Every year – and I have done lists like this for quite a few years now – I wonder what I’ll say for the little preamble: before getting straight to talking about the films themselves, it always feels proper to say a little something first. Well, this year I’ll start by saying this: 2023 has been a genuinely very difficult year to call. There have been lots of important external factors (such as the Sag-Aftra strike) which have affected what has made it to our screens; lots of these big questions over creative control, ownership and intellectual copyright will continue to have a profound impact on the world of film, as well as having the more obvious impact of keeping titles off our screens which would have been completed and released by now. Also, as much as the main Covid lockdowns are now some years behind us, Covid continues to have an impact on cinema, whether because people have written films which they could feasibly only make around reduced crews and locations, or because the huge dent made in profits and possibilities is continuing to bite; still, films are staggering to market, after years of being hamstrung by the impact of the pandemic.
But even taking all of these things into account, compounded by the fact that the cost-of-living crisis ruled out a lot of in-person festivals and events this year, which has doubtlessly had a massive impact on the titles making my list, 2023 has turned out to be a very varied year for film in terms of genres, budgets and approaches. On one hand, last-minute entrants like a certain film from a certain Toho Studios have showcased impressive SFX and a sense of scale like no other; on the other, tiny indie productions have got things done, too, despite clearly needing to make tough decisions and think carefully about how to bring their narratives into being. So this list contains a little of everything, and has had to miss a few titles out of the full list for reasons of expedience rather than indifference (hence a raft of titles getting honourable mentions.)
That’s enough preamble, isn’t it? Let’s get to it then.
TO FIRE YOU COME AT LAST
Perhaps in the fittingly opaque hinterlands between feature-length and short film, To Fire You Come At Last feels familiar, taking a little from the darkest examples of A Play For Today and/or other, mid-twentieth century Gothic, which is itself a weird palimpsest of ideas stemming back to the murder ballads and penny dreadfuls of centuries before. A simple enough story in many respects – fulfilling a promise to a dead man, come what may – it really lands through its sustained, artful atmosphere. It absolutely nails its night shots, importantly, engendering a pleasing sense of foreboding which runs throughout the film. You can check out the full Warped Perspective review here.
SALTBURN
A late 2023 release, it’s nonetheless no great surprise that Emerald Fennell’s latest Saltburn has made quite an impact; had a film like this with those scenes and that conclusion just merrily rolled past audiences, then that would have been truly remarkable. So it’s a film engineered to provoke in many respects, but this doesn’t take away from its sharp British humour, assured performances, and most of all in how it captures an idyllic summer (then spends the last act almost merrily taking it to bits). Barry Keoghan has form for being a disruptive presence within a family, but he takes it to a new level here, with what you could at least agree is a committed performance (rarely have so many bodily fluids appeared so readily in a mainstream film). I am still enjoying (?) myself by pondering how much Ollie knew he was going to do, and at what point. Saltburn absolutely has a life beyond itself, an outrageous, hyperreal riot. Check out my full review here.
VINCENT MUST DIE
Imagine if your very presence seemed to trigger random acts of violence in others? And, if you tried to seek help, it seemed to trigger even more, until you could no longer live your life in any normal way? What starts out as a grim, but somewhat funny farce in Vincent Must Die soon transfigures into a sizable, society-wide nightmare which drags up interesting questions and considerations, all whilst never letting up in its mission to shock. Played with humanity and humility, Karim Leklou’s plight as Vincent is the unerring focus for the first act of the film, though gradually the film expands its viewpoint to take in someone close to him, too: as this unfolds, the film is reminiscent of any number of contagion cinema titles, perhaps most notably The Crazies, but it’s by no means a do-over, and has a real charm of its own. One of this year’s Fantasia titles, check out my full review here.
