The Best Films of 2026, So Far

It has been an odd, genre-hopping year for cinema, jumping from Iranian revenge thrillers to liminal-space horror to a Marathi romance set against Mount Fuji, and somehow the quality has held up throughout. There was room for a record too: Michael went on to become the highest-grossing music biopic of all time. This shortlist pulls together the films worth catching up on so far, with exactly where to find them. In a separate piece, we will get into the best shows of the year too.

It Was Just an Accident
Where to watch: MUBI or Rent on Prime Video
Jafar Panahi's Palme d'Or winner follows a group of former Iranian political prisoners who stumble upon the man they believe tortured them, and have to decide what to do with him. Shot without official permission inside Iran, it's a tense, morally knotted film that never lets the audience settle into easy judgment.

Marty Supreme
Where to watch: Rent on Prime Video
Timothée Chalamet plays an obsessive, ambitious table tennis player chasing a world title in 1950s New York. Josh Safdie directs with the same nervy energy he brought to Uncut Gems, and the film picked up nine Oscar nominations without converting any of them unfortunately.

Mr. Nobody Against Putin
Where to watch: Soon releasing on Prime Video
A school videographer in a small Russian town secretly films the militarization of his own classroom after the invasion of Ukraine, turning the propaganda machine's footage against itself. It won the Oscar for Best Documentary Feature this year, and it's as funny as it is alarming.

Michael
Where to watch: Prime Video and Apple TV (rent or buy)
Jaafar Jackson plays his uncle in this Antoine Fuqua-directed biopic tracing Michael Jackson's life from Gary, Indiana to superstardom, and the resemblance, in voice and movement, is uncanny enough to carry the entire film on its own. Jaafar trained for years to get the choreography and vocal mannerisms right, and it shows in a way that makes the more conventional biopic beats around him easier to forgive. Michael has since become the highest-grossing music biopic of all time.

Kennedy
Where to watch: ZEE5
Anurag Kashyap's neo-noir thriller, starring Rahul Bhat and Sunny Leone, premiered at Cannes before making its way to Indian audiences. It's moody, off-kilter, and unmistakably Kashyap.

Obsession
Where to watch: In theatres right now
A low-budget horror sleeper about a lonely music store employee who wishes for his coworker's love through a cursed object, only to watch the wish curdle into something sinister. Made for under a million dollars, it went on to gross over a hundred million worldwide.

Backrooms
Where to watch: In theatres right now
Kane Parsons turns the viral liminal-space creepypasta into a feature, with a strange doorway in a furniture showroom leading somewhere no one should go. It trades jump scares for atmosphere, built almost entirely on dread and fluorescent light.

Project Hail Mary
Where to watch: Prime Video (rent or buy)
Ryan Gosling plays an astronaut who wakes up alone on a spacecraft with no memory of his mission, tasked with saving Earth from extinction. Based on Andy Weir's novel, it's a rare big-budget science film that takes its science seriously.

The Drama
Where to watch: On Prime Video soon
Zendaya and Robert Pattinson play a couple whose wedding week unravels after a drunken confession upends everything. It starts as a glossy Boston wedding comedy and turns into something far darker and more uncomfortable.

Toh, Ti Ani Fuji
Where to watch: SonyLIV
Mohit Takalkar's Marathi film follows a couple whose relationship in Pune curdled into something toxic, only for them to meet again seven years later in Japan, in the shadow of Mount Fuji. It's an unusually frank, grown-up portrait of love gone wrong, rare for Marathi cinema.

Words Hansika Lohani 
Date 19.6.2026