The best movies of 2023: Finding bright spots, from ‘Air’ to ‘Maestro,’ in another rough year for Hollywood

Critics tend to accentuate the positive in year-end lists, but cheerleading aside, 2023 wasn’t a great year for mainstream movies, either creatively or commercially.

Critics tend to accentuate the positive in year-end lists, but cheerleading aside, 2023 wasn’t a great year for mainstream movies, either creatively or commercially. Although streaming services helped finance plenty of marquee films, several of the eagerly anticipated titles fell short of expectations, while others (most notably “Killers of the Flower Moon”) didn’t know when to end – more of a problem in theaters, admittedly, than at home, where viewers can slice, dice and pause to their hearts’ content. Simply put, Hollywood still hasn’t found a sweet spot between art and commerce, prestige movies and those with broad appeal – a longstanding problem made worse, perhaps, by the priorities of streaming services, which can hide commercial failures and bask in the glow of awards and critical acclaim. Of course, the entertainment industry can’t live by awards alone, and there were disquieting commercial trends, including the near-across-the-board box-office decline of superhero movies, until recently a wildly reliable genre. That sudden swoon has fueled a sense movie-going hasn’t fully recovered from the one-two punch of the pandemic and streaming, and might never do so. On the plus side, the films that did stand out represent an eclectic roster in terms of subject matter and genres (with some conscience effort to reflect that range), even if some might not have made this list – which takes the liberty of a few combination entries – in a year with more clear-cut choices. Here, then, in alphabetical order (with streaming options noted where available):