Justin Chang: The Best Movies of 2020, as published by The Los Angeles Times. Visit the Times to see how Chang's choices are presented in pairs: "As has become standard practice, I’ve listed my favorite titles as a series of thematic pairings. Treat them as double bills, or just as another reminder that art never takes place in a vacuum."
[see also 2019, 2018, 2017, 2016]
- Vitalina Varela — Pedro Costa
- Time — Garrett Bradley
- Nomadland — Chloé Zhao
- First Cow — Kelly Reichardt
- Martin Eden — Pietro Marcello
- I'm Thinking of Ending Things — Charlie Kaufman
- City Hall — Frederick Wiseman
- Collective — Alexander Nanau
- Never Rarely Sometimes Always — Eliza Hittman
- Beanpole — Kantemir Balagov
- The Assistant — Kitty Green
- The Invisible Man — Leigh Whannell
- I Was at Home, But — Angela Schanelec
- Relic — Natalie Erika James
- Small Axe: Lovers Rock — Steve McQueen
- Small Axe: Mangrove — Steve McQueen
- Mank — David Fincher
- Tesla — Michael Almereyda
- The Nest — Sean Durkin
- Tenet — Christopher Nolan
10 honorable mentions (in no particular order)
- Bad Education — Cory Finley
- Crip Camp: A Disability Revolution — Nicole Newnham and James LeBrecht
- David Byrne's American Utopia — Spike Lee
- Driveways — Andrew Ahn
- The 40-Year-Old Version — Radha Blank
- Fourteen — Dan Sallitt
- Kajillionaire — Miranda July
- Ma Rainey's Black Bottom — George C. Wolfe
- Proxima — Alice Winocour
- She Dies Tomorrow — Amy Seimetz
- Sound of Metal — Darius Marder
- The Vast of Night — Andrew Patterson
- A White, White Day — Hlynur Pálmason
- The Wild Goose Lake — Diao Yinan
- Wolfwalkers — Tomm Moore and Ross Stewart