rankings

This Week in Rankings

Since the last update, I wrapped up my festival coverage for the year with reviews of Matsui Daigo’s Rewrite (my favorite film of the year so far), Miike Takashi’s Sham, Honeko Akebane’s Bodyguards, and Holy Night: Demon Hunters from the Fantasia Film Festival, Amoeba from the Toronto Film Festival, and Dear Stranger from Busan. Most of the rest of my reviews of new movies were for films with limited theatrical runs or which went straight-to-video, including Dongji Rescue, Prisoner of War, Affinity and Diablo, and Red Sonja (at Seattle Screen Scene). Reviews of older movies consist of Linda, Linda, Linda, and Evil Cat and The Cat. I also wrote about three Japanese TV series: Baby Assassins Everyday!, Glass Heart and CITY the Animation. Additionally, I served on the Best International Short Film jury at the San Diego Asian Film Festival, which was pretty wild.

You can get all those reviews and much much more by subscribing to The Chinese Cinema today for the low price of only $1/month or $10/year.

These are the movies I’ve watched and rewatched over the last few months, and where they place on my year-by-year rankings.

It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown (Bill Melendez) – 1, 1966
Three Days of the Condor (Sydney Pollack) – 15, 1975
Reds (Warren Beatty) – 3, 1981
Red Sonja (Richard Fleischer) – 58, 1985
Evil Cat (Dennis Yu) – 52, 1987

The Cat (Lam Nai-choi) – 26, 1992
Cure (Kurosawa Kiyoshi) – 4, 1997
Pulse (Kurosawa Kiyoshi) – 11, 2001
Gosford Park (Robert Altman) – 15, 2001
Bright Future (Kurosawa Kiyoshi) – 18, 2002
28 Days Later (Danny Boyle) – 50, 2002

Linda Linda Linda (Yamashita Nobuhiro) – 1, 2005
Runnin’ Down a Dream (Peter Bogdanovich) – 24, 2007
28 Weeks Later (Juan Carlos Fresnadillo) – 76, 2007
Moneyball (Bennett Miller) – 21, 2011
Conan the Barbarian (Marcus Nispel) – 55, 2011

The Perks of Being a Wallflower (Stephen Chobsky) – 73, 2012
Seventh Code (Kurosawa Kiyoshi) – 8, 2013
Creepy (Kurosawa Kiyoshi) – 35, 2016
Downton Abbey (Michael Engler) – 103, 2019
Baby Assassins (Sakamoto Yugo) – 13, 2021
Downton Abbey: A New Era (Simon Curtis) – 96, 2022

Baby Assassins: 2 Babies (Sakamoto Yugo) – 4, 2023
Baby Assassins Everyday! (Sakamoto Yugo) – 4, 2024
Baby Assassins: Nice Days (Sakamoto Yugo) – 9, 2024
Cloud (Kurosawa Kiyoshi) – 18, 2024

CITY the Animation (Ishidate Taishi) – 2, 2025
Fool Time (Jon Bois) – 10, 2025
Red Sonja (MJ Bassett) – 11, 2025
Amoeba (Tan Siyou) – 18, 2025
Ordinary Life (Mizushiri Yoriko) – 19, 2025
Water Sports (Whammy Alcazaran) – 20, 2025

Glass Heart (Goto Kotaro and Kakimoto Kensaku) – 21, 2025
Dongji Rescue (Guan Hu & Fei Zhenxiang) – 24, 2025
Through Your Eyes (Nelson Yeo) – 25, 025
Diablo (Ernesto Díaz Espinoza) – 26, 2025
A House of Dynamite (Kathryn Bigelow) – 27, 2025

Scorigami (Jon Bois) – 29, 2025
Ali (Adnan Al Rajeev) – 31, 2025
28 Years Later (Danny Boyle) – 32, 2025
Weapons (Zach Cregger) – 33, 2025
Ballerina (Len Wiseman) – 34, 2025
Prisoner of War (Louis Mandylor) – 36, 2025
Mr. Scorsese (Rebecca Miller) – 42, 2025

A Very Straight Neck (Sora Neo) – 49, 2025
Dear Stranger (Mariko Tetsuya) – 51, 2025
A South-Facing Window (Lkhagvadulam Purev-Ochir) – 52, 2025
Correct Me If I’m Wrong (Zhou Hao) – 54, 2025

John Candy: I Like Me (Colin Hanks) – 55, 2025
Thunderbolts* (Jake Schrier) – 56, 2025
Affinity (Brandon Slagle) – 62, 2025
The Red Banca (Nena Jane Achacoso) – 63, 2025

This Week in Rankings

Since the last update, festival season dominated my schedule, with coverage of Japan Cuts and the New York Asian Film Festival over at The Chinese Cinema and Fantasia and Cannes at InReview Online. I also put together a video introduction for a Tsui Hark retrospective that played at The Cinematheque in Vancouver.

At The Chinese Cinema, I’ve reviewed Scenes of City Life and Street Angel, Bullet Train and Bullet Train Explosion, Girl Students’ Dormitory, The Old Woman with the Knife, All the Wrong Clues (…For the Right Solution), 11 Rebels, and Ghost Killer.

Also, since it’s apparently quarter-century list season, I counted down the top Chinese Language and Non-Chinese Language films of the 2000s so far.

You can get all those reviews and much much more by subscribing to The Chinese Cinema today for the low price of only $1/month or $10/year.

These are the movies I’ve watched and rewatched over the last few months, and where they place on my year-by-year rankings.

Scenes of City Life (Yuan Muzhi) – 4, 1935
Street Angel (Yuan Muzhi) – 4, 1937
Casablanca (Michael Curtiz) – 1, 1942
Singin’ in the Rain (Stanley Donen & Gene Kelly) – 1, 1952

Lawrence of Arabia (David Lean) – 6, 1962
The Bullet Train (Sato Jun’ya) – 11, 1975
All the Wrong Clues (…For the Right Solution) (Tsui Hark) – 32, 1981
Girl Students’ Dormitory (Shi Shujun) – 5, 1983

Love Hotel (Somai Shinji) – 16, 1985
Working Class (Tsui Hark) – 23, 1985
Bull Durham (Ron Shelton) – 1, 1988
The Naked Gun (David Zucker) – 20, 1988
Glory (Edward Zwick) – 17, 1989

Love Letter (Iwai Shunji) – 13, 1995
The Chinese Feast (Tsui Hark) – 41, 1995
I Just Wasn’t Made for These Times (Don Was) – 51, 1995
Carrotblanca (Douglas McCarthy, Spike Brandt, Tony Cervone) – 108, 1995
Mission: Impossible (Brian De Palma) – 20, 1996

