SXSW 2024 Recap: Best and Worst Films

The winners

A full list of SXSW award winners is available at the official SXSW site. Note that Audience Awards will be announced at a later date.

Jury Award Winner, Narrative Feature Competition
tbd Bob Trevino Likes It
Comedy/Drama | USA | dir. Tracie Laymon

Writer-director Tracie Laymon's debut feature won the Jury Award in the Narrative Feature competition at this year's festival. Inspired by a friendship Laymon formed while looking for her father online, this heartfelt comedy stars Euphoria's Barbie Ferreira as Lily Trevino, a people-pleaser in need of connection after being abandoned by her mother and father. John Leguizamo plays Bob Trevino, a man who has never put himself first until his need for friendship leads him to answer a Facebook message from a stranger. IndieWire critic Samantha Bergeson believes "Leguizamo may give one of his career-best performances," but it's "Ferreira 's surprising command onscreen that is the most memorable." For Fletcher Peters of The Daily Beast, "Leguizamo and Ferreira are a perfect match," in a film that "spins a fascinating story into a superb movie." And THR's Angie Han adds, "Like its heroine, the comedy can be bright and bouncy and frequently funny. But also like her, it 's secretly a tearjerker, and never more effectively than when it 's at its very sweetest."

Jury Award Winner, Documentary Feature Competition
tbd Grand Theft Hamlet
Documentary | UK | dir. Sam Crane

Co-directors (and partners) Sam Crane and Penny Grylis took home the top prize in the Documentary Feature competition for this adventurous chronicle of Crane's attempt, with his fellow actor friend Mark Oosterveen, to mount a performance of Hamlet inside the digital world of Grand Theft Auto Online while quarantined in January 2021. Collider's Ross Bonaime thinks it's a "compelling and strange endeavor that recontextualizes the classic play in interesting ways," and Leslie Felperin of THR finds it "innovative, highly amusing and often touching." IndieWire critic David Ehrlich agrees, declaring it "hilarious and unexpectedly poignant," while Screen Daily's Fionnuala Halligan labels GTH an "easy, wry, instantly rewarding watch."

Best of the festival

Below are additional titles generating the most positive buzz at this year's SXSW festival. That's followed by a list of the remaining notable festival debuts, and then by a recap of this year's duds. Note that any films which previously debuted at other festivals are excluded.

tbd Civil War
Action | USA | dir. Alex Garland
Opens in theaters on April 12

The latest thought-provoking feature from writer-director Alex Garland (Men, Annihilation, Ex Machina) follows veteran photojournalist Lee (Kirsten Dunst), her mentor Sammy (Stephen McKinley Henderson), reporter Joel (Wagner Moura), and Jessie (Cailee Spaeny), a young photographer, as they journey through a war-torn near-future America from New York to Washington D.C. in hopes of getting an interview with the President (Nick Offerman). Appropriately enough, it left critics divided. Despite a "transcendent performance from Kirsten Dunst" and "Garland 's adept visual storytelling, supported by daring cuts by Jake Roberts and offbeat needledrops, the core of Civil War feels hollow" for Screen Daily's Robert Daniels. At Rolling Stone, David Fear expresses similar feelings, writing, "Civil War offers a lot of food for thought on the surface, yet you 're never quite sure what you 're tasting or why, exactly."

But for David Sims of The Atlantic, "It's exciting to watch [Garland] scale up his ambitions without diminishing his provocations—there 's no one to root for, and no real reward waiting at the end of this miserable quest." Slant's Rocco T. Thompson declares Civil War "frightening, even-tempered, and disarmingly humane," deeming it "intelligent precision filmmaking trained on an impossible subject." And RogerEbert.com's Matt Zoller Seitz adds, "Civil War is a furiously convincing and disturbing thing when you're watching it. It's a great movie that has its own life force. It's not like anything Garland has made. It's not like anything anyone has made, even though it contains echoes of dozens of other films (and novels) that appear to have fed the filmmaker's imagination."

tbd The Fall Guy
Action/Comedy/Drama | USA | dir. David Leitch
Opens in theaters on May 3

