As voted on by more than 200 critics participating in our annual Criticwire survey, here are the best films of the year. 1) MOONLIGHT A24 “‘Moonlight’ transforms rage and frustration into unadulterated intimacy. In this mesmerizing portrait of a suffocating world, the only potential catharsis lies in acknowledging it as Chiron so deeply wishes he could. Despite the somber tone, Moonlight is a beacon of hope for the prospects of speaking up.” —Eric Kohn 2) MANCHESTER BY THE SEA “It’s Lonergan’s masterfully subtle writing, littered with awkward exchanges that speak far louder than any cohesive monologue, that gives ‘Manchester’ its humanity.” —EK 3) LA LA LAND “At its best, ‘La La Land’ probes the irony of its existence, celebrating the greatness of a bygone era in the context of changing times.” —EK 4) TONI ERDMANN “The two leads’ extraordinary authenticity allows ‘Toni Erdmann’ to keep propelling forward, juggling themes about family and work-life balance that stretch beyond the cultural specificity of its setting.” —EK 5) OJ: MADE IN AMERICA “First screened to raves at Sundance in January, the compelling narrative seamlessly takes us from Los Angeles in the ’60s, when Simpson was a star USC football player and the city faced the Watts race riots, through the aftermath of the Simpson trial.” —Anne Thompson 6) PATERSON “Carried by an appropriately low-key Adam Driver and Jarmusch’s casual genius for capturing offhand remarks, ‘Paterson’ is his most absorbing character study since ‘Broken Flowers’ — and far more grounded in real life.” —EK 7) THE HANDMAIDEN “‘The Handmaiden’ works as a form of historical fantasy in which love conquers all, but not in the ways one might expect.” —EK 8) ARRIVAL “’Arrival’ is no two-hander; it is Adams’ film through and through. The actress makes a very strong lead, embodying the kind of swashbuckling language pedant whose eyes light with adventure when offered a particularly challenging conjugation.” —Ben Croll 9) HELL OR HIGH WATER “Just as it taps into a dying corner of American society, ‘Hell or High Water’ resurrects the power of western mayhem done right.” —EK 10) JACKIE Fox Searchlight “For his English-language debut, director Pablo Larrain has taken that most impersonal of genres – the three-handkerchief biopic – and delivered something that is bracingly, gloriously and entirely his own.” —BC 11) ELLE “For his first French-language production — and his first feature-length film in a decade — the 77-year-old filmmaker has delivered his most contained work in years, a dark comedy about sexual urges and other passions closer in form to 1973’s ‘Turkish Delight’ than anything he’s made since.” —EK 12) CERTAIN WOMEN “The cold, the distance, the arduous labor, the subtle class divisions, and the unwelcoming men… all of these help define why these certain women are the way they are.” —Noel Murray 13) CAMERAPERSON “More than that, the two dozen projects showcased here alongside original footage confront the process of creation. This is a collage-like guide to a life of looking.” —EK 14) THE LOBSTER “‘The Lobster’ brings Lanthimos’ distinct blend of morbid, deadpan humor and surrealism to a broader canvas without compromising his ability to deliver another thematically rich provocation.” —EK 15) CEMETERY OF SPLENDOR “Most films are domestic animals: cats or dogs. Some particularly beautiful ones might be horses or dolphins. But amongst the Fidos, the Fluffys and the Flippers, Apichatpong Weerasethakul‘s ‘Cemetery of Splendour’ is a Northern White Rhino, the most endangered species in the world.” —Jessica Kiang 16) SILENCE “A slow-burn tale filled with beautiful imagery and understated performances, its elegance yields one of Scorsese’s most subtle efforts.” —EK 17) EVERYBODY WANTS SOME!! “‘Everybody Wants Some!!’ contains many of the best ingredients found throughout Linklater’s career: A carefree attitude about life paired with sneakier observations about its deeper mysteries.” —EK 18) THE FITS “There’s vision here, clearly, and through the use of eye-catching frames and a standout score, ‘The Fits’ works like magic as an experimental performance piece.” —Nikola Grozdanovic 19) AMERICAN HONEY “It’s the closest thing to a magnum opus in Arnold’s blossoming career.” —EK 19) THE WITCH “Writer-director Robert Eggers’ accomplished feature-length debut