Serpent’s Path (Kurosawa Kiyoshi) – 23, 1998
License to Live (Kurosawa Kiyoshi) – 27, 1998
Mission: Impossible 2 (John Woo) – 24, 2000
Final Destination (James Wong) – 42, 2000
Final Destination 2 (David R. Ellis) – 45, 2003

Beautiful Dreamer (David Leaf) – 66, 2004
Final Destination 3 (James Wong) – 43, 2006
Mission: Impossible 3 (JJ Abrams) – 48, 2006
Tom Waits: Under Review (Unknown) – 60, 2006
The Simpsons Movie (David Silverman) – 50, 2007

The Final Destination (David R. Ellis) – 81, 2009
Hugo (Martin Scorsese) – 19, 2011
Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol (Brad Bird) – 20, 2011
Final Destination 5 (Steven Quale) – 59, 2011
42 (Brian Helgeland) – 73, 2013

Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation (Christopher McQuarrie) – 92, 2015
Rogue One (Gareth Edwards) – 23, 2016
Mission: Impossible – Fallout (Christopher McQuarrie) – 132, 2018
Long Promised Road (Brent Wilson) – 35, 2021
Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning (Christopher McQuarrie) – 73, 2023

She Taught Me Serendipity (Ohku Akiko) – 5, 2024
11 Rebels (Shiraishi Kazuya) – 10, 2024
The Gesuidouz (Ugana Kenichi) – 18, 2024
Ghost Killer (Sonomura Kensuke) – 25, 2024
See You Tomorrow (Michimoto Saki) – 39, 2024

Honeko Akabane’s Bodyguards (Ishikawa Junichi) – 42, 2024
Possession Street (Jack Lai) – 48, 2024
Serpent’s Path (Kurosawa Kiyoshi) – 54, 2024
Striking Rescue (Cheng Siyu) – 64, 2024

Rewrite (Matsui Daigo) – 1, 2025
Shifty (Adam Curtis) – 2, 2025
Sinners (Ryan Coogler) – 3, 2025
Muromachi Outsiders (Irie Yu) – 7, 2025
Bullet Train Explosion (Higuchi Shinji) – 8, 2025

Deep in the Mountains (Li Yongyi) – 9, 2025
Superman (James Gunn) – 10, 2025
Girl on Edge (Zhou Jinghao) – 11, 2025
Thug Life (Mani Ratnam) – 12, 2025
The Phoenician Scheme (Wes Anderson) – 13, 2025

Sham (Miike Takashi) – 14, 2025
Pee Wee as Himself (Matt Wolf) – 15, 2025
Predator: Killer of Killers (Dan Trachtenberg) – 16, 2025
Girls on Wire (Vivian Qu) – 17, 2025
A Useful Ghost (Ratchapoom Boonbunchachoke) – 18, 2025

Fantastic Four: First Steps (Matt Shakman) – 19, 2025
Informant (Kim Seok) – 22, 2025
Happy Gilmore 2 (Kyle Newacheck) – 24, 2025
Billy Joel: And So It Goes (Jessica Levin & Susan Lacy) – 25, 2025
Holy Night: Demon Hunters (Lim Daehee) – 26, 2025

Becoming Led Zeppelin (Bernard MacMahon) – 27, 2025
Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning (Christopher McQuarrie) – 28, 2025
Smashing Frank (Trevor Choi) – 29, 2025
Final Destination: Bloodlines (Directed by Zach Lipovsky and Adam B. Stein) – 30, 2025
The Stone (Arak Amornsupasiri and Vuthipong Sukhanindr) – 31, 2025
Behind the Shadows (Jonathan Li and Chou Man You) – 32, 2025

Lost Bullet 3 (Guillaume Pierret) – 34, 2025
The Old Woman with the Knife (Min Kyudong) – 35, 2025
So Beautiful, Wonderful, and Lovely (Okawara Megumi) – 36, 2025
The Old Way (Fan Xiang) – 37, 2025
Another Simple Favor (Paul Feig) – 38, 2025
Captain America: Brave New World (Julius Onah) – 39, 2025

This Week in Rankings

Since the last update, 2024 ended and I listed my favorite books of the year as well as my favorite older movies I saw for the first time. I also handed out the Endy Awards for the year.

I dusted off Seattle Screen Scene in order to review Paul WS Anderson’s In the Lost Lands. Over at InReview Online I reviewed a couple of films for the International Film Festival Rotterdam (Miike Takashi’s Blazing Fists and Anselm Chan’s The Last Dance), Rendez-vous with French Cinema (Rithy Panh’s Rendez-vous avec Pol Pot), and First Look ’25 (Yamanaka Yoko’s Desert of Namibia).

At The Chinese Cinema, I continued to explore the emergent iQIYI cinema with a look at seven films starring Raquel Xu Dongdong (The Raquel Report) and two starring Muqi Miya (The MIYA Memo), as well as two adaptations of Louis Cha’s Condor Heroes series (More Condors, More Heroes). The latter of those coincided with the release of Tsui Hark’s theatrical adaptation, Legends of the Condor Heroes: The Gallants.

Speaking of legendary filmmakers, I also reviewed Kitano Takeshi’s Broken Rage, Kuei Chih-hung’s Killer Constable, Donnie Yen’s The Prosecutor, and Ram Gopal Varma’s Enter the Girl Dragon, and saw a martial arts triple feature at the now-homeless Grand Illusion Cinema which included films by Chang Cheh and Lau Kar-leung. Finally, I started what I hope will be an extended exploration of Shanghai Cinema with a pair of Li Li-li movies: Fei Mu’s Blood on Wolf Mountain and National Customs, the final film made by actress Ruan Lingyu.

You can get all those reviews and much much more by subscribing to The Chinese Cinema today for the low price of only $1/month or $10/year.

These are the movies I’ve watched and rewatched over the last few months, and where they place on my year-by-year rankings.

