While the 2020s got off to a rough start—due to, well… reasons—and many movies were delayed, rescheduled, or even scrapped, the decade has still delivered plenty of fantastic cinematic experiences. From thought-provoking dramas to groundbreaking blockbusters and innovative indie gems, the 2020s have already given us unforgettable films. And with it being the halfway point of this decade we at SAW decided to present an addition to our usual “Best of” series we do each year. Several writers here at SAW turned in a list of what they thought were the best films since the beginning of the decade, the entries on the list were tallied, and then ranked to give you SAW’s 50 Best Movies of the 2020s So Far!
*Every entry was mentioned on someone’s list at least once and the more times an entry was listed, the higher that movie was ranked. However, some 2024 movies may not appear because they have not been seen by our writers yet, or it could just be they weren’t good enough to make this list. Anywho, please let us know what you think of the rankings and which films you believe should be on the list that didn’t make the cut. Enjoy the list, check out more of our Best of 2024 series, and comment down below!*
10. Past Lives (2023)
The major motif that has dominated the 2020s so far is exploring the multiverse, driven largely by Marvel’s need to find a fresh approach after a decade of superhero stories. While most of these movies have been maximalist, action-packed adventures, Past Lives does the complete opposite with characters firmly rooted in the here and now, with only wonders of what ifs and what could have beens. The movie’s most iconic shot shows childhood friends Nora and Hae Sung on diverging paths, with Nora’s family about to move to the US. While Nora mostly moves on with her life, Have Sung is still hung up on her years later and the two reconnect and even start a dating relationship online, but that comes to an end as Nora gets busy and decides she needs space.
The film focuses heavily on the Korean concept of In-Yun, the idea that all the smallest interactions with somebody—down to walking past them and brushing by each other on the street—builds up this connection between people. It is said that two people who are together in this life have built up mountains of In-Yun through their past lives. When Hae Sung arrives in America and visits Nora, now married, the three try to understand each other’s place in their lives, leading Hae Sung to deliver the heartbreaking question in the film’s final moments, “What if this is a past life as well, and we are already something to each other in our next life as well? Who do you think we are then?” It’s a beautiful, unusually mature approach to a love triangle that resonates deeply for anyone who has considered the paths they have chosen and the connections they’ve made and lost along the way.
–Jacob Holmes
9. The Holdovers (2023)
I held off watching this for the longest time because I truly didn’t think I’d like it. I’m not a fan of Alexander Payne at all. None of his films have ever worked for me. I just don’t gel with his style and sensibilities, I guess. But this one I loved. It feels like a cinematic warm hug. There’s a life-affirming quality to it that lonely housewives look for in Hallmark Christmas movies but unlike that pap, it actually has substance. It doesn’t spoon-feed you any message and it doesn’t sand off the rough edges of the characters to humanize them, to make them more likable.
You understand more about Paul Giamatti with his interactions with Da’Vine Joy Randolph and Dominic Sessa but he’s still the same downtrodden curmudgeon in the end as he is in the beginning. Learning more about Sessa’s character informs his behavior but it doesn’t stop him from making terrible decisions that will make you want to throttle him. These are real characters connecting with one another. It’s a simple story that has no larger point it’s trying to make or agenda it’s trying to push. It’s a throwback to a time in film history when little character dramas could be sold solely on the strength of their performances. Films like this rarely get made anymore, let alone justify their existence.
–Sailor Monsoon
8. Titane (2021)
I watch movies for two reasons: to feel something, whether it’s a thrilling or emotional response and to see something I’ve never seen before. Plenty of films do the first thing, I mean, action and horror don’t work if there are no thrills and dramas fall flat if you’re not emotionally invested and few are truly original but I can’t think of many that do both. Titane gave me everything I want from art. It made me laugh. It made me cry. It constantly kept me guessing as to where it was going and it definitely showed me things I had never seen in anything else before. If all you know about it is “the thing”, I won’t ruin anything by getting into the plot but trust me when I say, it’s far more than just the one thing it will forever be described as. There’s no other film to compare it to to even pitch it.
It has shades of Cronenberg’s Crash mixed with the WTF am I watching feel of insanity of Holy Motors but with an actual human heart at it’s center. The film isn’t just weird for the sake of weird, there’s a thematic point to everything. I haven’t tied together every symbolic thread but my reading of it is that it’s a story of a father accepting his daughter’s transformation. I won’t go into more than that but the fact that it has an actual emotional core, much less a plot, is probably the craziest thing about it. With just two films under her belt, Julia Ducournau has already joined my list of favorite directors.
–Sailor Monsoon
7. Nosferatu (2024)
I have had season tickets to every Robert Eggers movie since The Witch, and Nosferatu solidified him as one of my all-time favorite directors. No sexy vampires. No shapeshifting. No suave or debonaire Dracula. Just a wretched old vampire with a mustache and a crush. I love everything about Eggers’ Nosferatu, from the color palette to the gothic imagery to the performances of everyone involved. Lily-Rose Depp absolutely kills it in her performance with her ability to slip from an innocent young girl to a possessed naughty lady with her use of physicality. My biggest concern going into the film was Bill Skarsgard’s portrayal of the Count but I was instantly set at ease as he freaking killed it from the first time we heard his voice to the final scene. All signs of Skarsgard were lost in his performance to create a singular character unlike any other. Nosferatu is an instant horror classic.
