- [Beep] we're doing it live!
Welcome back to "Bingeworthy."
Happy New Year's Eve, I'm Alex from Thrillist,
and thanks for tuning in.
Today, the last day of a seemingly endless 2018,
we're taking a look back at the top 10 best
movies Netflix produced this past year.
Yes, this is a ranking,
and no, the hour and a half Kelsey Grammer
cruise ship commercial that was "Like Father"
did not make the cut.
I am so sorry Kristen Bell.
I really do love "The Good Place."
- I'm fine.
- Let's get into it.
Number 10, "Apostle."
If you missed your opportunity to catch
this gruesomely dark, tense horror set in the early 1900s,
fear not.
The premise:
Thomas returns home to find his sister
is being held ransom by a creepy island cult.
Thomas goes to said island and infiltrates said cult
in hopes of finding where his sister is being held.
Thomas gets in too deep,
and realizes he has entered a horrifying world
of violence, secrets, and coming face-to-face
with his own demons.
There's also a pretty big, weird twist
as the island itself has its own dark past,
what with shipwrecks and such.
Number nine, "Roxanne Roxanne."
This is a biopic about Roxanne Shante,
a female rapper in Queensbridge who broke
out in the '80s at the age of 14 with an epic
disc track against UTFO, eventually spawning a ton
of answer records in what was called "the Roxanne wars."
The film predates that and instead focuses
on the rags-to-riches journey of Shante.
- You don't want your daughter to be happy
in something, you want her to be miserable just like you.
- You a nasty mother--
- From her early battles with her disapproving mother,
to the complicated and often abusive relationship
she has with her older boyfriend, Cross,
played by Oscar-winner Mahershala Ali.
Chanté Adams plays Roxanne,
and Michael Larnell directs.
Number eight, "Calibre."
"Calibre" comes to us from the master of horror, Stephen King.
The film follows two city slickers who head
into the Scottish countryside on a hunting expedition,
where little by little things start falling apart for them.
- Phone the police.
It'll be considered murder.
- The hunt goes especially awry at one point.
Tensions and suspense build,
and [beep] really hits the fan faster
than calling this film "Calibray" in a discussion
with your cinephile friends.
Number seven, "Bird Box."
This is a post-apocalyptic drama where demons,
or aliens, or monsters,
we don't really know, but they appear to people
as horrible personal visions,
and as such make them commit suicide.
- What's wrong with you?!
Please stop!
- Meaning, anyone who goes outside has to be blindfolded,
or shielded from whatever they are.
Sandra Bullock stars as Malorie,
a woman whose world is falling apart
as she tries to take her children
to the last known sanctuary on Earth.
The big problem, it's down a river which she
has to navigate blindly.
As you probably suspect,
this film is filled with tense moments.
It's sort of like "A Quiet Place,"
but instead of not being able to talk,
our characters aren't able to see.
- But under no circumstance are you allowed
to take off your blindfold.
- Number six, "Set It Up."
"Set It Up" was Netflix's breakout rom-com of 2018.
The delightful comedy stars Zoey Deutch and Glen Powell
as two young assistants working for two type-A bosses,
Lucy Liu and Taye Diggs.
- Oh no! That's my- - Ah!
- That's my laptop.
- The show's jokes hit more often than not,
thanks to Claire Scanlon's direction.
She also did episodes of "Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt"
and "Brooklyn Nine-Nine,"
as well as the tight and hilarious writing
of Katie Silberman.
Number five, "The Ritual."
Now, this was definitely one of the creepiest movies
to stream in 2018.
It debuted at Toronto Film Festival before
being scooped up by Netflix,
being scooped up by Netflix, and tells the story of a group of friends
and tells the story of a group of friends
hiking through Sweden.
After one of the men has a misstep hiking,
the group decides to take a shortcut through the woods.
You see where this is going, right?
Now, upon encountering an evil presence deep in the forest,
the group quickly falls apart
and is attacked numerous times by a large
tree-demon-deer-person-monster thing.
It's a super-weird movie,
but has a pretty solid ending.
Number four, "Private Life."
Paul Giamatti is back to playing a nice guy, y'all.
Looking at you, "Billions."
This is a comedy about aging artists who live in Manhattan
and decide they wanna have kids,
but they're gonna need some help,
namely with fertility treatments.
There are naturally ups and downs,
laughter and tears,
Kathryn Hahn and newcomer Kayli Carter.
It's a powerful and endearing film.
Well worth its spot on this list.
- I wish you were my parents sometimes.
- Number three, "To All the Boys I've Loved Before."
Lara Jean has a vivid imagination,
which doesn't help when things get crushingly
real after five love letters she has written out
to five different boys get mailed to each of them.
One happens to land in the mailbox of her former
best friend's ex, Peter Kavinsky,
played by America's newest heartthrob, Noah Centineo.
- I'm sorry, what?
- I think it's really cool that you think
I have golden specks.
- In order to help Lara Jean out with one letter
sent to her neighbor
and get back at his ex,
Noah formulates a plan.
Let's pretend to date each other.
What could possibly go wrong?
Ultimately, this is a story about love,
albeit with some growing pains,
that is beautiful in its honesty
and not overly stylized, or too on-the-nose.
and not overly stylized, or too on-the-nose. It's basically really cute.
It's basically really cute.
Number two, "Ballad of Buster Scruggs,"
an American Western anthology from the Cohen brothers.
There are six vignettes all unrelated to one another
set in the early American frontier.
There's tragedy, humility, dark humor,
more tragedy, and an unforgettable portrayal
delivered to us by Tom Waits.
Other notable performances include those from
Liam Neeson, Zoe Kazan, Tim Blake Nelson,
James Franco, Stephen Root, Bill Heck, and Brendan Gleeson.
As far as Netflix movies of 2018 goes
this should be one everyone's top three list.
- Mm, first time?
- Huh?
- Huh? - Number one, "Roma."
- Number one, "Roma."
I'll start off with this.
"Roma," from Alfonso Cuaron,
director of "Children of Men" and "Gravity,"
has a very good shot at winning Best Picture at the Oscars.
The story starts off a little slow,
diving into the seemingly ordinary lives of ordinary people,
but masterfully folds the viewer into a world
that feels more like a documentary than a fiction.
We bare witness to government turmoil,
the social unrest so ubiquitous in the 1970s,
and the harsh realities faced by seemingly
ordinary people living ordinary lives.
Well, that's it for "Bingeworthy."
To read even more great entertainment content,
check us out at Thrillist online.
I'm Alex from Thrillist.
Happy New Year's, everyone.
I'm Alex Robinson,
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