Top Movie Picks

The following list isn’t in any order. I would rate them all 8 & above out of 10, if I had to. Let me know in the comments if I had missed any hidden gems. This list will keep growing as I explore more and I’ll edit later. I haven’t seen all the IMDB top rated movies and contents. These movies were chosen after exploration and I watch depending on my mood at that time, not necessarily to appreciate screenplay, writing, direction, acting, and storyline. So, many renowned award-winning movies will not be on this list.

56. Ponniyin Selvan 2

Directed by Mani Ratnam. With Vikram, Karthi, Jayam Ravi, Aishwarya Rai Bachchan. Arulmozhi Varman continues on his journey to become Rajaraja I, the greatest ruler of the historic Chola empire of south India.

55. Ponniyin Selvan 1

Ponniyin Selvan: I (transl. The Son of Ponni), also known and marketed as PS-1, is a 2022 Indian Tamil-language epic historical action adventure film directed by Mani Ratnam, who co-wrote it with Elango Kumaravel and B. Jeyamohan.

54. The Judge

Years after he returns to his hometown, Chicago-based lawyer Hank Palmer decides to fight the case for his father, Joseph, an adjudicator, who is accused of murder.

53. Just Mercy

After graduating from Harvard, Bryan Stevenson heads to Alabama to defend those wrongly condemned or those not afforded proper representation. One of his first cases is that of Walter McMillian, who is sentenced to die in 1987 for the murder of an 18-year-old girl, despite evidence proving his innocence. In the years that follow, Stevenson encounters racism and legal and political maneuverings as he tirelessly fights for McMillian’s life.

52. Dark Waters

In the 20th century, DuPont developed many polymers such as Vespel, neoprene, nylon, Corian, Teflon, Mylar, Kapton, Kevlar, Zemdrain, M5 fiber, Nomex, Tyvek, Sorona, Corfam and Lycra. DuPont developed Freon (chlorofluorocarbons) for the refrigerant industry, and later other refrigerants. It also developed synthetic pigments and paints including ChromaFlair. In 2014, DuPont was the world’s fourth-largest chemical company based on market capitalization and eighth-largest based on revenue.

On August 31, 2017, it merged with the Dow Chemical Company to create DowDuPont. Perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA, or C8) has been used as a surfactant in the emulsion polymerization of PTFE, although several manufacturers have entirely discontinued its use. PFOA persists indefinitely in the environment. PFOA has been detected in the blood of many individuals of the general US population in the low and sub-parts per billion range, and levels are higher in chemical plant employees and surrounding subpopulations. PFOA and PFOS have been estimated to be in every American person’s blood stream in the parts per billion range, though those concentrations have decreased by 70% for PFOA and 84% for PFOS between 1999 and 2014, which coincides with the end of the production and phase out of PFOA and PFOS in the US. The general population has been exposed to PFOA through massive dumping of C8 waste into the ocean and near the Ohio River Valley. PFOA has been detected in industrial waste, stain-resistant carpets, carpet cleaning liquids, house dust, microwave popcorn bags, water, food and Teflon cookware. As a result of a class-action lawsuit and community settlement with DuPont, three epidemiologists conducted studies on the population surrounding a chemical plant that was exposed to PFOA at levels greater than in the general population.

The studies concluded that there was an association between PFOA exposure and six health outcomes: kidney cancer, testicular cancer, ulcerative colitis, thyroid disease, hypercholesterolemia (high cholesterol), and pregnancy-induced hypertension. Overall, PTFE cookware is considered a minor exposure pathway to PFOA. As a result of the lawsuits concerning the PFOA class-action lawsuit, DuPont began to use GenX, a similarly fluorinated compound, as a replacement for polytetrafluoroethylene in the manufacture of fluoropolymers, such as Teflon. However, in lab tests on rats, GenX has been shown to cause many of the same health problems as PFOA. The chemicals are manufactured by Chemours, a corporate spin-off of DuPont, in Fayetteville, North Carolina. While PFOA was phased out by 2014, Chemours was already found to be dumping GenX into the Cape Fear River in 2017, with the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality (NCDEQ) ordering Chemours to halt discharges of all fluorinated compounds on September 5, 2017.

51. Whiplash

Andrew enrolls in a music conservatory to become a drummer. But he is mentored by Terence Fletcher, whose unconventional training methods push him beyond the boundaries of reason and sensibility. A modern story of obsession, ambition, resilience and accomplishment.

50. Lincoln

Abraham Lincoln uses his powers as the president of the United States of America as he strives to abolish slavery and reunite his country during the Civil War.

49. The invisible man
Cecilia’s abusive ex-boyfriend fakes his death and becomes invisible to stalk and torment her. She begins experiencing strange events and decides to hunt down the truth on her own.

