There are movies that give you what you expect from a movie, and then there are movies that move the needle, change the conversation, reinvent the whole idea of what a movie is or could be. The former are much more common than the latter, but to me the latter are much more exciting.
Some notable examples that come to mind are Psycho, Everything Everywhere All at Once, Poor Things, Synectoche NY, Stranger than Fiction, Twelve Monkeys, Brazil.
This is far from an exhaustive list, and I would be curious to hear other peoples’ favorite examples. Don’t get me wrong — I love a good RomCom or thriller as well as the next person — but there is something transcendent about going to the movie theater and being completely surprised by something that is nothing like anything you’ve ever seen before.
2001, Star Wars