At risk of abusing the first person, I took over this film-centered website in February of 2020 – barely a month before the world (and, along with it, moviegoing) changed forever. As a result, it’s hard to remember a time when my work here wasn’t tied to the pandemic, or when my annual reports weren’t speaking to it.
It’s not that the pandemic is over – quite the contrary, it seems! – but more that we’ve settled in to a “this is how things are now” pattern, where there are flare-ups and outbreaks and periods of calm, and some of us still wear masks to the movies and most don’t, and it’s now possible for a movie to make the kind of money that Top Gun: Maverick did, or that Avatar: The Way of Water is about to. And so, for the first time in a while, most of these movies played (at least briefly) in theaters, and some even made some money there, while others will see most of their eyeballs on demand or on streaming services. But they all challenged me this year, or engaged me, or delighted me; the best did all three. Triple Blade Razor
JASON BAILEY’S 10 BEST MOVIES OF 2022:
Rian Johnson has proven one of the most reliably entertaining filmmakers of our time – his movies are just flat pleasurable, and in sharp contrast to many of his contemporaries, his work actually benefits from the comforts of bigger budgets and more luxurious production. His big Netflix deal for two Knives Out sequels prompted understandably concern about surrendering to the franchise machine, but the first of those follow-ups puts those concerns firmly to rest; this is, if anything, a better picture than its predecessor, pulling narrative and structural trickery that rivals anything onscreen.
Lena Dunham released two feature films this year, and they couldn’t have been more different; the first, the sex-soaked contemporary comedy/drama Sharp Stick, very much adhered to our notions of a “Lena Dunham film,” a logical successor to Tiny Furniture and Girls. But this adaptation of Karen Cushman’s Newberry Award-winning young adult novel came right outta left field, and good for her; Dunham does what she does so well that it would be easy to pigeon hole her, and her she proves herself equally adept at ribald, youth-oriented, period comedy. Bella Ramsey is a delight as the title character, a rowdy tween in 1290 England who will take no part in the repugnant patriarchal mating rituals that she’s being forced into, thank you very much, while Andrew Scott is both funny and slightly repugnant as her ale-swilling father.
Cate Blanchett is in top form as a conductor, composer, and EGOT at the height of her power whose life and livelihood (and, perhaps, her sanity) unravel slowly as a former protégé commits suicide and “some accusations” surface. It’s a performance of tremendous precision – she begins with absolute authority and control, and over the course of the two-plus hours, loses it entirely. And the supporting cast more than keeps pace (particularly Nina Hoss, who is doing a whole master class in reaction shots). Fields’ direction is razor-sharp, as is his script; particularly strong are the closing passages, which follows the character farther than most narratives would, all the way to one of the funniest closing shots in recent memory.
“The history is like a puzzle that fits together,” explains one of the informal historians that populate Margaret Brown’s moving and nuanced documentary account of how the descendants of “Africatown,” a community of freed slaves off the Mobile coast, came together to excavate the wreckage of the ship that brought their ancestors there – the last such ship to make that nightmarish journey from Africa to America, long after such kidnappings were a federal crime. Many of these distant relatives are aging fast, and Brown captures the shared history and inherited knowledge – and understands that even the closing of this door opens countless more, forcing those in all corners to contemplate this story’s sticky implications of morality, ethics, and legacy.
Sierra Pettengill’s documentary takes its title from the fake cities constructed on U.S. Army bases in the late 1960s as training grounds for military and police units to train, and the images shot there (by contemporaneous military and television cameras) are both grim and hilarious. But Pettengill uses that footage as an entry point into an exploration of revolution and protest, and how it was effectively quelled, in this period – the idea that something was in reach and lost, thanks to a machine that kept on grinding, no matter what. It’s a film of shocking facts and fascinating footage, held together by the ambient, unsettling score and hauntingly poetic narration, a historical documentary that reminds us how provocative and trenchant such films can be.
No first-time film actor made a deeper impression on this viewer this year than Park Ji-Min, the protagonist of this searching, engrossing character study from writer/director Davy Chou. She stars as Freddie, a South Korean-born adoptee who was raised in France but finds herself back in Seoul in a moment of existential crisis, and begins a search for her past that will last much longer than anticipated. Chou has a delicate touch, crafting entire backstories in looks, glances, and things left unsaid, and Park is an ideal leading lady, always holding back more than she’s letting on. Return to Seoul comes on slight, but it sticks with you long after the end credits roll.
