100 Best Movies on Kanopy Right Now

100 Best Movies on Kanopy Right Now

November 4, 2024

Share:

twitter
facebook
reddit
pinterest
link

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.

Kanopy, like your library, 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. The goal of this list is to gather the excellent recent movies available on Kanopy in one place. 40 of them.

All of these movies, like everything else on agoodmovietowatch, are highly-rated by viewers and acclaimed by critics.

31. Melancholia (2011)

7.6

Country

Denmark, France, Germany

Director

Lars von Trier

Actors

Alexander Skarsgård, Brady Corbet, Charlotte Gainsbourg, Charlotte Rampling

Moods

A-list actors, Depressing, Discussion-sparking

When categorizing Lars von Trier’s oeuvre, critics speak of a “Depression Trilogy” bookended by Antichrist and Nymphomaniac, but Melancholia is the one that really embodies the concepts and worries nested at the heart of this project. The Danish director may be known for his provocative approach to filmmaking and disregard of taboos, but with this film, he makes room for vulnerability. On the character of Justine (Dunst) he places the weight of the world, only after allowing her to be weak, small, and socially unacceptable at her own wedding celebration. A rather subversive decision, but vesting these expectations in someone as wide-ranging as Kirsten Dunst assures an absolute win, even if there remain some questionable characteristics that align too well with abstract male fantasies of what a woman in distress would look like.

32. The Forest for the Trees (2004)

7.6

Country

Germany

Director

Female director, Maren Ade

Actors

Daniela Holtz, Eva Löbau, Heinz Röser-Dümmig, Ilona Schulz

Moods

Character-driven, Funny, Raw

More than a decade before she made Toni Erdmann, German filmmaker Maren Ade turned her eye on a small-town school, a socially awkward teacher, and the inarticulate in between. Even with her debut, Ade showcased a talent for spotting the hidden comic potential of situations that can be wounding, turning vulnerabilities into power through comedy. The Forest For the Trees is a dilemma-film, in the ways in which it both invites and rejects identification with Melanie. A frighteningly optimistic person, she misreads most if not all social cues and finds herself in embarrassing situations. Even more, her devotion to making it all work, after moving away from the big city for said teaching job, is something a lot of viewers can recognize and support, but her borderline unlikeability is sometimes too hard to ignore. However, a majestic finale crowns the film with a scene that is worth rewatching again and again, like a dream you wish to appropriate for yourself.

33. Stray (2021)

7.6

Country

Turkey, United States of America

Director

Elizabeth Lo, Female director

Moods

Original, Slice-of-Life, Thought-provoking

Beautifully directed and blessed to be led by the wonderfully gentle and curious dog Zeytin, Stray commits to its unique point of view by reimagining Istanbul as a place made up of cars, torsos, and trash on the street. Such constraints on one’s filmmaking might make it seem like director Elizabeth Lo is in the perfect position to manipulate her animal characters in order to get the “story” she wants, but it genuinely never feels that way. If anything, Zeytin is the one who pulls Lo into orbit, and there’s a sense that the director is simply recording what the dog is revealing to us about human beings’ daily rituals and how they end up creating structure, culture, and (sadly) outcasts from this culture.

34. City Hall (2020)

7.6

Country

United States of America

Director

Frederick Wiseman

Actors

Marty Walsh

Moods

Challenging, Inspiring, Instructive

From the sheer size of Frederick Wiseman’s documentaries (both in length and scope), it should be clear that his goal isn’t necessarily to have us retain every piece of information he gives us in all of this film’s board meetings and press conferences. This is a film interested in the macro view of how a city works, and Wiseman’s attention to detail even in his old age (he’s 94 at the time of writing this) is truly inspiring for any aspiring documentarian. City Hall doesn’t necessarily tell us anything we might not already know about the coordination between a local government unit and its constituents and citizens, but Wiseman gets us to think of the grand design of it all—which is both wondrous and horrifying to behold.

35. Night of the Kings (2021)

7.6

Country

Canada, Cote D'Ivoire, France

Director

Philippe Lacôte

Actors

Denis Lavant, Digbeu Jean Cyrille, Issaka Sawadogo, Koné Bakary

Moods

Gripping, Original, Thought-provoking

With a script that seems to have been written for a medieval fantasy, but set in a present-day Ivorian jail, Night of the Kings immediately situates itself between the realms of reality and imagination. Whether or not one thinks that certain details about the prison’s strange rituals have been lost in translation, the mysticism surrounding the events of the movie remains impossible to shake. The idea of improvising one’s way out of trouble should make sense in any cultural context after all, and this is what keeps the film on edge—and what helps Night of the Kings work as such a singular vision from an often underrepresented region of world cinema.

