The 20 best A24 films

Is there a more A24 movie than Hereditary? Okay, so maybe Ari Aster's follow-up, Midsommer, but there isn't another movie that defined the studio and the brand of horror it's known for more than Hereditary. It's a grim, artsy tale of grief and troubled families that lands somewhere between Tolstoy and folk horror, with a bonkers flair that stoked the fire for more "what the actual..." horror flicks to follow.

The Best Picture winner of 2017 encapsulates a simple life in grandiose detail. Over the course of three chapters, we watch Chiron grow up as a gay man in a gangster city, torn between his gentle self and his rough surroundings. Directed with elliptical grace by Berry Jenkins, the result is a melancholy scrapbook about one man's struggle to escape the scraps.

Uncut Jaaams! The cocaine-in-your-veins panic attack that is Uncut Gems has subsequently become a meme, but the Safdie Brothers' drama about a man who digs himself into a hole larger than the Grand Canyon is a prolific, pulse-pounding slice of realism, bolstered by an Adam Sandler performance that deserved a nomination at the Oscars.

As cold, bold, and beautifully austere as the buildings of its architect, The Brutalist may have dragged on longer than Adrien Brody's Oscar acceptance speech, but it's a powerful piece of filmmaking nonetheless. A tale of the American Dream that spans countless countries, the Holocaust and the desire to become great, no matter the cost, The Brutalist may have laid the blueprint for future epics of its type.

We're at the hotel, motel, Holiday Inn! The adults who compose this dilapidated motel consist of prostitutes, drug dealers, and drugged-up burnouts, but the children see this pastel-hued dump as a playground. Charting the lives of those on the outskirts, Sean Baker brings vivid color to those who have lost sight of the world around them.

What the heck is this? That's a common question you might have watching the bizarre output of A24, yet no movie made me question that more than Swiss Army Man.  A movie about a farting corpse that flies, a stranded man on an island, and the power of love, this movie cuts the Swiss cheese while carving its way into your heart.

A charming, heartfelt, and personal breakout from Barbie director Greta Gerwig, Lady Bird soars on its laid-back realism. Following a nerdy outcast in high school, the movie earns top marks in drama for how it tells a simple story with poetic depth.

The Lighthouse is what happens when you put two Jack Nicholsons in The Shining in the same room. When two men lose their minds, their clothes, and their beans in a windswept lighthouse, the effect is maddeningly epic, with some of the most committed performances to insanity since Jack Nicholson's early oeuvre.

Watching Ex Machina in a world of Waymos feels a little different. We got robots driving our cars, dropping off our food, and even directing some of our movies. Alex Garland's chamber-piece about a man visiting a "genius" tech designer is seedy, mysterious, thrilling, and strikes a chord that's a bit more futuristic than HDMI.

The concept of watching a movie about a kidnapped woman, her child, and the long-lasting effects of trauma might sound unwatchable. But the movies make room for tender, gentle moments of beauty, care, and hope that shine through the claustrophobic darkness.

Is it one of the best A24 movies? Probably not. Is it arguably the funniest A24 movie? Dang right. Tim Robinson's unhinged comedy meets A24's unhinged cinema when a man becomes obsessed with befriending his newscaster neighbor. The bit about Subway deserves to be on any A24 highlight list.

Paul Schrader once penned Taxi Driver for Martin Scorsese; now he's penning another Travis Bickle for Ethan Hawke. An austere slow-cinema experiment about a priest slowly losing his way, Schrader brings back the transcendence of slow cinema for a new generation, using techniques from greats like Carl Dreyer and Robert Bresson.

When I first watched The Lobster, I wasn't really sure what to make of it. A guy wants to off himself and turn into a lobster, Kafka-style, what's that all about? The more I think about Yorgos Lanthimos' breakout film, however, the more it metamorphoses into something more comedic, heartfelt, and, sadly, moving, becoming a bold experiment that expands after your first bite.

Saying goodbye to a family member is never easy. It's even harder when you hide their cancer diagnosis to keep them from knowing, so that they can live carefree until death. This movie shines with grief, while making room for comedy as well, as grandma frolics through her final days with a smile. 

Scarlett Johansson pulls up on you in a car with a flirtatious smile. You getting in? The strange genius of this movie is that Johansson actually pulled up on strangers in another country, with hidden cameras, then took them to get killed (in the movie, of course) since her alien needs to survive on flesh. It's dark, operatic, cosmic, and eventually downright mesmerizing to watch this movie get under your skin.

This movie really tries to cram everything, everywhere, all at once, into every single frame of its story about a family that's grown apart. Including multiple universes, karate, flying donuts, talking rocks, and some of the most moving moments ever put on film, this is an epic that deserves to be considered among A24's best.

An aching tale of what could have been that doesn't discount the beauty of what it is, Past Lives follows the carousel friendship of two childhood crushes, circling back to each other over the years with immense sorrow yet immense tenderness. Past Lives is a sad movie, yes, but not a depressing one — it lives with hope as well.

Before Uncut Gems , the Safdies were cranking up the tension to unheard of heights with their story of a bank heist gone wrong. Drenched in sweat, neon lights, and grave mistakes, the film watches Robert Pattinson sprinting through the city looking for a breath of hope.

The boys are 13, but they treat politics like the 70-year-old schemers that run our country, and always have run our country, with unfiltered greed. It's kinda hilarious watching these little kids play politics, yet even more concerning since these kids could be running our country very soon.

Blossoming in the weeds, graced by sunlight and trickling streams of grace, Minari is a lovely tribute to the struggles of immigrants planting their stake in America. In the film, this family struggles immensely to find their roots, but the film is directed with such gentle realism that you watch it feeling soothed, optimistic, even wonderful and transcendent.