A little over midway into the 2020s and movie landscape is jam-packed with heaters that are sure to stand the test of time.
But even so, there are plenty of recent movies that deserve to get their flowers. Great movies that have been woefully misunderstood, haven’t received a proper release, or are simply better than their lack of mainstream reception.
Watch With Us loves all movies big and small, so we put together a list of five of the most underrated movies of the decade so far.
Our first pick is 2023’s The Beast, a French and English-language sci-fi romance starring Léa Seydoux.
‘The Beast’ (2023)
In a dystopian future, AI has taken over most of the world’s jobs, deeming humans incapable of rational thought due to their emotions. In order to obtain more productive work, humans must go through a grueling process in which they are robbed of their emotions through DNA purification that uncovers their past lives. Agreeing to go through with this DNA purification, Gabrielle (Seydoux) sees herself in the years 1910 and 2014, as an acclaimed pianist and wife to a doll-making factory owner in France, and then as an aspiring actress in Los Angeles. In each year, including the present one, Gabrielle is drawn to Louis (George Mackay), in a film which examines the changing, timeless and terrifying cycles of love and isolation.
Adapted loosely from Henry James’ 1903 novella The Beast in the Jungle, The Beast is a haunting and ambitious sci-fi drama that weaves romance and horror across three overlapping timelines. Seydoux and Mackay give terrific, triplicate performances, with Mackay’s 2014 character (an incel inspired by real-life mass murderer Elliot Rodger) being particularly unsettling and impressive. The Beast alternates between being deeply moving and disturbing to create something that feels both powerful and unique.
‘Megalopolis’ (2024)
In an alternate version of the United States known as New Rome, the country is run by a group of aristocratic families while the rest of New Rome lives in poverty. Renowned genius architect Cesar Catilina (Adam Driver) has grandiose ideas for a utopian society he calls “Megalopolis,” but his plans come into conflict with Franklyn Cicero (Giancarlo Esposito), the corrupt, conservative mayor of New Rome who is more like a tyrant than a benevolent leader. However, Cesar’s affections for the mayor’s daughter, Julia (Nathalie Emmanuel), make the young woman question where her true loyalties lie.
This plot synopsis makes Megalopolis sound like it’s far less convoluted than it really is, and The Godfather filmmaker Francis Ford Coppola‘s grand return to the director’s chair was met by a mixture of befuddlement and awe. The movie had unquestionably poor box office returns, and your mileage may vary on its weird, wacky world. Whatever you think of Megalopolis, it is truly a film made by a man free of studio meddling because he funded it entirely with his wine company. The movie is strange, but it is a wholly singular and uncompromised vision; constantly entertaining and intentionally funny.
‘Funny Pages’ (2022)
When the mentor of aspiring cartoonist teenager Robert Bleichner (Daniel Zolghadri) is tragically killed in a car accident, Robert decides to strike out on his own as a starving artist, trading his privileged life in Princeton, New Jersey for the squalor of a basement apartment in Trenton. After taking up a job as an assistant to a public defender (Marcia Debonis), he meets one of her clients, a volatile man named Wallace (Matthew Maher). When Robert learns that Wallace was once an assistant cartoonist at Image Comics, he tries forcing an extremely unwilling Wallace to be his new mentor.
Funny Pages is a great movie for people who like bizarre and uncomfortable stories about horrific, unlikable characters. In this way, Funny Pages is a genuine breath of fresh air — a movie unafraid to be as caustic as possible, and to populate its narrative with people who seem like the absolute worst possible versions of humanity. What results is incredible and unique, and the movie succeeds as an unconventional coming-of-age story that leans away from nostalgia and leans heavily into cringe ideas of what it means to be an artist.
‘The Munsters’ (2022)
House of 1000 Corpses and The Devil’s Rejects director and lifelong The Munsters fan Rob Zombie is given the directing job of a lifetime in his reimagining of the classic 1960s sitcom about a family of benevolent ghouls who live in America. Zombie’s The Munsters serves as a prequel to the series and follows Lily (Sheri Moon Zombie), a lonely 150-year-old vampire in Transylvania who has been craving companionship when she meets the dashing, 7-foot-tall Herman (Jeff Daniel Philips). Though the two instantly fall in love, their courtship is impeded by Lily’s father, the Count (Daniel Roebuck), who has other plans for his daughter.
There is simply no other movie like The Munsters that exists in the 2020s. It is deeply goofy and stupid, hinging on a brand of comedy that simply doesn’t exist anymore, while also being the most colorful and gorgeous-looking movie that Netflix has probably ever released on its platform. The neon- and pop-art-drenched production design and meticulous, tactile sets render The Munsters a genuine labor of love, while the earnest approach to such dated and silly material makes it feel unique compared to a glut of cynical filmmaking. In a just world, Zombie would be allowed to make a new movie every single year.
‘Showing Up’ (2022)
Sculptor and arts administrator Lizzy (Michelle Williams) is working on an upcoming show of her work, a series of sculptures that exhibit women in various physical expressions of anguish or joy. Lizzy’s landlord and neighbor is Jo (Hong Chau), a fellow artist and Lizzy’s professional rival with whom she frequently argues. While Lizzy tries to focus on finishing her work in time for the show, personal problems begin piling up, like her broken water heater that Jo won’t fix, the hippies who are taking advantage of her father (Judd Hirsch), her mentally unwell brother (John Magaro) and an injured pigeon she begins tending to fondly.
Showing Up is an intimate and quietly funny portrait of the pains of making one’s life out of being an artist, and of retaining one’s sense of self in a highly populated creative field. Director Kelly Reichardt and star Williams team up for their first collaboration since 2016’s Certain Women, and the film sees both women working in perfect sync; Williams capturing the mundane struggles of artistic life with empathy and subtlety, Reichardt’s simplistic filmmaking style adding surprising power and depth to the nuances of creative (and everyday) hardship.
