2021 in Films

Format adapted from Charles François, who I still hope will one day rediscover his cinephilia and start hanging out with myself and the Skandies crew again. It’s been ten years since he last used it and I hereby declare it in the public domain.

Combine the first two columns for a list of films released (or "released") in 2021, and the last two columns for films seen in 2021. Ordering is preferential when ratings are identical.

Seen Previously
Movies I saw in 2020 {or before} that were released in the U.S. in 2021. Films not yet released but currently scheduled for this year are indicated by a (→).
Seen in 2020
Movies I saw shortly before, during or after their 2021 U.S. run. Asterisks (*) indicate films seen prior to their actual release. TV-only "runs" (arbitrarily deemed eligible) get a (†).
To Be Released
Movies I saw in 2021 which are still awaiting a U.S. release. Those known to have lined up distribution are indicated by a (→). Production {year} is listed if film is more than two years old.

A For All Time

A- Event

*Memoria (Apichatpong) 90
*Pig (Sarnoski) 84

B+/A- Near Great

In Front of Your Face (Hong) 81
*The Killing of Two Lovers (Machoian) 78

B+ Must See

Red Rocket (Baker) 73

B/B+ Warmly Recommended

*Annette (Carax) 72
*Enemies of the State (Kennebeck) 72
Short Vacation (Kwon, Seo) 71
Ahed's Knee (Lapid) 71
The Night House (Bruckner) 70
Benediction (Davies) 70
*Petite Maman (Sciamma) 69

B Recommended

*The Power of the Dog (Campion) 68
Paris, 13th District (Audiard) 68
*A Hero (Farhadi) 67
*No Sudden Move (Soderbergh) 67
Passing (Hall) 66
Cliff Walkers (Zhang) 66
Onoda (Harari) 65
About Endlessness (Andersson) 65
West Side Story (Spielberg) 64
*I'm Your Man (Schrader) 64

B-/B Recommended with Mild Reservations

Întregalde (Muntean) 63
*Anne at 13,000 Feet. (Radwanski) 63
*White Lie (Lewis, Thomas) 62
Monday (Papadimitropoulos) 62
The Girl and the Spider (Zürchers) 62
King Richard (Green) 61
Operation Varsity Blues (Smith) 61
Beginning (Kulumbegashvili) 61
Days (Tsai) 60
Wood and Water (Bak) 60
*Wheel of Fortune and Fantasy (Hamaguchi) 60
Prayers for the Stolen (Huezo) 60
Compartment No. 6 (Kuosmanen) 60

B- Recommended with Strong Reservations

A Tale of Love and Desire (Bouzid) 59
*Cyrano (Wright) 59
The Velvet Underground (Haynes) 59
*Stowaway (Penna) 59
*Drive My Car (Hamaguchi) 58
Teenage Emotions (Da) 58
*France (Dumont) 58
*The Tragedy of Macbeth (Coen) 58
*The Year of the Everlasting Storm (various) 57
*Bad Luck Banging or Loony Porn (Jude) 57
Slow Machine (Felten, Denardo) 57
The Hand of God (Sorrentino) 57
Summer of Soul (...or, When the Revolution Could Not Be Televised) (Thompson) 57
The French Dispatch of the Liberty, Kansas Evening Sun (Anderson) 56
*C'mon C'mon (Mills) 56
*Mayor Pete (Moss) 56
Ali & Ava (Barnard) 56
The Disciple (Tamhane) 56
The Lost Daughter (Gyllenhaal) 55
Montana Story (McGehee, Siegel) 55
The Last Duel (Scott) 55
*The Souvenir Part II (Hogg) 55

C+/B- On the Fence, Leaning Forward

Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings (Cretton) 54
*Keep an Eye Out (Dupieux) 54
One Second (Zhang) 54
Oxygen (Aja) 54
Saloum (Herbulot) 54
Malignant (Wan) 53
The Worst Person in the World (Trier) 53
*Mandibles (Dupieux) 53
Neptune Frost (Williams, Uzeyman) 53
Licorice Pizza (Anderson) 52
The Other Tom. (Plá, Santullo) 52
*The Electrical Life of Louis Wain (Sharpe) 52
State Funeral (Loznitsa) 52
Undine (Petzold) 51
What Do We See When We Look at the Sky? (Koberidze) 51
The Green Knight (Lowery) 51
Prisoners of the Ghostland (Sono) 51