VINCENT
First things first: this is a different Vincent. Is this Vincent a monster? We certainly see …something which indicates that he might be, but the whole film gently encourages us to interrogate the idea of the ‘monster’ throughout – so, when we first meet Vincent (Mikkel Vadsholt) supping on what looks like a bag of blood, oh and working out of an ice-cream van, then it seems we’re being led to believe that this man is a straightforward threat – maybe to children, right before we encounter a deeply unhappy young man whose own love of cinematic monsters seems to be all that’s keeping him together. But the film is rather cleverer than simply offering up a victim to a standard-issue monster, and turns our suspicions back on us, asking us – how much can we really know? Enough to judge? It’s a touching, clever film about unorthodox friendships and a learning curve taking place against a potentially supernatural background, successfully spanning different genres with ease. As I said at the time, this is one of those indie films which keeps you looking for gems of a similar quality. You can read my full review of Vincent here.
PEPPERGRASS
Peppergrass is just such a thoughtful, charming homage to a range of horror genres, one which sustains all of its different notes. What’s not to love? When I initially reviewed this film back in the spring, co-director Chantelle Han commented ‘we made this film for you’; so, yes, it is very much a fan’s film, it knows its influences, but it weaves everything together into a distinctive whole. In short, it’s the sort of love letter we want: it’s saying the right things in a different way.
Starting out as a road movie, then a home invasion, then a failed heist turned survivalist horror, Peppergrass depends for its success on its close focus on key character Eula (also Chantelle Han), a pregnant restaurant owner who needs a break and decides to make it happen by attempting to steal a rare truffle from a reclusive veteran. Things move from the ridiculous to the sublime in a clever film which uses the backdrop of the pandemic in a meaningful, plausible way (and may well have been impacted by the Covid pandemic itself, given that it was actually completed in 2021. But whatever the slight delay, I’m very glad it got a release this year.)
GODZILLA MINUS ONE
First of all, Godzilla Minus One is one of those rare birds for me where I haven’t written up a full-length review; having only seen it last week is one reason for that, but also, sometimes it’s just nice to go and see something without crowding your head with mental notes. In effect, you can, on occasion, just watch the damn film. Still, we need some justification for its inclusion on this Best Of list, so here goes: it’s a Toho Studios prequel to the original Gojira title, placing it squarely back in its own origins and excising a lot of the guff which primarily US studios have felt the need to add in through more recent decades.
In Godzilla Minus One, whilst there is some justification offered for Godzilla turning up (we’re back to the WWII setting of course) no one is seeking to find a reason here for Godzilla’s behaviour. He just is, he just does. As he decimates a Japan which is already pretty decimated, GM1 manages to sustain some engaging characters in an unorthodox little family unit, which includes a three year old tot acting her little heart out; that’s charming, but it’s protagonist Shikishima (Ryonosuke Kamiki), a failed kamikaze pilot who can’t shake his personal guilt for Japan’s surrender, who really holds the film together, a central focus for proceedings – which range big. A world of failed optimism but the desire to survive, of a loss of hope in government to protect the people, but of hope in the people themselves, GM1 has interesting things to say about Japan and Japanese history, but this is a monster movie and it works fantastically, with some superb shots and sequences. It has to move its pieces around a bit quickly at the end to get things in place for the first film – its real time sequel – but it holds together, and it’s a brilliant film, in which Godzilla is unequivocally terrifying again.
WHEN EVIL LURKS
When you’re a horror fan, sometimes you just crave the obliteratingly nasty – non-horror fans may find that difficult to understand, but so it is. Well, Argentinian horror When Evil Lurks – Argentina certainly isn’t messing about when it comes to its horror cinema lately – is nasty, a supernatural horror of possession and all its attendant bodily breakdowns, one which feels kind of familiar, but also throws in a few curveballs which play with ‘the rules’ of possession horror. If you have seen the film, and many of you reading are likely to have, then I’m ready to bet that the choice of image, above, has triggered some quite clear memories of your viewing. Not that children are always victims here, though: in the universe of the film, they can get past the whole ‘bad language and self-harm’ thing to start swinging weapons around as a small rural community is beset by a body-hopping kind of entity which favours baseless, irrational violence. It’s shocking, it’s often ingenious, it knows just when to skirt near to dark comedy and it’s an enjoyable slab of very grisly entertainment. Why press in on the edges of your horror film with awkward subtext, when you can just have someone caving their own head in with a hammer – just in case?
