ExploreCompareKidsFind Your IQMy TVITonightBlogAboutNewsletterHow We ScoreJoin Founding Circle

Cinema · 2014 Ranked

Best Films of 2014, Ranked by IQ Score

The year the prestige-indie convergence reached its mid-2010s peak. The films of 2014, ranked by IQ Score.

2014 is widely cited as the mid-2010s peak of prestige-indie convergence. Whiplash, Boyhood, Birdman, Inherent Vice, Mr. Turner, A Most Violent Year, Nightcrawler, all released within twelve months.

Anchor picks: Boyhood (Richard Linklater's 12-year production) is the canonical formal-experiment entry. Whiplash (Damien Chazelle's debut) is the canonical music-pedagogy entry. Birdman won Best Picture and Best Director. Inherent Vice (PTA) is the only English-language Pynchon adaptation.

17 titles · ranked by IQ Score

  1. 1
    Interstellar poster, IQ Score 189/200, Masterclass tier

    Interstellar

    Masterclass sci-fi, drama

    A former pilot leads a desperate mission through a wormhole to find a habitable planet as Earth becomes uninhabitable. Educational elements about physics, climate change, and relativity. Cognitive engagement from the tim…

    189/200
  2. 2
    Selma poster, IQ Score 176/200, Masterclass tier

    Selma

    Masterclass biography, drama, historical

    2014 Best Picture nominee. The Selma-to-Montgomery voting rights marches led by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. High cognitive demands from the political strategy and moral complexity. Exceptional educational value, the film…

    176/200
  3. 3
    Whiplash poster, IQ Score 172/200, Masterclass tier

    Whiplash

    Masterclass drama

    A drummer pursues excellence under an abusive conductor. Educational about music, obsession, and perfectionism. Cognitive engagement from the power dynamics and the ambiguity. Entertainment from the tension and the drumm…

    172/200
  4. 4
    Birdman poster, IQ Score 168/200, Masterclass tier

    Birdman

    Masterclass comedy, drama

    2014 Best Picture winner. Appears to be filmed in a single continuous shot as a washed-up superhero actor mounts a Broadway play. Exceptionally high cognitive demands, the formal structure, magical realism, and meta-comm…

    168/200
  5. 5
    Mr. Turner poster, IQ Score 168/200, Masterclass tier

    Mr. Turner

    Masterclass drama, biography, art

    Mike Leigh's 2014 J.M.W. Turner biopic anchored by Timothy Spall (Cannes Best Actor) as the early-19th-century English Romantic landscape painter. The structural commitment to letting Spall's grunting-and-spitting physic…

    168/200
  6. 6
    The Tale of the Princess Kaguya poster, IQ Score 166/200, Masterclass tier

    The Tale of the Princess Kaguya

    Masterclass animation, drama, fantasy

    Isao Takahata's 2013 final film before his death, an adaptation of the 10th-century Japanese folk tale 'The Tale of the Bamboo Cutter.' The hand-drawn watercolor-and-charcoal animation style is among the medium's most-fo…

    166/200
  7. 7
    Inherent Vice poster, IQ Score 160/200, Masterclass tier

    Inherent Vice

    Masterclass drama, neo-noir, comedy

    PTA's 2014 Thomas Pynchon adaptation, the only English-language Pynchon film yet attempted. Joaquin Phoenix's Doc Sportello renders the late-counter-culture Los-Angeles detective in a paranoid-haze register most adaptati…

    160/200
  8. 8
    Ida poster, IQ Score 159/200, Stimulating tier

    Ida

    Stimulating drama, history

    A novice nun discovers her family's Jewish origins before taking her vows. Pawel Pawlikowski's black-and-white film is formally extraordinary, the square aspect ratio and top-heavy compositions are a precise formal choic…

    159/200
  9. 9
    The Grand Budapest Hotel poster, IQ Score 158/200, Stimulating tier

    The Grand Budapest Hotel

    Stimulating comedy, adventure

    Employs nested narrative frames, period pastiche, and geometric visual language requiring viewers to track multiple timelines while appreciating Wes Anderson's structural and formal experimentation.