Working from a script by Drew Pearce, stunt man turned director David Leitch (Bullet Train, Deadpool 2, Atomic Blonde) is at the helm of this very loose adaptation of the 1980s television series with which it basically shares only a title and the name and job of the lead character. Ryan Gosling is Colt Seavers, a stunt man who is reunited with the one that got away, Emily Blunt's Jody Moreno. She's directing a film and needs Colt to stand-in for the star, Aaron Taylor-Johnson's Tom Ryder. Vulture critic Bilge Ebiri believes "Blunt and Gosling have splendid chemistry – the kind of onscreen magnetism shared by people who are not just insanely hot but also simply know how to look at each other." Rolling Stone's David Fear agrees, writing, "The Fall Guy is at its delirious best not when it 's ginning up sound and fury and mayhem, but when it simply lets Gosling and Blunt trade screwball banter and give every scene they share a will-they-or-won 't-they tension." For The Guardian's Adrian Horton, it's a "consistently good time, two hours of zingers with impeccable timing, two bona fide movie stars with palpable chemistry, several enjoyably meta send-ups of the business and, of course, plenty of crazy stunts." Writing for Collider, Perri Nemiroff declares it a "big-screen delight and a moviemaking lover 's dream," and Fletcher Peters of The Daily Beast finds it "clever, charming, and full of laughs."

tbd Omni Loop
Comedy/Drama/Sci-fi | USA | dir. Bernardo Britto

Critics believe there's much more to like in this sci-fi dramedy than in writer-director Bernardo Britto 's previous feature, Jacqueline (Argentine). Omni Loop stars Mary-Louise Parker as Zoya, a woman who is stuck in a time loop while dealing with a black hole in her chest. When she meets Ayo Edebiri's Paula, Zoya hopes she has found someone who could help solve her time-travel conundrum. Writing for IndieWire, Katie Rife enjoys how the film handles its premise in a "way that feels fresh and interesting," and Stephen Saito of Variety appreciates how Britto is "more interested in emotional implications rather than scientific ones." THR critic David Rooney adds, "What keeps the movie engaging is the rapport between the two women, and the way their mutual support and compassion slowly shifts their focus."

tbd Timestalker
Horror/Rom-com | UK | dir. Alice Lowe

Writer-director-actor Alice Lowe's follow-up to her debut feature, Prevenge, is a "darkly funny, emotionally insightful time-travel comedy drama about a woman determinedly pursuing the supposed love of her life throughout history," according to Nikki Baughan of Screen Daily. Lowe stars as the lovelorn Agnes and Aneurin Barnard (Dunkirk) is Alex, her object of pursuit over centuries. "Timestalker delivers belly laughs in the most unexpected ways," writes Matt Donato in his review for Collider, adding that it's "an odd duck of a romantic comedy that does everything except conform to subgenre molds." The Playlist's Rodrigo Perez praises the film's ability "to quickly blend laughs, constant craving, and even genuine pathos throughout all its eras," and IndieWire critic Kate Erbland believes, "You 've heard this story before, but you 've never seen it quite like this."

Other notable debuts (good but unexceptional)

tbd Arcadian
Action/Horror/Thriller | Ireland | dir. Benjamin Brewer
Opens in theaters on April 12 and streams on Shudder later in 2024

Working from a script by Michael Nilon (Braven), Benjamin Brewer (The Trust) makes his solo feature directing debut with this post-apocalyptic horror-thriller starring Nicolas Cage as a father who must protect his two sons (Jaeden Martell and Maxwell Jenkins) from deadly creatures that come out after sundown. It's a "good Nicolas Cage movie" and a "work of horror worth taking seriously even as things go gloriously off the rails," according to Chase Hutchinson of Collider. RogerEbert.com's Brian Tallerico believes Arcadian to be an "effective creature feature that avoids a lot of the traps of post-apocalyptic horror ... and delivers on its premise." And in his review for Screen Daily, Robert Daniels claims "the design of these monsters is nearly worth the price of admission alone" in what amounts to a "creature feature composed of cheap thrills and silent chills."

