The 15 Best A24 Movies Ranked

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When we typically muse on who should be considered the "author" of a film, I don't think we ever come to the conclusion of "the studio." Sure, there are some pockets of vision within the history of movie studios — the Warner Bros. gangster picture, the Universal horror movie, the Paramount "maverick 1970s film" — but by and large, they provide the means to the end, the money and distribution deal for directors to make their mark on culture.

A24, however, is anything but typical. Founded in 2012 by Daniel Katz, David Fenkel, and John Hodges, and named after an Italian motorway Katz was driving down, the independent movie studio has become one of the 21st century's most notable film tastemakers. It's a brand unto itself, a marker of a certain "type" of movie that indicates quality and intrigue. And even if some purists poo-poo their Instagram-friendly marketing apparatus, you can't deny their output of exceptional movies (even if their bad Rotten Tomatoes scores sometimes say otherwise).

To pay homage to this once-in-a-generation studio, here are the 15 best A24 movies, ranked — and know that there were at least 24 others that could've made the list.

The Daniels, Kwan and Scheinert, made their feature directorial debut with 2016's "Swiss Army Man," codifying their brand of absurdism, sincerity, and genre-hopping with startling and bold efficiency.

Hank (Paul Dano) is stranded on an island with only one man for company: A corpse, played fearlessly by Daniel Radcliffe (who had just one question before signing on). But this corpse ain't your average cadaver. It can fart a jet ski's propulsion engines, pop a compass-like erection, and eventually relearn and speak English. So Dano and Radcliffe help remind each other of the wide-varying and simple pleasures of life, even as they turn down some dark corners with the history of a woman named Sarah Johnson (Mary Elizabeth Winstead).

Beyond the sheer power of the film's audacity, there's a ton to admire in its craft, especially in its charmingly homemade visual effects and stunning score from Manchester Orchestra bandmates Andy Hull and Robert McDowell (a score that the onscreen characters often participate in).

Speaking of audacity: There aren't many contemporary film studios willing to release a four-hour drama about an architect complete with an overture and an intermission. But A24 took a chance on "The Brutalist," and that investment paid off in an overwhelming triumph. 

Adrien Brody is our architect, Hungarian Holocaust survivor László Tóth, who emigrates to America in the post-war 1940s to find fulfillment in his work and life. Along the way, he tussles with his trauma, reconnects with his wife Erzsébet (Felicity Jones), and engages in a tumultuous business relationship with American magnate Harrison Lee Van Buren (Guy Pearce).

Director Brady Corbet and DP Lol Crawley shot the film on VistaVision, a long-dormant format that effectively "rotates" the 35mm film stock so the image shot takes up more information in a higher resolution. Seeing this sucker on a 70mm print (or the A24-released 4K Blu-ray), you see the visual gamble pay off, as the images are stunning and intoxicating, pulling you wholly into the epic scope yet intimate focus of the tale.

"The Lighthouse" is a chamber drama with a distinct flavor of cosmic horror, a two-hander that descends into absolute madness. Robert Eggers (who also made A24's "The Witch") co-wrote and directed the story, about a young wickie, or lighthouse keeper (Robert Pattinson), who takes a job working with an older and easily agitated supervisor (Willem Dafoe). As vicious storms batter the blokes, routine and isolation veer sharply into obsession and destruction — and that's before supernatural visions rear their surreal head. Are you sold yet?

This is another film with a unique and vital visual look; Eggers, who was not afraid to get rough, shot the film with DP Jarin Blaschke on black-and-white film stock specifically filtered to emulate the look of early 1900s photography and nascent cinema, then presented it in a classical 1.19:1 aspect ratio. It makes the whole affair feel like some cursed artifact, unearthed and untouched.

2018's "Hereditary" was a breakthrough film in multiple ways. It announced elevated, trauma-driven horror as a mainstream genre space, Ari Aster as an auteur worth our attention, and A24 as a studio worth noting. It's a pulverizing, punishing watch, possessing abject power and impeccable craft.

Annie (Toni Colette, incredible) is the matriarch of the dour Graham family, suffering from the loss of her somewhat estranged mother. This death pulls the thread on an increasingly perilous tapestry of familial secrets and tragedies, culminating in an unforgettable and unforgiving climax.

The movie has instantly vaulted its way into the modern horror canon, its iconography coming less from any possessing demon or malevolent killer and more from the psychological warfare of a family determined to destroy itself. That's not to say it doesn't work as a "traditionally scary movie"; I promise, one of its scariest scenes will scar you for life. If that's not a testament to Aster's storytelling and filmmaking ability, I don't know what is.

And in another dour journey through a cursed family, "The Iron Claw" is a drama based on the unbelievable true story of the Von Erich wrestling family.

Zac Efron, in a career-best performance, centers the film as Kevin Von Erich, who struggles mightily to keep the wrestling dreams of his father, Fritz (Holt McCallany, playing a complicated real-life character), afloat alongside his brothers Kerry, David, and Mike (Jeremy Allen White, Harris Dickinson, and Stanley Simons). This family undergoes Sisyphean levels of tragedy, death, and shattering heartbreak, asking unspeakably difficult questions about destiny, identity, and dreams along the way.

