As in other years, 2017 seemed to get off to a slow start at the movies. Then came the Harvey Weinstein scandal — and collateral damage — blew everything up. Off screen, at least. Would Hollywood survive?

Film fests started unleashing a long list of great flicks, including some stunning directorial debuts, by the likes of mumblecore graduate Greta Gerwig (“Lady Bird”), Jordan Peele (“Get Out”), one half of riotous comedy duo Key & Peele, and Matt Spicer (“Ingrid Goes West”).

Veteran directors were in the mix, too, with Ridley Scott giving us “Blade Runner 2049” and end-of-year gem “All the Money in the World,” and the revered Agnes Varda offering “Faces Places.”

And the horror genre continued to be home to some of our most gifted filmmakers, including Guillermo del Toro, with his brilliant hybrid film “The Shape of Water,”; Yorgos Lanthimos, with the decidedly odd “The Killing of a Sacred Deer”; Trey Shults‘ post-apocalyptic psychological terror drama “It Comes at Night”; and Nacho Vigalondo‘s “Colossal.”

Along the way came a boatload of worthwhile film fare. Without further ado, my Top 10 (descriptions mostly culled from my Twitter feed @screenviews):

1. The Shape of Water — Nobody makes transportive movie magic quite like Guillermo del Toro, whose latest stunning cinematic feat is a horror/sci-fi/fantasy hybrid centered on a romance between a mute woman and a brawny sea creature. It lives, thrillingly.
2. The Big Sick — Was there a sharper screenplay this year than the one Kumail Nanjiani co-wrote for this surprisingly affecting cross-cultural comic drama? Nanjiani is a riot as a version of himself, and Holly Hunter and Ray Romano are in peak form.
3. Get Out — It’s a thriller, it’s a comedy, it’s a horror show. Jordan Peele’s shocker is all three, but it’s also deeply unsettling social commentary, built on Daniel Kaluuya‘s sharp turn as a black man uncovering a freaky secret about his white girlfriend’s family.
4. Lady Bird — Remember, as a teenager, knowing everything until  you didn’t? Saoirse Ronan is dead-on as high schooler Christine, bright but bored, alive with creative energy but given to bouts of angst in Greta Gerwig’s smart, funny directorial debut.
5. Good Time — A gritty, ’70s-flick vibe informs the Safdies’ exhilarating story of a sleazy bank robber (Robert Pattinson) and his zigzagging, dangerously misguided efforts to free his mentally handicapped brother  (Benny Safdie) from prison.
6. The Disaster Artist — Sorry, “Room” is bad-bad (not bad-good), but James Franco‘s tale of mysterious weirdo Tommy Wiseau’s folly is the gift that keeps giving, an often riotously funny comedy that also, surprisingly, taps into a certain poignancy. James & brother Dave Franco kill.
7. Dunkirk — Chris Nolan goes to war, and brings home an epic movie-movie spectacle, often silent, that places the viewer deep in the heart of air, land and sea action during the titular WWII rescue operation. Brilliant companion to “The Darkest Hour.”
8. The Florida Project — It looks and feels like a partly improvised documentary told from the POV of little kids, but Sean Baker‘s veering rhythms take hold, and the oversaturated colors contrast with a tale of poverty in the shadows of Disney World.
9. Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri — Frances McDormand‘s fearless, edgy performance as the would-be avenging mom is the showpiece. But filmmaker Martin McDonagh peoples his off-kilter comic drama with fascinatingly damaged small-town characters, played by Sam Rockwell and Woody Harrelson, among others.
10. Baby Driver — Summer’s biggest cineplex blast is one of the year’s highest-octane, most stylish film trips, a heist movie that really moves. In Edgar Wright‘s hands, getaway driver Baby (Ansel Elgort) moves like a ballet dancer to incendiary pop/rock tracks.

Also notable, in no particular order: I, Tonya; Ingrid Goes West; Blade Runner 2049; All the Money in the World; It Comes at Night; The Killing of a Sacred Deer; A Ghost Story; The Post; War for the Planet of the Apes; Logan Lucky; The Meyerowitz Stories (New and Selected); Darkest Hour; Detroit; Colossal; Loving Vincent; The Post; and documentaries Jane and I Called Him Morgan.