National Customs (Zhu Shilin & Luo Mingyou) – 13, 1935
Blood on Wolf Mountain (Fei Mu) – 8, 1936
The Old Mill (Wilfred Jackson & Graham Heid) – 6, 1937
Confucius (Fei Mu) – 21, 940
Citizen Kane (Orson Welles) – 1, 1941

Bugs and Thugs (Friz Freleng) – 34, 1954
Funny Face (Stanley Donen) – 1, 1957
The Godfather (Francis Ford Coppola) – 3, 1972
Pat Garrett & Billy the Kid (Sam Peckinpah) – 7, 1973
Enter the Dragon (Robert Clouse) – 11, 1973

The Brave Archer (Chang Cheh) – 24, 1977
The 36th Chamber of Shaolin (Lau Kar-leung) – 2, 1978
Crippled Avengers (Chang Cheh) – 7, 1978
Killer Constable (Kuei Chih-hung) – 9, 1980
The Clones of Bruce Lee (Joseph Kong Hung & Nam Ki-nam) – 42, 1980
Revenge of the Ninja (Sam Firstenberg) – 47, 1983

Silverado (Lawrence Kasdan) – 23, 1985
Blue Velvet (David Lynch) – 6, 1986
Die Hard (John McTiernan) – 8, 1988
Young Guns (Christopher Cain) – 55, 1988
Cocktail (Roger Donaldson) – 69, 1988
Wild at Heart (David Lynch) – 11, 1990

Chungking Express (Wong Kar-wai) – 1, 1994
Ricky Jay and His 52 Assistants (David Mamet) – 25, 1996
The Rock (Michael Bay) – 31, 1996
Fat Choi Spirit (Johnnie To & Wai Ka-fai) – 6, 2002

The Hours (Stephen Daldry) – 47, 2002
The Stepford Wives (Franz Oz) – 62, 2004
David Lynch: The Art Life (Jon Nguyen, Rick Barnes, & Olivia Neergaard-Holm) – 148, 2016
Ash is Purest White (Jia Zhangke) – 1, 2018
The Dead Don’t Die (Jim Jarmusch) – 23, 2019

Miss Agent (Zeng Li) – 61, 2020
Queen of Triads (Venus Keung & Wong Jing) – 39, 2021
The Sniper (Chris Huo) – 46, 2021
The Legend of the Condor Heroes: The Dragon Tamer (Zhu Lingfeng & Yu Diao) – 81, 2021
Enter the Girl Dragon (Ram Gopal Varma) – 62, 2022

Lynch/Oz (Alexandre O. Philippe) – 65, 2022
Female Special Police Officer (Zhang Zhen) – 71, 2022
Queen of Triads 2 (Venus Keung & Wong Jing) – 87, 2022
Queen of Triads 3 (Kam Ka-wai) – 87, 2023

Broken Rage (Kitano Takeshi) – 7, 2024
Rendez-vous avec Pol Pot (Rithy Panh) – 22, 2024
Desert of Namibia (Yamanaka Yoko) – 27, 2024
The Last Dance (Anselm Chan) – 46, 2024
The Prosecutor (Donnie Yen) – 55, 2024

Wild Agent 2: Peach Assassination (Huang He) – 57, 2024
The Art of the Calendar (Kier-La Janisse) – 58, 2024
Shell Girl (Wang Xia) – 61, 2024
Sniper 2 (Shen Zhaoqing) – 65, 2024
Cunk on Life (Al Campbell) – 67, 2024

Blazing Fists (Miike Takashi) – 1, 2025
Legends of the Condor Heroes: The Gallants (Tsui Hark) – 2, 2025
In the Lost Lands (Paul WS Anderson) – 3, 2025
Den of Thieves 2: Pantera (Christian Gudegast) – 4, 2025
The Legend of Condor Hero: What is love (Lin Zhenzhao) – 5, 2025
We Beat the Dream Team (Michael Tolajian) – 6, 2025

This Week in Rankings

Since the last update, it was announced that I’ve written another liner notes essay. This time, it’s for the Chameleon Films release of Johnnie To’s Sparrow and it’s available for preorder right now. Over at InReview Online, I contributed write-ups of George Miller’s Furiosa and Soi Cheang’s Twilight of the Warriors: Walled In to their Best of the Year countdown.

At The Chinese Cinema, I wrote about Hong Sangsoo’s A Traveler’s Needs and By the Stream, the Yuen Clan’s Magic Movies (Miracle Fighters, Shaolin Drunkard, Taoism Drunkard, Young Taoism Fighter), Qin Pengfei’s The Bodyguard and Blade of Fury, Yamada Naoko’s The Heike Story, and Tsai Ming-liang’s Abiding Nowhere.

You can get all those reviews and much much more by subscribing to The Chinese Cinema today for the low price of only $1/month or $10/year.

These are the movies I’ve watched and rewatched over the last few months, and where they place on my year-by-year rankings.


A Charlie Brown Christmas (Bill Melendez) – 3, 1965
It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown (Bill Melendez) – 1, 1966
How the Grinch Stole Christmas! (Chuck Jones) – 15, 1966
A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving (Bill Melendez & Phil Roman) – 40, 1973

The Miracle Fighters (Yuen Woo-ping) – 4, 1982
Shaolin Drunkard (Yuen Woo-ping) – 41, 1983
Taoism Drunkard (Yuen Cheung-yan) – 51, 1984
The Young Taoism Fighter (Chen Chi-hwa) – 62, 1986
Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves (Kevin Reynolds) – 54, 1991

The Heike Story (Yamada Naoko) – 1, 2021
Hundreds of Beavers (Mike Cheslik) – 5, 2022
Woman of the Hour (Anna Kendrick) – 34, 2023

Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga (George Miller) – 1, 2024
Juror #2 (Clint Eastwood) – 6, 2024
A Traveler’s Needs (Hong Sangsoo) – 7, 2024
The Colors Within (Yamada Naoko) – 8, 2024
By the Stream (Hong Sangsoo) – 14, 2024

God Hates a Coward (Jon Bois) – 15, 2024
Abiding Nowhere (Tsai Ming-liang) – 17, 2024
Look Back (Oshiyama Kiyotaka) – 18, 2024
Here (Robert Zemeckis) – 21, 2024
Vengeance Most Fowl (Merlin Crossingham & Nick Park) – 23, 2024

Anora (Sean Baker) – 25, 2024
Trap (M. Night Shyamalan) – 26, 2024
Crisis Negotiators (Herman Yau) – 30, 2024
Dahomey (Mati Diop) – 32, 2024
Drive-Away Dolls (Ethan Coen) – 33, 2024

The Fall Guy (David Leitch) – 34, 2024
The Bodyguard (Qin Pengfei) – 37, 2024
Blade of Fury (Qin Pengfei) – 38, 2024
Made in England (David Hinton) – 39, 2024
Challengers (Luca Guadagnino) – 43, 2024

Conclave (Edward Berger) – 49, 2024
Would You Like to Buy a Mattress (Jon Bois) – 50, 2024
A Complete Unknown (James Mangold) – 51, 2024
Alien: Romulus (Fede Álvarez) – 52, 2024
The Brutalist (Brady Corbet) – 53, 2024