36. Secret Sunshine (2007)

7.6

Country

South Korea

Director

Chang-dong Lee, Lee Chang-dong

Actors

Cha Mi-kyeong, Do-yeon Jeon, Go Seo-hee, Jang Hye-jin

Moods

Challenging, Character-driven, Dark

For better or worse, death strikes us all, fast and unexpectedly. It’s tough enough if the death is caused by ill health or accidents, but when premeditated by another person– it can be easy to lose faith in a higher power. Secret Sunshine depicts a grieving mother trying to start a new life in the countryside, though certain events make it tough to fit in. There’s a well-meaning, long-term bachelor who’s interested in her, though she’s not ready to reciprocate, and there’s townsfolk that would like to invite her to their church, though she’s reluctant to join. There’s curious, gossipy neighbors ready to comment on her every action. Secret Sunshine reveals a darker layer to the countryside towns we retreat to to cope, but it also examines the ways we grieve, cope, and deal with forgiveness, in a community that would prioritize itself at the expense of what’s morally right.

37. Amy (2015)

7.6

Country

UK, United Kingdom

Director

Asif Kapadia

Actors

Amy Winehouse, Blake Fielder, Frankie Boyle, Jay Leno

In Amy, Kapadia eschews talking heads for something more intimate: home videos, photographs, and phone messages from Winehouse’s earliest and closest friends, which he stitches together to reintroduce a version of the singer that has, up till this point, been ignored by the public. It’s an attempt to reverse Winehouse’s vilified public persona, not by denying her struggles with drug and alcohol abuse, but by showing as many parts of her as possible. The musical prodigy, jazz fanatic, and sweet friend, as well as the troubled soul, hurt child, and obsessive lover. She’s far from perfect, but she is human, not some punching bag caricature the media has made her out to be. Though Kapadia’s methods sometimes get a little too close for comfort (using phone messages intended for her friends and private clips of her being high feels borderline voyeuristic), they also feel necessary in reclaiming an identity that’s closer to her true self. During these questionable moments, Amy feels not just hard but wrong to watch, but that discomfort is also the point. It should be unsettling to get to know a real person.

38. Queen Margot (1994)

7.6

Country

France, Germany, Italy

Director

Patrice Chéreau

Actors

Asia Argento, Barbet Schroeder, Bernard Nissile, Bernard Verley

Moods

Character-driven, Discussion-sparking, Dramatic

Before Games of Thrones delivered court intrigues, shocking murders, and adulterous affairs, Queen Margot delivered all these nearly two decades earlier, depicting the dramatized, real life events of the French Wars of Religion. While it doesn’t have dragons, it has style, with some of the most stunning scenes intercut with some of the most gruesome, pushing the envelope with a freedom only possible due to none of their descendants still holding the French throne. It’s also one of the most expensive French films ever made, but every franc was put to good use, with luxurious sound, sets, costumes, and camerawork excellently supporting the cast’s performances. Initially released to mixed reception in America with 20 minutes cut from the runtime, La Reine Margot has thankfully been restored and re-released in full for its 20th anniversary in 2014.

39. Tabu (2012)

7.6

Country

Brazil, France, Germany

Director

Miguel Gomes

Actors

Ana Moreira, Carloto Cotta, Henrique Espírito Santo, Laura Soveral

Moods

Challenging, Discussion-sparking, Dramatic

Something about falling in love in an exotic place makes it feel much more romantic, leading to plenty of classic black and white films centered on the idea, with a visual language and a set of aesthetics meticulously enacted in 2012’s Tabu. These classic films, however, rarely contemplate the actual reality behind these films– the reason that made these romantic trips possible in the first place. Tabu subtly critiques this indulgent imagination, with the silent memory melodramatically portrayed and narrated by the white lovers, but with the African natives and their homes and landscapes depicted naturally. Writer-director Miguel Gomes remixes classic cinema techniques to paint and reframe the lovers’ myopic memory, in such a striking fashion.

40. Chinese Odyssey 2002 (2002)

7.5

Country

Hong Kong

Director

Jeff Lau Chun-Wai

Actors

Athena Chu, Chang Chen, Eric Kot Man-Fai, Faye Wong

Moods

Dramatic, Easy, Funny

While produced by Wong Kar Wai, Chinese Odyssey 2002 isn’t a moody, melancholy drama that we’re used to. Instead, the Ming Dynasty-set adventure directed by Jeffrey Lau comically spoofs plenty of the beloved genres that captivated Chinese audiences– wuxia epics, musical dramas, and historical romances. The ludicrous crossdressing plot is played in such an over-the-top way, with Lau visually delivering his jabs, with a narrator providing droll commentary on the events, and with intercuts of faux interviews and excerpts from everyone, even including the disgruntled innkeeper spying on the crossdressing princess and the confused restaurant owner. It’s actually quite impressive how the ridiculous plot leads to such a wholesome, moving conclusion.

Comments

Add a comment

Curated by humans, not algorithms.

agmtw

© 2024 A Good Movie to Watch. Altona Studio, LLC, all rights reserved.