Since it was established back in 2012, production company A24 has released a multitude of acclaimed movies spanning various genres. Often favoring low-budget but high-quality, well-written movies over mediocre Hollywood-style blockbusters, A24 has changed the standards for indie cinema in more ways than one. Founded by filmmakers Daniel Katz, David Fenkel and John Hodges, A24 Films began as a film distribution company before later moving into production itself. Some of its earliest projects include A Glimpse Inside the Mind of Charles Swan III and Spring Breakers.
After picking up the U.S. rights to Ex Machina and Room, A24 has seen steady growth in the cinematic world, and as of 2019, the company's films have received a total of 25 Academy Award nominations. Moreover, its television division has also seen a variety of successes, particularly with the hit show Euphoria. While still a new and upcoming production company, it is clear that A24 has made big waves in the filmmaking world. The company consistently manages to produce thoughtful and often challenging movies that examine human experience and emotion in a variety of settings. Though it's true that A24's origins came from darker-themed movies, particularly horror-thrillers, it has recently been exploring other topics and themes: for example, Everything Everywhere All at Once.
Room, The Witch And Moonlight Brought A24 Into The Limelight
A24's successful acquisition of the distribution rights for Room paved the way for its following movies, such as The Witch and Moonlight. Room was an incredibly successful film based on the 2010 Emma Donoghue novel and stared Brie Larson and Jacob Tremblay. Rotten Tomatoes gave Room a rating of 93 percent, based on 317 reviews, with the site's critical consensus stating that "Room makes for an unforgettably harrowing—and undeniably rewarding—experience."
This success rubbed off on The Witch, the now cult horror movie which served as Robert Eggers' directorial debut. The Witch is far more like the rest of A24's IPs, such as The Lighthouse (also an Eggers movie), in that it follows supernatural events in an isolated location and thus relies heavily on cast performances. Starring Anya Taylor-Joy in her first film appearance, in addition to Ralph Ineson and Kate Dickie, The Witch follows a Puritan family in the 1630s who encounter forces of evil in the woods beyond their New England farm.
However, 2016's Moonlight is by far one of the most well-known A24 movies, not only for that Oscar blunder but also for its subject matter. Based on Tarell Alvin McCraney's unpublished semi-autobiographical play In Moonlight Black Boys Look Blue, Moonlight is presented in three stages of the main character's life: childhood, adolescence and early adulthood. Moonlight was critically acclaimed for the way it explored the difficulties Black men face with sexuality and identity, including tackling scenes of physical and emotional abuse in childhood. Grossing over $65 million worldwide, Moonlight has been cited as one of the best films of the 21st century and is the first LGBTQ film with an all-Black cast. Editor Joi McMillon became the first Black woman nominated for an editing Oscar, while Mahershala Ali became the first Muslim to win an acting Oscar.
A24 Experienced A Sudden Boom In Popularity From 2018
After enjoying medium success between 2015 and 2017, the release of Hereditary in 2018 kick-started an explosion in popularity for the fledgling film studio. Released in the summer, Hereditary was only the fourth film produced by A24 and was director Ari Aster's feature directorial debut. Aster, like Eggers, has since worked with A24 on Midsommar and the upcoming comedy-horror Disappointment Blvd. Like its predecessors, Hereditary is a skin-crawling horror movie following a less-than-average family as they are haunted by a mysterious presence. Like The Witch, Hereditary enjoys spooky and jaw-dropping visuals, looking more like an art piece than the average supernatural horror. The film received wide critical acclaim, with particular praise for Colette's performance and Aster's direction.
After Hereditary's success both critically and at the box office (having earned $80 million on a $10 million budget), Aster returned to write and direct the 2019 folk-horror Midsommar. Midsommar was met with mixed reviews, with fans loving how gutsy Aster had been to set a horror movie mainly during the day, while others criticized its muddy storyline and the unlikeable performance from lead Florence Pugh. Interestingly, Midsommar was initially pitched as a straightforward slasher film set among Swedish cultists, but Aster developed the original concept to focus more on the deteriorating relationship between Pugh's Dani and her boyfriend Christian. Aster manages to capture the essence of Swedish midsummer celebrations while playing with the audience's emotions, as they feel sympathy for both Dani and Christian as they struggle with their eerie cult-like hosts and their failing relationship. Midsommar is indeed a complex movie but is very on-brand for A24, especially as it became a massive topic of discussion within the boundaries of horror cinema.
