I’ve done it again. I caught enough films last year to create a Best and Worst list. I must confess that I was quite lucky as I was feeling under the weather last Christmas and may not have had the energy to crank out the last two reviews I did.

Let’s not waste any time. Here are the 5 Best films I saw in 2023.

5. Beau Is Afraid

Love it or hate it, you can’t deny that Beau Is Afraid is one of the biggest and weirdest opuses 2023 had to offer. If it lost you by the end of the second hour then you probably didn’t watch it again but anyone who did, myself included, undoubtedly got more out of it.

The film is teeming with details that you’ll only pick up upon with multiple viewings. What do they all mean? Honestly I’m still not sure. I understand that the second hour can be a drag but as well as being outlandishly quirky and beautifully made, Beau Is Afraid can actually be fun to watch at times. There are comedic moments that you honestly wouldn’t expect from a film as dark and unsafe as Beau, they’re genuinely funny and help the pace and mood of the film a lot.

It’s not for everyone, which is why I love it.

4. Oppenheimer

What a blessing Barbenheimer was. You can’t review the year of 2023 without mentioning it. I was surprised to get not one but two good films out of the phenomenon.

As someone with limited knowledge of J. Robert Oppenheimer, I found this film to be a fascinating character study as well as a great drama chronicling the creation of the atom bomb. In a way, it’s perfect for anyone who doesn’t know a lot about Oppenheimer as the whole point of the film is trying to determine who he was and what he stood for.

These questions matter and the film does a tremendous job of making you understand that.

Oh, and there’s a big explosion in it so you can’t go wrong there.

3. Barbie

Yes, I know, you saw it coming from a mile away but believe me when I say that my reasons for including Barbie in my 5 Best are genuine. While Oppenheimer was masterful in its exploration of its subject matter, like a lot of films this year it didn’t do anything unexpected.

Barbie on the other hand told a story about a children’s toy that has no right being as deep and poignant as it is. It does play like a standard comedy in places and there are a few plot holes but if you go into the film thinking that the Barbie doll is just a meaningless product that’s had no impact on women’s rights or culture, your prejudice will be challenged by the end. It probably won’t change but the fact that the film tries to is amazing in and of itself.

2. No One Will Save You

An alien invasion film where the humans are the strangest and most interesting characters. That certainly wasn’t on my cards for 2023.

It’s a gem for anyone who loves a classic alien abduction story but beyond its creepy flying saucers and terrifying greyhead aliens, No One Will Save You tells a wonderful and haunting tale about an individual’s struggle to prosper in a community that has rejected them.

It is a beautiful piece of cinema in that not a word of dialogue is spoken and all the history and trauma that hangs over the community is conveyed visually. You have to be ready and in the mood to watch No One Will Save You because, similar to Beau Is Afraid, every shot has something to say.

1. Talk To Me

If you read my review this shouldn’t be a surprise as it was a rave review that I wrote for Talk To Me, with only a single complaint. With its premise, setting and characters it could’ve easily been another painfully generic Blumhouse horror but by introducing themes of loneliness and the craving for connection in the social media age, Talk To Me is a poignant and evocative piece of modern horror.

If it acknowledged the mystery and ambiguity of the afterlife it shows then Talk To Me would’ve been perfect in my book. That’s my only complaint, one that not everyone will agree with and certainly one that doesn’t invalidate my praise for the film.

Watch it and be taken by its brilliance before the sequel comes out and potentially wrecks its legacy.

Now for the juicy stuff, here are the 5 Worst films I saw in 2023.

5. Insidious: The Red Door

How appropriate that we go from one horror that is free of cliché and genericism to one that’s teeming with it.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m sure there’re dozen of titles that came out in 2023 more deserving of the Number 5 spot on Worst of the year but out of the few I saw, Insidious: The Red Door was notable in that it’s a sequel that doesn’t take off until the last 30 minutes. With some rewriting, The Red Door could easily be a soft reboot of the Insidious series as the bulk of the film is essentially a dramatized reminder of what happened in the previous films. If you want to know what happened after Insidious: Chapter 2 you have to sit through an hour-long jump scare fest to get to it.

Not an insult to the art of cinema by a long shot but certainly a letdown, hence its place in the Number 5 spot.

