100 Best Movies on Kanopy Right Now

100 Best Movies on Kanopy Right Now

November 24, 2024

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Kanopy is a platform that allows you to stream movies for free with your library card or university login. It’s just like making a trip to the library to borrow DVDs, except without the trip or the DVD part – just the watching. And like your library, Kanopy is full of classics. That’s a great thing if you’re into older movies, but if you’re looking for quality recent titles, you have a lot of digging to do. That’s where we come in. In this list, we’re gathering excellent recent movies available on Kanopy in one place. All 100 of these movies, like everything else on agoodmovietowatch, are highly rated by viewers and acclaimed by critics, so make sure you visit our other lists, or browse the site by mood, if you want more recommendations.

91. Faces Places (2017)

6.9

Country

France

Director

Agnès Varda, Female director

Actors

Agnès Varda, Amaury Bossy, Jean-Luc Godard, Jean-Paul Beaujon

Moods

Heart-warming, Lovely, Warm

What happens to genius and complex filmmakers once they reach old age? Agnès Varda at 89 is one example. She maintains an interest in the same deep questions but portrays them in a casual way – basically tries to have a little more fun with things. She finds a friend in JR, a young artist with a truck that prints large portraits. Together they go around French villages (the French title is “Visages Villages”), connecting with locals and printing their photos on murals. Their interactions are researched, but not worked. In fact, they are deeply improvised. Because of this and because the movie is structured in an episode format, it will completely disarm you. And when you least expect it you will be met with long-lasting takes on mortality, loss, but also gender, the environment and the evasiveness of life and art.

92. Hotel Salvation (2016)

6.9

Country

India

Director

Shubhashish Bhutiani

Actors

Adil Hussain, Anil Rastogi, Geetanjali Kulkarni, Lalit Behl

Moods

Thought-provoking

Hotel Salvation is a touching movie about a father asking his son for a last wish : let him die in the Holy city of Varanasi. This Indian drama will let you discover a modern Hindu philosophy, the power of the scenic Varanasi and the bonds of family. It faces the question of death in the light, gentle and humorous way that perfectly illustrates the contradiction in question: celebrating life while surrounded by death.

93. Lady Bird (2017)

6.9

Country

United States of America

Director

Female director, Greta Gerwig

Actors

Abhimanyu Katyal, Andy Buckley, Anita Kalathara, Bayne Gibby

Moods

Slice-of-Life

A beautiful coming-of-age story that is mixed with one of the best depictions of a mother character in movie history both make Lady Bird an absolutely exquisite film. Its slice-of-life story taps into the universal issues, dreams, and frustrations that almost every small-town kid has faced; and it manages to do all of this without feeling forced or cliché. This is because of the attention and care that were given to it but also because of how tightly it’s based on the life of its writer / director Greta Gerwig. A wonderful movie.

94. It’s a Disaster (2012)

6.9

Country

United States of America

Director

Todd Berger

Actors

Kevin M. Brennan, Laura Adkin, Rachel Boston

Moods

Discussion-sparking, Slow, Weird

A very particular dark comedy. If it’s for you, you’ll find it to be hilarious and thought provoking. If not, you might find it too weird and a bit slow. The movie centers around the relationships between couples having brunch together one morning and what happens when they are hit by a weird tragedy. Not only do you get to learn a lot about the characters, it offers you the opportunity to put yourself in their unlikely situation. Watch this movie with a friend and you’ll have a lot to talk about for sure, it as one of the best endings I’ve ever seen in a movie. It’s one of those films you can’t say too much about without giving it away, but it’s definitely worth the watch.