48. Nocturnal Animals

Susan receives a manuscript of her ex-husband Edward’s new novel and finds it very compelling. However, the story forces her to confront several disturbing truths about their marital life.

47. Atlas Shrugged Series

A railroad executive and a steel mogul form an alliance to fight against the exploitative government of the United States and to save their respective interests.

46. The King’s Speech

King George VI tries to overcome his stammering problem with the help of speech therapist Lionel Logue and makes himself worthy enough to lead his country through World War II.

45. Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil and Vile

A chronicle of the crimes of Ted Bundy, from the perspective of his longtime girlfriend, who refused to believe the truth about him for years.

44. Deepwater Horizon

On April 20, 2010, the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig explodes in the Gulf of Mexico, igniting a massive fireball that kills several crew members. Chief electronics technician Mike Williams (Mark Wahlberg) and his colleagues find themselves fighting for survival as the heat and the flames become stifling and overwhelming. Banding together, the co-workers must use their wits to make it out alive amid all the chaos.

43. Sully: Miracle on the Hudson

Captain Chesley, a commercial pilot, makes an emergency landing on the Hudson River after his plane is hit by birds. However, an investigation into the matter might prove to be fatal to his career.

42. 127 hours

127 Hours is a 2010 biographical survival drama film co-written, produced and directed by Danny Boyle. The film stars James Franco, Kate Mara, Amber Tamblyn and Clémence Poésy.

41. The murder on the orient express

Murder on the Orient Express is a work of detective fiction by English writer Agatha Christie featuring the Belgian detective Hercule Poirot.

40. The theory of Everything

Stephen Hawking, an excellent astrophysics student working on his research, learns that he suffers from motor neurone disease and has around two years to live.

39. The Social Network

Mark Zuckerberg creates a social networking site, Facebook, with his friend Eduardo’s help. Though it turns out to be a successful venture, he severs ties with several people along the way.

38. Life of Pi

Pi Patel finds a way to survive in a lifeboat that is adrift in the middle of nowhere. His fight against the odds is heightened by the company of a hyena and a male Bengal tiger.

37. Pawn Sacrifice

Bobby Fischer, an American grandmaster, challenges the best player in the Soviet Union in a chess championship, causing the two nations to use this to fuel their respective agendas.

36. Imitation Game

Alan Turing, a British mathematician, joins the cryptography team to decipher the German enigma code. With the help of his fellow mathematicians, he builds a machine to crack the codes.

35. Shutter Island

Teddy Daniels and Chuck Aule, two US marshals, are sent to an asylum on a remote island in order to investigate the disappearance of a patient, where Teddy uncovers a shocking truth about the place.

34. Marriage Story

A stage director and his actor wife struggle through a grueling, coast-to-coast divorce that pushes them to their personal and creative extremes.

33. Knives Out

The circumstances surrounding the death of crime novelist Harlan Thrombey are mysterious, but there’s one thing that renowned Detective Benoit Blanc knows for sure — everyone in the wildly dysfunctional Thrombey family is a suspect. Now, Blanc must sift through a web of lies and red herrings to uncover the truth.

32. Joker

Arthur Fleck, a party clown, leads an impoverished life with his ailing mother. However, when society shuns him and brands him as a freak, he decides to embrace the life of crime and chaos.

31. Forest Gump

Forrest, a man with low IQ, recounts the early years of his life when he found himself in the middle of key historical events. All he wants now is to be reunited with his childhood sweetheart, Jenny.

30. Inception

Cobb steals information from his targets by entering their dreams. Saito offers to wipe clean Cobb’s criminal history as payment for performing an inception on his sick competitor’s son.

29. se7en

Two detectives, a rookie and a veteran, hunt a serial killer who uses the seven deadly sins as his motives.

28. Interstellar

In the future, where Earth is becoming uninhabitable, farmer and ex-NASA pilot Cooper is asked to pilot a spacecraft along with a team of researchers to find a new planet for humans.

27. The Prestige

Two friends and fellow magicians become bitter enemies after a sudden tragedy. As they devote themselves to this rivalry, they make sacrifices that bring them fame but with terrible consequences.

26. 1917

Two soldiers, assigned the task of delivering a critical message to another battalion, risk their lives for the job in order to prevent them from stepping right into a deadly ambush.

25. The Martian

When astronauts blast off from the planet Mars, they leave behind Mark Watney (Matt Damon), presumed dead after a fierce storm. With only a meager amount of supplies, the stranded visitor must utilize his wits and spirit to find a way to survive on the hostile planet. Meanwhile, back on Earth, members of NASA and a team of international scientists work tirelessly to bring him home, while his crew mates hatch their own plan for a daring rescue mission.

