70. Get Out (2017- Jordan Peele)
In which "that guy from Key and Peele" became a master of horror. Jordan Peele's portraits of a uniquely American hell are both wonderful, though his first cut is inevitably the deepest. Get Out is a masterpiece in misdirection, where uneasy racial tensions surface in unexpected ways. Released at the start of the Trump administration, Get Out was an act of unquiet resistance, a politically charged scream at a world rapidly going to shit. And yet what Peele takes aim at isn't the overt bigotry lurking inside the White House, but a more insidious threat altogether; eviscerating the virtue signaling white folks who really want you to know that they would have voted for Obama a third time if they could. Existing alongside the gorgeously intelligent political horror were roller-coaster thrills and sharp, sharp laughs. It's hard to remember another debut that so confidently announces that it's director is here, and I hope he sticks around for a long time yet
The High Point: The ending, where Peele punctures the Twilight Zone thrills with the very real threat of the police's attitude towards POC, before subverting it joyously
69. The Wolf of Wall Street (2013- Martin Scorsese)
You'd hardly call it an unexpected move, Martin Scorsese helming a lengthy biopic of an amoral man headed up by one of his go-to male leads, but something about The Wolf of Wall Street felt fresh, like he was tapping the same reservoir using different equipment. Funny thing is that he wasn't, just remixing and updating the hallmarks of his style for a new era. As evolutions go, it's an effective one, proof that Scorsese's not a master because his style is definitive of a specific period, but because of how quickly and comfortably he's able to adapt that style, spinning a raucous, often totally contradictory yarn that pinballs between satire and celebration, making 180 minutes feel like a tight 90 (all hail Thelma Schoonmaker). It's a film that contains multitudes, like the man it's capturing, or the only nation capable of producing him. It's a blast, a blend of white-hot, barnstorming performances and intricate components that work in total unison. Yep, he's still got it
The High Point: "I'm not leaving"
68. Kill List (2011- Ben Wheately)
Folk horror's been having a bit of a moment lately, what with Midsommar, The Witch and Apostle sowing 70s style dread in pastures new, but in 2011, Ben Wheately made a countryside cult shocker that was more than a tribute to wicker men and witchfinder generals: it was a genre definer unto itself. A cold, eerie thriller that mutates and warps into a terror lying at the end of a path of followed orders, Kill List is Wheately at his breathless, cine-savvy best. It's sparse and bare-bones on the surface but rewatches (if you can bear them) prove that this deceptively simple tale is actually caked with detail and rich with meaning. The most exciting thing about it though, is also possibly the most curious; despite the fact that it's an hour and a half of quality horror, it only really reveals itself as a masterpiece in the last 20 seconds, where the entire film is horrifically re-contextualised in the nastiest, most disorienting way possible. It's as dark as cinema gets, but it's equally exciting
The High Point: The ending. If you know, you know
67. Almost Famous (2000- Cameron Crowe)
Media journalism is tough and thankless, with genuine zest and passion clashing with fragile egos and uneasy peeks behind the curtain. And yet Almost Famous finds a magic- nay, a romance- in it, a piece of woozy road poetry that just doesn't really seem to age. And while it's easy to scoff at Cameron Crowe and pretty much everything he's done since, there's an irresistible charm to his heartfelt ballad of big tunes and bigger personalities. It's a film that captures a moment while temporarily getting captured itself, absorbing the sights, smells and crucially sounds of early 70s rock-n'-roll as Patrick Fugit's fresh-faced journo followed Stillwater (the greatest fictional band of all time). It's hangout cinema at its best, leaving each rewatch feeling like a long overdue meeting with old friends
The High Point: Hold me closer tiny daaaaaaaancer
66. We Need to Talk About Kevin (2011- Lynne Ramsay)
I don't think any filmmaker embodies the phrase "quality over quantity" better than Lynne Ramsay. She's only made three (frustratingly spread-out) films since 2000, yet each one feels like a deeper stab into the dark heart of man. And yet, there's something so lingeringly awful about her third (and best) film, a not-quite-horror fable of a mother struggling to love her psychotic(?) son. It's got arguments about nature vs. nurture aplenty, but the real highlight is the performances: on one side of the struggle is a put-upon, possibly unstable Tilda Swinton, on the other a never-better Ezra Miller, who always feels like they're holding back an unstoppable tempest of darkness. It's a bleak interrogation of parenthood, that quintessentially human horror founded on misguided love and thankless responsibility. It makes us unhappy, and it makes us uncomfortable because complacency is a breeding ground for evil, regardless of whether it's born or bred.
