It is the ides of January 2024. Thus, it is time to discuss 2023. There was a news report today that the Iowa Caucuses will be happening soon; I'd rather think about literally anything other than that. The Top 15 Movies of 2023 is within the set of "anything" so let's go:
Argument:
I find myself compelled to say something profound about the state of movies every time I write these lists. I feel less than up to the task this year. It was a good year in that it had many good movies and several great movies. I still love going to see a film in theaters once or twice a week. I saw 70-ish movies in 2023, consider that my bona fides for even daring to write a list like this. I have Nicole Kidman's AMC opening prayer memorized word for word. Yet despite a rote shrugging statement of "do you know this invention called motion pictures? It's good actually", I'm not sure I have anything brilliant to add. And this feels like a year that actually calls for some brilliance and insight.
Two revolutions occurred in the film world in 2023, both largely off the screen.
The big one is, of course, the major labor battle won by the WGA and SAG-AFTRA against intransigent management. It was the biggest disruption in the movie calendar since the return to [scare quotes] "normalcy" [scare quotes] "following" Covid. Unlike, Covid, it feels like it actually meant something. The good guys won, which usually only ever happens in the movies. Real life is always more complicated, of course.
I have this grim feeling when I follow American politics that in the long-term, I'm always losing, and even "wins" are at best a draw that delays inevitable doom. You can take down a monstrous president but in his place must crown an unimpressive seat-warmer bore who maybe fixes some of the disaster the last guy. However, the shift in labor politics in the last few years has been remarkable. UPS workers went on strike, car manufacturers went on strike, health care workers went on strike, it was everywhere. People have never been this ready to use the power of collective action at any point in my life. The sense that neoliberal individual solutions were the only option was absolutely concrete even in the years immediately after the 2008 financial crisis when capitalism had so clearly failed us. Even then, nobody dared imagine an alternative. The last major Hollywood labor battle, WGA's strike in 2009, ended early because many members were
uncomfortable using their own labor power. That was still "too pink" back
then. Those very writers were the ones depicting "unions" as laughably corrupt relic full of lazy, fat moochers. Not even a generation later, its all changed. Capitalism got more greedy and the working lives of writers and actors became so tenuous that not-working was an easy call. How can socialism be so scary when the current deal offers you nothing at all?
The big strikes and their resolutions are extremely complicated. Major wins were had, and compromises were made. Studios did not become worker cooperatives and the AI "innovations" that are so "exciting" were not dismantled entirely. David Zaslav still gets to run one of the biggest and greatest studios into the ground. But wins were real and the protections were important. The five month battle was terrible for the industry, it cost billions of dollars in destruction. It was hard for everybody, even the workers who won. Management fought a quixotic battle with no plan, no goals, and lost. They went to war with their own companies and ended up doing nothing except proving their weakness.
If the strikes proved anything, they just go to show that if Hollywood did not have the labor traditions and union culture it does, it would eat itself into nothingness in a matter of years. The bosses are clueless. Look at how badly they've handled the pivot to streaming. They're blowing millions on services nobody wants to buy for audiences that are over-saturated already. Look at the largely union-less video game industry and all its pains in the last year (but I'll get to that in two weeks).
The other big revolution is a lot less important. It is mostly funny for me.
That revolution is in audience taste. In 2023 nobody wanted to watch superhero movies anymore. It only took four years for Marvel to go from undisputed Masters of the Cinematic Universe to a tiresome has-been. Ant-Man 3 under-performed, The Marvels was a full flop, and Guardians of the Galaxy 3 was a huge hit - but only thanks to being a legitimately terrific film full of beloved characters. That and the new Spider-Verse movie are the exceptional exceptions that prove the rule. If you want people to love you, you have to really try. Once upon a time, the MCU did not need to be good, the movies would be hits by right of fiat. They could throw out any random nobody like Doctor Strange in a flawed mostly-okay movie and still birth a franchise. Now? Everybody is exhausted. Who even is still watching the Marvel TV shows at this point? Another season of Loki sounds depressing to me.
I used to see all the Marvel movies, I was one of the faithful, even when I was complaining that the movies were largely mediocre. Whether I wanted to or not, back in the day, I needed to have an opinion about Spider-Man: No Way Home. Just breathing in the film space meant sucking in that film's fumes, chewing on its unavoidable scent trails. Superheroes were important. That is until last year, when I did not see either Thor 4 or Black Widow and I missed nothing. In 2023, I have not seen The Marvels, I do not know anybody who has seen The Marvels, and nobody has asked what I think about it. In retrospect, all the DC movies bombing were actually canaries in a coal mine. If people suddenly stop drinking Pepsi, it means that things probably are not great at Coke either.
And it is not like people are not interested in the movies anymore! The box office figures have not recovered pre-Covid, and the in the long run, movies are still contracting as an industry. Yet the box office was up 30.5% worldwide in 2023 versus 2022, with a 21% increase in America alone. Those numbers were good even with a massive disruption in the release schedule thanks to the strikes. It could have been better with a Dune 2. Look at what ate superhero movie's lunches. Barbie and Mario were enormous hits. A dry historical biopic was the brotastic action film of the summer in Oppenheimer. An obviously worse version of The Little Mermaid made half a billion dollars for some reason. People went to movies to see Five Nights at Freddy's when that was streaming for "free" on Peacock on Day 1, because seeing movies in theaters still matters. (And maybe nobody has Peacock, which is a shame: Mrs. Davis is quite good. Management sure screwed that up.)
What does this tell us? I think it is positive news all around. Nobody, not even the most fervent comic book fan, could have wanted a universe where every year superheroes were the beginning and end of the discussion. We should be glad The Marvels flopped, everybody. Barbie is not my favorite movie of all time, it is not in the Top 15, it is not on the honorable mentions, and it is the worst movie Greta Gerwig has directed by a mile. But it is a slick comedy with a unique visual style full of great actors. Its less profound than it thinks, but at least wants to confront the nature of femininity in the modern world. People loved it. It was a joyous moment. And it was a different kind of blockbuster with a different energy, bravo on that level. I greatly prefer Barbie to be the story of the summer over a nostalgia retread like Top Gun: Maverick.
And meanwhile the people who actually make movies, whose artistic visions become the celluloid or pixels on the screen, were willing to fight for their share and their power in still creating it. The world isn't perfect. People will never see Poor Things or Talk to Me in the numbers they saw Fast X. Netflix's movie output still sucks and people should ask for me than the mediocre that's convenient. Zaslav cancelled Coyote vs Acme. But in some ways, the workers did their part, the audience did their part, management did just enough to not ruin things, so movies continue to thrive and evolve in 2023. There's tons to talk about.
Anyway, let's talk about some really damn good movies from 2023. I'll be releasing one review a day until the Best Movie of the Year.
The Actual List Part of the List:
15. Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3
14. Skinamarink
11. Monster
9. Oppenheimer
8. May December
6. Poor Things
3. Past Lives
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