The Top 10 Movies That I Forgot Came Out in 2023
Lately, there’s a lot of talk about the “best movies of the year” and the “worst movies of the year” and the uhhh…moral turpitude of indulging in the latter, or whatever. That’s all well and good, but what about the movies that I have simply forgotten about? Did anyone even think about that? Every year I watch more movies than the average person (and I’m still on the lower end of some cinephiles, if you can believe it), and unless—but truly not limited to—I write about them, I forget about them the second I step out of the theater, as if I’m Men in Black’d once I cross the threshold from AMC Empire into the visual assault of Times Square. Even more likely to be forgotten are the movies that I didn’t see, but was once all too aware of, that feel like they came out years ago and yet premiered in theaters mere months prior. People say that life is short, but it feels terribly long if you are forced to care about the yearly slate of films.
Now, I don’t want to sound like the elite film critic who’s out-of-touch with the regular Joe Schmo Renfield-enjoyer. But I have a suspicion that there are many average moviegoers likely to forget many 2023 releases as well. A perpetually written-on downside of the content mill is that there is too much, especially when films in particular are no longer exclusively events that you leave your house to attend. Instead, they are merely a few hours killed in your own living room, soon to be siloed away in your brain once finished and onto the next series or made-for-streaming movie—all the more egregious when you consider how much some of them cost. Last year, I wrote about some of these more forgettable films in a list aptly titled “The Top 10 Movies That I Forgot Came Out This Year.” Such inclusions were the likes of The Gray Man, Lightyear and, of course, Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore. (Can you believe I still don’t know what his secrets were?) I thought it would be fun to bring the concept back for 2023, so that we can reflect on all the movies that somehow released this year but were barely real. As we head towards 2024, here’s to movies that actually exist.
Ghosted
Maybe the fakest movie on the list, if only slightly more real for not starring Gal Gadot but instead genuine actors like Chris Evans and Ana de Armas (who already proved their “chemistry” to audiences with Knives Out and, funnily, The Gray Man). When the poster for this Apple TV+ flick was revealed, reactions were less “Wow! I’m excited to see two beautiful actors do an action rom-com together!” and more “They’re not even trying!” It’s incredible, then, that the feeling like Evans and de Armas were barely present for their photoshoot extended to the first trailer, which many viewers complained stunk of green screen and visual trickery to make it less obvious that the actors did not film scenes together—despite, apparently, all reports indicating that they were on set together. Helmed by Eddie the Eagle auteur Dexter Fletcher, the film premiered to abysmal reviews, immediate memory-holing, and a strong sense of yearning for the days when actors were also stars. That’s Hollywood, baby!
Peter Pan & Wendy
The Disney live-action remakes of their already-gorgeous 2D animated films were seemingly made to be forgotten about, so that your brain can simply make room for the next one on the endless conveyor belt from which Bob Iger serves these turds up. Case in point: Did you know that the same year as the discourse-y Little Mermaid remake, there was a Peter Pan reimagining directed by The Green Knight director David Lowery starring Jude Law as Captain Hook? Despite reviewing the film, I can barely remember a thing about it myself; the only aspect that sits in my mind is the murky can of pea soup that counts as the film’s cinematography. Oh yes, and attempting to make the inherently racist character of Tiger Lily into a progressive girlboss and still ending up…kind of racist. Managing to score an overall “fresh” aggregate rating on Rotten Tomatoes (as did The Little Mermaid) is less an indicator of real quality and more, as signified by many of these so-called “fresh” reviews, an admittance of “well, it could’ve been worse.”
