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Favorite Films of the 2010s


Top ten lists for movies of the decade were everywhere in December. I even saw one top 200 list! Instead of taking that route, I've chosen to just list a few films from the 2010s that stood out as my favorites of the last decade. Each of these movies blew my mind, touched my soul, and otherwise made it impossible for me to forget them. I don't know if these were the best, but they're some of the movies I remember most from the decade past. These are not reviews, just a brief sentence or two about why I dig each movie, with links to more for those I've written about before. Here they are, presented in no order whatsoever, except of course leading off with a Michelle Pfeiffer film because that's how we roll around here.


 mother! (Darren Aronofsky, 2017)
Aronofsky’s absorbing, anxiety-provoking assault on the senses. One of Michelle Pfeiffer’s most scorched earth performances—she deserved ALL the awards. Poor Jennifer Lawrence. “The sink’s not braced!!” Truly stunning.


 Green Room (Jeremy Saulnier, 2016)
Excruciatingly tense and gripping punk rock horror thriller. Even the early quiet moments are eerily beautiful. Works so well because we really grow to care about these kids in the band. “What’s your desert island band?” Absolutely brilliant movie.


The Edge of Seventeen (Kelly Fremon Craig, 2016)
This one is a gem. As compassionate a portrait of teenage awkwardness/introversion as any I’ve seen. Hailee Steinfeld is a treasure, carrying the entire movie with her towering performance, and Woody Harrelson is the sort of perceptive teacher we all desperately need as kids. Their scenes together are pure gold.

Cam (Daniel Goldhaber, 2018)
Written by former camgirl Isa Mazzei, Cam is a darkly comic, at times genuinely terrifying, and always utterly sympathetic film. It explores how the line between our online and offline selves can be dangerously blurred, and eventually even obliterated entirely.
You're Next (Adam Wingard, 2011)
Relentless home invasion thriller that positively cooks from start to finish. Starring Sharni Vinson, in an amazing performance, as possibly the most assured, kick-ass Final Girl in horror history.


 The Invitation (Karyn Kusama, 2015)

Destroyer (Karyn Kusama, 2018)
Two from one of the best directors working today, Karyn Kusama. Both explore long-term repercussions of grief, in different but equally powerful and unsettling ways. The Invitation's unsettling, slowly unfolding horrors are so fraught with tension it’s almost unbearable. Destroyer is devastating, and Nicole Kidman is extraordinary.


 Hounds of Love (Ben Young, 2016)
Claustrophobic, dread-soaked nightmare. Completely unsettling from the first frame to the last. Extremely affecting use of Joy Division’s “Atmosphere.” Brutal and unforgettable.


 Snowpiercer (Bong Joon-Ho, 2013)
This is how I like a good dystopian sci-fi exploration of climate disaster and class division: set inside a high-speed train shooting through the blizzard wasteland with passengers who are the (supposed) last survivors on the planet. Chris Evans proves he isn’t just Captain America—he’s also intense and magnetic here.


 Mandy (Panos Cosmatos, 2018)
brings a 1970s Roger Dean album cover to blood-red-saturated life in this phantasmagoria of despair whose dreamlike pacing eventually hops the express train to Crazy Town. Nicolas Cage is outstanding.

50/50 (Jonathan Levine, 2011)
No one talks about this movie now, almost ten years later, but it captured exactly what it's like to feel as if you're living outside your body, while medical professionals treat the disease and many friends and family have no idea how to talk to you about any of it. Excellent script (Will Reiser), and Joseph Gordon-Levitt brought it to life and absolutely nailed it.
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  1. Paul SJanuary 9, 2020 at 8:10 AM

    Happy New Year Michael. I haven't seen any of your selections sadly. Tired of being disappointed over and over again, I go to few new movies now. Two, I think, in the past six or seven years. I did enjoy Mad Max Fury Road and Hell or High Water, outside of them I haven't seen a new release in over a decade. It is good that you're finding stuff that blows your mind. I really should give some of your featured films a look.

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