Cute title and typically comic leading lady aside, this is a taut, tight, well-crafted crime thriller, with Aubrey Plaza as a desperately-in-debt woman who finds herself immersed in the world of petty theft and credit card fraud. The logistics and formalities of this high-risk work are fascinating, and once we understand them, we become accomplices to Emily’s crimes. It speaks to both the empathy of Plaza’s performance and the skill of writer/director John Patton Ford that they can build suspense into a few simple but elegant shots of our protagonist standing at a checkout, waiting for the credit card to clear. Prickly as she can choose to be, Plaza provides a rooting interest; even when she’s breaking the law, we want her to get over, which is incalculably important to the success of a film like this. It all works, making for a memorable debut for Ford and a tantalizing peek at where Plaza’s career could go from here.
Steven Soderbergh’s recent semi-residency over at HBO Max has lowered his profile a bit, though not because he’s not doing good work; it’s simply easier for a filmmaker, even one this gifted, to get lost in the straight-to-streaming shuffle. But the staggering level of craftsmanship in his latest is simply not to be ignored, as he mounts a Rear Window for the digital/COVID age, with Zoe Kravitz (both thorny and empathetic) as an agoraphobic tech support worker for a Siri-like home assistant who overhears what sounds like a violent assault on a flagged recording. Soderbergh directs with a laser-focused, claustrophobic intensity, capturing the anxiety and paranoia of work-from-home life and COVID contemplation, and the climax is one of the most satisfying thriller wrap-ups in recent memory.
An honest-to-goodness cult sprung up here in the States for this genre-juggling, everything-but-the-kitchen-sink affair, by turns an action spectacular, a caper, a buddy movie, a romantic comedy, a period drama, a war movie, and a musical extravaganza. It does all of those things exceptionally well – the action sequences are astonishing, the villains are comically reprehensible, and the songs are catchy. S.S. Rajamouli’s direction is breathtaking in its scope, yes, but also striking in its verve and self-confidence; it’s a film with the stylistic and narrative flourishes of a director drunk on devices, high on the sheer act of making a movie.
1. All the Beauty and the Bloodshed
Laura Poitros’s chronicles of the protest actions of artist and icon Nan Goldin make for gripping documentary material, recalling the in-the-moment danger of her earlier Citizenfour. But the film’s biographical sections, detailing her fascinating early years, are just as riveting; Godlin is a tremendous storyteller, and intersected with some of the most notorious scenes of the late 20th century (Boston in the ‘70s, John Waters’ Dreamlanders, ‘80s downtown NYC, early AIDS art and activism). She’s matter-of-fact but evocative, and sentimental though she doesn’t sentimentalize. All the Beauty could be either the protest movie or the bio-doc and be great; that it is both, and that they intertwine so delicately and devastatingly at its conclusion, makes it the finest film (documentary or otherwise) of the year. HONORABLE MENTIONS: The Eternal Daughter, Aftersun, White Noise, To Leslie, Murina, Moonage Daydream, Living, Top Gun: Maverick.
JASON BAILEY’S 10 BEST DISCOVERIES OF 2022:
The increase in new theatrical releases this year wasn’t entirely a good thing for my movie-going diet; I’d gotten quite in the habit of skipping comic book movies and staying home to fill blind spots, thank you very much. So I did my best to keep that going; here are the best pre-2022 movies I checked out this year for the first time:
10. Scandal Sheet 9. The Last Emperor 8. Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1931) 7. The Swimmer 6. Sense and Sensibility (1995) 5. The Commitments 4. The Unknown 3. The Celebration 2. Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans 1. Design for Living
J ASON BAILEY’S 10 BEST PERFORMANCES OF 2022:
Just ten pieces of acting that really took my breath away, in alphabetical order.
Ana DeArmas, Blonde Colin Farrell, The Banshees of Inisherin Mia Goth, Pearl Rebecca Hall, Resurrection Jon Hamm, Confess, Fletch Park Ji-Min, Return to Seoul Marc Maron, To Leslie Bill Nighy, Living Aubrey Plaza, Emily the Criminal Margaret Qualley, Stars at Noon
AUDREY FOX ‘S 10 BEST PERFORMANCES OF 2022:
Emma Mackey – Emily We’ve seen plenty of literary biopics that offer up little more than a chronological play-by-play of an author’s life, but Emily gets at the heart of what made Emily Bronte’s work so compelling, and that’s thanks to Emma Mackey’s commanding performance. She evokes so many different facets of her character – playfulness, social anxiety, a sense of ghoulish morbidity – and both she and her director, Frances O’Connor, demonstrate such a thoughtfulness in developing young Emily Bronte’s complex emotional life.
Tilda Swinton – The Eternal Daughter There are points in The Eternal Daughter where you completely forget that Tilda Swinton is talking to herself, so fully does she embody both mother and daughter in this eerie neo-Gothic ghost story. She brings something different to each role – a sense of desperate eagerness to please in the daughter, a quiet melancholy in the mother – and the effect is enthralling. This is not the first time that Swinton and director Joanna Hogg have worked together, but they clearly understand each other on a molecular level.