Another massive success of 2019 was Robert Eggers' The Lighthouse, starring Willem Dafoe and Robert Pattinson as 19th-century lighthouse keepers embroiled in psychological turmoil after being marooned at a remote New England outpost. The Lighthouse is generally marketed as horror but has widely defied categorization as it also tackles elements of psychological thriller, survival and the human condition. The Lighthouse first emerged from Max Eggers' re-envisioning of Edgar Allan Poe's unfinished short story of the same name, while the plot was inspired by a 19th-century myth about a murder at a Welsh lighthouse. Drawing heavily from the photography of 1890s New England, maritime-themed French cinema and symbolist art, The Lighthouse echoes Eggers' origins in theater by focusing entirely on Pattinson and Dafoe's performances. While The Lighthouse is not as financially successful as Hereditary or Everything Everywhere All At Once, the movie still received critical acclaim and was nominated for Best Cinematography at the 92nd Academy Awards and 73rd British Academy Film Awards.
How A24 Is Continuing To Influence Modern Cinema
The past year has been the most successful for A24 yet, with fantastic releases like After Yang, The Tragedy of Macbeth, Everything Everywhere All At Once, Men and X. It is wonderful to see the small independent company doing so well and demonstrates that there is still hope for contemporary indie filmmakers to work on small budgets and see success. A24 proves there is still space in the filmmaking scene for smaller production companies, making movies that don't tie into a franchise or rely on CGI for thrills. For example, the recently released Everything Everywhere All at Once, written and directed by Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert (collectively known as the "Daniels"), is an excellent illustration of how to make an absolutely wild movie with minimal CGI and majority practical effects.
Everything Everywhere stars Michelle Yeoh as a Chinese-American woman being audited by the Internal Revenue Service who discovers that she must connect with parallel universe versions of herself to prevent a powerful being from causing the destruction of the multiverse. A.O Scott of The New York Times described the movie as a "swirl of genre anarchy", as it plays with elements of black comedy, sci-fi, fantasy, martial arts and animation. The Daniels researched the concept of the multiverse extensively and began penning the screenplay back in 2016. Everything Everywhere All at Once received widespread critical acclaim, with reviewers praising its imagination and handling of themes such as existentialism, nihilism and Asian-American identity. Unsurprisingly, it grossed over $91 million worldwide, surpassing Hereditary as A24's highest-grossing film of all time.
Like Moonlight, Everything Everywhere explores difficult and far-reaching themes experienced by a minority group, thus not only appealing to persons in that community but viewers who want to learn more about other experiences. Everything Everywhere demonstrates the commitment of the A24 team to interesting and out-of-this-world stories, in addition to their dedication to classical filmmaking and low-budget productions. A24's other recent movies, X and Men, have both been well-received for their excellent execution of the horror genre. Men, in particular, was praised for Rory Kinnear's performances as multiple characters in the town where Jessie Buckley's lead moves to heal from a personal tragedy. X puts a modern-day twist on the classic slasher genre, paying homage to movies such as Texas Chainsaw Massacre and Scream.
So, since its founding ten years ago, A24 has put out a number of excellent and award-winning movies and TV shows. Its consistently high standards of films, all with compelling storylines and intriguing characters, have set a high standard for indie cinema and upcoming filmmakers. Students of film now look up to A24 as a standard, no longer obsessed with classical movies and Hollywood blockbusters. While A24 is still a lesser-known studio, it has carved out a place in the filmmaking scene and made room for intelligent horror and thrillers amongst big-budget Hollywood movies, in addition to thoughtful coming-of-age dramas. The company has given several auteurs their big break, from the likes of Ari Aster to Robert Eggers and the Daniels. Mainstream audiences and fans alike are looking forward to what A24 has to offer next, though it's certain its upcoming projects will be as successful as their predecessors.