100 Best Movies on Kanopy Right Now

100 Best Movies on Kanopy Right Now

November 4, 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.

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.

71. Heidi (2015)

7.2

Country

Australia, Belgium, France

Director

Alain Gsponer

Actors

Anna Schinz, Anuk Steffen, Beth Armstrong, Bruno Ganz

Moods

Easy, Feel-Good, Heart-warming

Where The Secret Garden championed the restorative powers of tending to a garden as well as one’s thoughts, Swiss novel Heidi touched on similar themes a few decades before, celebrating instead the natural beauty of the Alps mountainside, and the titular character bringing back joy and hope to her family. The film remains faithful to the novel, playing out the book’s events with a more sleek look and even more stunning landscapes of the Swiss Alps. While previous generations would inevitably compare the version of their time to this latest version, 2015’s Heidi is a decent adaptation, recreating the classic tale for today’s kids.

72. Pusher (1996)

7.2

Country

Denmark

Director

Nicolas Winding Refn

Actors

Gordon Kennedy, Gyda Hansen, Jesper Lohmann, Karsten Schrøder

Moods

Challenging, Character-driven, Dark

Films about drug dealing aren’t particularly new, but the way Pusher delves into their lives feels different– more realistic than glamorous, somewhat like a guerrilla documentary, with the handheld camera as a silent, unnamed witness. As the camera follows low-level dealer Frank through the course of a week, Kim Bodnia skillfully garners empathy with the way he holds himself through the pressure, and does the opposite when he does the same wrongs that were done to him. The story itself may be simple, but writer-director Nicolas Winding Refn made his mark through this debut, inadvertently creating a franchise and influencing Danish cinema.

73. Pushing Hands (1991)

7.2

Country

Taiwan

Director

Ang Lee

Actors

Chit-Man Chan, Deb Snyder, Fanny De Luz, Haan Lee

Moods

Challenging, Character-driven, Discussion-sparking

After a long life lived in a home one chose, it can be hard to uproot your entire life, especially in a country that seems diametrically opposed in manners and values. Before his American produced hits like Brokeback Mountain and Life of Pi, Ang Lee made his debut through Pushing Hands, a film entirely shot in America but produced from Taiwan, exploring from the Chinese perspective the generational conflict between Asian immigrants and the mainlander parents that they brought to have a good life. It’s humorous at certain moments, with the steady demeanor of Chu contrasted to everyone around him, but Pushing Hands stems from the understanding of someone who’s directly lived through it, unfolding into a thoughtful, sentimental drama that quickly established Lee’s directorial voice.

74. Shirley Valentine (1989)

7.2

Country

United Kingdom, United States of America

Director

Lewis Gilbert

Actors

Alison Steadman, Anna Keaveney, Bernard Hill, Cardew Robinson

Moods

Character-driven, Easy, Feel-Good

As an adaptation of the one-character play, it’s a delight to see Pauline Collins as Shirley Valentine rip into the signature monologue through fourth wall breaks– ranting, bantering, and raving to us about the unique follies of mundane domesticity. Collin maintains the same comedic timing and wittiness of the titular character that has captivated Liverpool, and then London, at the time. However, while critics found it easy to dismiss the script as a series of superficial, stagy ramblings, Valentine genuinely searches for life purpose, for herself, for her soul, confronting her younger aspirations, the box she was essentially crammed into due to marriage expectations, and the life that she sacrificed for family’s sake. Shirley Valentine may not have gotten the acclaim succeeding female mid-life crisis films have gotten, but it’s an underrated classic comedy that many can enjoy.

75. The Reason I Jump (2020)

7.1

Country

United Kingdom, United States of America

Director

Jerry Rothwell

Actors

David Mitchell, Donna Budway, Emma Budway, Jeremy Dear

Moods

Discussion-sparking, Instructive, Touching

For better or worse, The Reason I Jump isn’t a documentary made for autistic viewers but for a neurotypical audience that may not be very knowledgeable about autism. This means the film doesn’t really offer anything new to the conversation, and it misses the opportunity to truly let its main characters express themselves in their own unique ways, uninterrupted. That said, The Reason I Jump still structures itself smartly (with stunning filmmaking to boot) by having each of its five characters introduce us to different aspects of the autism experience, from sense and memory to communication and community.