4. Evil Dead Rise

I had a lot of positive things to say about Evil Dead Rise but the reason why it’s in my Worst of the year list is because it made the same mistake as its 2013 predecessor i.e. it took itself seriously.

To a horror fan the only thing that makes Evil Dead Rise stand out amongst other horrors is its gore, but to an Evil Dead fan the gore is the bare minimum. There is so much more to the series than gore yet that’s all Evil Dead Rise perfects. It should be applauded for its unique setting and decent characters but if Evil Dead wasn’t in the title you’d rightly assume it was just another horror but with more gore.

The biggest sin Evil Dead Rise commits is ignoring the comedic aspect of the franchise, a quality that makes it truly distinct from other zombie series. It’s just not Evil Dead without it.

3. Five Nights At Freddy’s

Amazingly, if this were just a generic jump scare fest like Insidious: The Red Door, not only would it not be in my 5 Worst of the year but, if it were fun enough, it might’ve just made it into my 5 Best of the year.

Adapting the first Five Nights At Freddy’s game into a horror film should’ve been a done deal for Blumhouse. What was stopping them from producing a 90-minute jump scare-laden horror about a security guard in the monitoring room of a restaurant nervously watching the creepy animatronics on his screens? It wouldn’t be The Exorcist but it would match the simplicity of the first game.

This amalgamation of the first 4 games results in a half-decent supernatural drama, which while not terrible (I did have some good things to say), is miles away from what I expected of a Five Nights At Freddy’s adaptation.

2. Chicken Run: Dawn of the Nugget

Similarly to Insidious: The Red Door, with some rewriting Dawn of the Nugget could’ve been a soft reboot of the Chicken Run story. Unfortunately, from the very first frame, the film is very determined to be a direct sequel to the 2000 original.

Reasons behind the recasting aside, the voices for many of the returning characters fail to uphold the continuity from the first film. The only recast voices that try to resemble their predecessors are David Bradley as Fowler and Romesh Ranganathan as Nick. Zachery Levi as Rocky and Thandiwe Newton as Ginger sound like completely different characters, which is terrible for a Chicken Run sequel.

While the premise has a lot of potential and feels like a natural progression from the first film, the heist aspect gets lost as the plot progresses and eventually devolves into all our characters just wandering aimlessly in a massive factory. Not the absolute worst sequel a classic could get but it’s subpar next to the original and that’s bad enough.

1. Rebel Moon: Part One – A Child of Fire

For years it seemed like the worst thing you could say about a film that builds its own universe, whether it’s Jupiter Ascending, Avatar or The Chronicles of Riddick, is that it’s derivative.

I was of that opinion until I saw Rebel Moon.

No. Derivative is not the worst thing a film trying to kickstart its own franchise can be. The worst thing it can be is boring and A Child of Fire is excruciatingly boring.

Like with the prior titles on this list, I had good things to say about Rebel Moon; the first 30-40 minutes are very promising, the protagonist’s a bit dull, the worldbuilding is clearly influenced by Star Wars but the farming community we’re introduced to is very fleshed out and the tyrannical empire we see is clearly inspired by the Stalin era Soviet Union rather than Nazi Germany.

Everything goes downhill as soon as we leave the farming community. What follows is a dark, sulky rendition of Seven Samurai where the Star Wars influence borders on plagiarism. I’m not even sure how often the characters smile let alone how many reasons they give us to care for them. I wrote it in my review and I’ll write it again here; they’re action figures.

I know this won’t be a popular choice but Rebel Moon was the worst viewing experience I had in 2023, no contest, hence it’s Number 1 spot.

I must admit, had I not seen Rebel Moon and Dawn of the Nugget, I wouldn’t have had enough for a 5 Worst of the year list. Picking 5 of the Best was no struggle as I was spoilt for choice. Most of the films I caught this year were pretty decent, even the generic ones like Renfield and The Flash tried to do something different.

Had I not caught what’s now being called the 100-day cough here in England I would’ve had this out by New Year’s. If I have any resolutions this year it’s to see more than enough films to make a 5 Best and a 5 Worst of the year list and to get them written and posted by 2025.

I think those are promises I can keep. We’ll see. Enjoy the New Year guys, here’s to 2024.