I thought about doing some end of the year lists for a number of topics. Best meals. Best chocolate bars. Best durian. Best books and music. But I think I’m too much of a relativist to compare things directly and I prefer organizing by place. Most of what I read and eat and listen to makes it into these blogs eventually, but most movies I see will never make it into another post, so I thought I should just list and blurb them here.
This is everything I saw in theaters in 2024 (with my current lifestyle I lack a nice TV and thus I don’t watch movies at home). I cheated a tiny bit, putting the films I saw on January 2, 2024 onto my 2023 list, and putting a few of the 2024 releases that I caught in early 2025 onto this list. Almost all of these were seen in Mumbai, with a handful that I saw in Thailand in the middle and a few others in some other Indian cities. Almost all were 2024 releases, with some prestige movies from 2023 in the beginning of the year and a number of classics at a film festival and a Raj Kapoor retrospective (which I wrote about). While going through other 2024 lists I did spot some films I caught in 2023, but I won’t be including those.
This is not a very good list. Read it for fun if you like movies but don’t expect much, other than discovering some Indian movies you might not know. Because of travel and a poor selection of world cinema and independent films available in India (and sadly I missed the excellent MAMI film festival last year), the list of films I watched more reflects what looked decent that was playing at decent theaters near me rather than the films of 2024 that I most wanted to see. I see what I can, but I probably would have only gone to see a quarter of these if I were living in, say, NY or LA where I’d have a much better selection, and even fewer if I had a nice TV where I’d mostly just watch classics and only go for new releases if I felt I really had to. That said, I’m glad I saw most of these, so there’s something to be said about restrictions. Then again, most of these are mediocre, even the ones I liked. I’m kind of obsessed with movies though.
I counted 54 movies, which is worse than 2023, but still above 52, so I’m happy. If I dip below a movie a week on average then I should probably rethink the way I’m living my life.
I don’t really like making lists, so no top ten or anything, but everything 8/10 and up would be my top picks, and 7/10s are my runners up. My rankings are instinctive and there’s no actual meaning to them, but I’ll just say I’m probably a harder critic than most when giving out numbers. An 8/10 is a movie I’d casually say I loved even if it’s unlikely to go on my all time favorites list, 7/10’s are also very good, and the 6’s are generally pretty good, or okay but with great elements, or half great and half bad or something like that, and even 5s are movies that I more or less enjoyed and think have some redeeming value.
As a rule I’ve decided to limit all of my blurbs to under three lines as they appear on my computer while writing them. I did a lot of cutting and the writing became pretty choppy for some of them. Next year I’ll limit it to four lines.
Listing the films in the order that I watched them (director in parentheses), and anything rated 8 or above is bolded:
Merry Christmas (Sriram Raghavan)- Hindi noir. Great pulpy fun, and surprisingly romantic and charming. Love the slow burn pace, the tonal balance, and the old school feel, even if it didn’t 100% work for me. One of those movies where I thought “If only it were shot on film.” 8/10
Hanu-Man (Prasanth Varma) - Telugu mythological superhero movie. Too loud, long, and kiddy, and the characters are underdeveloped, but it is fairly entertaining, mostly well done, and full of clever, creative stuff even though the core of it is fairly generic. Good for what it is. 6/10
Renaissance: A Film by Beyonce (Beyonce) - I don’t love the music but I warmed to it and enjoyed this on the big screen a lot, both the performances and the documentary part. 7/10
Guntur Kaaram (Trivikram Srinivas) - Fairly watchable but also way too long and generic, a typical Telugu star film. Sometimes fun but little stood out. Mainly watched it to prepare for Rajamouli’s next with Mahesh Babu, who I’ve liked but yet to love over a handful of films. 4/10