65
To this day, I don’t think we have a definitive answer as to why Adam Driver did this “Fuck You, It’s January” movie in March, in the same year as his masterful performance as the titular Ferrari of Ferrari. I do recall an interview somewhere where Driver claims he did it for his kids, but I’m not accepting that. The film—a toothless, nothing sci-fi in which Driver’s character crash lands on prehistoric earth—stands out wildly against Driver’s filmography, marked by collaborations with names like Michael Mann, Leos Carax, Spike Lee, Noah Baumbach and, most recently, Francis Ford Coppola for the upcoming Megalopolis. Driver isn’t one to phone-in a performance for a direct-to-video movie (or, in this case, one that feels direct-to-video). Aside from a regrettable triptych of “Planet Battles” films, Driver has been a virtuoso at choosing roles from the very beginning, starting his film career with a minor spot in Clint Eastwood’s J. Edgar. 65 seems like an early-career move from an actor trying to find his footing, not a mid-career turn bookended by work with some of our greatest living directors. Was it really for his kids, or maybe the directors—the visionary minds who brought us A Quiet Place—have dirt on Driver? “Fight CGI dinosaurs or the telemarketing fraud goes public!” Just spitballing here…
Boston Strangler
Some might say that movies used to have Keira Knightley in them—and they still do, they’re just direct-to-streaming biopics about the Boston Strangler. Nowadays, movies can star the household-name star who led both the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise and period classics like Pride & Prejudice and Atonement and be shuffled off to the Hulu gulag where her film will live a short, painful life and soon die. Supported by a stellar cast of character actors including Carrie Coon, David Dastmalchian, Bill Camp, and Chris Cooper, Boston Strangler seems to have intended to function as a Spotlight or Zodiac acolyte—but see, we already have Spotlight and Zodiac at home. And despite overall favorable critical consensus, reviews suggest the intention as another hard-hitting investigative bio-drama merely whimpers as an obvious “girlbossed Zodiac” which brazenly apes David Fincher’s style to far lesser effect. In the end, perhaps the film’s greatest undoing was being a direct-to-Hulu creation in the first place, a cruel fate for crowd-pleasing films like Prey, Palm Springs and No One Will Save You. Unfortunately, Boston Strangler didn’t have nearly the same hype, seemingly made to be watched, modestly enjoyed, and then forgotten as soon as you feel emboldened to fire up that 100th Zodiac rewatch.
Insidious: The Red Door
There’s an old piano and they play it hot behind the Red Door… Insidious: The Red Door, that is, directed by Dagmara Dominczyk’s husband and all-around best guy, the franchise’s own Patrick Wilson. Wilson returns as plagued dad Josh Lambert, from the franchise’s first two installments, whose now college-aged, astral-projecting son Dalton (Ty Simpkins) goes away to university where he discovers that the Insidious monster is calling back to him after all these years. I was actually hyped for this one—I love First Insidious, I really like Second Insidious, and I hated both Three and Four Insidiouses. With a 50% hit rate and a years-long love for Hannah Horvath’s one-time lover Patrick Wilson, I was eager to see my friends from the Insidious universe return, as well as what Wilson would have to offer in the director’s chair. But just like that one scene from Nathan For You… “I hope you’re hungry… for nothing!!” I can’t fathom for what reason Wilson was hired to direct this project, as I couldn’t discern a single artistic distinction; no pointers were learned under the tutelage of his frequent collaborator James Wan, who co-created the franchise and helmed the first two films. Insidious: The Red Door is a boring, pointless and forgettable return for the characters from the franchise’s two best films. A silver lining: Perhaps without IP restraints, Wilson will be free to make his own The Tree of Life.
Renfield
How do you make a movie starring Nicolas Cage as Dracula and whiff it this fucking badly? The film was supported by over a year of hype surrounding this stellar casting (since at least Vampire’s Kiss, Cage has needed to play a “real” vampire badly), only heightened when on-set photos were released of Cage looking deliciously gaudy in his Dracula makeup. I suppose it makes sense when you decide to babygirlify Dracula’s familiar, Renfield, whose characterization in the film is based more on the Bela Lugosi classic than Bram Stoker’s novel. Not an issue in and of itself, here we jump through decades into present-day, and expand upon the Renfield-Dracula relationship (as first seen in Tod Browning’s 1931 film) into a feel-good parable about shedding toxic relationships. Viewers like me were pleased that the theatrical cut decided to ax the god-awful Awkwafina line where she compares Renfield bringing victims to Dracula to being like “Dracula’s Postmates,” but that same horrific vibe permeates the film nonetheless. The premise of Renfield self-actualizing and ridding himself of Dracula through the self-care so widespread in 2023 is the kind of joke that’s barely funny if you told it at a party, and it’s certainly not funny enough to sustain a 90-minute film. Last Voyage of the Demeter left more of an impression on me, if only for the “Boat Dracula” memes.
