This is Christopher Nolan's insane, original concept: a professional thief steals information by infiltrating the subconscious. Sorry, Mr. Nolan, how are you going to do this? The answer is incredibly engrossingly. Somehow Nolan made a film about dreams both substantial and visceral, with a thrilling dose of physics-defying action.
Inception (2010)
Star Wars: The Force Awakens (2015)
"They say that once you grow crops somewhere, you've officially colonized it. So, technically, I colonized Mars. In your face, Neil Armstrong!"
The Martian (2015)
George Miller's fourth in the <> series careens on as one of the best action movies of all time. Tom Hardy replaces Mel Gibson as the enigmatic <>, alongside the clear standout and heart of the film: Charlize Theron as the one-armed Imperator Furiosa. In Miller's visionary post-apocalyptic Oz, they attempt to save "the wives," women selected for breeding, from the tyrannical Immortan Joe. The entire movie takes place over one absolutely bonkers chase sequence.
Mad Max: Fury Road (2015)
"Let me tell you something. There is no nobility in poverty. I have been a rich man, and I have been a poor man. And I choose rich every <beep> time."
The Wolf of Wall Street (2013)
Marvel movies proved they could keep on evolving with Ryan Coogler's <>. The 2018 film bucked the superhero formula with its Afro-futurist setting, family saga and James Bond gadgetry. The bold claws of an auteur are all over this comic book blockbuster.
Black Panther (2018)
Annihilation (2018)
"Murph, after you kids came along, your Mom, she said something to me I never quite understood. She said, 'Now, we're just here to be memories for our kids.' I think that now I understand what she meant. Once you're a parent, you're the ghost of your children's future."
Interstellar (2014)
<> was not the deep-dive into Scientology's origins many might have expected. Paul Thomas Anderson sews together the fictional life of Lancaster Dodd (Philip Seymour Hoffman), leader of a religious movement known as "The Cause," and his tension with the yin to his yang, Freddie Quell (Joaquin Phoenix). The 2012 character drama, dealing with a world recovering from World War II, is a poetic epic.
The Master (2012)
Hunt for the Wilderpeople (2016)
"If you think about the very nature of life, I mean, from the very beginning, the development of the first cell that divided into two cells - the sole purpose of life has been to pass on what was learned, that there was no higher purpose. So if you're asking me what to do with all this knowledge you're accumulating, I say, 'Pass it on.'"
Lucy (2014)
Spike Jonze's 2013 romance between a lonely man and his Siri-like AI is even more frighteningly relevant today. Samantha (Scarlet Johansson) is the soothing, intimate voice in Theodore Twombly's (Joaquin Phoenix) ear, but the bounds of her programming soon go beyond sprucely organizing his life. Jonze's future is both vividly-realized and always rooted in the complexities of the human heart.
Her (2013)
Ex Machina (2015)
“You don't even know what the thing is yet. How big it can get, how far it can go. This is no time to take your chips down. A million dollars isn't cool. You know what's cool? A billion dollars”
The Social Network (2010)