Dream Scenario (Kristoffer Borgli) - I didn’t expect to like this since I’m not interested in dreams or dream sequences, but I loved it. It takes the concept in surprising, dramatically compelling, and uncomfortably funny directions. Cage of course is great. 8/10
Captain Miller (Arun Matheswaran) - Arthouse RRR. Great visuals, some cool stylistic choices and action, and the plot is fun and interesting on paper, but the storytelling and characters left a lot to be desired, and it's too long and loud. 6/10
The Beekeeper (David Ayer) - I had fun, but was expecting more from David Ayer, based on his earlier work, but I haven't seen anything he's done after 2014. A solid Statham programmer, fun action, a decent blend of silliness and craft, but it doesn't do enough to distinguish itself. 6/10
Anyone But You (Will Gluck) - A handful of excellent rom-com moments and I liked the leads, but much of it is bad and very contrived. Even if you like this sort of stuff, eh. Easy A from the same director is vastly better. 5/10
Fighter (Siddharth Ananad) - Bollywood Top Gun. I’m a fan of both leads but was pretty bored for most of it. I quite liked the action scene at the end where they aren’t in planes. There’s an excellent subplot about the power of Hrithik Roshan’s smile. That’s about it. 4/10
Malaikottai Vaaliban (Lijo Jose Pellissery) - An awesome offbeat artsy Indian folk tale, inspired by myth as well as westerns and sometimes kung fu movies, but never too pasthichey, always original and distinctive. Too long and indulgent but it’s so good I didn’t mind. 9/10
Argylle - Pretty silly and stupid but I liked it. Clever and fun. At first I was like "this reminds me of Bullet Train and Knight & Day but not as good” but by the end it was about as good as those despite lacking their great star performances. 6/10
Iron Claw (Sean Durkin) - Really great, one of those dramas where I’m happy just hanging out with the characters before anything even happens. When things do happen, it felt rushed, but it’s otherwise top notch. Terrific performances, great music, shot on film. 8/10
Suzume (Makoto Shinkai) - I liked it. The first half was a lot of fun, and as an anime outsider quite unique and otherworldly to me. It lost me as it went on. I felt the same about Weathering With You (haven't seen Your Name) but this engaged me much more than that. 6/10
Anweshippin Kandethum (Darwin Kuriakose) - Good murder mystery procedural stuff with zero character development. Very odd experience. Nice visuals and rural Kerala setting, solidly crafted, good acting, but meh. 4/10
Visions (Yann Gozlan) - French stylish sexy thriller, giallo-ish, totally my thing, unfortunately the script is quite dull. 5/10
Perfect Days (Wim Wenders) - Delightful, and I love that it’s literally an ad for Japanese public toilets. 7/10
Berlin (Atul Sabharwal) - Pretty cool Hindi post-Cold War espionage thriller. Low budget but with an old school craftsmanship to it. It’s cleverly constructed and quite entertaining. 7/10
Poor Things (Yorgos Lanthimos) - So brilliant, original, inventive, compelling, and funny. 9/10
Civil War (Alex Garland) - Thought it was fun, a good mainstream entertainment, better made and more interesting than most, a thinking man's Roland Emmerich movie with some great scenes. Maybe I’d have liked it more if I had some intellectual engagement with America… 6/10
Enter the Dragon (Robert Clouse) - I kinda find Bruce Lee fights to be boring, but the movie is still a lot of silly fun. Bruce and Bond mashup. Great visuals and music. The mirror fight is terrific. I think I prefer his actual Hong Kong films, though I haven’t seen any in 10+ years. 7/10
The Sleeping Woman (Laura Alvea) - Perfectly competent but very mediocre Spanish thriller. 5/10
Guns of Navarone (J. Lee Thompson) - I feel like a 2 hour cut of this would have been great. It drags. But still good fun, old school Hollywood craftsmanship, guys on an adventure WW2 movie, some great visuals, music, and suspense sequences. The finale is excellent. 6/10
