The 10 Best Films of 2023

Editor’s Note: Find all of The Atlantic’s “Best of 2023” coverage here.

Cinema continued to wobble back to its feet in 2023: Blockbuster events such as “Barbenheimer” proved that audiences had an appetite for more than just superhero movies at the box office, while the rippling effects of the writers’ and actors’ strikes forced Hollywood to examine the unsettling implications of the past decade’s streaming revolution. But as usual, the art form itself didn’t really suffer, especially if you knew where to look, and curating my list of the year’s best films proved extra difficult.

So strong were this year’s offerings that my honorable mentions include excellent films by some of my most-loved auteurs—(from Michael Mann), (Todd Haynes), (Alexander Payne), and (David Fincher), all worthy additions to totemic bodies of work. There were wonderfully challenging entries, such as Ari Aster’s unhinged ,and Jonathan Glazer’s chilling , designed to rattle the viewer in their seat; Bradley Cooper’s takes the staid biographical film in directions I couldn’t have anticipated,.