tbd Azrael
Action/Fantasy/Horror/Sci-fi/Thriller | USA | dir. E.L. Katz

Samara Weaving (Ready or Not) stars in this nearly dialogue-free horror film from writer Simon Barrett (You're Next, The Guest) and director E.L. Katz (Cheap Thrills, Small Crimes). Wanted as a sacrifice to appease a demonic evil, Weaving's Azrael spends the film fleeing various terrors, resulting in what Collider's Matt Donato describes as a "cutthroat minimalist action-thriller" that "benefits from Samara Weaving's star power." Writing for THR, Jordan Mintzer believes this "familiar if well-executed genre programmer dishes out enough gory thrills." And Katie Rife of IGN claims it's an "inventive and exciting blend of folk and survival horror." The Daily Beast critic Coleman Spilde adds, "A lack of self-importance keeps the film from feeling like an experiment, but rather a fully formed thesis brought to life by an electrifying Weaving, whose daring choices may have solidified her as Hollywood 's next horror dynamo."

tbd Babes
Comedy | USA | dir. Pamela Adlon
Opens in theaters on May 17

Better Things creator and star Pamela Adlon's debut feature stars Ilana Glazer and Michelle Buteau as best friends dealing with an unexpected pregnancy and the daily struggles of motherhood. Written by Glazer with her fellow Broad City writer Josh Rabinowitz, Babes is an " endearing portrait of friendship wrapped in a raunchy maternal comedy," writes THR critic Lovia Gyarkye, who also believes the film "bursts with a boisterous energy from its opening moments." Rolling Stone's David Fear describes it as "body horror with belly laughs" with a script that is "determined to milk every ounce of humor out of every ounce of bodily fluid that may be spilled, squirted or secreted by expectant moms." Variety critic Peter Debruge also praises Adlon's "unapologetically crude homage to motherhood" as a "consistently outrageous tour through the joys of pregnancy." And in is review for TheWrap, Matthew Creith finds Glazer and Adlon to be an "ideal match," resulting in a "comedic gold mine of delightful punch lines."

tbd Desert Road
Thriller | USA | dir. Shannon Triplett

Writer-director Shannon Triplett's feature debut follows an aspiring photographer (Kristine Froseth) who wrecks her car and discovers that each time she walks down the road for help she finds herself back at her car. For The Playlist's Rodrigo Perez, it's "admirably ambitious" but "never lands and is too sparse and spare to work." More positive is IndieWire's Wilson Chapman, who writes, "In its best moments, Desert Road mixes its oblique and withholding storytelling and old-fashioned thriller filmmaking to often spellbinding effect." THR critic Sheri Linden praises Froseth's "compelling portrait of youthful resilience and vulnerability" in this "gripping mind-bender" that she believes "will surely invite repeat viewings to discern its hints and untangle its logic."

tbd The Idea of You
Drama | USA | dir. Michael Showalter
Streams on Prime Video beginning May 2

Working with writer Jennifer Westfeldt (Friends with Kids), director Michael Showalter (The Big Sick, Spoiler Alert) adapts Robinne Lee's best-selling novel about Solène (Anne Hathaway), a 40-year-old single mom, who begins an unexpected romance with Hayes Campbell (Nicholas Galitzine), the 24-year-old lead singer of a globally popular boy band. THR's Lovia Gyarkye believes this romantic comedy is "bit like cotton candy — an airy confection consumed with the knowledge of its fleeting enjoyment," admitting that "most of the film 's charm comes from Hathaway." Alejandra Martinez of TheWrap finds it "refreshing to see desire, especially one that prioritizes a woman in her forties," and praises the "steamy, unapologetic, urgent feel to the film 's intimate scenes. The filmmaking underscores the desire, passion and emotion that passes between the two main characters." For /Film's Ryan Scott "this is the genre at its best," while Variety critic Peter Debruge declares it an "instant classic" that improves upon the original book, proclaiming "this is Hathaway 's movie, and she owns it: independent, desirable and never, ever desperate."

tbd Magpie
Thriller | UK | dir. Sam Yates

Daisy Ridley stars as an aggrieved wife in this thriller written by her husband, actor Tom Bateman, and directed by Sam Yates. With a newborn and a young daughter (Hiba Ahmed), Annette (Ridley) suffers quietly as her husband Ben (Shazad Latif), a writer, starts an affair with a glamorous actress (Matilda Lutz), but she has more to reveal in a twist that "has a kicky crowd-pleasing resonance," according to Variety's Owen Gleiberman. Writing for IndieWire, Katie Rife finds the script "lean and sharp, which is impressive given that this is scribe Tom Bateman 's first project as a writer," while Yates, who "primarily works in theater ... acquits himself admirably with a limited, steely color palette, tight editing, and an emphasis on the actors." For Screen Daily's Robert Daniels Magpie is a "slow-burn gothic noir that is delectably petty and creepily conjured" and an "assured, gratifyingly cheeky debut by Yates."