Rainier: A Beer Odyssey (Isaac Olsen) – 57, 2024
Yacht Rock: A DOCKumentary (Garret Price) – 58, 2024
Nosferatu (Robert Eggers) – 59, 2024
Beetlejuice Beetlejuice (Tim Burton) – 60, 2024
Treasure Hunting (Qin Pengfei) – 64, 2024

Civil War (Alex Garland) – 65, 2024
Deadpool & Wolverine (Shawn Levy) – 66, 2024
Madame Web (SJ Clarkson) – 69, 2024
SWAT Angels in Mission (Liu Meng & Xue Wen Hua) – 70, 2024

This Week in Rankings

Since the last update it was announced that I’ve written another liner notes essay for a Criterion Collection release. This one is for Sammo Hung’s Eastern Condors, and it’s available for pre-order right now. I’ve continued on the festival beat over at InReview Online, where I reviewed Kurosawa Kiyoshi’s Cloud, Yang Li’s Escape from the 21st Century, Huang Xi’s Daughter’s Daughter, John Hsu’s Dead Talents Society, Jia Zhangke’s Caught by the Tides, and Timo Tjahjanto’s The Shadow Strays.

I’ve compiled all my InRO Festival Reviews from this year into one convenient spot over at The Chinese Cinema, where I’ve also recently reviewed Soi Cheang’s Twilight of the Warriors: Walled In, John Woo’s remake of his own The Killer, the documentary about cinematographer Mark Lee Ping-ping Let the Wind Carry Me, Corey Yuen’s The Bodyguard from Beijing, Jason Yu’s Sleep, Ryoo Seungwan’s Veteran 2: I, the Executioner, and a handful of movies that are streaming on the iQIYI channel (Fight Against Evil 2, Black Storm, Drunken Prodigy, Second Life, An Arrow through the Heart).

You can get all those reviews and much much more by subscribing to The Chinese Cinema today for the low price of only $1/month or $10/year.

These are the movies I’ve watched and rewatched over the last few months, and where they place on my year-by-year rankings.

The Gold Rush (Charles Chaplin) – 1, 1925
The Untouchables (Brian De Palma) – 28, 1987
The Bodyguard from Beijing (Corey Yuen) – 79, 1994
Bad Boys (Michael Bay) – 66, 1995
The Waterboy (Frank Coraci) – 72, 1998

Let the Wind Carry Me (Kwan Pung-Leung & Chiang Hsiu-Chiung) – 48, 2009
Prometheus (Ridley Scott) – 65, 2012
Veteran (Ryoo Seungwan) – 37, 2015
Alien: Covenant (Ridley Scott) – 144, 2017
The Night Comes for Us (Timo Tjahjanto) – 64, 2018

Dune (Denis Villeneuve) – 35, 2021
Fight Against Evil (Qin Pengfei) – 56, 2021
Hundreds of Beavers (Mike Cheslik) – 23, 2022
Sleep (Jason Yu) – 27, 2023
Fight Against Evil 2 (Qin Pengfei) – 78, 2023
Anyone But You (Will Gluck) – 82, 2023

Horizon: An American Saga – Chapter 1 (Kevin Costner) – 2, 2024
Eephus (Carson Lund) – 3, 2024
Twilight of the Warriors: Walled In (Soi Cheang) – 4, 2024
Megalopolis (Francis Ford Coppola) – 6, 2024
Caught by the Tides (Jia Zhangke) – 8, 2024

Chime (Kurosawa Kiyoshi) – 9, 2024
The Shadow Strays (Timo Tjahjanto) – 10, 2024
Cloud (Kurosawa Kiyoshi) – 13, 2024
The Kadarius Toney Fan Club (Jon Bois) – 14, 2024
The Killer (John Woo) – 15, 2024

Escape from the 21st Century (Yang Li) – 16, 2024
Second Life (Chris Huo) – 18, 2024
Dead Talents Society (John Hsu) – 22, 2024
Veteran 2: I, the Executioner (Ryoo Seungwan) – 24, 2024
Dune 2 (Denis Villeneuve) – 25, 2024

Daughter’s Daughter (Huang Xi) – 26, 2024
Drunken Prodigy (Ashton Chen) – 29, 2024
Black Storm (Qin Pengfei) – 32, 2024
An Arrow through the Heart (Guo Yubo) – 37, 2024

This Week in Rankings

Since the last update I wrote the liner notes essay for Vinegar Syndrome’s release of Johnnie To’s Lifeline. I’ve got a couple of other essays in the works, expected announcements for those in the next couple of months. In the meantime, I’ve been covering film festivals. At InReview Online, I wrote about Guan Yu’s Black Dog, which played Cannes, and for the New York Asian Film festival I covered Baby Assassins: Nice Days, Customs Frontline, and The Lyricist Wannabe. I covered Japan Cuts over at my own site, with reviews of Shin Godzilla: Orthochromatic, Kubi, Kyrie, Between the White Key and the Black Key, Sayonara Girls, Shadow of Fire, Mermaid Legend, August in the Water, and Moving.

Also over at The Chinese Cinema, I wrote about Only the River Flows, Beijing Watermelon, July Rhapsody, Nothing Can’t Be Undone by a Hotpot, The Valiant Ones, and three movies called Once a Thief.

You can get all those reviews and much much more by subscribing for the low price of only $1/month or $10/year.

These are the movies I’ve watched and rewatched over the last few months, and where they place on my year-by-year rankings.

Baseball Bugs (Friz Freleng) – 10, 1946
Pickpocket (Robert Bresson) – 7, 1959
The World of Suzie Wong (Richard Quine) – 21, 1960
Topkapi (Jules Dassin) – 21, 1964

Once a Thief (Ralph Nelson) – 32, 1965
Le Samouraï (Jean-Pierre Melville) – 5, 1967
The Thomas Crown Affair (Norman Jewison) – 16, 1968
Le cercle rouge (Jean-Pierre Melville) – 5, 1970

Harry in Your Pocket (Bruce Geller) – 31, 1973
The Valiant Ones (King Hu) – 7, 1975
Carry On Pickpocket (Sammo Hung) – 22, 1982
Fantasy Mission Force (Kevin Chu Yen-ping) – 34, 1983

Mermaid Legend (Ikeda Toshiharu) – 16, 1984
The Killing Fields (Roland Joffé) – 38, 1984
Beverly Hills Cop (Martin Brest) – 48, 1984
Typhoon Club (Somai Shinji) – 6, 1985
Rambo: First Blood Part II (George P. Cosmatos) – 45, 1985

Golden Eighties (Chantal Akerman) – 14, 1986
Eastern Condors (Sammo Hung) – 10, 1987
Beverly Hills Cops II (Tony Scott) – 51, 1987
Beijing Watermelon (Obayashi Nobuhiko) – 6, 1989
Field of Dreams (Phil Alden Robinson) – 23, 1989

