The Globe and Mail
Film
Alessandro Nivola, left, and Adrien Brody in a scene from "The Brutalist."The Associated Press
“Survive till ‘25″ has been the mantra of Hollywood this year, with the industry still recuperating from the somewhat self-inflicted wounds of two strikes, one pandemic and countless tectonic shifts in how, why and where audiences watch movies.
At about this time last year, I felt that 2023 would go down as a landmark era for film both domestic and abroad – as rich even as the cinematic bounty delivered in 2019, the Last Great Year before the global movie industry truly and well lost its mind.
I’m afraid that 2024 offers no such historical potential – this was an anxious stretch of recovery, reassessment and retrenchment that not even the desperate portmanteau magic of “Glicked” (that’d be Gladiator II and Wicked) could rescue. But between all the doom and gloom, there were – as there always have been and always will be – masterpieces large and small. -Barry Hertz
Here are the top 10 films of 2024, and how to watch (most of) them right now.
Songs
Beyonce's Texas Hold 'Em was the best cultural reclaiming of 2024 in songs.Chris Pizzello/The Associated Press
Music-identification app Shazam surpassed 100 billion song recognitions recently. Here, I have recognized 10 songs that mattered in 2024. -Brad Wheeler
Brad Wheeler’s list of 10 songs that mattered in 2024
Albums
Kendrick Lamar's album, GNX, soared to No. 1 on the Billboard chartsPGLang/Interscope/Supplied
Let us put aside our feuds, be they of the potentially professionally lethal Drake-versus-Kendrick variety, or of whether brat summer belonged to everyone or solely the truest of brats. Here we seek only to celebrate quality, for 2024′s onslaught of albums was full of it. It was a year of bangers, slow burners, technological disrupters, futurists and thinly veiled metaphor-makers. There’s a lot worth celebrating. -Josh O’Kane
Josh O'Kanes top 10 albums of the year
Visual arts
Shelley Niro: 500 Year Itch is the first major retrospective exhibition of the multi-media work of Mohawk artist Shelley Niro, shown at the Art Gallery of Hamilton.National Gallery of Canada/Supplied
In a disturbing year internationally, Canadian artists and art galleries seemed to rise above the fray with an engaging slate of programming that points to a dynamic post-pandemic recovery. Work by female artists and the importance of textiles as a medium were two recurring themes. -Kate Taylor
Read Kate Taylor's 10 best things about visual arts in 2024
Television
Freewheeling comedy English Teacher, created and starring Brian Jordan Alvarez, found a way to mine the humour of the culture wars while keeping heart and head intact.Steve Swisher/FX/Supplied
There’s a spreading perception that the era of prestige TV has peaked – and that the quality of shows out there is on the decline. I label this point of view as misinformation. As a critic who moved over to the small-screen beat partway through the year, I tried to catch up on all the highly touted shows out there even as new hotly tipped ones launched weekly – and I was nearly crushed by an avalanche of terrific television. Maybe it’s just harder to hunt the quality down in all those siloed streaming services.
Here are 10 of the best new shows or limited series that premiered this year – and where to find them now – picked with the counsel of wise colleagues and in no particular order. -J. Kelly Nestruck
Read J. Kelly Nestruck's top 10 television show of the year
Theatre (Toronto, Shaw, Stratford)
The Inheritance was a major win this year for Canadian Stage.Dahlia Katz/Canadian Stage/Supplied
It’s hard to fully take the pulse of Canadian theatre right now. The past year saw eye-popping deficits, controversial cancellations and ill-advised lawsuits – but also extended runs, big swings on new work garnering international attention and a boom in the Toronto commercial sector. Here are the 10 shows, in chronological order, that most impressed Globe and Mail theatre critics J. Kelly Nestruck and Aisling Murphy in Toronto and at the Stratford and Shaw Festivals in 2024.
Read J. Kelly Nestruck's and Aisling Murphy's top 10 theatre picks
