In movies, 2023 was a year of endings for major action franchises. Sort of; we know that nothing truly ends anymore. “John Wick” bowed out – at least the Keanu Reeves branch of the saga – although spinoffs are planned. For “Mission: Impossible,” it was the beginning of the end of the Ethan Hunt saga, although “Part Two” of the finale will arrive in two years.
“Superhero fatigue” doesn’t actually mean superhero films are slowing their release pace. 2023 marked the end of the DC Extended Universe, with four films dumped into theaters, all of them panned (but one of which was secretly good). A fifth movie, “Batgirl,” was apparently so bad that DC didn’t release it at all.
But the newly minted DC Universe will ramp up soon. It will be overseen by James Gunn, who ended his “Guardians of the Galaxy” trilogy, and his association with the Marvel Cinematic Universe, this year. It was the only one of the three MCU movies to get positive reviews.
There’s still room for other genres, barely, as theaters (themselves bowing out? – not just yet) threw horror and comedy fans a bone at least once, and saw their heaviest traffic for a World War II biopic (“Oppenheimer”) and a social satire centering on Barbie dolls. These were my favorite movies of the year:
10. “Reptile”
Director/co-writer Grant Singer simply makes a movie we don’t see a lot of anymore: A character-driven murder mystery with richly drawn characters that has no further agenda. Though not on that level of greatness, it calls to mind “Heat” as a stellar cast of detectives and suspects plays out a grand cat-and-mouse game. The cops in this movie – led by the always great Benicio del Toro – can be corrupt, and they can be decent. The brain-teasing whodunit will keep you glued, but the big takeaway is that “Reptile” feels like it’s set in non-augmented reality. (Full review.)
9. “Air”
Director Ben Affleck and (remarkably) first-time screenwriter Michael Convery take us deep into Nike’s recruitment of Michael Jordan in the early 1980s. We’re taken back to an era of brown-paneled office spaces, and – more strikingly – a time when Converse and Adidas ruled the shoe world and upstart Nike was on the verge of collapse. Except that Matt Damon’s Sonny makes a Hail Mary play to sign His Airness. Throw in MJ’s mom (Viola Davis) ingeniously negotiating a new type of contract, and “Air” is an eye-opening piece of sports marketing history. (Full review.)
8. “No Hard Feelings”
Director/co-writer Gene Stupnitsky keeps the pilot light burning for heartfelt Apatow-style goofball comedies in an age when they’ve been shunted aside. The “Wow, she can do comedy too!” thing is overrated – we’re talking about professional A-list actors – but nonetheless: Yes, Jennifer Lawrence can very much do comedy. Her expressive face adds depth to the chuckles, and she has great chemistry with an actor 11 years her junior (Andrew Barth Feldman) in a daring tightrope-walk of a tale about a financially strapped woman who takes a job dating a teenage boy. (Full review.)
7. “John Wick: Chapter 4”
I’m a big believer that the intermission should make a comeback, and I suppose I’m not helping my argument by putting director Chad Stahelski’s nearly 3-hour “JW4” on my list. But hey, in home viewing you can make your own intermissions – and you’ll want to because this is exhausting. But also amazing. The gun-fu backed by dance-club thumpers is still present, but we also get the series’ best use of thick traffic and endless stairways, plus a delightful overhead building-cutout shot borrowed from “Minority Report.” Throughout four films, we’ve grown to care about Keanu Reeves’ Wick and the mythology, too, and that pays off in the grand finale. (Full review.)
6. “BS High”
This HBO Max documentary is Exhibit A in the argument that truth is stranger than fiction. A few years ago, Ohio man Roy Johnson created a fake high school football team, brazenly labeled it Bishop Sycamore (B.S.), got youths of shaky academic standing and unclear ages to come there from all over the country, and crafted a schedule with not only in-state games but also games on ESPN. Twice! I’m not easily surprised by corruption within governmental structures, but the combination of brazenness by the fraudster and laziness from so many people asleep on their jobs shocked me. Johnson’s scheme would be admirable if he was fictional, but interviews reveal his undisguised sociopathy and the serious psychological and even physical damage done to innocent young men, further making “BS High” a stunner.
5. “Hell House LLC Origins: The Carmichael Manor”
It seems impossible that veteran horror watchers like myself could still be unnerved by the old staple of supernatural beings creeping through a large, isolated house. Even more unlikely is that the tricks would work in the fourth entry of a “found footage” saga. Writer-director Stephen Cognetti pulls it off, though, bouncing back from weak second and third entries to actually surpass the scares of the cult favorite “Hell House LLC” (2015). A higher-grade cast than usual, a new variety of settings (including a jaunt into woods around the manor) and the peppering in of some 1980s home videos make for a mysterious and thrilling journey. (Full review.)
4. “Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3”
Writer-director James Gunn somehow delivers both a love letter to his Guardians (although created for comics in the 1960s, Gunn brought them to mainstream popularity) and a middle finger to Disney (although he’d never admit it) before starting his full-time job overseeing the new DC Universe. By far the most cynical “Guardians” film, this is not easy viewing for animal lovers as we focus on an ailing Rocket (voiced by Bradley Cooper) while getting the backstory of how the raccoon became hyper-intelligent via cruel experimentation by the deliciously evil High Evolutionary (Chukwudi Iwuji). That said, Gunn peppers in enough humor – plus a surprising love match that in retrospect makes perfect sense – to not betray the initial concept of a free-wheeling makeshift family of outcasts. (Full review.)
3. “The Flash”
Director Andy Muschietti and screenwriter Christina Hodson (working from a story by three writers, themselves working from the comics’ “Flashpoint” mythology) achieve something that isn’t widely appreciated: They made a good DCEU film. In recent years, DC’s mismanagement has been well chronicled, and “The Flash” itself includes shoddy CGI and a rewritten ending that undercuts some of the story’s point. Yet thanks to one of the best-ever dual performances (Ezra Miller plays teenage and 20-something Flashes), a perfect guest turn by Michael Keaton that completes his personal Bat-trilogy (yes, Kilmer and Clooney are in the same chronology, but it’s a multiverse, so it’s OK), and an edgy new Supergirl (Sasha Calle), an emotional epic emerges from the atrociously run DC factory. (Full review.)
2. “Talk to Me”
Australia’s Philippou brothers start with an almost laughable premise: Bored teens have made a game out of brief jaunts into the afterlife via holding a preserved corpse’s hand and saying “Talk to me.” They go on to make a grippingly scary movie that warns against going too far into the unknown, somehow dodging “Nightmare on Elm Street” type silliness. Sophie Wilde leads a cast of skilled yet raw performers through a mystery that challenges friendships and families, and her Mia takes the spotlight in a thrilling final 10 minutes that throws new information at us in shocking ways. (Full review.)
1. “Mission Impossible: Dead Reckoning — Part One”
Tom Cruise begins the two-part finale (or at least Ethan Hunt’s finale, it seems) to the greatest action-spy series ever made by calling back to previous set-pieces: a sandstorm, a car chase through a packed old city, a fight atop a speeding train. But director/co-writer Christopher McQuarrie (himself a three-film veteran of the series now) goes to the next level with an almost hilariously thrilling finale where Ethan and Hayley Atwell’s thief-with-a-good-heart Grace must climb through successively falling train cars. Playing behind the globe-trotting thrills is an intriguing story about the threat of artificial intelligence – certainly the brainiest the series has been – that teases a revelatory “Part Two.” It won’t come until 2025, but I’ve already accepted that mission. (Full review.)