She Shoots Straight (Corey Yuen) – 36, 1990
Once a Thief (John Woo) – 26, 1991
The Raid (Tsui Hark) – 43, 1991
Moving (Somai Shinji) – 4, 1993
August in the Water (Ishii Gakuryu) – 40, 1995

Once a Thief (John Woo) – 90, 1996
Can’t Hardly Wait (Deborah Kaplan & Harry Elfont) – 69, 1998
Go (Doug Limon) – 56, 1999
July Rhapsody (Ann Hui) – 18, 2002

Yesterday Once More (Johnnie To) – 17, 2004
Sparrow (Johnnie To) – 2, 2008
Linger (Johnnie To) – 41, 2008
Open City (Lee Sang-gi) – 81, 2008

Shin Godzilla (Anno Hideaki & Higuchi Shinji) – 8, 2016
Joan Didion: The Center Will Not Hold (Griffin Dunne) – 121, 2017
Destination Wedding (Victor Levin) – 79, 2018
The Booksellers (DW Young) – 100, 2019

Sayonara, Girls. (Shun Nakagawa) – 25, 2022
Kubi (Kitano Takeshi) – 2, 2023
Kyrie (Iwai Shunji) – 14, 2023
Only the River Flows (Wei Shujun) – 24, 2023

Hit Man (Richard Linklater) – 39, 2023
The Lyricist Wannabe (Norris Wong) – 45, 2023
Shadow of Fire (Tsukamoto Shin’ya) – 59, 2023
Between the White Key and the Black Key (Tominaga Masanori) – 76, 2023

Furiosa (George Miller) – 1, 2024
Baby Assassins: Nice Days (Sakamoto Yugo) – 2, 2024
Black Dog (Guan Hu) – 3, 2024
I Saw the TV Glow (Jane Schoenbrun) – 4, 2024
The Spectacular Failure of the Star Wars Hotel (Jenny Nicholson) – 5, 2024
Reform! (Jon Bois) – 6, 2024
That’s Not Entirely Accurate (Jon Bois) – 7, 2024
Nothing Can’t Be Undone by a Hotpot (Ding Sheng) – 10, 2024

The History of Slipping on Banana Peels (Jon Bois) – 11, 2024
Twisters (Lee Isaac Chung) – 12, 2024
Customs Frontline (Herman Yau) – 13, 2024
Beverly Hills Cop: Axel F (Mark Molloy) – 15, 2024
Jim Henson Idea Man (Ron Howard) – 17, 2024
Brats (Andrew McCarthy) – 18, 2024

This Week in Rankings

Since the last update, I handed out the 2023 Endy Awards. Over at the Criterion Collection’s online magazine Current, I wrote about Hou Hsiao-hsien’s early films. And for InReview Online I reviewed Ann Hui’s latest film, Elegies, which played at the International Film Festival Rotterdam.

At The Chinese Cinema, I reviewed: Onlookers, The Heroic Trio and Executioners, Death Notice, Eye for an Eye 2, The Mystery of Chess Boxing, Beach of the War Gods, Visible Secret, Dancing with the Dead, The Mad Monk, Art College 1994, The Roundup: Punishment, Sailor Suit and Machine Gun, and Casino Raiders. You can get all those and much much more for the low price of only $1/month or $10/year.

These are the movies I’ve watched and rewatched over the last few months, and where they place on my year-by-year rankings.

Seven Samurai (Kurosawa Akira) – 1, 1954
Lawrence of Arabia (David Lean) – 6, 1962
The Taming of the Shrew (Franco Zeffirelli) – 26, 1967
The Italian Job (Peter Collinson) – 13, 1969
Beach of the War Gods (Jimmy Wang Yu) – 24, 1973

Cloud of Romance (Chan Hung-lit) – 22, 1977
The Fall of Ako Castle (Fukasaku Kinji) – 18, 1978
Lover on the Wave (Chen Kun-hou) – 30, 1978
The Mystery of Chess (Joseph Kuo) – 13, 1979
Chu Lien (Lai Cheng-ying) – 27, 1979

Cute Girl (Hou Hsiao-hsien) – 18, 1980
Sailor Suit and Machine Gun (Somai Shinji) – 17, 1981
Cheerful Wind (Hou Hsiao-hsien) – 38, 1981
Conan the Barbarian (John Milius) – 6, 1982
The Green, Green Grass of Home (Hou Hsiao-hsien) – 21, 1982
The Boys from Fengkuei (Hou Hsiao-hsien) – 7, 1983

Bull Durham (Ron Shelton) – 2, 1988
Les sièges des l’Alcazar (Luc Moullet) – 15, 1989
Major League (David S. Ward) – 37, 1989
Casino Raiders (Wong Jing & Jimmy Heung) – 50, 1989
Hamlet (Franco Zeffirelli) – 28, 1990

Backdraft (Ron Howard) – 47, 1991
Basic Instinct (Paul Verhoeven) – 25, 1992
Noises Off… (Peter Bogdanovich) – 34, 1992
Wayne’s World (Penelope Spheeris) – 59, 1992
When Cinema Reflects the Times: Hou Hsiao-hsien and Edward Yang (Kore-eda Hirokazu) – 30, 1993

Executioners (Johnnie To & Ching Siu-tung) – 33, 1993
The Heroic Trio (Johnnie To) – 43, 1993
The Mad Monk (Johnnie To) – 93, 1993
Loving You (Johnnie To) – 38, 1995
Get Shorty (Barry Sonnenfeld) – 44, 1995

Romeo + Juliet (Baz Luhrmann) – 10, 1996
Twister (Jan de Bont) – 44, 1996
Lifeline (Johnnie To) – 22, 1997
Expect the Unexpected (Patrick Yau) – 10, 998
Out of Sight (Steven Soderbergh) – 18, 1998
Shakespeare in Love (John Madden) – 47, 1998

The Matrix (Lilly and Lana Wachowski) – 2, 1999
Help!!! (Johnnie To & Wai Ka-fai) – 29, 2000
Center Stage (Nicholas Hytner) – 43, 2000
Visible Secret (Ann Hui) – 10, 2001

Ocean’s Eleven (Steven Soderbergh) – 24, 2001
Ocean’s Twelve (Steven Soderbergh) – 40, 2004
Red Eye (Wes Craven) – 32, 2005
Classic Albums: Nirvana – Nevermind (Bob Smeaton) – 66, 2005
Ocean’s Thirteen (Steven Soderbergh) – 54, 2007