I'm a man with a brother, which means I can't, like, think about this movie without tearing up. And when I actually watched it, I full-blown wept in a way I haven't in a theater, maybe ever. It's beautifully made and relentlessly emotional, garnering its most efficacy because at its core, there is some level of hope and even celebration of what a positive version of masculinity can look like.

Great, now I'm thinking about the last scene and crying again. Thanks a lot, "The Iron Claw"!

Writer/director Lulu Wang gave us a fictionalized look at a real and revelatory family experience, and we are all the better for taking her "Farewell" (and for Wang not letting studio demands derail her plan).

The movie stars Awkwafina (refreshingly downshifting her performance gear) as Wang's surrogate Billi, a Chinese-American writer who loves her grandma, or Nai Nai (Zhao Shu-zhen), who lives in Changchun, China. But when Nai Nai is diagnosed with terminal cancer, her family ... decides not to tell her! Instead, they plan a family wedding as an excuse for everyone to say their goodbyes, without the person they're saying goodbye to knowing it could be the last time she sees them.

This is an inherently interesting, engaging, and philosophically rich premise, and Wang deals with it all deftly, giving the proceedings an endearing, lightly comedic tone. It's the kind of movie that will give you a newfound lease on life, a gratitude for even its most quotidian or straight-up annoying aspects — and that's before its jaw-dropping ending title card.

Comedian, musician, actor, and incredible filmmaker?! Bo Burnham is annoyingly talented; we all know this. And his "Eighth Grade" moves well past the curiosity of "what will this polymath do next?" and firmly into the realm of "one of the great coming-of-age movies."

Perfect leading lady Elsie Fisher plays eighth grader Kayla Day, a girl struggling with all the horrors anyone who went to middle school is familiar with. Despite her earnest and endlessly supportive father (Josh Hamilton, hitting a home run), Kayla's growing pains are, indeed, painful, especially thanks to the exacerbation of awkwardness and isolation that comes with growing up publicly on the Internet.

Burnham has a great knack for balance, moving from handheld, slice-of-life, performance-driven scenes into one of the great looks at "doomscrolling on the Internet," an impressionistic blend of visuals set brilliantly to Enya's Orinoco Flow. It's at times an agonizing watch, so close to the bone does it cut.

Another brilliant coming-of-age film, and one that absolutely should've won Best Picture over that nonsensical claptrap "Nomadland" (but I'm not still bitter), "Minari" is hilarious, sweet, tragic, and soaring.

The members of the Yi family are Korean-American immigrants who have recently moved to rural Arkansas under the guidance of patriarch Jacob (Steven Yeun, in one of his best movies) and the embittered reluctance of matriarch Monica (Han Ye-ri, so relatable). As the family tries to achieve a version of the American dream, young son David (Alan Kim, adorable) grows up and learns some truths, both hard and soft, and often exacerbated by his traditional yet somewhat chaotic grandma Soon-ja (the Oscar-winning Youn Yuh-jung).

"Minari" is accessible but deep, often laugh-out-loud funny, while willing to plumb the depths of regret and concern that come with the primal, universal concerns of raising a fulfilled family. It's a remarkable piece of filmmaking from Lee Isaac Chung.

"Green Room," from great genre auteur Jeremy Saulnier, is an agonizing, efficient, and profoundly brutal horror film. It's a white-knuckle feat, full of intelligent screenwriting, intriguing performances, and some of the gnarliest sequences of violence I've ever seen on screen — what Saulnier referred to as "full-frontal gore."

A young, struggling hardcore punk band, the Ain't Rights (including the soulful Anton Yelchin), books a gig in a decrepit, isolated venue in the forests of Portland, Oregon. So far, a pretty normal turn of events for a young, struggling hardcore punk band! Just one problem: The venue is a Neo-Nazi hangout, led by the quietly chilling and subversively cast against type Patrick Stewart. And when our musicians witness a dead body in the titular green room, an all-out assault ensues.

Parts of Saulnier's grimy and authentic vision are so unpretentious and plainly spoken that they feel illegal to witness. Not many contemporary horror movies, even ones released by A24, can reach this level of effect. But I've now seen "Green Room" numerous times, and it shakes me to my core on every single watch.

How about another lovely, coming-of-age tale?

Greta Gerwig broke through as a filmmaker with "Lady Bird," an early-2000s-set period piece about a high school senior (Saoirse Ronan) struggling through her last year at Catholic school. As she makes new discoveries about her identity and what young adulthood could look like for her, she insists on being called Lady Bird (though her given name is Christine) and moving far away from Sacramento for college. All of this irks her mom (the sublime Laurie Metcalf), providing the picture of the juiciest and funniest of its many dramas and misunderstandings.

Elder millennials, like this author, will find much to recognize and cringe at in Gerwig's painstakingly observed film, especially with its wonderful use of needle drops from era-iconic musicians like Alanis Morissette, the Dave Matthews Band, and Bone Thugs-N-Harmony.

But within Gerwig's specificity comes a universal appreciation and reminder of this particularly difficult age, especially if one has a particularly difficult relationship with their family. It's an incredible snapshot, edited with good humor and efficiency by Gerwig and her regular collaborator ​​Nick Houy.

