Not really.
Of the recent movies, Everything Everywhere All at Once is a storytelling masterpiece. Since you mentioned it, I personally rate it alongside Tarantino's Pulp Fiction.
I thought it was so awful I gave up half way through. Maybe it gets better after that. But I agree on Pulp Fiction.
I genuinely didn’t really think there was a story, just spectacle.
I bounced off of it at first, but I bounced (hard) off of Lebowksi as well.
I don't think it's PTA's best film (or that I will come around to that opinion eventually), but it's pretty good.
The scene where the antagonist is walking down a hallway while the background keeps changing — is among the best fight scenes / visuals in any film, ever.
Even setting its influence aside, Pulp Fiction is the better movie.
If you've not seen Pulp Fiction by 2026 [0], how can I safely recommend you submit yourself to hours of semi-disconnected robberies, rapes, and deceit? It's a great movie, EEAaO is just better storytelling.
[0] similarly, how does one recommend the acclaimed Deliverance without blushing?
My favourites of his are probably Once upon a time, Jackie Brown and Deathproof, with an honourable mention for Basterds.
Django has low re-watchability (unlike most of Tarantino's work) but incredible acting/twists/cinematography.
Once Upon a Time is too much for me (bottom-tier Tarantino IMHO), but it does have many great actors/scenes (the overall storyline/premise is what I didn't care for).
Haven't seen Deathproof, but Basterds is wonderful storytelling.
Probably my favourite thing about cinema is how slippery the subjective experience is.
For example I can appreciate a movie I don't really enjoy in a way I can't with music. Also on a rewatch a movie can go from hated to loved, or vice versa, in a way that feels unique to the medium.
Well-said.
>...on a rewatch [it] can go from hated to loved
I typically don't rewatch movies for at least five years — this is enough time for life experiences to change media interpretations. Yet I listen to the same tracklist of catchy MP3 earworms, on repeat.
Songs are motivational background energy (for me), and skipping a track isn't nearly as hard as bailing out of two hours invested in a cozy full-length film.
How so? This is an intriguing statement and I want to hear more.
Can he also explain this above statement, please?
It's not going to a template for lots of similar films. It's more of a one-off.
But anyway, that was several years ago, it stretches the meaning of "recent".
But that movie just dragged on, and now I look back and see it as a bungled opportunity. It could've been so much tighter in the edit. They could've cut a third of the movie and made the whole thing so much better.
The first half has me thinking instant classic, my hope is sky high. But then toward the end I find myself looking at my watch and realize it's simply not going to the stick the landing.
OTOH, many acclaimed streaming series have generally done this well. My take is that as long-form storytelling has evolved, movies have transitioned into this post-modernist phase as directors/writers don't feel they have the runway to tell something truly cohesive that doesn't end up being trite. It's much more about saying 'something' or imbuing a feeling than telling a fully fleshed 3 act story.
It would become just an action movie with crazy plot then.
I feel that way with Inception. That out of nowhere 30-minute snow action part dragged on forever.
Triangle of Sadness https://www.imdb.com/title/tt7322224
Coming Home in the Dark https://www.imdb.com/title/tt6874762
* American Fiction
* The Holdovers
* Oppenheimer
* Perfect Days(!)
* Nosferatu
* Conclave
* Challengers
* The Mastermind
I can rattle off more but those seem pretty hard to argue with. All of them are better than EEAAO.
"Flow" in 2024 was also fantastic.
> Not really.
Not really meaning you can't really name one good movie a year (i.e., agreeing with OP)? Because your example of a good recent movie was 4 years ago.