The High Point: "Why would I not understand the context? I am the context"
65. Stories We Tell (2012- Sarah Polley)
Documentary is interrogation by design, but what happens when the camera faces the other way? There's been a lot of great documentaries that seek to explore the unseen sides of a wealth of subjects and ideas- many of them this century (Farenheit 9/11, Searching For Sugarman, Hail Satan?, Capturing the Friedmans, Super Size Me, Blackfish, etc.)- but Stories We Tell is that rare thing, a non-fiction film that solely aims to acquaint you with its creator. Essentially, Sarah Polley and her family tell stories, and that's kind of it. Gradually, decades-old family secrets unearth themselves and the truth comes to light in all of it's ugly, love-filled glory, but the real thrill of Stories We Tell is how familiar it all feels. Polley invites us not just into her life, but herself- the past and present, the uneasy future and the intimate rhythms of her and those closest to her. At times it feels too personal, irresponsibly so, and when she finally ruminates on why she did this in the first place, you're right there with her, looking back at the last hour like some sort of raw, naked confession
The High Point: Hard to pinpoint one, but Polley's father recounting his wife's death is devastating
64. You, the Living (2007- Roy Andersson)
It's funny, but Roy Andersson might just be the saviour we need right now. You, the Living, the second installment of his Living trilogy, is a symphony made of a madness that comes from tedium. The episodes are unrelated but packed with carefully composed chaos, each one crawling behind the one before it like a funeral march of human sanity. Andersson's world is grey, empty and hopeless, totally void of comedy.... which is exactly why he's laughing. The comedy in YTL feels like an act of desperate comfort, laughing because laughter means something against a strange, uncaring universe. It's not all doom and gloom, though, because Andersson's vision actually becomes oddly comforting. By the end of it, when we realise that everything isn't pointless and that it's us that give the world meaning, he comes out from behind the curtain and bows from the other side of the screen; his work is done
The High Point: The long winded, crushingly awkward dream sequence
63. Donnie Darko (2001- Richard Kelly)
What is Donnie Darko? A psychological-horror film? A time-travel movie? A black comedy? A cry for help? We may never know. What we do know is that 19 years later, it's still as beguilingly weird and foreboding as ever. Richard Kelly's stunning debut plays out like a dark prophecy, set from the start and steadily ticking towards a horrifying conclusion that still somehow feels like a total surprise. It's an unnerving, chaotic spell that the film sows, where everything onscreen seems to be blasting out of its main character, like the world itself is ending just because he's in it. It's disturbing stuff brilliantly headed up by Jake Gyllenhaal, letting every drop of teen rage flow out of him. Why does it hold up as well as it does? Because it taps into that uniquely teenage feeling that everything is fucked and there's nothing you can do to stop it, just watch as everything comes tumbling down
It's also the only film I own the script for (and it's great!)
The High Point: A house burns, a horrible truth comes out, and a community is left forever changed. Until.... well, you'll see
62. The Babadook (2014- Jennifer Kent)
There's something to be said about the therapeutic effects of horror. It's a release, a way to experience the worst of the world in a controlled environment and let it go at the end. Jennifer Kent's film is a story about, grief, love, and the horrors that exist between them, but ultimately, it's about healing. The Babadook, like all great monsters, is a metaphor, scary because of what's behind it. Kent travels to the darkest corners of the psyche, teasing out loss and pain while crucially giving them space to breath, like exposing a wound to the air to help it close. It's dark without being cruel, always giving its mother and son the hope to believe that things will get better. It rejects the idea that horror is a removed experience, something nasty to be enjoyed at a distance, and instead embraces the audience, inviting them into the experience and ensuring that, if they involve themselves with the plight of the characters, they'll be rewarded. It's an act of love disguised as an expression of terror
The High Point: Amelia takes on the Babadook, owning him and conquering her demons. Literally
61. Parasite (2019- Bong Joon-ho)
Bong's Oscar smash is still the best thing to happen in 2020, and while a lot has gone wrong since, it's an undeniable indication that the industry is changing for the better. Parasite is a uniquely modern thriller, that gorgeous blend of the specific and the universal that Bong does so well. He constructs this incredible world inside the film, where everyone's a parasite, thriving at the expense of someone else. It's a biting social comment, aided by sharp thrills and delightfully dark humour, but what makes Parasite so effective is how big-hearted it is. Bong is lamenting, crying for a system that keeps the have-nots down while reducing the haves to skilless husks, affluent but ultimately useless. It's something he's tapped into before but rarely has it felt this urgent. In the words of the man himself, "We all live in the same country, called capitalism." Well, quite
The High Point: Everything was going so well. And then the doorbell rang
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