Cinema · 2023 Ranked
Best Films of 2023, Ranked by IQ Score
The year auteur cinema dominated theatrical and Oscar conversation simultaneously. The films of 2023, ranked by IQ Score.
2023 is the year auteur cinema dominated theatrical and Oscar conversation simultaneously. Oppenheimer (Nolan, Best Picture), The Zone of Interest (Glazer), Past Lives (Song), Killers of the Flower Moon (Scorsese), Anatomy of a Fall (Triet), Poor Things (Lanthimos), all released within twelve months.
The structural argument for 2023-as-canonical-year: the Barbenheimer summer-2023 cultural phenomenon, Scorsese's most-ambitious epic since The Irishman, Glazer's first feature in 10 years winning Best International Feature, Celine Song's directorial debut anchoring Best Picture conversation, and the Greta Gerwig + Christopher Nolan + Greta Lee + Sofia Coppola simultaneous-2023-release year.
20 titles · ranked by IQ Score
-
1
-
2
-
3
-
4
-
5
-
6
-
7
-
8
-
9
-
10
-
11
-
12
-
13
-
14
-
15
-
16
-
17
-
18
-
19
-
20
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 2023?
By IQ Score on TV Intelligentsia, Oppenheimer (Best Picture) and The Zone of Interest (193) anchor the year's Masterclass tier. Past Lives, Killers of the Flower Moon, Anatomy of a Fall, and Poor Things round out the canonical entries.
Why is The Zone of Interest ranked so high?
The Zone of Interest (Glazer, 2023) scores 193 on the TVI rubric, among the highest scores in the entire database. The film's formal commitment to rendering the Auschwitz commandant's family domestic life with documentary-grade banality (the camp violence is heard, never shown) is the rare prestige-cinema work whose form IS the argument.
Was Barbenheimer 2023 a watershed moment?
The July 21, 2023 simultaneous release of Oppenheimer (Nolan) and Barbie (Gerwig) became the year's defining cultural moment, both films broke commercial expectations while operating at very different prestige-and-commercial registers. The 'Barbenheimer' meme drove theatrical attendance at a scale post-COVID Hollywood badly needed.
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 →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