–Vincent Kane
6. Oppenheimer (2023)
–R.J. Mathews
5. The Substance (2024)
What can I say about this movie that hasn’t already been said? It is one of the best movies of the decade and it’s not even close. Demi Moore and Margaret Qualley absolutely kill in their roles as Elizabeth Sparkle and Sue, and the supporting cast knocks it out of the park. Even at an almost two-and-a-half-hour run time, it moves. The vibes are incredible and even with its incredibly dark storytelling, I still left with the emotion that maybe we shouldn’t hate aging so much as a culture. It’s effective, compelling, and an absolute wild ride. Watch it. Even if you hate it, you won’t regret it.
–Valerie Morreale
4. The Banshees of Inisherin (2023)
British-Irish playwright Martin McDonagh is the master of dark comedy, and his latest film Banshees of Inisherin shines right alongside his other work. This is a story of two men on a small (fictional) Irish Island in 1923. As the Irish Civil War rages across the horizon on the mainland, a more intimate civil war is brewing between longtime friends Padraic (Colin Farrell) and Colm (Brendan Gleeson). Padraic is a simple man, and his life largely revolves around his daily trek to the island pub to grab a pint and make meaningless conversation with Colm. The problem is, the older Colm suddenly feels the need to fill his life with something more meaningful than these chats, and abruptly decides to stop sitting with Padraic, telling him “I just don’t like you anymore.”
Shaken by this revelation, Padraic attempts to rekindle the friendship, escalating Colm’s attempts to end the friendship in a. way that only McDonagh would ever conceive of. As Padraic’s sister Siobhan leaves for the mainland, Padraic’s life continues to become duller and more isolated—which only increases his desperation for Colm’s friendship.
–Jacob Holmes
3. Poor Things (2023)
There’s nothing like watching the unique vision of an artisan director come to life, and Yorgos Lanthimos’ Poor Things is nothing if not that. A play on the Frankenstein story sees Dr. Godwin Baxter (Willem Dafoe) kind of revive a suicidal pregnant woman by placing the brain of her baby into her body, who comes to life as the woman we know as Bella (Emma Stone). Stone’s transcendent performance earned her the Best Actress at the 2024 Oscars ceremony for her committed portrayal of the bizarre conceit. The film rests on her shoulders as she crafts a particular childlike nature to Bella through the way she walks, talks, and behaves—while also still clearly communicating that some elements of her learning have developed more rapidly.
This film is full of sex and nudity, and commentary on sex. Obviously, with the brain of a baby at the beginning, there’s a gross dynamic at play where the men who seek her seem (or are) predatory. Such is the case of Duncan Wedderburn (Mark Ruffalo), who whisks Bella away to Lisbon hoping to take advantage of her sexually precocious nature. But the movie flips that, as Bella remains totally in control at all times—Bella has grown up with no qualms or boundaries about sex and understands it only as a pleasurable action. Wedderburn’s hopes to control Bella backfire fantastically, and Bella eventually decides to become a prostitute, taking advantage again of her sexual agency, although she does finally begin to learn a bit more about how that agency can be taken away. At its heart, this is a movie about how men seek to control women, and about how one woman unburdened by certain societal expectations finds her own way through life.
–Jacob Holmes
2. Everything Everywhere All at Once (2022)
If the 2020s have been an era of the multiverse movie, then Everything Everywhere All at Once is the absolute pinnacle of the collection. A knowingly absurd A24 movie, EEAAO slowly built up a love and passion among movie fans everywhere until it suddenly burst out into the mainstream all at once, eventually heading to the Oscars and taking home everything it possibly could. Most people remember this film for the hot dog fingers and the butt plug fights, but underneath that absurdity is a beating heart about appreciating the life we are living right now and the people we have in it.
When Evelyn (Michelle Yeoh), an aging immigrant mother running a struggling laundromat, is first contacted by another, more confident version of her husband Waymond (Ke Huy Quan), she is envious of the alternate lives she leads. That is until she realizes that in some universes, she never even had her daughter Joy (Stephanie Hsu). The rocky mother-daughter relationship in our universe turns out to be amplified across the multiverse as a version of Joy calling herself Jobu Topaki is scouring the multiverse searching to make her mother feel the emptiness she feels inside. The movie is all over the place, yet somehow manages to make all of it work toward its central story of repairing that bond while understanding that, if nothing matters, then we should choose happiness and love for the people in our lives.
–Jacob Holmes
1. Dune: Part Two (2024)
Denis Villeneuve has been one of the best modern directors for some time now, delivering incredible action, drama, and sci-fi films for over a decade, but with Dune: Part 2, he was operating on a different level. It is grand and ambitious. The fact that he was able to make Frank Herbert’s work of art into something coherent on screen is a triumph in itself. The fact he made Dune: Part 2 as incredible, immersive, and legible as it turned out is awe-inspiring. The level of ambition and audacity that we rarely see in art form Dune: Part Two elevates itself to supernatural heights. The monochromatic scenes alone on Giedi Prime are a spectacle to behold, while the riding of the sandworm is one of the most thrilling scenes we have witnessed since Endgame. His mastery also lies in his ability to make these grandiose events while staying true to the thematic core of the novel while not dumbing it down for the audience. It is an event meant for the big screen, and I am glad I was able to witness it fully immersed in a cinema.
-Vincent Kane
20-11
What movies from the first half of this decade do you think should have made the Top 50? Share them with us down in the comments!