First list down

 So, what did I think of Empire's top 20 films of 2024?

I've prioritised Empire's list over The Guardian's this year (I have actually managed to watch #50 on that one, but that's as far as I've got) and it's definitely the right choice. I can't say I loved all of Empire's choices but they were all interesting and there were one or two very pleasant surprises. 

Looking first at the films that make both lists, we have ten films (up from seven in 2023) and they were all interesting and some of them were considerably weirder than I was expecting. We have to start with All Of Us Strangers because it topped both lists (the second year in a row that's happened after Past Lives in 2023) - I thought this was a very interesting film and can quite understand why the critics put it top. And then I guess we should talk about The Zone Of Interest (#2 here, #3 in The Guardian) - this was another obviously critic friendly film, but it didn't quite hit the spot for me. My favourite "normal" films were The Holdovers and Conclave with Poor Things, Love Lies Bleeding, I Saw The TV Glow and Hundreds Of Beavers being my favourite "not at all normal" films. And that only leaves us with Anora and La Chimera, both of which were fine without being outstanding for me. 

Looking at all the films that The Guardian included but Empire ignored, it's hard to say whether the omissions make sense because I've not seen most of them, but at this point in time it only feels like Wicked and Emilia Perez might have stood a chance of making Empire's list. Looking at the films that Empire included but The Guardian ignored, I'd say they were all pretty decent but I wouldn't say any of them are unforgivable omissions. Personally, I'd particularly recommend Kneecap (4* in The Guardian), Furiosa : A Mad Max Saga (4*), Hit Man (again 4*) and (to my great surprise) Perfect Days (yup - 4*). The one I'm most surprised The Guardian omitted was The Substance (another 4*) - this feels like a very right-on feminist thing that they usually love. I'm also going to mention Robot Dreams, because that was the only film not previously mentioned that got 5* from The Guardian. 

Summing the rankings across the two lists, the top five are All Of Us Strangers (2), The Zone Of Interest (5), Anora (10), The Holdovers (12) and Poor Things (15) - the lists are pretty aligned this year. If I had to pick one film off the list to recommend, it's quite a tricky decision but I think I'd go for The Holdovers - it's a charming story which is well written, acted and shot. However, I think Hit Man is quite unlucky not to get the nod because it also scores highly on all those fronts and I'm also going to recommend Poor Things, Hundreds Of Beavers and Perfect Days if you fancy something slightly different (or very different in the case of the first two). 

Being realistic, I'm not going to make it through The Guardian's list this year, but I do intend to pick some of them that we've not seen already - it will be interesting to compare them to see if there are any that I don't understand how Empire ignored.

#1 - An interesting film
#20 (2025) - Well done, but unnecessary

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