tbd Monkey Man
Action/Thriller | USA | dir. Dev Patel
Opens in theaters on April 5

In his directorial debut, Dev Patel stars as Kid, a young man taking beatings in an underground fight club in hopes of getting close to the villainous elites who took everything from him as a child. For Coleman Spilde of The Daily Beast, "Patel certainly has vision." but "his first film is wildly scattershot and tonally erratic." Collider critic Perri Nemiroff similarly laments, "Monkey Man isn't perfect, often getting dragged down by thinly sketched characters, but it marks Dev Patel as a director to watch." Jacob Hall of /Film is much more positive, writing, "There's more going on — visually, emotionally, thematically — in single moments of this ultra-violent action movie than you find in most films of the genre. To call it ambitious would be an understatement." And The AV Club's Matthew Jackson believes it's a "muscular, emotional, ferocious triumph of a movie, and when it 's over, you 'll want to go right back in and watch it all over again."

tbd My Dead Friend Zoe
Comedy/Drama | USA | dir. Kyle Hausmann-Stokes

The debut feature from co-writer (with AJ Bermudez) and director Kyle Hausmann-Stokes stars Sonequa Martin-Green as Merit, a U.S. Army Afghanistan War veteran struggling with the continuing presence in her life of Zoe (Natalie Morales), her dead best friend from the Army. Hausmann-Stokes, a former Army paratrooper and Iraq veteran, expands his 2022 short with a cast that includes Ed Harris as Merit's grandfather, who is struggling with dementia, and Morgan Freeman as the leader of Merit's therapy group for those suffering from PTSD. For Variety's Peter Debruge, it's an "affecting look at mental health among ex-servicepeople," while Proma Khosla of IndieWire believes the film is "possessed of a realism that has to come from heartbreaking firsthand experience." In his review for Collider, Matt Donato adds, "My Dead Friend Zoe might bill itself as a comedy, and you will laugh — Natalie Morales could make us laugh as the Grim Reaper in an orphanage — but be sure to bring the tissues because this movie is a heartbreaker in the best, most fulfilling way."

The disappointments

tbd The Greatest Hits
Drama/Sci-fi | USA | dir. Ned Benson
Opens in theaters on April 5 and streams on Hulu beginning April 12

Writer-director Ned Benson's (The Disappearance of Eleanor Rigby) exploration of grief stars Lucy Boynton as a woman who finds that listening to certain songs can literally transport her back in time—to the point just before she and her then-boyfriend (David Corenswet) experienced a car crash that proved fatal for him. Out of all of the time-travel stories at this year's SXSW (and there certainly were a lot of them), The Greatest Hits shone the brightest for The Daily Beast's Coleman Spilde, who admires "a crafty yet subtle inversion of a stale genre" that boasts a "confident script and enchanting, modest direction." But Austin Chronicle critic Marjorie Baumgarten finds the film less successful (albeit "irrepressibly romantic"), cautioning, "Perhaps it's asking too much for a time-travel romance to conform to rules of logic, but The Greatest Hits never strikes the right chord." And THR's Caryn James seems to agree, writing, "The Greatest Hits is the kind of film that should sweep you away with its charm and emotion. Instead, it's too transparently button-pushing to go beyond the stale tropes of the weepy drama."

tbd Immaculate
Horror | USA | dir. Michael Mohan
Opens in theaters on March 22

Sydney Sweeney reunites with Michael Mohan (Save the Date), who directed her in The Voyeurs, for this horror film about Cecilia, a devout nun who finds herself pregnant after arriving at a secluded convent in the Italian countryside. For Brian Tallerico of RogerEbert.com, Sweeney "does absolutely nothing wrong here, finding a potential new arrow in her professional quiver as a scream queen, but everything else around Immaculate crumbles due to its remarkable lack of ambition." Coleman Spilde of The Daily Beast also believes Sweeney "transcends all of the triteness" of this "frankensteined monstrosity, stitched together with little grace or acumen." Writing for IGN, Katie Rife finds Immaculate "beautifully shot, and very loud" but warns that it's "simply too mild and reliant on jump scares." The film does have its defenders, however. Derek Smith of Slant claims the "film 's final act contains some of the most twisted, gory violence this particular subgenre of horror has seen in years." And in his review for TheWrap, Chase Hutchinson declares it "genuinely scary just as it is shattering."