Burn After Reading (Joel & Ethan Coen) – 35, 2008
The Lone Ranger (Gore Verbinski) – 20, 2013
Gyeongju (Zhang Lü) – 34, 2014
The Intern (Nancy Meyers) – 53, 2015
Love and… (Zhang Lü) – 126, 2015

Everybody Wants Some!! (Richard Linklater) – 26, 2016
A Quiet Dream (Zhang Lü) – 31, 2016
Table 19 (Jeffrey Blitz) – 147, 2017
Ode to the Goose (Zhang Lü) – 12, 2018
Fukuoka (Zhang Lü) – 25, 2019
Sound! Euphonium the Movie: Our Promise – A Brand New Day (Ishihara Tatsuya) – 57, 2019
Yanagawa (Zhang Lü) – 34, 2021

Evil Does Not Exist (Hamaguchi Ryusuke) – 5, 2023
Death Notice (Herman Yau) – 41, 2023
Onlookers (Kimi Takesue) – 44, 2023
Sound! Euphonium: Ensemble Contest (Ishihara Tatsuya) – 49, 2023
Art College 1994 (Liu Jian) – 56, 2023
Self-Reliance (Jake Johnson) – 76, 2023
The Marvels (Nia DaCosta) – 78, 2023

Eye for an Eye 2 (Yang Bingjia) -2, 2024
The Roundup: Punishment (Heo Myeong-haeng) – 3, 2024
Steve! (Morgan Neville) – 4, 2024

This Week in Rankings

Since the last update, I wrote about some more festival films at InReview Online: Following the Sound, The Breaking Ice, 100 Yards, and A Light Never Goes Out. At SeattleScreenScene I wrote about Boudica: Queen of War. Over at The Chinese Cinema, I wrote about The White Storm 3: Heaven or Hell, The Imp, Gen-X Cops and Gen-Y Cops, The Mr. Vampire Sequels, The Arrow Bruce Lee Boxset, New Fist of Fury, and Baby Assassins: 2 Babies. I appeared, along with my daughter, on The Wiseman Podcast to talk about Ballet, and I recorded a commentary track for the upcoming Kino/Metrograph Bluray of Fruit Chan’s Made in Hong Kong.

These are the movies I’ve watched or rewatched over the last few weeks, and where they place on my year-by-year rankings.

Brothers and Sisters of the Toda Family (Ozu Yasujiro) – 14, 1941
Record of a Tenement Gentleman (Ozu Yasujiro) – 15, 1947
A Hen in the Wind (Ozu Yasujiro) – 23, 1948
Zulu (Cy Endfield) – 4, 1964
It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown (Bill Melendez) – 1, 1966

The Big Boss (Lo Wei) – 6, 1971
The Way of the Dragon (Bruce Lee) – 15, 1972
Fist of Fury (Lo Wei) – 19, 1972
Enter the Dragon (Robert Clouse) – 11, 1973
New Fist of Fury (Lo Wei) – 36, 1976
Game of Death (Robert Clouse) – 36, 1978

The Happenings (Yim Ho) – 20, 1980
The Imp (Dennis Yu) – 26, 1981
Once Bitten (Howard Storm) – 50, 1985
Ferris Bueller’s Day Off (John Hughes) – 30, 1986

Mr. Vampire II (Ricky Lau) – 53, 1986
Mr. Vampire 3 (Ricky Lau) – 36, 1987
Mr. Vampire Saga 4 (Ricky Lau) – 45, 1988
Vampire vs. Vampire (Lam Ching-ying) – 67, 1989

Searching for Bobby Fischer (Steven Zaillian) – 18, 1993
Heaven and Earth (David Lai) – 49, 1994
Made in Hong Kong (Fruit Chan) – 2, 1997
Bio Zombie (Wilson Yip) – 21, 1998

Gen-X Cops (Benny Chan) – 61, 1999
Gen-Y Cops (Benny Chan) – 50, 2000
Millennium Mambo (Hou Hsiao-hsien) – 1, 2001
U-Man (Cheung Chi-sing) – 52, 2002

La La Land (Damien Chazelle) – 82, 2016
Murder on the Orient Express (Kenneth Branagh) – 141, 2017
In Search of Ozu (Daniel Raim) – 105, 2018
Hydra (Sonomura Kensuke) – 67, 2019
Ponniyin Selvan Part 1 (Mani Ratnam) – 3, 2022

100 Yards (Xu Haofeng and Xu Junfeng) – 1, 2023
Baby Assassins: 2 Babies (Sakamoto Yugo) – 2, 2023
The Final Game of Death (James Flower) – 5, 2023
Ponniyin Selvan Part 2 (Mani Ratnam) – 8, 2023
Anatomy of a Fall (Justine Triet) – 15, 2023

The Killer (David Fincher) – 20, 2023
Blackberry (Matt Johnson) – 22, 2023
The History of the Minnesota Vikings (Jon Bois) – 23, 2023
Raid on the Lethal Zone (Herman Yau, 26, 2023
Bottoms (Emma Seligman) – 27, 2023

Boudica: Queen of War (Jesse V. Johnson) – 37, 2023
The Breaking Ice (Anthony Chen) – 39, 2023
Still: A Michael J. Fox Movie (Davis Guggenheim) – 41, 2023
The White Storm 3: Heaven or Hell (Herman Yau) – 43, 2023

The Top 309 Films of All-Time

It’s time once again for a list of my favorite movies. For the last decade or so, I’ve been creating a randomly selected Top 100 out of a much larger consideration set. This year, I tried to make a list of my favorites that was as small as possible, and ended up with 309 I simply couldn’t bear to cut. Here they are in random order.

1. Labyrinth of Cinema
2. Steamboat Bill, Jr
3. Celine and Julie Go Boating
4. An Autumn Afternoon
5. Hard-Boiled
6. Millennium Mambo
7. Moonrise Kingdom
8. Ballet
9. Vampyr
10. Red Cliff
11. The Lion in Winter
12. A Canterbury Tale
13. The Love Eterne
14. Dangerous Encounters — First Kind
15. Kicking and Screaming
16. The Grandmaster
17. Trouble in Paradise
18. Whisper of the Heart
19. Ran
20. School on Fire
21. Funny Face
22. The Day He Arrives
23. Seven Samurai
24. Bram Stoker’s Dracula
25. Modern Times


26. One Froggy Evening
27. Made in Hong Kong
28. Shanghai Express
29. I’m Not There
30. Rushmore
31. The Matrix
32. The Right Stuff
33. Yi yi
34. The Lady Eve
35. Intolerance: Love’s Struggle through the Ages
36. Only Angels Have Wings
37. Legend of the Mountain
38. Throw Down
39. In the Mood for Love
40. House
41. The Empire Strikes Back
42. The Adventures of Robin Hood
43. Journey to the West: Conquering the Demons
44. 35 Shots of Rum
45. Once Upon a Time in the West
46. Casablanca
47. Nomad
48. A Matter of Life and Death
49. Dead Man
50. Fantasia


