2023: a tumultuous, but also exciting year for cinema that saw the bottoms fall out of once unstoppable franchises and the rise of new and old masters. Characterized by surprise blockbusters, stinging excavations of the human condition, and a few bold oddities, this year was a cornucopia of great film. So much so that for the first time ever, I’m expanding the usual top 10 to a top 20.

Michael Mann Ferrari disguises the fissures of masculinity in the typical rhythms of biographical fare, but the sheer amount of texture and feeling hidden between the lines — and within Adam Driver’s craggy, steely performance — is staggering. Intimate, somber failings juxtaposed with screeching banshee metal and spitfire ambition, their non-reconciliation a feature and not a bug: a full-blooded film years in the making. Minor spoilers ahead…