C+ Take It or Leave It

*The Courier (Cooke) 50
Belfast (Branagh) 50
Futura (Marcello, Munzi, Rohrwacher) 50
Barb & Star Go to Vista Del Mar (Greenbaum) 50
The Tsugua Diaries (Fazendeiro, Gomes) 50
*Rams (Sims) 50
The Salt of Tears (Garrel) 49
Judas and the Black Messiah (King) 49
Dune: Part One (Villeneuve) 49
Lingui: The Sacred Bonds (Haroun) 49
MLK/FBI (Pollard) 48
*The Ice Road (Hensleigh) 48
*Flee (Poher Rasmussen) 48
Nightmare Alley (Del Toro) 47
*Summer of 85 (Ozon) 47
*Titane (Ducournau) 47
*The Mad Women's Ball (Laurent) 47
Benedetta (Verhoeven) 46
The Story of My Wife (Enyedi) 46
Cry Macho (Eastwood) 46
The Woman Who Ran (Hong) 46

C/C+ On the Fence, Leaning Backward

Arthur Rambo (Cantet) 45
The Matrix Resurrections (Wachowski) 45
*Preparations to Be Together for an Unknown Period of Time (Horvát) 45
*No Man of God (Sealey) 45
There Is No Evil (Rasoulof) 44
*Finch (Sapochnik) 44
Spencer (Larraín) 44
Procession (Greene) 43
Three Floors (Moretti) 43
Swimming Out Till the Sea Turns Blue (Jia) 43
I Carry You With Me (Ewing) 43

C Pass

*Bergman Island (Hansen-Løve) 42
*Flag Day (Penn) 42
*12 Mighty Orphans (Roberts) 42
*The Power (Faith) 41
Nine Days (Oda) 41
*Isabella (Piñeiro) 41
*There's Someone Inside Your House (Brice) 40
Earwig (Hadzihalilovic) 40
Wrath of Man (Ritchie) 40
Casablanca Beats (Ayouch) 39
Notturno (Rosi) 39
Unclenching the Fists (Kovalenko) 39
No Time to Die (Fukunaga) 38
Spoor (Holland, Adamik) 38
Introduction (Hong) 38
Parallel Mothers (Almodóvar) 37
The Card Counter (Schrader) 37
*Outside the Wire (Håfström) 37

C- Ugh

*The Alpinist (Mortimer, Rosen) 36
*Penguin Bloom (Ivin) 35
*Awake (Raso) 33
Tragic Jungle (Olaizola) 32
Hitman's Wife's Bodyguard (Hughes) 31
Malmkrog (Puiu) 28

D+ Double-Ugh

*The Unforgivable (Fingscheidt) 26
Inexorable (Du Welz) 26
*Here Today (Crystal) 25
Siberia (Ferrara) 22

D Bomb

F Burn the Negative

Walk-outs Channel Surfing

Aleph (Radivojevic)
*All Light, Everywhere (Anthony)
All the Light We Can See (Escoto)
Apples (Nikou)
Are You Lonesome Tonight? (Wen)
As in Heaven (Lindeburg)
Atlantis (Vasyanovych)
@Zola (Bravo)
Bebia, à mon seul désir (Dobrachkous)
Candyman (DaCosta)
CODA (Heder)
Dug Dug (Pareek)
El gran movimiento (Russo)
*Eyimofe (This Is My Desire) (Esiris)
Faya Dayi (Beshir)
Flora & Ulysses (Khan)
Friends and Strangers (Vaughan)
The Good House (Forbes, Wolodarsky)
The Gravedigger's Wife (Ahmed)
Gull (Kim)
The Humans (Karam)
Identifying Features (Valadez)
In the Heights (Chu)
Limbo (Sharrock)
*The Lost Daughter (Gyllenhaal)
*Luzzu (Camilleri)
Madalena (Marcheti)
Medusa (Silveira)
Mi Iubita, Mon Amour (Merlant)
Mr. Bachmann and His Class (Speth)
Moon, 66 Questions (Lentzou)
Murina (Kusijanović)
No One's With the Calves (Sarabi)
One Night in Miami... (King)
Quo Vadis, Aida? (Źbanić)
Radiograph of a Family (Khosrovani)
Raya and the Last Dragon (Hall, López Estrada)
Rock Bottom Riser (Silva)
Ste. Anne (Vermette)
7 Prisoners (Moratto)
Shiva Baby (Seligman)
Small Body (Samani)
Stop-Zemlia (Gornostai)
Taming the Garden (Joshi)
This Is Not a Burial, It's a Resurrection (Mosese)
The Trouble With Being Born (Wollner)
We're All Going to the World's Fair (Schoenbrun)
The Wheel (Pink)
Wùlu {2017} (Couilbaly)
You Are Not My Mother (Dolan)

Incomplete Mishap/Bad Timing

Wolf (Biancheri)