51. A Touch of Zen
52. Blind Detective
53. Dazed and Confused
54. Days of Being Wild
55. Eyes Wide Shut
56. Oki’s Movie
57. The Flowers of Shanghai
58. The Thin Red Line
59. The General
60. The Bellboy
61. Zulu
62. Bull Durham
63. Slacker
64. Jackie Brown
65. Original Cast Album: Company
66. Die Nibelungen
67. L’Avventura
68. Harlan County, USA
69. Metropolis
70. Fantastic Mr. Fox
71. Duck Soup
72. The Puppetmaster
73. Black Narcissus
74. Duvidha
75. The Midnight After


76. Inherent Vice
77. Awaara
78. Last of the Mohicans
79. Chan is Missing
80. Orlando
81. Reds
82. Heat
83. The History of the Seattle Mariners
84. Comrades: Almost a Love Story
85. Still Life
86. The Mission (1999)
87. Big Night
88. Xiao Wu
89. Johnny Guitar
90. The Last Temptation of Christ
91. Duck Amuck
92. In the Heat of the Sun
93. The New World
94. Jeanne Dielman, 23 quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles
95. A New Leaf
96. What’s Opera, Doc?
97. The Red Shoes
98. The Terrorizers
99. Pierrot le fou
100. A City of Sadness


101. Two-Lane Blacktop
102. The Philadelphia Story
103. Wheels on Meals
104. Yearning
105. Mahanagar
106. The 36th Chamber of Shaolin
107. The Searchers
108. Shanghai Blues
109. Bringing Up Baby
110. All About Eve
111. The Quiet Man
112. Howard’s End
113. All that Jazz
114. Robin and Marian
115. The Battle of Algiers
116. Mughal-e-azam
117. Les amants du Pont-Neuf
118. Hero
119. They Were Expendable
120. A Day in the Country
121. The Docks of New York
122. The Musketeers of Pig Alley
123. Rock ‘n’ Roll High School
124. The Third Man
125. Raiders of the Lost Ark


126. Touch of Evil
127. Stranger than Paradise
128. The Rules of the Game
129. Romancing in Thin Air
130. Certified Copy
131. Sunrise
132. The Miracle Fighters
133. Annie Hall
134. Dragon Gate Inn
135. Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest
136. A Woman is a Woman
137. Hatari!
138. Beau travail
139. Unforgiven
140. The Eight-Diagram Pole Fighter
141. The Harder They Come
142. Singin’ in the Rain
143. Exiled
144. The Shop Around the Corner
145. The Blade
146. Police Story
147. Mr. Smith Goes to Washington
148. Lovers Rock
149. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
150. Punch-Drunk Love


151. Chungking Express
152. Alien
153. Hellzapoppin’
154. Airplane!
155. Fort Apache
156. Blackhat
157. SPL 2: A Time for Consequences
158. Les Vampires
159. Mulholland Dr.
160. Histoire(s) du cinema
161. Wagon Master
162. Renaldo & Clara
163. Out of the Past
164. The Last Days of Disco
165. La Commune (Paris 1871)
166. Charade
167. Peking Opera Blues
168. Bambi
169. The Bad News Bears
170. Mahjong
171. Broadcast News
172. Hana and Alice
173. Sans soleil
174. Pyaasa
175. The Age of Innocence


176. Holiday
177. Los Angeles Plays Itself
178. The Heart of the World
179. His Motorbike, Her Island
180. Goodbye, Dragon Inn
181. Metropolitan
182. Shadow Kingdom
183. The Fellowship of the Ring
184. Late Spring
185. Throne of Blood
186. Running on Karma
187. Three Colors: Blue
188. Vertigo
189. City Lights
190. Don’t Go Breaking My Heart 2
191. Liz and the Blue Bird
192. The Bridges of Madison County
193. Tropical Malady
194. Perceval le Gallois
195. The Princess Bride
196. Ash is Purest White
197. Anatomy of a Murder
198. Ugetsu
199. Satantango
200. Speed Racer


201. Chimes at Midnight
202. The Royal Tenenbaums
203. Glengarry Glen Ross
204. Mad Max: Fury Road
205. It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown
206. Playtime
207. Let the Bullets Fly
208. A Charlie Brown Christmas
209. Rear Window
210. Gremlins 2: The New Batch
211. Sparrow
212. My Fair Lady
213. The Music Room
214. La danse: The Paris Opera Ballet
215. Trainspotting
216. Dirty Ho
217. Young Mr. Lincoln
218. The Umbrellas of Cherbourg
219. The BIg Sleep
220. Miller’s Crossing
221. My Neighbor Totoro
222. I am Cuba
223. Platform
224. Meek’s Cutoff
225. Citizen Kane


226. Linda Linda Linda
227. Fallen Angels
228. Miami Vice
229. Children of Paradise
230. Song of the Exile
231. Night of the Hunter
232. Only Yesterday (1991)
233. Happy Together
234. Meet Me in St. Louis
235. Broken Blossoms
236. Kiki’s Delivery Service
237. The Big Red One
238. My Left Eye Sees Ghosts
239. Excalibur
240. Green Snake
241. Bound for the Fields, the Mountains, and the Seacoast
242. Kung Fu Hustle
243. The Killer
244. Good Men, Good Women
245. Conan the Barbarian
246. A Moment of Romance
247. An American in Paris
248. Phantoms of Nabua
249. Henry V
250. It Felt Like a Kiss


251. Voyage in Italy
252. Journey to the West (2014)
253. Days of Heaven
254. Sherlock, Jr
255. Once Upon a Time in China
256. Kill Bill Vol. 1
257. Rio Bravo
258. Kiss Me Kate
259. The Big Lebowski
260. Wolf Children
261. Om Shanti Om
262. Dangerous Liaisons
263. City on Fire
264. Irma Vep
265. Morocco
266. The Time to Live, the Time to Die
267. M. Hulot’s Holiday
268. The Rocking Horsemen
269. Pulp Fiction
270. Full Contact
271. Safety Last
272. It’s a Wonderful Life
273. A Brighter Summer Day
274. Last Life in the Universe
275. Paterson