NEW LIFE
There has been an impressive spate of sci-fi in recent years that pares back the sci-fi elements as much as it can to allow the human consequences to come to the fore. That is the case with New Life also, though it’s a film which brings plenty of horror to bear on its science fiction, via its examination of how protocol and ‘doing the right thing’ balances against humanity in an unprecedented outbreak of something as-yet unknown. Whilst the film does move around, it’s not a film which grows and grows in scale; New Life is instead a story of two ill-fated women whose paths join: whilst it tantalises what would happen if this situation grew further out of control, its focus is on the initial situation, as explored through an interesting, detailed though broken timeline. It also lands an incredibly moving sequence come the end, with a line of dialogue which speaks to a world of pain beyond itself. Impressive stuff from John Rosman. Check out a fuller review here.
INFLUENCER
Shudder has, over the years, steadily built itself up from simply being a horror streaming platform to a film development programme, commissioning and/or screening new cinema of its own. And it’s probably fair to say that Shudder Presents features often have a lot in common: slick, modern, with a sense of the need to both charm and appal a relatively young, well-versed audience. Influencer (2023) is by far and away the best of the new Shudder productions I have seen, as much as it has a lot in common with other, good titles in its sharp visuals, good production values and knowing pace. Notably, however, it dispenses with supernatural horror and plants its feet in a recognisable, if (for many) unattainable world: that of the social media influencer, those affluent young people who magically manage to get into the enviable (for many) feedback loop of spending a lot of money to have a good time, to make more money to spend on a good time. Social media has been creeping into horror for as many years as it’s been such an important component in people’s lives, but Influencer does sterling work asking a series of important questions: who is watching these feeds? What do they get out of it? And what will they do with the information?
A careful, devastating and brutal film with a knock-out, sinister antagonist and a cleverly winding plotline, I was absolutely gripped by Influencer and it’s certainly a film which could stand another viewing or two. Clever, unsettling fare. You can see a longer review of the film here.
SISU
It’s absolutely only the presence of Sisu in the world that could ever knock Influencer from the top spot; that it popped up, seemingly out of nowhere, the brainchild of Rare Exports director Jalmari Helander makes it even better; a safe pair of hands for an inventive and horror historical fantasy. So – if you missed it – how do we define what it’s all about? Well, it’s a gleeful fantasy of redress and justice, a grisly superhero movie, a splatstick comedy and a version of a Wild West revenge flick – only relocated to the frozen North. When the retreating Nazis decide to rob a mute gold miner in the Finnish wilderness, they get far more than they bargained for as the man turns out to be more than adept at survival. In fact, he could turn out to be the adversary they have long feared – and their fateful engagement with him their last ordeal on Earth. Once you are happy to suspend your disbelief, and you should (or must), then every note in Sisu is a pleasure to behold. It’s one extraordinary man’s odyssey through ultraviolence, and as I suspected at the time, it hasn’t been bettered. Bravo, Jalmari Helander! Here’s a complete review of this wild ride of a film.
HONORABLE MENTIONS:
And, finally, here are some other 2023 films which deserve praise:
The low-key but visually impressive moral meanderings of RUBIKON, with its space sci-fi and environmental portents; similarly, the thoughtful sci-fi of RESTORE POINT and its idea of life as a file which can be backed up and re-run at will – unless, of course, someone deliberately eschews this process; the high weird relationship horror of GOOD BOY; INVOKING YELL, which brings more of the lo-fi atmospherics of black metal + horror to the screen than many far bigger budget projects; SPAGHETTI JUNCTION, a careful, science fiction-adjacent coming-of-age story with beautiful characterisation and character development; the quiet and thoughtful character study of SOMETIMES I THINK ABOUT DYING, and – another viewing from very late in the year – the unashamedly fun slasher THANKSGIVING, in which Eli Roth shows us once more that, whatever else, he is more than capable of a damn good, high entertainment horror.