Ari Aster took some of the themes, ideas, and horrors presented in "Hereditary" and blew them up for his 2019 masterpiece "Midsommar," a brightly-lit slow burn into madness that plays like "The Wicker Man" with a Mike Nichols breakup comedy smuggled in the center.

Dani (Florence Pugh, phenomenal) is having a really bad time. She's in a strained relationship with emotionally stunted eff-boy Christian (Jack Reynor, really funny), who wants to break up with her — and then her sister murders-suicides the rest of her family! So a guilt-ridden Christian brings Dani alongside his graduate student friends on a trip to a rural Swedish community. But this community's rituals and plans for dear Dani start to go sideways and mutate into a deadly cacophony.

For a film so eager to plunge headfirst into heaviness and violence, "Midsommar" is an aesthetically gorgeous work, constructed of immaculately artfully composed long, wide takes from DP Pawel Pogorzelski. And, if you really get on its wavelength, you'll find "Midsommar" is surprisingly hilarious.

"Past Lives" hurts so good. Celine Song's feature directorial debut (A24 is really good about distributing those!) is a piece of emotional warfare, an achingly beautiful, contemplative drama that hurls a hand grenade into the most secret, rueful parts of our brains and hearts. If you're worried about texting an ex, you should not see "Past Lives."

For everyone else, the film follows the life of Nora Moon (Greta Lee, intoxicating), a Korean-American immigrant with a lovely, if slightly daffy husband (John Magaro, nothing but vulnerability). But her life is upturned with the arrival of Hae Sung (Teo Yoo, in complete control of his instrument), a lost love from her past who's interested in reconnecting. What ensues is a series of philosophical conversations, stress tests of the concept of "empathy," and set pieces where you will need, in your bones, the characters to physically touch each other in some way.

It's a powerful masterwork, a piece that will make you reflect on every unturned stone in your life and cry, cry, cry over all of them.

The Daniels broke into the mainstream with their financially and critically successful "Everything Everywhere All at Once," the only Best Picture winner I can think of where people erotically touch each other with hot dog hands.

Evelyn Quan Wang (the Oscar-winning Michelle Yeoh) is a Chinese-American immigrant who's not particularly holding her life together. Her laundromat is in deep tax doo-doo, her kind husband (the Oscar-winning Ke Huy Quan) is considering divorce, and her prickly daughter (the Oscar-deserving Stephanie Hsu) is openly antagonistic toward her stubborn, traditionalist ways. But instead of dealing with all of this head-on, Evelyn is thrust into an action-packed conspiracy that spans the multiverse, trying to juggle countless realities while fighting a nihilistic force of evil. Or is it all just a metaphor?

"Everything Everywhere All at Once" promises just that, and delivers enthusiastically. It's got martial arts fight choreography, Wong Kar-wai references, flights of absurd juvenilia, and at least one nakedly sentimental, "can't we all just get along?" speech. Somehow, the Daniels keep it all together, inspired by a single contradictory question, and delivering what just might be the defining text of millennial existence.

For the 2 hours and 15 minutes of "Uncut Gems," you won't breathe. Benny and Josh Safdie's crime drama is a relentlessly paced sprint through the most anxiety-ridden version of New York City you'll ever see. It's visceral, quotable, hilarious, tragic, and an absolute fireball against the most corrosive components of capitalistic culture.

Plus, it has Adam Sandler delivering one of the great screen performances of the 21st century – it simply had to be him! His character, Howard Ratner, is a jeweler, hustler, and gambling addict, and he's also obsessive. His base reality involves running around screaming at clients, bookies, loan sharks, and his mistress (Julia Fox, screwball comedy queen).

But his already precarious existence goes completely topsy-turvy when he gets his hands on a piece of black opal, something both he and NBA superstar Kevin Garnett (playing himself incredibly) believe possesses a kind of spiritual power beyond its financially lucrative implications. This uncut gem cranks Howie's self-destructive tendencies into fast-forward, a cat's cradle of unstoppable forces meeting immovable objects.

In Barry Jenkins' immaculately lensed "Moonlight," we follow the life of Chiron over three periods and actors: Childhood (Alex Hibbert), adolescence (Ashton Sanders), and adulthood (Trevante Rhodes). Chiron's is a story of a burgeoning queer identity in a body and society that doesn't always allow for that peacefully or empathetically. Its sequences are searing, and its resolution is beyond poignant.

"Moonlight" is a powerful drama, a gorgeously made film, and a heartwrenching showcase for a deep ensemble cast, including the Academy Award-winning Mahershala Ali. Among its other "bittersweet" Oscar nominations, it won Best Picture, a win qualitatively overshadowed by the debacle of Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway accidentally announcing "La La Land" as the victor.

"Moonlight" is the correct choice, both qualitatively and symbolically. If "La La Land" tells us that classical conceptions of cinema are the future, "Moonlight" is the perfect counterproposal and mission statement of A24. Innovation, evolution, and experimentation are where cinema can and should go, and I'll bet A24 will continue to be one of this idea's main authors.