Thanksgiving (Eli Roth) - The whole was too conventional and middling for me, but the death sequences really knocked it out of the park. I was guffawing at some of them, and I’m not much of a laugher. Hats off to Eli. 6/10
Love Lies Bleeding (Rose Glass) - I was really loving the first half but man did it go off rails as it went on. Still, I loved the style and the world it created. Wish the script were stronger. 6/10
Laapataa Ladies (Kiran Rao) - After seeing this I thought “a week in the editing room and this could be worthy of the Oscar foreign language nom.” Should have sent them my notes. Anyway, it’s great fun, very charming, I was teary eyed at the end. 9/10
Aadujeevithan - The Goat Life (Blessy) - The survival drama, which makes up the bulk of the movie, isn’t very compelling. But I kind of liked it. The vibe, visuals, and music reminded me of a classy mainstream Indian movie from the 00s, like something from Mani Ratnam. 6/10
Challengers (Luca Guadagnino) - I love movies like this where for the first hour I can't decide if it's bad or not, but its excellence creeps up on me and it just keeps getting better. So good. Shot on film by Sayombhu Mukdeeprom. 9/10
Aavesham (Jithu Madhavan) - This Malayalam movie was a huge hit and also received a ton of critical acclaim. I can’t remember the last time I felt so out of touch. I admired some of the visuals and performances but largely found it very difficult to sit through. 3/10
My Boo (Komgrit Triwimol) - Fairly cute Thai ghost rom-com. Unremarkable and it could have been stronger in many ways but it had its charms. 5/10
Lahn-Mah / How to Make Millions Before Grandma Dies (Pat Boonnitipat) - Low key Thai drama, huge sleeper hit all over Southeast Asia. Though I didn’t totally connect with it, I liked it and it’s nicely made. Great Bangkok movie, beautifully shot in the old neighborhoods I love. 7/10
Dog God (Ing K.) - Super low budget Thai movie (mostly in English) from the 90s, banned until recently. The cheap filmmaking drags it down a bit but also adds to the charm, like a Clerks sort of thing, and it's a funny satire of spiritual cults. Not amazing but I had a good time. 6/10
Furiosa (George Miller) - I was never as into Mad Max as I wanted to be, but I loved this. A slow paced epic, more my speed than the earlier films, and the world building here hooked me more than the sparse storytelling of much of the series (as I recall, it’s been a decade). 8/10
Haunted Universities 3 (Aussada Likitboonma, Sorawit Meungkeaw, Nontawat Numbenchapol) - Thai horror anthology. A mixed bag. The second film was beautifully crafted, if uninteresting to me. The third needed a better setup but was great fun once it got going. 5/10
Late Night With the Devil (Cameron Cairnes, Colin Cairnes) - I love the concept and it’s quite well executed, but for whatever reason it never fully came alive for me. Still, pretty fun. The main guy needed to be funnier? And it would have been better if they lopped off the prologue? 6/10
Kalki 2898 AD (Nag Ashwin) - Watchable and there's some great Indo-futurist visuals. Kamal Haasan's brief performance is legit 10/10. But despite some narrative threads that had potential, it’s mostly meh. I should boycott any film promising to start a “cinematic universe.” 5/10
Kill (Nikhil Nagesh Bhat) - Very good action, more disturbing and with more emotional heft than I expected. For an Indian movie it is refreshingly concise. I’m just not that excited by wall to wall action movies like this. I need more variety and joy in my action, or more of a narrative. 6/10
Longlegs (Oz Perkins) - Eh. Dug it at first, but as it went on I didn't care about anything. The style was too distancing, which would be fine if I bought into the surreal nightmare of it all, but I didn't. Cage might be great but his presence is really just distracting. 5/10
Trap (M. Night Shyamalan) - I can’t say it’s good, but I had fun. Easily my favorite of his since The Visit (I’ve seen all but Old). The first half is particularly fun, if dumb. A good offbeat Hitchcock riff. Great weird lead performance. Shot on film by Sayombhu Mukdeeprom. 6/10
