Peele didn’t direct Him, he just produced it.

But yeah, I think all of these are varying degrees of good, with some being amongst the best of their year. Auteur horror is in a great place right now.

The Hustler is an excellent Paul Newman film about billiards.

Blow-Up is a bizarre anxiety drenched film about a photographer who may have captured evidence of a crime in the background of a photo.

Grand Prix is a neat film about formula 1 racing, with some of the best action photography ever.

If queer film is your jam, the work of Kenneth Anger is always worth checking out, Scorpio Rising being my favorite of those I’ve seen

If you like sci-fi and experimental shorts, Chris Marker’s La Jetee is pretty cool, and is what 12 Monkeys was based on.

As for super ambitious metanarrative experiments, Symbiopsychotaciplasm: Take One is incredible.

Often, I’m in the same boat as you. For example, Skinamarink is one of the worst offenders I’ve seen in recent years. If a movie does it once or twice, I don’t mind it, as it can soften you up to allow more clever scares to get further under your skin, or have you on edge whenever the score cuts out. But doing it too much ruins the effect.

There are ones I think are genuinely good, though. Ones without that loud audio stab, or where it comes slightly delayed such that the image already spooked me and the noise hits it home, work for me. I think of a moment in Hereditary when you all of a sudden see movement over a character’s shoulder in a darkened room that had appeared empty (avoiding details for spoilers). It’s more earned, because the terror spreads like a wave through the audience as people realize it at different times, as the movie doesn’t call attention to it, but if you’re watching the screen, you’ll see it eventually.

Shinya Tsukamoto’s 2018 film Killing is a great, tense story that both plays into and undermines some of the tropes of samurai films. It’s a bit brutal at times, and also amusing in that wry way that Tsukamoto is so good at.

Watching through chronologically as you are will give Asteroid City the strongest punch. It’s one of my favs of his (and one of his funniest), but it’s so deeply in conversation with the rest of his body of work that it would be a lot harder to get on its wavelength without at least a few of them under your belt.

I’m glad you found it as illuminating and enjoyable as I did! =)

I really enjoyed the interview he gave on The Big Picture about a month ago: https://youtu.be/Nh9H3EXM3jA?t=6641

(also available in their podcast feed if you prefer audio-only)

sigh

I was wrong. BNW blows. =/

Side note for Brave New World: I’ve seen a handful of people online say they’ve no interest in a jingoistic movie given gestures around. Which is strange to me, since if the trailer is even the slightest bit accurate, it’s more in the vein of Winter Soldier, where the US government is the problem. Maybe they mean it’s too close to reality? shrugs

It’s been mixed over the past few years. I know way more people who’ve watched the post-Endgame shows than the post-Endgame movies. They certainly haven’t been treated as the cultural event they were in the 2010s.

Although, that’s been shifting. A bunch of people I know both online and in real-life were pumped for Deadpool & Wolverine. I’ve been hearing a bunch of excitement over the upcoming Thunderbolts* and Fantastic Four movies. And I’m personally super pumped for Brave New World, although the reports of production woes seem to have tempered others’ expectations.

I occasionally read Mike McGranaghan’s The Aisle Seat and Dan Chilton’s Dan Says its Alright.

And if I may be so bold, I’d like to offer up my own, Take 'Em to the Movies, Austin!. I aim to get up at least one review a week, along with the occasional list.

My initial experience of I Saw the TV Glow was actually similar to yours: I liked it a good deal on first watch, but as We’re All Going to the World’s Fair is one of my favorite movies, Schoenbrun’s follow up was always going to be at a disadvantage. But I rewatched TV Glow about a month ago, and it ended up my #13 on the year.

As for Gazer, it’s admittedly not primarily a horror film, but has enough terror and surreal imagery and atmosphere that I think it qualifies.

Starting with the best: The Substance, I Saw the TV Glow, Gazer (still playing festivals), Late Night with the Devil, Nosferatu, In A Violent Nature, Strange Darling, Longlegs, A Quiet Place: Day One, The First Omen.

This year was great for showing that less conventional horror films can really make a splash, both in the online conversation and at the box office.

Note that Oddity was directed by Damian Mc Carthy. The Monkey is being directed by Osgood Perkins, who did Longlegs in 2024.