2021. Another year down, COVID is still raging, and things are looking pretty grim for movie theaters out there. The pandemic has transformed the cinematic landscape into a tempest of uncertainty, with only the most gargantuan of tentpoles being sure things at the box office. But just because profitability is scarce doesn’t mean movies are dead. Just to name a few gems, this year saw lush Arthurian legend come to life, a new freewheeling Paul Thomas Anderson flick, Ridley Scott in his element, fresh bloodcurdling horrors, and another jaunt into the Matrix. Movies have still got it. Here’s my list of the best movies of 2021.

A bare-knuckle haymaker across the dome of our obsession with nostalgia and Hollywood’s reboot complex, The Matrix Resurrections is ambitious, sci-fi metafiction sure to be divisive. Tackling themes of creator vs. destroyer, revival, and the illusion of choice in a brand new context, it’s Lana Wachowski’s meditation on why she didn’t want do another Matrix movie…via another Matrix movie - and it’s great. Minor spoilers ahead…