76. The Last Suit (2017)

7.1

Country

Argentina, Poland, Spain

Director

Pablo Solarz

Actors

Ángela Molina, Cristóbal Pinto, Jacek Lenartowicz, Jan Mayzel

Moods

Challenging, Character-driven, Emotional

When something like a World War happens, the generation that grew up at the time inevitably would be changed, and this change sticks to that generation, even if the ones that follow don’t immediately understand. The Last Suit is centered on this idea, but it does so through a relatively lighthearted and humorous way, as Abraham Bursztein goes on a cross-continental trip to see a childhood friend from the war, and meet people with different perspectives along the trip. With at least six different languages, two different timelines, and a compelling protagonist, The Last Suit is a new take on the Holocaust that might be a tad too sentimental for some viewers, but is a poignant reminder of the history that still haunts the world today.

77. In the Soup (1992)

7.1

Country

France, Germany, Italy

Director

Alexandre Rockwell

Actors

Carol Kane, Debi Mazar, Elizabeth Bracco, Jennifer Beals

Moods

Character-driven, Funny, Grown-up Comedy

Making a film is sort of a miracle– to make one can sometimes come into fruition through a lucky combination of connections, creativity and circumstances all perfectly aligning as if by fate. But making a film takes cash to do it. In the Soup is an independent comedy centered on an aspiring auteur meeting an eccentric, creative gangster that’s willing to do everything (including crime) to fund it. The film does mostly depend on conversations between characters, witty repartee and Steve Buscemi’s voice-over, but it does capture the importance of patrons in the artistic process, how silly some lofty artistic aspirations can be, and to never forget the human side of the filmmaking process, not just the solitary brainstorming.

78. Julia (2008)

7.1

Country

Belgium, France, Mexico

Director

Erick Zonca

Actors

Aidan Gould, Bruno Bichir, Eugene Byrd, Ezra Buzzington

Moods

A-list actors, Character-driven, Dark

Most people are aware that alcoholism doesn’t lead to clear decision-making, but while we’re familiar with the plenty of the usual consequences, such as calling your exes, overspending, and car crashes, it usually doesn’t lead to a kidnapping plot against a multimillionaire. 2008’s Julia takes things to the extreme, with the initial capture escalating into a murder charge, a cross-country escape, and a 2-million ransom bounty, but it feels a bit plausible with the way Tilda Swinton sinks into Julia’s desperation, making bad decision after bad decision with options eventually closing in. While the film might feel a tad too long for some viewers, Julia is nonetheless a compelling thriller, made much more memorable with Swinton’s performance.

79. Buffalo ’66 (1998)

7.1

Country

Canada, United States of America

Director

Vincent Gallo

Actors

Alex Karras, Anjelica Huston, Ben Gazzara, Christina Ricci

Moods

Character-driven, Funny, Quirky

When you’re an ex-convict that wants to hide his stint in jail from his parents, among other things, fake dating is a rather strange solution. It’s usually the stuff of cheesy romcoms, but Buffalo ’66 plays out differently. The pretense doesn’t stem from jealousy or money or career status, but rather from desperation, becoming another attempt to win some semblance of self-worth from dysfunctional parents, which inevitably doesn’t work… At least in the way Billy hopes it would. While Layla’s motivations aren’t fully fleshed out, Christina Ricci brings a certain doll-like sweetness that lines up with what’s expected of her by her captor, but also happens to enliven the rest of the family, allowing just a glimpse of the good people they used to be, before they slip back into their usual unkind, thoughtless selves. This, along with Billy’s background– flashbacks of neglect and abuse in frames within frames– makes their connection a bit toxic, but Buffalo ’66 has an interesting style and excellent performances to make it a memorable watch.

80. Trees Lounge (1996)

7.1

Country

United States of America

Director

Steve Buscemi

Actors

Anthony LaPaglia, Bianca Hunter, Bronson Dudley, Brooke Smith

Moods

Challenging, Character-driven, Slice-of-Life

There’s no shortage of media depicting alcoholism, but many of them come across as preachy, sanctimonious, and coming from someone that hasn’t gone through it. Steve Buscemi’s directorial debut is another character study of an alcoholic pushed to drink because of losing both his job and his girlfriend, but the way Buscemi writes, directs, and acts as this Long Island town drunkard has an unassuming realism that doesn’t paint Tommy’s life as the worst thing ever, but rather as a steady toleration of having life left unfixed, of continuing to indulge in self-destructive behavior, because it’s not bad enough to actually do something about it. Trees Lounge might not be the most exciting debut, but it’s one that’s honest.

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