tbd Road House (2024)
Action/Thriller | USA | dir. Doug Liman
Streams on Prime Video beginning March 21

While director Doug Liman's threat to boycott the premiere of his remake of 1989's Road House proved empty (he ultimately showed up), critics did agree with his stance that this crowd-pleaser should have been released in theaters. Jake Gyllenhaal stars as an ex-UFC fighter who takes a job supporting a Florida Keys bar owner (Jessica Williams) who's having some trouble with a douchey crime boss (Billy Magnussen) and his henchmen, one of whom is played by Conor McGregor. Variety's Owen Gleiberman believes this "infectiously stylish piece of slumming" could be a "decisive hit" if it played in theaters, and Matthew Creith of TheWrap thinks "this remake fights for the right to be seen on any size screen available." For Screen Rant's Ferdosa Abdi, "Road House is loud, abrasive, and maddeningly entertaining. What it lacks in depth or nuance it makes up for with charm, lazy wit, and style." And Adrian Horton of The Guardian adds, "The straight-to-streaming release plan, however intentional, is indeed a bummer, as Liman 's rowdy, campy remake both looks and sounds more expensive and textured than what we 've come to expect from digital releases."

But as you may have surmised from that not-so-hot Metascore, a decent number of critics were far less enthusiastic about Liman's remake. This latter group includes RogerEbert.com critic Brian Tallerico, who finds the film an enjoyable B-movie to start but adds, "[O]nce this defiantly goofy movie starts to take itself seriously, and asks us too often to do the same, the wheels come off with ridiculous twists, awkward line readings, and some of the worst fight CGI in years." Similarly, Slashfilm's Jacob Hall warns, "Once you squint and look past the Gyllenhaal of it all, there's not much on offer here. The leading man tears through a thin sketch of a story, populated by characters, performances, and even action that feel like placeholders."

tbd Stormy
Documentary | USA | dir. Sarah Gibson
Streams on Peacock beginning March 18

Sarah Gibson's documentary on Stormy Daniels, the woman to whom Donald Trump paid $130,000 of hush money through his lawyer Michael Cohen, received mixed reactions from critics upon its premiere at SXSW. Brian Tallerico of RogerEbert.com believes Stormy to be a "successful attempt to strip away the political issues and present its subject as a flesh-and-blood human being, someone with feelings, anxieties, and a great deal of courage." But for THR critic Daniel Fienberg, "the exhaustive repetition of the most familiar parts of her narrative — plus an over-reliance on poorly utilized footage from an ethically compromised earlier documentary project — left me more irritated than moved by Stormy, however persuasive I found its main character." IndieWire's  David Ehrlich echoes those sentiments when he writes, "The more this bland and incurious Peacock Original argues that Stormy has been done wrong by the media, the more convincingly it makes the case that she deserved a better documentary."

tbd Y2K
Comedy | USA | dir. Kyle Mooney

SNL alum Kyle Mooney 's directorial debut stars Rachel Zegler, Jaeden Martell, and Julian Dennison as high schoolers who must battle a rise of the machines when the clock strikes midnight at their New Year's Eve party. For THR critic Lovia Gyarkye, the film, written by Mooney (Brigsby Bear) and Evan Winter, has "undeniable flair" but is "nevertheless too unfocused to appreciate." Screen Daily critic Robert Daniels agrees, warning that Y2K "never develops into an original story, circling the drain around nostalgic jokes that soon lose potency." The Guardian's Adrian Horton is slightly more positive, finding it a "promising if wildly uneven debut that banks heavily, often successfully, on Mooney 's penchant for late 90s nostalgia." Supporters of the film include John Fink of The Film Stage, who admits it's "far from perfect" but also "vibrant and often hilarious," and IndieWire's Christian Zilko, who declares it "one of the most natural crowd pleasers that A24 has ever produced" with "more than its share of laugh-out-loud lines and big cinematic moments."

Additional content by Jason Dietz

All photos above courtesy of SXSW.