24. Arrival

Louise Banks, a linguistics expert, along with her team, must interpret the language of aliens who’ve come to earth in a mysterious spaceship.

23. Edge of Tomorrow

A soldier fighting aliens gets to relive the same day over and over again, the day restarting every time he dies.

22. Avatar

Jake, who is paraplegic, replaces his twin on the Na’vi inhabited Pandora for a corporate mission. After the natives accept him as one of their own, he must decide where his loyalties lie.

21. Gravity

On an outer space mission, Dr Ryan Stone, an engineer, and Matt Kowalski, an astronaut, are hit by high-speed space debris. As the situation gets dire, Stone, the lone survivor, rises to the occasion.

20. A quiet place

A family struggles for survival in a world where most humans have been killed by blind but noise-sensitive creatures. They are forced to communicate in sign language to keep the creatures at bay.

19. Predestination

As his last assignment, a temporal agent is tasked to travel back in time and prevent a bomb attack in New York in 1975. The hunt, however, turns out to be beyond the bounds of possibility.

18. Ready Player One

James Halliday designs a virtual reality and hides the keys to his fortune in it for a worthy player to find after his death. Wade, a teenager, sets out on a quest to find the keys and the fortune.

17. I Origins

A molecular biologist and his laboratory partner uncover evidence that may fundamentally change society as we know it.

16. Alita: Battle Angel

Alita, a battle cyborg, is revived by Ido, a doctor, who realises that she actually has the soul of a teenager. Alita then sets out to learn about her past and find her true identity.

15. The platform

In the future, prisoners housed in vertical cells watch as inmates in the upper cells are fed while those below starve.

14. What Happened to Monday

In a world where families are limited to one child due to overpopulation, a set of identical septuplets must avoid being put to a long sleep by the government and dangerous infighting while investigating the disappearance of one of their own.

13. Annihilation

Lena, a biologist and former soldier, joins a mission to uncover what happened to her husband inside Area X — a sinister and mysterious phenomenon that is expanding across the American coastline. Once inside, the expedition discovers a world of mutated landscapes and creatures, as dangerous as it is beautiful, that threatens both their lives and their sanity.

12. Ender’s Game

Ender Wiggin, a brilliant young strategist, is recruited by the International Military to lead the force defending Earth from a genocidal alien race bent on annihilating humankind.

11. Lucy

Lucy gains extraordinary physical and mental capabilities after the effects of a performance-enhancing drug set in. Soon, she evolves into a warrior bent on destroying those who held her captive.

10. Spectral

Soldiers battle supernatural forces that are threatening to overwhelm New York City.

9. The Maze Runner (Trilogy)

Thomas loses his memory and finds himself trapped in a massive maze called the Glade. He and his friends try to escape from the maze and eventually learn that they are subjects of an experiment.

8. Circle

Mae is ecstatic to be employed in the biggest tech company in the world. But after she gets involved in an experiment that could change the world, she realizes its adverse consequences.

7. 2012

2012 is a 2009 American science fiction disaster film directed by Roland Emmerich.

6. The Hunger Games (Trilogy)

The Hunger Games film series is composed of science fiction dystopian adventure films, based on The Hunger Games trilogy of novels by the American author Suzanne Collins. The movies are distributed by Lionsgate and produced by Nina Jacobson and Jon Kilik.

5. Divergent, Allegiant, Insurgent

The Divergent Series is a feature film trilogy based on the Divergent novels by the American author Veronica Roth. Distributed by Summit Entertainment and Lionsgate Films, the series consists of three science fiction action films set in a dystopian society.

4. Battleship

An international fleet of ships encounter an alien armada and discover their destructive goals. To defeat their enemies, they are forced to fight an intense battle on sea, land and air.

3. Exam

Eight candidates for a highly desirable corporate job are locked together in an exam room and given a final test with just one seemingly simple question. However, it doesn’t take long for confusion to ensue and tensions to unravel.

2. The Trial of the Chicago 7

The film is based on the infamous 1969 trial of seven defendants charged by the federal government with conspiracy and more, arising from the countercultural protests in Chicago at the 1968 Democratic National Convention. The trial transfixed the nation and sparked a conversation about mayhem intended to undermine the U.S. government.

1. Hacksaw Ridge

The true story of Pfc. Desmond T. Doss (Andrew Garfield), who won the Congressional Medal of Honor despite refusing to bear arms during WWII on religious grounds (Christian pacifism is the theological and ethical position that any form of violence is incompatible with the Christian faith.). Doss was drafted and ostracized by fellow soldiers for his pacifist stance but went on to earn respect and adoration for his bravery, selflessness and compassion after he risked his life — without firing a shot — to save 75 men in the Battle of Okinawa.