    158/200
  10. 10
    Gone Girl poster, IQ Score 155/200, Stimulating tier

    Gone Girl

    Stimulating thriller, drama

    A woman disappears on her anniversary; suspicion falls on her husband. Educational about marriage and media spectacle. Cognitive engagement from the unreliable narrators and the twists. Entertainment from the psychologic…

    155/200
  11. 11
    Force Majeure poster, IQ Score 150/200, Stimulating tier

    Force Majeure

    Stimulating drama, comedy

    A Swedish man instinctively flees an avalanche at a ski resort, abandoning his wife and children, the incident haunts the family vacation. Ruben Ostlund's earlier film is exceptional, the single incident's reverberations…

    150/200
  12. 12
    Nightcrawler poster, IQ Score 145/200, Stimulating tier

    Nightcrawler

    Stimulating crime, drama, thriller

    Follows freelance videographer infiltrating Los Angeles news cycle, where moral degradation emerges through incremental choices and institutional demand.

    145/200
  13. 13
    Boyhood poster, IQ Score 144/200, Stimulating tier

    Boyhood

    Stimulating drama

    A boy's childhood filmed over 12 years with the same actors. Richard Linklater's formally unique achievement. Educational about the American experience of childhood and family. The formal conceit (real aging) is the film…

    144/200
  14. 14
    We Are the Best! poster, IQ Score 141/200, Stimulating tier

    We Are the Best!

    Stimulating drama, comedy, coming-of-age

    Lukas Moodysson's 2013 Stockholm punk film, adapted from his wife Coco Moodysson's graphic novel. Three thirteen-year-old girls form a band in 1982 without instruments or songs. Moodysson treats their feminist consciousn…

    141/200
  15. 15
    A Most Violent Year poster, IQ Score 140/200, Stimulating tier

    A Most Violent Year

    Stimulating crime, drama, thriller

    J.C. Chandor sets a heating-oil businessman's insistence on the legal path against a 1981 New York that punishes it, making integrity a costly wager rather than a virtue. Isaac's Abel argues that the standard, not the sh…

    140/200
  16. 16
    Edge of Tomorrow poster, IQ Score 129/200, Competent tier

    Edge of Tomorrow

    Competent sci-fi, action, adventure

    Doug Liman builds the film's intelligence into its structure: the reset mechanic forces the viewer to track state across iterations and read each death as data, so the combat becomes a puzzle. The loop-editing is a real…

    129/200
  17. 17
    The Babadook poster, IQ Score 121/200, Competent tier

    The Babadook

    Competent horror, drama

    Psychological horror interprets supernatural entity as manifestation of maternal grief and parental burnout. Gothic atmosphere and ambiguous reality demand viewers parse trauma metaphor from literal haunting.

    121/200
Your IQ Score for this list
0 of 17 marked
Tap "+ Watched" on cards above to compute your score
--/200

Get the Saturday drop.

Every Saturday: 3 new TVI scores, 1 Brain Diet playlist, and the thinking behind what's worth watching. Free.

Questions about this ranking

What is the best film of 2014?

By IQ Score on TV Intelligentsia, Boyhood, Whiplash, Birdman, and Inherent Vice anchor the year's Masterclass tier. The Grand Budapest Hotel, A Most Violent Year, and Mr. Turner round out the canonical entries.

Why was 2014 such a strong year?

2014 was widely cited as the mid-2010s peak of prestige-indie convergence. Linklater's Boyhood (12-year production), Damien Chazelle's directorial debut (Whiplash), and PTA's only English-language Pynchon adaptation (Inherent Vice) all released within twelve months. The auteur-indie register peaked commercially.

Which 2014 film is most underrated?

A Most Violent Year (J.C. Chandor), Calvary (John Michael McDonagh), and Force Majeure (Ruben Östlund) are the three most-underrated 2014 films by IQ Score relative to cultural reach. Each operates at register the genre's mainstream catalog rarely amplifies.

Founding Circle

Lifetime membership, one payment.

Founders get the monthly founders newsletter, quarterly deep dives with a 30-day founder-first window, two title requests a year, and a place on the founders wall. 100 lifetime spots at $99.

Claim your spot →
6-month full refund. No subscription.

Browse every ranked list on TV Intelligentsia

202 ranked-by-IQ lists, filmographies, decade hubs, year hubs, character rankings, streaming-platform lists, and editorial curations. All scored on the same published rubric.

See all ranked lists → Open the full database