20. Nightmare Alley
Nightmare Alley makes this list almost exclusively for its ending, which is indeed one of the most gloriously twisted that Del Toro has ever come up with in his long and storied career of weaving dark adult fairy tales and morality plays. If the middle act of the movie had the same sort of biting character disinigration as the movie's final moments, or the same sort of par for the course incredible world building of its director that was center stage in the carnvial-centric first act then this really could have been a contender for the best of the year. As it stands now it's a movie that's lifted up in spite of itself and I really want to love it more than I actually do for the qualities that it does knock out of the park. The first act's macabre sideshow setting and colorful cast of characters instantly pulls you into a world that was hyped up to wonderful effect in the film's teaser trailer which saw the glorious Willem Dafoe conceptually hypothesizing rather Bradley Cooper's lead antihero was "man or beast" as part of his character's carnival barker act.
Dafoe's barker, Ron Perlman's strongman, and a host of others along with just freaking phenemonal production design work with a BIG highlight being a fun house early in the run time puts the cards in Nightmare's Alley's hand to deliver a real flush of a film. Unfortunately once the story leaves the carnival and Cate Blanchett's blandly written femme fatal archtype character comes into play the film really does come to a screeching halt and straight up devolves into a mess of manipulation and mind games that is way too complicated for its own good. Once Richard Jenkins enters the movie it definitely comes back to life and the last act as previously stated very much sticks the film to landing, but that middle chunk is simply one of the most messy pieces of writing in Del Toro's career and unfortunately drags what could have been a top contender down to being a still worthy but imperfect start to the list.
19. Old
Out of all my selections for this list, Old might be the one I have the most personal bias towards. Is this a return to form of M. Night's early masterworks? Definitely not, in fact his late 2010s comeback era movies like The Visit and Split go a lot further in recapturing that tone. No, Old is a glorious return to form for M. Night's campier fare that's still high concept enough to be more than just throwaway silliness. What I loved about Old is how committed it was both to the goofy and off kilter tone but also to the dire situations the characters find themselves in with this premise. Throughout the movie we get great showpieces of true tension and skin-crawling body horror alongside moments like "Oh my god, it's Mid-Sized Sedan!!!" and children running around a resort casually asking characters for their "name and occupation" that will be filed right up there with Marky Mark's "What!?!!?....NO!" as all time great so-bad-it's-good dialogue deliveries. And that right there is why Old worked so much for me on a personal level. It's equal parts ridiculous and genuinely suspenseful, but most importantly at no point in its brisk run time does it ever feel bored of what it's setting out to do. It has all the calling cards of a new M. Night trainwreck while still having enough genuinely good things about it to elevate it above the director's truly bad movies and into a category that's wholly unique for the seasoned would-be Hitchcock successor.
Up next: A true comeback performance from Nicolas Cage and my favorite documentary of the year!
Nightmare Alley makes this list almost exclusively for its ending, which is indeed one of the most gloriously twisted that Del Toro has ever come up with in his long and storied career of weaving dark adult fairy tales and morality plays. If the middle act of the movie had the same sort of biting character disinigration as the movie's final moments, or the same sort of par for the course incredible world building of its director that was center stage in the carnvial-centric first act then this really could have been a contender for the best of the year. As it stands now it's a movie that's lifted up in spite of itself and I really want to love it more than I actually do for the qualities that it does knock out of the park. The first act's macabre sideshow setting and colorful cast of characters instantly pulls you into a world that was hyped up to wonderful effect in the film's teaser trailer which saw the glorious Willem Dafoe conceptually hypothesizing rather Bradley Cooper's lead antihero was "man or beast" as part of his character's carnival barker act.
Dafoe's barker, Ron Perlman's strongman, and a host of others along with just freaking phenemonal production design work with a BIG highlight being a fun house early in the run time puts the cards in Nightmare's Alley's hand to deliver a real flush of a film. Unfortunately once the story leaves the carnival and Cate Blanchett's blandly written femme fatal archtype character comes into play the film really does come to a screeching halt and straight up devolves into a mess of manipulation and mind games that is way too complicated for its own good. Once Richard Jenkins enters the movie it definitely comes back to life and the last act as previously stated very much sticks the film to landing, but that middle chunk is simply one of the most messy pieces of writing in Del Toro's career and unfortunately drags what could have been a top contender down to being a still worthy but imperfect start to the list.
19. Old
Out of all my selections for this list, Old might be the one I have the most personal bias towards. Is this a return to form of M. Night's early masterworks? Definitely not, in fact his late 2010s comeback era movies like The Visit and Split go a lot further in recapturing that tone. No, Old is a glorious return to form for M. Night's campier fare that's still high concept enough to be more than just throwaway silliness. What I loved about Old is how committed it was both to the goofy and off kilter tone but also to the dire situations the characters find themselves in with this premise. Throughout the movie we get great showpieces of true tension and skin-crawling body horror alongside moments like "Oh my god, it's Mid-Sized Sedan!!!" and children running around a resort casually asking characters for their "name and occupation" that will be filed right up there with Marky Mark's "What!?!!?....NO!" as all time great so-bad-it's-good dialogue deliveries. And that right there is why Old worked so much for me on a personal level. It's equal parts ridiculous and genuinely suspenseful, but most importantly at no point in its brisk run time does it ever feel bored of what it's setting out to do. It has all the calling cards of a new M. Night trainwreck while still having enough genuinely good things about it to elevate it above the director's truly bad movies and into a category that's wholly unique for the seasoned would-be Hitchcock successor.
Up next: A true comeback performance from Nicolas Cage and my favorite documentary of the year!
