What I mean by favorite here is
"what I often find myself greatly admiring when I notice it's done really well"
gonna go with Director of Photography (cinematographer). with emphasis on the photography.
Some things I've watched recently that illustrate this role.
- Saltburn, great use of vertical space with the 4:3 aspect ratio, lots of color and natural light. Summer is captured well.
- Crash (1996), Lots of night scenes (always tough to get right), the setting looks appropriately dark, grimy, and mechanical.
- Fight Club, also a (literally) dark film and looks great.
I'm always impressed with good sound design--particularly foley. It really makes a world of difference to give an environment the right tone and make it an immersive scene.
At the more entry levels of filmmaking, nothing separates the wheat from the chaff faster than sound. Not only is it very underrated by a lot of budding, amateur filmmakers, but it's so easy to get wrong and so difficult to get right. A lot like finding a drummer for a fledgling band, finding a good sound designer is super hard to find, but so important.