152 films I watched within 365 days.
This year, I watched a lot of movies. There were several reasons why this was both my most treasured and habitual activity in 2023. I am required to watch movies for my job, which means I get access to a lot of early screenings and screeners. I also spent the majority of the year, as I wrote about last time I popped up here on the blog, in immense physical pain; I spent a lot of time on the couch, so I also spent a lot of time playing video games (Pokémon Scarlet, The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, Mario Kart 8 mostly), watching TV shows (too many to even list here; watch Scott Pilgrim Takes Off), and sitting through extremely long video essays on YouTube.
In 2023, I watched 152 movies, which is more than I have ever watched before in my life, I think. That includes movies I streamed and saw at a theater; movies I rewatched or had never seen before; and movies I watched and judged as a member of a jury for a major film festival (!!!), among others. There were even a handful of movies that I watched more than once this year, a testament to how many great movies came out this year.
Below is a complete list of the movies I watched in 2023. This is for accounting purposes, mostly. But I also think it paints a better picture of the year I had than any of my typical melodramatic, woe-is-me musings can. I don’t do that whole Letterboxd star-rating shtick, so I didn’t rate these—but I thought it would be fun to do some superlatives, good and bad, anyway.
Favorite new movie of the year:
Past Lives. Past Lives. PAST LIVES.
Least-favorite new movie of the year:
Down Low is one of the worst movies I’ve ever seen in my life. Its trailer is also the first one I’ve ever seen that quotes a review I wrote. This is what I deserve.
New movies I saw twice this year:
Past Lives, Barbie, The Super Mario Bros. Movie, Poor Things, The Boy and the Heron.
Most-watched actor of the year:
I watched four movies starring Albert Brooks this year, all of which I liked a lot. (The best was probably Modern Romance.) The documentary his bestie Rob Reiner made about him, less good. If we’re not including that one, Albert is tied with Ryan Gosling; he starred in the best movie I watched entirely on my phone this year. Half Nelson! Streaming for free on YouTube!
Most-watched actress of the year:
Rachel Sennott, three of whose movies I watched in quick-ish succession this year. I also suffered through all of The Idol. But I liked watching Rachel do Bottoms promo with Ayo Edebiri more than anything I actually saw her act in.
Most underrated movie I watched this year:
I have been thinking about and referencing The Adults for eight months straight now. It wasn’t that good of a movie, but it was definitely a fun viewing experience for me—I watched it at 10 a.m. on a Tuesday during Tribeca Film Festival, and I was the only one laughing and cringing among my scant fellow filmgoers. Michael Cera’s Marge Simpson impression is just too good!
Most overrated movie I watched this year:
The more I think about American Fiction, the more annoyed and disappointed by it I get.
Most appropriately rated movie I watched this year:
Paddington 2 is as good as everyone says it is.
And now, here’s the full list of all 152.
1. Jeanne Dielman
2. This Place Rules
3. Love and Mercy
4. Death of a Salesman (1985)
5. To Leslie
6. The Conformist
7. Cat Person
8. Eileen
9. Theater Camp
10. Sometimes I Think About Dying
11. A Little Prayer
12. Fairyland
13. Knock at the Cabin
14. Beyoncé: The President’s Daughter
15. Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania
16. Modern Romance
17. The Return of Beyoncé
18. Another Body
19. Angel Applicant
20. BlackBerry
21. You Were My First Boyfriend
22. Geoff McFetridge: Drawing a Life
23. My Year of Dicks
24. M3GAN (unrated)
25. Join or Die
26. The Young Wife
27. Pay or Die
28. Queendom
29. Riders on the Storm
30. We’re All Going to the World’s Fair
31. Down Low
32. Bottoms
33. Peak Season
34. Great Photo, Lovely Life
35. Problemista
36. Molli and Max in the Future
37. I Used to Be Funny
38. Americana
39. Navalny
40. Midnight Run
41. Wendy and Lucy
42. Old Joy
43. The Super Mario Bros. Movie (x2)
44. Suzume
45. Tetris
46. The Bling Ring
47. Beau Is Afraid
48. Charlie’s Angels (2000)
49. Are You There, God? It’s Me, Margaret
50. Half Nelson
51. A Thousand and One
52. Bring It On
53. Defending Your Life
54. Spring Breakers
55. Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3
56. Scream 4
57. You Hurt My Feelings
58. Scream 5
59. Kurt Cobain: Montage of Heck
60. Anna Nicole Smith: You Don’t Know Me
61. Past Lives (x2)
62. Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse
63. Batman (1989)
64. The Flash
65. Your Fat Friend
66. Metropolis
67. Elemental
68. Asteroid City
69. Waitress: The Musical
70. The Adults
71. Reality
72. Hideo Kojima: Connecting Worlds
73. Fantastic Mr. Fox
74. Take Care of Maya
75. Spirited Away
76. Raiders of the Lost Ark
77. Victim/Suspect
78. Nimona
79. Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom
80. Gray Matter
81. Art College 1994
82. Oppenheimer
83. Barbie (x2)
84. The Deepest Breath
85. Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade
86. Haunted Mansion (2023)
87. The Nice Guys
88. The First Slam Dunk
89. Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory
90. Spider-Man: Lotus
91. Passages
92. TMNT: Mutant Mayhem
93. All I Wanna Do (Strike!)
94. Person to Person
95. BS High
96. The Elephant 6 Recording Co.
97. Shiva Baby
98. Stolen Dough
99. You’re So Not Invited to My Bat Mitzvah
100. Stop Making Sense
101. They’ll Love Me When I’m Dead
102. The Automat
103. The Faculty
104. Selena Gomez: My Mind and Me
105. I Know What You Did Last Summer
106. The Boy and the Heron (x2)
107. Foe
108. All of Us Strangers
109. The Ringleader: Case of the Bling Ring
110. Anatomy of a Fall
111. Mean Girls
112. Hit Man
113. Priscilla
114. There Will Be Blood
115. The Zone of Interest
116. Popstar: Never Stop Never Stopping
117. Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour
118. Scott Pilgrim vs. the World
119. Dream Scenario
120. Vertigo
121. American Fiction
122. Killers of the Flower Moon
123. The Holdovers
124. Five Nights at Freddy’s
125. Rustin
126. In the Mouth of Madness
127. Hunger Games: Ballad of Songbirds + Snakes
128. Poor Things (x2)
129. The Marvels
130. Albert Brooks: Defending My Life
131. Mind Game
132. Saltburn
133. Muppets Treasure Island
134. The Killers
135. May December
136. The Color Purple (2023)
137. It Started as a Joke
138. Renaissance
139. Safe
140. The Iron Claw
141. No Hard Feelings
142. Good Time
143. Paddington 2
144. The Most Wonderful Time of the Year
145. Muppet Christmas Carol
146. The Apartment
147. Godzilla Minus One
148. Wonka
149. Chicken Run
150. The Eternal Memory
151. Rye Lane
152. Real Life