It Ends With Us (Justin Baldoni) - Uh I kinda loved this. I didn’t know what it was and only saw it because I needed something to slot into a double feature and the pickings were slim. Shockingly good soap opera. Funny, charming dialogue. Juicy melodrama (off-screen too!). 9/10
Blink Twice (Zoë Kravitz) - Not great but I liked it. The script is fun, but too thin. Elevated by a strong sense of style, great music, and good performances. Funny censorship in India. All sorts of horrible stuff depicted but they blurred a vape. I saw a guy vaping in the theater later. 6/10
Alien: Romulus (Fede Álvarez) - I liked it, though it was too generic and not interesting like the other recent films in the series. Too much of a typical franchise entry. But the filmmaking was on point, some of the set pieces were great, and it looked amazing in the laser IMAX. 6/10
Vaazhai (Mari Selvaraj) - A lot to admire in here, but I liked it less than everyone else, partly because it’s a poor kids in a village movie and I never connect with those, partly because it’s too long and waaaay too loud. Still, there’s some great filmmaking and nice detailing. 6/10
Aag (Raj Kapoor) - Not very compelling, but a promising debut with some strong filmmaking. 5/10 [Note: I did a whole post on the eight Raj Kapoor films I saw in a week, see that post for longer blurbs, I am keeping these very short.]
Shree 420 (Raj Kapoor) - A great entertainment, if too long and overly simplistic. Great cast and music. 8/10
Barsaat (Raj Kapoor) - Beautifully shot and has nice music but is largely quite dull. 5/10
Awara (Raj Kapoor) - An all time great. 10/10
Bobby (Raj Kapoor) - A dull romance with fun candy colored visuals, some great music, and interesting side characters. 5/10
Sangam (Raj Kapoor) - What begins as a tedious romantic melodrama with an annoying protagonist builds into an epic melodrama with an incredible finale. Plus, great music. 6/10
Jis Desh Mein Ganga Behta Hai (Radhu Karmakar) - Drags a bit near the end, but this is a very fun dacoit adventure with great music. 8/10
All We Imagine as Light (Payal Kapadia) - A lovely movie, intimate and well observed, a portrait of Mumbai that shows hardship without just wallowing in characters’ sorrows, and a style that is fresh and distinctive, not just another neorealist drama. I wanted more to happen, though. 7/10
Heretic (Scott Beck, Bryan Woods) - A fun, clever thriller, and an excellent Hugh Grant movie. Hugh Grant is a great source of inspiration for me. He combines British politeness and charm with a huge ego and a contempt for humanity. When I watch him I know I am not alone. 6/10
Mera Naam Joker (Raj Kapoor) - All of its three stories have some great material in them, but all are also simultaneously too long and underdeveloped. I found it to be quite watchable, though. 6/10
Viduthalai 2 (Vetrimaaran) - I loved part one, despite its hyper editing. It had a strong story to get into and a great character as an entry point. This has the same problems but is a sprawling, talky political film that’s hard to connect with. Still worthwhile, though. A unique epic. 6/10
Mufasa (Barry Jenkins) - Yeah it’s a clearly compromised commercial product with an embarrassing tacked on frame narrative, but underneath that is a pretty solid, entertaining animal adventure movie. A bit rushed, and the songs are lackluster, but I liked it. 6/10
Nosferatu (Robert Eggers) - Great gothic fun. A bit distancing, I always felt I was watching it rather than connecting with it, but it was so cinematically exquisite that I didn’t mind. My first Eggers, and I am eager to watch more. 8/10
A Real Pain (Jesse Eisenberg) - Fairly entertaining, with a nice heart and some strong work, particularly in the second half, but I largely found it to be too much of a middlebrow dramedy. Too short to develop the ensemble, and I didn’t find the leads to be all that interesting. 6/10
Sonic the Hedgehog 3 (Jeff Fowler) - I found the first two to be good silly fun but this, while still fairly enjoyable, felt like a step down. Maybe it’s because I saw it in 4DX (the only showtime available), my first such experience, and it was horrid and depressing. 5/10
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