Critics Poll: ‘Quo Vadis, Aida?’ Named Best Film of 2021 So Far By Over 100 Critics

Although it hasn’t so far been a year to remember at the movies, 2021 still managed to deliver worthy content via various different streaming platforms and, in some cases, actual movie theaters.

The dominant trend in our sixth mid-year critics poll seems to lean towards cinematic quality during the first half of this year deriving almost exclusively from the indie and foreign circuit. Although many abstained from participating in this year’s poll, almost uniformly due to their not being able to come up with a handful of worthy movies to submit, we still managed to compile 100 critics lists and the results are curiously intriguing, to say the least.

Jasmila Žbanić’s Quo Vadis, Aida? has been named the best movie of the first six months of 2021. Although it had its world premiere at the Venice Film Festival last September, the film was only released Stateside on March 5th of this year. Tackling the harrowing journey of a Bosnian UN translator torn between family and work as the Serbian army takes over her town, the film earned rave reviews and even managed to garner a Best International Feature Film Oscar nomination.

The newly installed Oscar eligibility rules made it possible for many critics to include films such as “The Father” (#7) and “Judas and the Black Messiah” (#8) into their lists. However, one future Oscar contender that is very much a 2022 movie finished as the runner-up to this poll, John Chu’s WB musical, “In the Heights” (#2)

Many, if not the majority, of these titles will soon be forgotten during the second half of the year as the Cannes Film Festival is set to reignite the pandemic-inflicted industry with a new sense of purpose next week. Ditto this fall with Venice, Telluride, and Toronto set to go back to some kind of normalcy.

1) Quo Vadis, Aida? (21 votes)
2) In the Heights (20)
3) Summer of Soul (16)
4) The Killing of Two Lovers (15)
5) Riders of Justice (15)
6) Saint Maud (14)
7) The Father (14)
8) Judas and the Black Messiah (13)
9) The Mitchells vs. The Machines (12)
10) About Endlessness (11)

11) Shiva Baby (10)
12) The Spark Brothers (10)
13) Undine (9)
14) New Order (8)
15) Truffle Hunters (8)
16) The Disciple (8)
17) Moffie (8)
18) I Carry You With Me (6)
19) Barb and Star Go to Vista Del Mar (6)
20) Beginning (6)

21) There Is No Evil (6)
22) Zola (6)
23) Test Pattern (5)
24) Rita Moreno: Just a Girl who Decided to go for it (5)
25) This is Not a Burial, It’s a Resurrection (5)
26) All Light, Everywhere (5)

FULL LIST OF PARTICIPANTS