Well, will you look at that. We’ve only gone and made it to the end of another year. Somehow.

Battered and bruised though we (and cinema) may be, we’ve just about made it through the storm - and that, at the end of the day, must be considered a win.

So, as we hurtle face-first into a fresh new year, it feels important to look back, take stock, and honour the best of what the last twelve months have had to offer.

There’s plenty in the wider world to be down about right now but listing out all the ways in which this planet sucked in 2024 is not, let’s be honest, why you’ve clicked on a top ten movie list. So, let’s leave the real-world doom and gloom to one side for a moment and concentrate on this year’s cinematic positives.

With that pandemic hangover still stinging and the burn from last year’s writer/actor strikes still being felt, 2024 certainly wasn’t a vintage year for the film industry, however, while such issues have made it far from a classic twelve months movie-wise, there remains plenty to celebrate. And celebrate we most certainly will!

As the industry continues its gradual recovery from covid, strikes, and the streaming wars, some degree of normality has returned to cinema, proving that there’s plenty of life left in the pictures yet.

So, without further ado, here’s my top ten films of 2024…

Banging tunes, plenty of laughs, a buzzing energy, some impressively brazen direction, three smart performances, some solid emotional beats, and a bit of an Irish lesson for good measure. Yeah, that’s the good shit.

All things considered, there’s much to love with Kneecap, as the infamous Irish rap trio drop a biopic banger out of nowhere.

Scannán iontach is ea é!

A simple but wonderfully crafted story of lost lives reclaimed through art. Never overplays its hand, and while it often feels close to greatness without quite getting there, it’s nevertheless a triumph of low-key filmmaking that works, not because of grand gestures or theatrics, but in painfully quiet moments of men talking.

Beautifully shot in a way that makes the most of what could’ve been a thoroughly grim location, director Greg Kwedar finds the beauty in Sing Sing’s prison setting and ensures that the glimmers of light offered by the acting programme are powerfully felt, even if these moments are agonisingly fleeting.

Colman Domingo is undoubtedly the film’s heart, but its soul is in Clarence “Divine Eye” Maclin and the extended cast of real-life former inmates, all of whom add depth and authenticity to the story.

An unflinching, uncompromisingly immersive ode to war journalism, Civil War isn’t here to take sides, however, it’s no less impactful because of it, as we witness the carnage and sprawling chaos of war through the eyes of those risking it all for that one perfect shot.

Fierce, frenzied, and wilfully devoid of context, Alex Garland’s film is a tense, timely, disorientating, aggressively neutral viewing experience that’s not easily forgotten.

What a curious little oddity. A freaky, unnerving meditation on obsession and identity, crafted with tonnes of heart and an impeccable attention to detail.

As an avid consumer of slightly shonky 90s young adult television, I Saw the TV Glow spoke to me. It was hard to know what to make of the film’s frenzied weirdness immediately after watching, however, I've found it hard to shake its ominously hypnotic spell in the days and months since. This will be one I return to a lot as the years click by, for sure.

Honestly, I think I may be in love with June Squibb. She’s just awesome. While Thelma is great anyway, there’s something about Squibb that just elevates it to another level of wonderful entirely.

With a delicate blend of loveable farce, charming humour, endearingly low-key action, and a healthy dose of heart, Thelma is a feel-good delight from start to finish. A warm, irreverent, touching slice of life, loss, age, and purpose that left me with the biggest smile on my face.

Visually stunning and narratively robust, Dune: Part Two is an absolute triumph, as Denis Villeneuve builds on the foundations laid by the first film with yet another epic sandstorm of science fiction magnificence.

As brutal as it is beautiful, Dune: Part Two is a truly masterful slice of sci-fi cinema and a phenomenally realised vision that takes everything its predecessor established and rides it hard into the desert like a spiced-up sandworm.

Never thought a chamber drama about picking a new pope would be one of my films of the year, yet here we are.

Beautifully shot, masterfully directed, impeccably constructed, enthrallingly written, and with a powerhouse performance from Ralph Fiennes in there for good measure - Conclave is a page-turning belter that will have you locked in from start to finish.

What. A. Ride. Sometimes rambling, sometimes touching, often hilarious, always deeply human. Anora is classic Sean Baker…and then some.

The plot takes a rambling Tarantino-esque detour in the second act but other than that - it’s another Baker banger, driven by a blistering, star-making performance from a magnificent Mikey Madison.

What an absolute charmer. With a dash of Wall-E here and a dollop of The Iron Giant there, you could say that the film’s many themes and ideas are a tad over familiar but that would be doing The Wild Robot a huge disservice.

With its heart firmly in the right place, The Wild Robot’s many life lessons are charming and endearingly earnest, while the film’s central themes of conservation, community and identity are on-point, pertinent, and so well executed, the story’s familiarity never becomes an issue. Pair that with some gorgeous animation, an emotionally resonant plot, and some wonderful voice work by Lupita Nyong’o and you have an instant animated classic on your hands.

Powerful. Haunting. Unforgettable. Nickel Boys is a truly astonishing effort that plays with form and narrative in such a way that we have no choice but to feel the full, horrific force of its true story.

The film’s unique first-person perspective makes everything so devastatingly intimate and unerringly personal it’s almost too much to handle at times, however, the indelible mark the story will leave on you cannot be denied; and while it certainly takes a minute to adjust to Nickel Boys’ distinctive shooting style, once it clicks, boy does it click.

Happy New Year to one and all! Here’s to better times and more marvellous movies in 2025!