"The year of Timothee Chalamet"— Internet reacts to Barack Obama's movie recommendations for 2024

On December 20, 2024, former US President Barack Obama took to Instagram to share his list of favorite movies, books, and music for 2024. In his post, he mentioned that he always looks forward to sharing his annual list and included a selection of movies he recommends checking out this year.

One of the movies on his list was Dune: Part Two. Alongside it, the former president's movie recommendations featured All We Imagine as Light, Conclave, The Piano Lesson, The Promised Land, The Seed of the Sacred Fig, Anora, Dìdi, Sugarcane, and A Complete Unknown.

Netizens quickly reacted to Obama's movie recommendations on X, with one user commenting on the inclusion of Timothee Chalamet's Dune: Part Two by tweeting:

"The year of Timothee Chalamet"

Netizens praised his movie recommendations for 2024 on the social media platform.

"Wow, Mr. President, you're a Timothée Chalamet fan! Yes!" an X user commented.

"A list to appeal to everyone. Thank you for including Dune." another X user mentioned.

Additionally, some recommended movies for the former president to watch:

"You need to watch “Seven Doors”" an X user tweeted.

"I think you forgot Terrifier 3" a netizen commented.

Some internet users also expressed their opinions on Obama's movie recommendations for 2024:

"I haven't heard of some of those but conclave was extremely boring definitely would not watch that." an internet user said.

"I’m adding these to my watchlist ASAP!" another internet user mentioned.

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"I’m a bit of a sucker for science fiction, dystopias or thrillers"— Barack Obama comments on his favorite movie genres and movie production company

According to a report by Movie Web dated January 2024, Barack and Michelle Obama launched their film and television production company, Higher Ground Productions, in May 2018. The production company started with a multi-year deal with Netflix, which has since distributed the company's projects, starting with the 2019 documentary American Factory.

In an interview with The New York Times dated December 2023, the former president talked about his production company and the genres of movies he prefers. He said:

“I’m a bit of a sucker for science fiction, dystopias or thrillers. Michelle jokes that my favorite movies involve horrible things happening to people and then they die, whereas she actually likes fun, uplifting stories that make her laugh.”

Talking about his production company, Obama mentioned:

“It’s taken a while for us to remind our team at Higher Ground, as well as the creative community in Hollywood, that this isn’t like Masterpiece Theatre — not everything we do has to fit on PBS. We are known to watch other things.”

According to a report by Deadline from September 2023, Barack Obama provided notes on the script of Sam Esmail's Leave The World Behind, starring Ethan Hawk and Julia Roberts. The movie was produced by the former president's production company, and Sam Esmail talked to Vanity Fair about the same.

Commenting on how the former president helped his movie, Esmail said:

“In the original drafts of the script, I definitely pushed things a lot farther than they were in the film, and President Obama, having the experience he does have, was able to ground me a little bit on how things might unfold in reality.”

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In addition to posting movie recommendations for 2024, the former president also shared a list of his favorite books of 2024, like Samantha Harvey's Orbital and Sally Rooney's Intermezzo. Additionally, Obama's favorite music list for 2024 features tracks such as Kendrick Lamar's Squabble Up, Rema's Yayo, and Hozier's Too Sweet, among other tracks.