel Boys initially. I was lost in what I expected the film to be partly because I had read Whitehead's novel and partly because understood Hollywood's history in telling this kind of story. 

Ross's approach is different. 

We are lulled into an initial sense of hopefulness as we're introduced to Elwood. Yes, we see the tensions. We feel them achingly. However, there's a whisper of possibility and a life so close yet so far. The friendship between Elwood (Ethan Herisse) and Turner (Brandon Wilson) is essential here, both from different worlds yet existing within common ground. We are constantly told that the world is changing, however, greed for power and possession and conttrol is mighty and those who have it won't give it up easily. There are scenes that unfold here that I've been unable to forget and that's a reality that's intentional and played out by an older Daveed Diggs toward film's end. 

It's unfathomable to me that Nickel Boys snagged a PG-13 rating, yet it's vital that it did because this is a film that begs to be seen far and wide by those who will understand, those who will remember, and those who will uncomfortably look away. This is bold, courageous cinema that refuses to compromise and refuses to let us be comfortable. I will admit I struggled with whether or not to even include Nickel Boys in my top ten, however, long after having seen it it's one of the few films from this year I simply can't forget and, I'd dare say, I hope I never do. 

Iranian filmmaker Mohammad Rasoulof may very well have given up his homeland for the sake of making the unforgettable The Seed of the Sacred Fig, an important film that continues the controversial filmmaker's willingness to question authority in a counttry where questioning authority is punisable in every way imaginable. Of the film's in my top ten this year, I'll confess that The Seed of the Sacred Fig may be one of the more questionable as the story's plausability occasionally lags and the narrative threads don't always gel. However, sometimes imperfect cinema becomes perfect because of what it says and how it changes the world. As a film critic who has a social impact award in his name, I'd be remiss if I didn't recognize that even a flawed The Seed of the Sacred Fig is better than the vast majority of cinema produced in 2024. 

If I were to pick my favorite film of 2024, it may very well be Joanna Arnow's The Feeling That the Time for Doing Something has Passed. Arnow stars as Ann, a thirtysomething New York who's existing casually in her sense of stuckness. She has a  years-long casual BDSM relationship, a low-level corporate job, and a disagreeable Jewish family. A dry comedy, this is a film that in Hollywood's usual hands would turn on the emotional resonance and force Ann to learn some grand moral lessons before winding her way to a happy ending. 

I mean, okay, there's a shard of happiness here yet Arnow has integrity galore in embracing Ann exactly as she is and recognizing that there are a lot of others like her. While my first three films in my top ten were noteworthy for what they said, this is a film noteworthy for what it doesn't say and for it's ability to simply exist with its characters. I laughed often, though despite her predicaments it was never actually at Ann. It was more with the familiarity of the lives we live while we're searching for the life we want. As a bonus, The Feeling That the Time for Doing Something has Passed is executive produced by Sean Baker. 

This world, Garland's world, would kill me. 

So, it's likely not surprising that I most resonated with a secondary character in Civil War. The always impressive Stephen Henderson adds gravitas and vulnerability as Sammy, an elder statesman in the journalism world whose infirmities are now making it harder for him to live the life he's always lived even as he's watching the America he's grown up with seemingly disappear. He's determined to join acclaimed journos Lee (Kirsten Dunst) and Joel (Wagner Moura) as they head toward Washington D.C. to interview the President (Nick Offerman), "the only story left" Lee tells us, in a world where the Western Forces, a united California and Texas, are racing toward that same destination determined to descend upon the White House for reasons best explained in the film. The trio will be joined by a newbie, Jessie (Cailee Spaeny), who idolizes Lee but who is very clearly a burden to everyone arriving at their destination safely. 

Admit it. You're already thinking to yourself you know how all this is going to go. 

You're partially right. You're mostly wrong. 

You need know very little about me to know that I resonated deeply with Ghostlight. I've said over and over and over again in my life that writing has saved me in profound and undeniable ways. My life has been changed on stage, off stage, by the written word, and in a myriad of other creative ways. Without the arts, I firmly believe I'd have been dead years ago. Watching Kupferer's Dan find community and meaning in this local theater's production, I was reminded time and again of the people who enfolded me when I was barely worth enfolding and who absolutely refused to let go no matter how ugly I became in word and deed. My losses were profound, a wife and a child for example, yet the arts gave me a safe place to grieve, rage, lament, weep, love, and occasionally even laugh. 

If my beloved Joanna Arnow flick has competition for my favorite film of 2024, it's likely from this June Squibb-led Magnolia Pictures release that I'm pretty sure is far better than anyone expects it to be. Inspired by a real-life experience of director Josh Margolin's own grandmother, Thelma has 95-year-old character actress June Squibb in her first true leading role as Thelma, an older woman who falls prey to one of those financial swindles and sets out to right the wrong. The result is glorious with Squibb clearly relishing the opportunity to play way against type and Richard Roundtree doing fantastic work in what would turn out to be his final performance. The criminally underrated Parker Posey is here as well, Fred Hechinger charms as the grandsom who has immense faith in his grandmother, and in what could have easily been a one-note joke we end up with one of the year's most entertaining flicks. 

I've been a fan of Brady Corbet since his remarkable turn in Gregg Araki's Mysterious Skin and it's been a blast to watch him grow into such a mighty fine filmmaker. The Brutalist, for me, is one of the few "hype" films of 2024 to live up to that hype and it includes a sure fire Oscar nomination for best picture, best director, most likely a screenplay nod, a nod for Adrien Brody as best actor, and hopefully a nod for Guy Pearce in his best performance in years. Currently in theaters, this is one to check out for yourself. 

It would be reasonable for you to suspect that my fondness for Solvent is influenced by my ever so brief appearance in the bold and ballsy film starring Jon Gries as Gunner S. Holbrook, whose expertise in "tracking hidden and potentially fragile goods" has brought him to the Austrian village of Egelsau at the commissioning of Polish academic Krystyna Szczepanska (Aleksandra Cwen) to search the abandoned farmhouse of former high-ranking Nazi official Wolfgang Zinggl. The mission, if you will, is to discover the location of mass graves. What they find, how they find it, and the price they pay for finding it are all largely what drives the narrative arc of this film that Grenzfurthner co-wrote alongside Ben Roberts. Grenzfurthner is an uncompromising filmmaker and Solvent an often difficult film to watch in a myriad of ways. 

The odds are strong that my passion for this film would exist even if I didn't have a "blink and you'll miss it" appearance of sorts toward the film's end. Quite simply, I've grown immensely fond of Grenzfurthner's films over the years and this may very well be the best one of them all. It most definitely earns its place in my top ten for 2024. 

There's little denying that Pixar's Inside Out 2 and The Wild Robot will likely share this year's awards spotlight, however, this Independent Spirit Award nominee captivated me in every moment. Dialogue-free, Flow is a film that will speak to animal lovers with its thoughtful, intentional, and whimsical storytelling with sounds used sparingly yet perfectly and every moment of the journey feeling magical. 

The film is Latvia's entry in the Academy Awards and will hopefully snag a deserved nomination even in this particularly strong year for animation. Easily my favorite animated feature for 2024. 

The Next 10: Sing Sing, Anora, A Complete Unknown, September 5, Green Border, Conclave, A Real Pain, Los Frikis, Better Man, No Other Land