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Now the Guardian’s Top 50 countdowns, as voted for by the whole film team, have announced their No 1s, here are our chief critic’s personal choices, in no particular order
The 50 best films of 2024 in the UK
The 50 best movies of 2024 in the US
More on the best culture of 2024
The time has come once more for me to present my “Braddies”, a strictly personal awards list for films getting a UK release in the calendar year just gone – quite distinct from the Guardian’s collegiate best-of-year critics’ poll.
It’s been 12 months in which the big-worry issue refuses to go away, two little letters that until recently, didn’t mean anything much at all and now reduce us to a quiver of anxiety: AI. The conclusion of the writers’ strike was supposed to have provided for the primacy of creative humanity, and for keeping AI in its place as a tool. But studios are keen to find efficient and profitable ways to exploit their intellectual property and Lionsgate has actually signed a deal with artificial intelligence firm Runway to engage with their back catalogue. An uneasy thought. I was one of those who winced at the film Alien: Romulus which used AI to revive a very distinguished British actor for a major role and seemed very pleased with itself about how clever this was. What happened to originality?
Added to which, last year’s panto villain, heartless corporation beancounter David Zaslav, CEO of Warner Bros Discovery, made a reappearance on the public stage – to more booing. Last year his studio was denounced for scrapping a finished film, Batgirl, for a tax write-off. Now it appears to let down one of Warner Bros’ most legendary names, 94-year-old Clint Eastwood, whose most recent film as a director is a legal thriller called Juror#2 – but Warner Bros put it out on a tiny number of screens as they prepared to dump it on streaming. Well, it’s not a masterpiece (though some critics, through a mixture of gallantry and contrarianism, seem almost to be claiming that it is). It does however deserve a fair hearing.
This was also the year that Daniel Day-Lewis dramatically un-retired and was reported to be shooting a movie directed by his son Ronan – a drama they have co-written about the father-son dynamic. It’s a high-risk venture, though perhaps no more of a risk than any feature film, and it’s marvellous to get Day-Lewis back.
For me, 2024 hasn’t been a vintage year for Hollywood and its big high-concept, high-prestige, luxury-ticket star vehicles, but there was plenty of amazing work from elsewhere in the world if you wanted to look for it: superb films from Alice Rohrwacher, Payal Kapadia, Sean Baker, Jane Schoenbrun and more. So here are my picks, and as ever, you are invited to comment on a winner and also to talk about people and films that should have made the grade.
Best film
La Chimera
All We Imagine As Light
The Zone of Interest
Anora
All of Us Strangers
Red Island
Love Lies Bleeding
I Saw the TV Glow
My Favourite Cake
The Beast
Best director
Alice Rohrwacher for La Chimera
Jonathan Glazer for The Zone of Interest
Robin Campillo for Red Island
Andrew Haigh for All of Us Strangers
Sean Baker for Anora
Bertrand Bonello for The Beast
Marco Bellocchio for Kidnapped
Rodrigo Moreno for The Delinquents
Yorgos Lanthimos for Poor Things
Agnieszka Holland for Green Border
Best actress
Demi Moore for The Substance
Sandra Hüller for The Zone of Interest
Emma Stone for Poor Things and Kinds of Kindness
Mikey Madison for Anora
Danielle Deadwyler for The Piano Lesson
Kani Kusruti for All We Imagine As Light
Divya Prabha for All We Imagine As Light
Chhaya Kadam for All We Imagine As Light
Cynthia Erivo for Wicked
Saoirse Ronan for The Outrun
Best actor
Cillian Murphy for Small Things Like These
Andrew Scott for All of Us Strangers
Paul Mescal for All of Us Strangers
Josh O’Connor for La Chimera and Challengers
Jeffrey Wright for American Fiction
Christian Friedel for The Zone of Interest
Kôji Yakusho for Perfect Days
Daniel Craig for Queer
Ralph Fiennes for Conclave
Hugh Grant for Heretic
Best supporting actress
Isabella Rossellini for Conclave
Claire Foy for All of Us Strangers
Isabelle Huppert for The Crime Is Mine
Emily Watson for Small Things Like These
Kathy Burke for Blitz
Lesley Manville for Queer
Louise Mauroy-Panzani for Àma Gloria
Sakura Ando for Monster
Merve Dizdar for About Dry Grasses
Elizabeth Debicki for MaXXXine
Best supporting actor
Jeremy Allen White for The Iron Claw
Denzel Washington for Gladiator II
Jamie Bell for All of Us Strangers
Alfredo Castro for The Settlers
Jesse Plemons for Kinds of Kindness
Jeremy Strong for The Apprentice
Yuriy Borisov for Anora
Michael Potts for The Piano Lesson
Nicolas Cage for Longlegs
Tom Hardy for The Bikeriders
Best cinematography
Hélène Louvart for La Chimera
Jeanne Lapoirie for Red Island
Jamie Ramsay for All of Us Strangers
Lukasz Zal for The Zone of Interest
Ranabir Das for All We Imagine As Light
Franz Lustig for Perfect Days
Yorick Le Saux for Blitz
Yunus Roy Imer for The Outrun
Drew Daniels for Anora
Yoshio Kitagawa for Evil Does Not Exist
Best documentary
Grand Theft Hamlet
Occupied City
A Sudden Glimpse to Deeper Things
Black Box Diaries
Soundtrack to a Coup d’Etat
A Long Journey Home
Made in England: The Films of Powell and Pressburger
Beatles ’64
Copa 71
Children of the Cult
Best screenplay
Jonathan Glazer for The Zone of Interest
Osgood Perkins for Longlegs
Bertrand Bonello, Guillaume Bréaud and Benjamin Charbit for The Beast
Radu Jude for Do Not Expect Too Much From the End of the World
Andrew Haigh for All of Us Strangers
Bas Devos for Here
Peter Straughan for Conclave
Justin Kuritzkes for Challengers
David Zellner for Sasquatch Sunset
Rose Glass and Weronika Tofilska for Love Lies Bleeding
Best debut
Thien An Pham for Inside the Yellow Cocoon Shell
Ramata-Toulaye Sy for Banel & Adama
Luna Carmoon for Hoard
Amrou Al-Kadhi for Layla
Felipe Gálvez Haberle for The Settlers
Giacomo Abbruzzese for Disco Boy
Paola Cortellesi for There’s Still Tomorrow
Baloji for Omen (Augure)
Amanda Nell Eu for Tiger Stripes
Cord Jefferson for American Fiction
Most likely to be overlooked by the boomer MSM
Hundreds of Beavers