276. Monty Python and the Holy Grail
277. Apocalypse Now
278. The Story of Woo Viet
279. Do the Right Thing
280. Fire Walk with Me
281. Rouge
282. F for Fake
283. Little Women
284. The Birds
285. Ruggles of Red Gap
286. 2046
287. The Wind that Shakes the Barley
288. News from Home
289. The Green Ray
290. Ashes of Time
291. Mean Streets
292. The Band Wagon
293. Cat People
294. A Better Tomorrow
295. Oxhide II
296. The Pirate
297. One Week
298. Psycho
299. Jaws
300. The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly


301. Amanda (2019)
302. Spring in a Small Town
303. Japanese Girls at the Harbor
304. Ishtar
305. North by Northwest
306. Yourself & Yours
307. Claire’s Camera
308. Baahubali
309. Early Summer

This Week in Rankings

Since the last update, I’ve covered a number of films for various film festivals: In Our Day for Cannes, Enter the Clones of Bruce for Tribeca, Vital Sign, Kitty the Killer, A Light Never Goes Out, and Nomad for the New York Asian Film Festival, Shin Kamen Rider, My Heart is that Eternal Rose, Take Care of My Cat, and River for Fantasia, and When Morning Comes I Feel Empty, Mondays, The First Slam Dunk, Convenience Story, Saga Saga, Hand, and Plastic for Japan Cuts. I also wrote about The Roundup: No Way Out at InReview Online and Barbie, Once Upon a Time in Uganda, and Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny at Seattle Screen Scene.

At The Chinese Cinema, to which you can subscribe for a mere $1/month or $10/year, I wrote about the Swordsman of All Swordsmen Trilogy, Mutant Ghost Wargirl, The Sparring Partner and A Guilty Conscience, Heart of Dragon, A Janitor and Yellow Dragon’s Village, High Risk, Woman Basketball Player No. 5, Mad Fate, two versions of The Red Detachment of Women, and The Avenging Eagle.

These are the movies I’ve watched or rewatched over the last few weeks, and where they place on my year-by-year rankings.

How to Play Golf (Jack Kinney) – 15, 1944
A Study in Choreography for Camera (Maya Deren) – 13, 1945
Woman Basketball Player No. 5 (Xie Jin) – 19, 1957
Breakfast at Tiffany’s (Blake Edwards) – 5, 1961
The Red Detachment of Women (Xie Jin) – 9, 1961

The Good, the Bad, & the Ugly (Sergio Leone) – 1, 1966
The Swordsman of All Swordsmen (Joseph Kuo) – 12, 1968
The Red Detachment of Women (Pan Wenzhan & Fu Jie) – 11, 1970
The Bravest Revenge (Chien Lung) – 14, 1970
The Ghost Hill (Ting Shan-hsi) – 8, 1971
The Avenging Eagle (Sun Chang) – 19, 1978

Nomad (Patrick Tam) – 1, 1982
Repo Man (Alex Cox) – 22, 1984
Pee Wee’s Big Adventure (Tim Burton) – 21, 1985
Heart of Dragon (Sammo Hung) – 31, 1985
My Heart is that Eternal Rose (Patrick Tam) – 9, 1989

Dances with Wolves (Kevin Costner) – 39, 1990
Ballet (Frederick Wiseman) – 5, 1995
High Risk (Wong Jing) – 21, 1995
Happy Gilmore (Dennis Dugan) – 36, 1996
Take Care of My Cat (Jeong Jae-eun) – 15, 2001
The Princess Diaries (Garry Marshall) – 58, 2001

Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers: Runnin’ Down a Dream (Peter Bogdanovich) – 24, 2007
Transformers (Michael Bay) – 55, 2007
Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen (Michael Bay) – 83, 2009
Transformers: Dark of the Moon (Michael Bay) – 65, 2011
Moonrise Kingdom (Wes Anderson) – 2, 2012
Transformers: Age of Extinction (Michael Bay) – 82, 2014

The American Ballet Theatre: A History (Ric Burns) – 143, 2015
Dunkirk (Christopher Nolan) – 85, 2017
Transformers: The Last Knight (Michael Bay) – 88, 2017
Bumblebee (Travis Knight) – 83, 2018
Extraction (Sam Hargrave) – 40, 2020

Licorice Pizza (Paul Thomas Anderson) – 6, 2021
Yellow Dragon’s Village (Sakamoto Yugo) – 19, 2021
A Janitor (Sakamoto Yugo) – 50, 2021
Once Upon a Time in Uganda (Cathryne Czubek) – 55, 2021

The First Slam Dunk (Inoue Takehiko) – 19, 2022
When Morning Comes, I Feel Empty (Ichibashi Yuho) – 24, 2022
Mondays (Takebayashi Ryo) – 31, 2022
The Sparring Partner (Ho Cheuk-tin) – 42, 2022
It’s What Each Person Needs (Sophy Romvari) – 45, 2022

A Light Never Goes Out (Anastasia Tsang) – 54, 2022
Hand (Matsui Daigo) – 58, 2022
Mutant Ghost Wargirl (Liu Binjie) – 71, 2022
Convenience Story (Miki Satoshi) – 82, 2022

Asteroid City (Wes Anderson) – 1, 2023
Oppenheimer (Christopher Nolan) – 3, 2023
In Our Day (Hong Sangsoo) – 5, 2023
Barbie (Greta Gerwig) – 6, 2023
Mad Fate (Soi Cheang) – 7, 2023

Plastic (Miyazaki Daisuke) – 8, 2023
A Guilty Conscience (Jack Ng) – 11, 2023
John Wick Chapter 4 (Chad Stahelski) – 12, 2023
River (Yamaguchi Junta) – 13, 2023
You Hurt My Feelings (NIcole Holofcener) – 14, 2023

Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning, Part One (Christopher McQuarrie) – 16, 2023
Shin Kamen Rider (Anno Hideaki) – 17, 2023
Saga Saga (Natsuto Aimi) – 18, 2023
Past Lives (Celine Song) – 19, 2023
Extraction 2 (Sam Hargrave) – 20, 2023

The Roundup: No Way Out (Lee Sang-yong) – 22, 2023
Indiana Jones & the Dial of Destiny (James Mangold) – 23, 2023
Spider-Man: Across the Spider-verse (Joaquim Dos Santos, Justin K. Thompson, Kemp Powers) – 24, 2023
Enter the Clones of Bruce (David Gregory) – 25, 2023
Following the Sound (Sugita Kyoshi) – 26, 2023

Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves (John Francis Daley & Jonathan Goldstein) – 27, 2023
Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 3 (James Gunn) – 29, 2023
Vital Sign (Cheuk Wan-chi) – 31, 2023
Kitty the Killer (Lee Thongkham) – 33, 2023
Scream VI (Tyler Gillett & Matt Bettinelli-Olpin) – 34, 2023
Transformers: Rise of the Beasts (Steven Caple) – 35, 2023