manages a tricky balance: On the one hand an elegant period piece about the dissolution of a New England family circa 1630, it’s also a genuinely unsettling horror movie about possession.” —EK 21) AQUARIUS “Though Braga’s performance sometimes outshines Mendonça’s leisurely two-and-a-half hour narrative, in its better moments the two work in marvelous harmony.” —EK 22) LOVE & FRIENDSHIP “Has there ever been a purer match between author and adapter than Jane Austen and Whit Stillman?” —NM 23) GREEN ROOM “In almost every way Saulnier has upped his game with ‘Green Room,’ his bloody, impressive follow-up.” —Jason Gorber 24) NO HOME MOVIE “Individually, these moments are difficult to parse; collectively, they amount to an existential wail. At the same time, they carry a profound beauty that hints at more uplifting possibilities.” —EK 25) SING STREET “But if Carney’s latest jam proves that he can’t change his spots, it also shows that he knows how to learn from his mistakes. For a filmmaker so fixated on the same story, that can be a far more valuable skill.” —David Ehrlich 26) 20TH CENTURY WOMEN “A big-hearted and bittersweet bear hug of a memoir, by far the most moving and mature of the four films he’s made to date.” —DE 27) THINGS TO COME “‘Things to Come’ is less a story of becoming than it is one of survival, but, as its relatively aged heroine begins to molt from the crust of her past and steel herself for the unwritten chapters of her life, those two goals begin to seem like one and the same.” —DE 28) LOVING “With ‘Loving,’ the director moves from the combination of otherworldly lyricism and genre storytelling in ‘Take Shelter,’ ‘Mud’ and ‘Midnight Special’ toward more conventional drama by exploring the intimate details behind its legacy.” —EK 29) NOCTURNAL ANIMALS “’Nocturnal Animals’ is an impressively ambitious effort, one part mean Texas thriller, one part middle-age melodrama, and makes for a meta-textual riddle that is almost as pleasurable to reflect on as it to actually watch.” —BC 30) RIGHT NOW, WRONG THEN “Hong not only finds an intriguing gimmick to play with, but then proceeds to use it for genuinely revealing purposes.” —Kenji Fujishima 31) I AM NOT YOUR NEGRO “Raoul Peck’s ‘I Am Not Your Negro’ masterfully encompasses what it means to break through cycles of isolation and invisibility.” —Aramide A Tinubu 32) A BIGGER SPLASH “Here is a movie that’s genuinely _alive_, plunging into theaters with the style of a swan dive and the impact of a cannonball. It’s a messy romp that’s funny, hot, and horrifying in equal measure; and if it squeaks a bit whenever it tries to shift gears, that sound just becomes another instrument in Guadagnino’s latest symphony of the senses.” —DE 32) KNIGHT OF CUPS Broad Green Pictures “Filled to the brim with whispery voiceover narration, roaming camerawork and an unending collage of lush images to evoke its forlorn character’s desire to escape the clutches of vapidity, ‘Knight of Cups’ is always lovely to regard.” —EK 34) KUBO AND THE TWO STRINGS “Staggeringly beautiful and immensely true, the best animated film of 2016 — one of the year’s best films of any kind, really — is a stop-motion fable about a one-eyed boy in mythical Japan that was made by a team of gifted visionaries in an Oregon warehouse.” —DE 35) HAPPY HOUR This four-hour opus wasn’t widely released, but those lucky enough to have seen it are almost unanimous in their praise. 36) KRISHA “‘Krisha’ derives an extraordinary sense of mystery around the nature of the character’s problems — and whether she indeed possesses the ability to control them.” —EK 37) CHEVALIER “The only certainty is Tsangari has delivered another intriguing and thoroughly original character study, which this time serves as an apt metaphor for Greece’s larger problems.” —EK 37) HAIL, CAESAR! “The Coens deftly manage to have it both ways, playing their homage-y centerpieces straight in order to honor old-school filmmaking, and then punctuating them with artifice-destroying punchlines.” —Nick Schager 37) HUNT FOR THE WILDERPEOPLE “Waititi, who’s been picked out by Marvel to direct “Thor: Ragnarok” this year, knows how to construct a tight movie with joyful, warm three-dimensional characters.” —Sam Fragoso SEE THE REST OF THE STORY AT BUSINESS INSIDER
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