95. Tower (2016)

6.9

Country

United States of America

Director

Keith Maitland

Actors

Aldo Ordonez, Blair Jackson, Chris Doubek, John Fitch

Moods

Discussion-sparking, Thought-provoking, Thrilling

The unbelievable true story the first mass-shootings in America, and a documentary made with so much attention that it is almost impossible to forget. The animations might put you off if you watch the trailer, but they are what makes this movie so amazing. Added to old tapes and current statements from survivors and heroes, they perfectly fill the gaps in the enactment of what happened. An equally sad, gripping and incredibly well-made work on an event that happened 50 years ago and to which there are still no solutions.

96. The Pearl Button (2015)

6.9

Country

Chile, France, Spain

Director

Patricio Guzmán

Actors

Adil Brkovic, Gabriel Salazar, Gabriela Paterito, Javier Rebolledo

A beautiful, poetic and disturbing ode to the waters of the Chilean archipelago from the perspective of the stars and planets, its Indigenous inhabitants, and the bodies of those who were disappeared into it under the Pinochet regime. As Patricio Guzman tells us and shows us, water has a memory and a voice. The opening sequence is like Salgado’s “Genesis” photos but in colour and moving on the screen, absolutely breathtaking.

97. Always (2011)

6.9

Country

South Korea

Director

Song Il-gon

Actors

Cho Seong-ha, Goo Seung-hyun, Han Hyo-joo, Jin Goo

Moods

Depressing, Emotional, Intense

Always follows the story of Jeong-hwa and Cheol-min, both very different individuals who are gentle in their own way. The story starts off by demonstrating how different the leads are in terms of their personality and their outlook on life. The plot can be a little predictable and cliche in some moments, but Always is not a complicated movie—though in addition to being a romance, it also includes some surprising violence that may intensify your viewing experience. Still, Always is about the two leads’ struggle against fate as they try to survive their tough situations, with strong chemistry between the lead actors from start to finish.

98. Trouble the Water (2008)

6.9

Country

United States of America

Director

Carl Deal, Female director

Actors

George W. Bush, Julie Chen, Julie Chen Moonves, Michael Brown

Moods

Inspiring, Instructive, Thrilling

Nominated for an Academy Award for best documentary feature. On the day before Hurricane Katrina, a young aspiring rap singer in the 9th Ward turns her new video camera on herself and her neighbors. She keeps shooting as the water rises, neighbors struggle to rescue each other, people panic and flee. Weeks later she returns to her neighborhood and records the death and decay left behind. Raw and real, worth watching.

99. The Killing of Two Lovers (2021)

6.6

Country

United States of America

Director

Robert Machoian

Actors

Arri Graham, Avery Pizzuto, Barbara Whinnery, Chris Coy

Moods

Intense, Raw, Slow

The broad, symbolic strokes of The Killing of Two Lovers—how its story is set up and the general atmosphere it evokes—are stunning to behold. It’s a naturalistic story whose ordinary moments feel like they’re being told at the end of the world, given how deliberately chilling Robert Machoian’s direction is. Unfortunately, once you start getting into the details of the plot and its characters, their actions and decisions don’t lead to particularly interesting insights about the separation and the couple’s relationship to each other or their children. The end result is something that’s clearly driven by a compelling mood more than anything, but whose resolution still feels anticlimactic.

100. Out in the Dark (2012)

5.0

Country

Israel

Director

Michael Mayer

Actors

Alon Pdut, Chelli Goldenberg, Huda Al Imam, Jameel Khoury

Moods

Depressing, Discussion-sparking, Romantic

Stories of forbidden love are captivating, because in the face of a lover, in the face of one’s opposite, one cannot help but be challenged, hopefully for the better. This is not what happened here. Out in the Dark is a film debut that takes this idea in the Middle East, with two gay lovers coming from Palestine and Israel. It’s an intriguing idea, and had it been more nuanced, Israeli director Michael Mayer would have created a daring first feature, but the film clearly comes from a limited Israeli perspective, with no Palestinians casted or working behind the scenes. While the film may be sympathetic to hypothetical LGBTQ+ people in Palestine, Out in the Dark doesn’t have the guts to question why they’ve been persecuted in the first place.

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