The Creator
The new movie from Garth Davis…er, no, Gareth Evans…er, no, Gareth Edwards. I enjoyed Edwards’ Fat Godzilla movie, and a lot of people liked The Creator. But I couldn’t really understand why anyone was hyping it up as if it were the return of an auteur. The guy had only made three films and one of them (his most recent, from seven years ago) was that mind-numbing slog Rogue One. I guess people were excited to see what Gareth would do next after taking such a long hiatus and splitting from the Godzilla sequel in favor of returning to smaller work. An admirable endeavor, and many feel it was well-earned in The Creator; a mid-budget, original idea—which lord knows we need more of. But I wasn’t going to roll out to see this one—I’m not a sci-fi head to begin with, and there was nothing in the trailer to entice me. I love to expand my horizons, but I also know my taste, and life is too short to seek out films I’m just not interested in. The film got positive-leaning reviews overall, though many of the criticisms were about in line with what I expected. And then it pretty much just…disappeared. Personally, I see a trailer for another dim, gray, dystopian sci-fi with “timely themes” and I shuffle it off to the “pay no mind” part of my brain. But I guess that’s a “me” problem.
Heart of Stone
Hollywood’s sinister plan to make us love Gal Gadot isn’t quite the same as when the studio system manufactured stars out of Lucille LeSueur (Joan Crawford) and Archibald Leach (Cary Grant). For starters, Crawford and Grant were very talented and people liked watching them in movies. Conversely, Gadot is not a good actor. In fact, the only time I see people talking about her acting is to make fun of it, like “Enough champagne to fill the Nile” and the infamous “Imagine” video. Do people out there like Gadot? I will admit I exist in a bit of a bubble composed solely of people who detest her presence, so who knows—maybe the average American loves her wooden acting and expressionless, beautiful face. I mean, they have to…right? For the film industry to keep dropping her into starring roles like Heart of Stone? I feel like every review of her acting is always “Ooooh she’s almost there…” and it’s like, if she isn’t there yet, will she ever be? Anyway, Heart of Stone: Allegedly a movie.
Tetris
For whatever reason, 2023 was the year of “how did this get made?” movies: Flamin’ Hot, about the creation of Flamin’ Hot Cheetos; Air, about the creation of Air Jordans; BlackBerry, about the creation of BlackBerry (great titles, everyone); and Tetris—self-explanatory. And while amassing fairly positive reviews, Tetris didn’t have the juice of Air, the awards-buzziness of Glenn Howerton in Blackberry or the “why the hell did anyone think this was a good premise for a whole movie?” of Flamin’ Hot. Amid a sea of biographical product origin stories, Tetris didn’t really stand out. It didn’t help that the only name star was lead actor Taron Egerton, who isn’t real star material, and is a mostly tepid presence even with some nominations for Rocketman back in 2019. Tetris is also apparently less of a “how did this beloved consumer project get made?” film and more of a “here is how capitalism wins out against communism” film. The narrative doesn’t follow the development of Tetris, but the discovery of the iconic game originally created by a Soviet programmer, and the race to bring it over to America. It has a slightly nationalist bent that rubbed some critics the wrong way, dubbed alongside the other films mentioned here as “capitalist porn.” But you’re gonna win over more hearts if you’ve got Affleck and Damon involved; it’s just simple math.
Winnie the Pooh: Blood & Honey
Not a mainstream film and maybe the stupidest inclusion on this list, the release of Winnie the Pooh and his friends in the Hundred-Acre Wood into the public domain early last year brought with it the announcement of a “Winnie the Pooh horror film” to immediately cash in on Pooh’s freedom from copyright. Now sporting an iconic 3% on Rotten Tomatoes, this low-budget film roused a lot of hullabaloo following its announcement back in spring of 2022, due to the very audacity to take beloved children’s characters and pervert them for a tasteless gorefest. That doesn’t sound all that bad to me actually, it was just clear that the movie wasn’t going to be any good—I wasn’t exactly tempted by the sight of full-size adults wearing Spirit Halloween Pooh character masks in the trailer. The controversy allowed Winnie the Pooh: Blood & Honey to enjoy box office success, taking in over $5 million against its humble $100K budget. But cultural memory is short, and as with a lot of stuff that generates controversy in the lead-up, once it’s out there, no one cares anymore. Does anyone reading this right now remember that this thing came out this year? And now because something went viral on social media, we’re getting a whole fucking franchise.
Brianna Zigler is an entertainment writer based in middle-of-nowhere Massachusetts. Her work has appeared at Little White Lies, Film School Rejects, Thrillist, Bright Wall/Dark Room and more, and she writes a bi-monthly newsletter called That’s Weird. You can follow her on Twitter, where she likes to engage in stimulating discussions on films like Movie 43, Clifford, and Watchmen.