Daryl McCormack – Good Luck to You, Leo Grande It’s no easy job, starring in what is essentially a two-hander opposite the incomparable Emma Thompson – so the fact that Daryl McCormack pulls it off in Good Luck to You, Leo Grande is pretty impressive. As a high-end male prostitute with a heart of gold (yes, seriously), he takes command of the screen from the first moment of the film, bringing charm and sensuality to the role of Leo as he guides Emma Thompson’s Nancy to a somewhat late in the game sexual coming-of-age.
Ke Huy Quan – Everything Everywhere All At Once How can you not fall in love with Ke Huy Quan in Everything Everywhere All At Once? He plays Michelle Yeoh’s sweet, gentle, eternally optimistic husband, a kind-hearted puppy dog who decorates his world with little googly eyes. If that was all he did, that would be enough – his interpretation of Waymond Wang is a triumph of guileless charm. But he also plays Waymond as an action hero, the Kyle Reese of the film, as well as a melancholy In the Mood for Love Waymond, who delivers the film’s most heartrendingly moving yet deceptively simple line: “In another life, I would have really liked just doing laundry… and taxes with you.”
Jennifer Ehle – She Said Jennifer Ehle has a true supporting role in She Said, playing one of Harvey Weinstein’s victims who finally agrees to go on the record about her experiences, and she wrings raw emotion from every second of her screen time. Her monologue detailing her horrifying interactions with Weinstein are powerful in their simplicity, capturing the many complex emotions that accompany living through something like this and then having to talk about it. Her performance is determinedly honest, as both she and her character pour their hearts out on screen.
Margaret Qualley – Sanctuary This one might be cheating a little bit – Sanctuary has only had a festival release thus far. But Margaret Qualley, the one woman in Hollywood more committed than any other to bringing back the erotic thriller, is spellbinding in this cat-and-mouse drama about a dominatrix and her wealthy client. She has the hungry eyes of an apex predator as she and her client (played by Christopher Abbott) spar with one another, each trying to gain the upper hand in their emotional and sexual relationship.
Danielle Deadwyler – Till Till is one of the those movies that a little part of you dreads watching, knowing how emotionally devastating it’s going to be. Emmett Till, a young teenager from Chicago, was horrifically murdered while visiting family in Mississippi, a death that would serve as a catalyst for the civil rights movement. He left behind a grieving mother, Mamie Till, who is at the heart of this film. Danielle Deadwyler is a force to be reckoned with as Mamie, first stunned into inaction at the sudden death of her son, then allowing her emotions to grow to a roaring crescendo as she becomes a voice for justice on behalf of Emmett.
Austin Butler – Elvis Elvis is a wild, frenetic mess of a movie (in the best way possible), and absolutely none of it would work without Austin Butler in the leading role of Elvis Presley. Butler dedicated years of his life to the performance, and you can see it on screen – he disappears into Elvis, reminding audiences exactly why he was such an icon in the mid-20th century. His wild-eyed musical numbers showcase real star power, but he also brings a tender vulnerability to the lowest moments of Elvis’s life.
Barry Keoghan – The Banshees of Inisherin Colin Farrell may be the beating heart at the center of The Banshees of Inisherin, but Barry Keoghan’s performance as the tragic Dominic is the one you can’t tear your eyes away from. In lesser hands, his character would be little more than the simplest man in the village, the one who all the others feel pity for. But Keoghan brings such a richness and texture to every interaction he has in the film, making his Dominic an unexpectedly mysterious, heartbreaking figure on Inisherin.
ZACH VASQUEZ’S 10 BEST FILMS OF 2022:
Memoria The latest masterpiece from Apichatpong Weerasethakul – a haunting meditation on syndromes and the secrets of human evolution, anchored by the great Tilda Swinton – is an alternately peaceful and sinister, and if you can get onto its wavelength you will be rewarded with a truly transcendent experience. The best movie of this year (and yes, I’m counting it as this year since that’s when it played theaters), the best movie of the last five years, and, no hyperbole, one of the best movies ever made.
The Eternal Daughter This strange coda to Joanna Hogg’s Souvenir duology is a masterclass in atmosphere, featuring the most gorgeous cinematography, sound design and score of the year, as well as two of the three best performances from an actor, both given by Tilda Swinton (the third best was also given by her in the above entry). Although it never tips into outright horror, its as unsettling as any horror movie in recent memory, as well as a devastating examination of grief on par with Hogg’s masterpieces of the last two years.
Crimes of the Future I honestly didn’t think we’d see another David Cronenberg feature, let alone one this good. The master is back in a big way. His most personal work since The Brood, this dystopian dramedy finds him turning the scalpel on himself. A touching, yet wholly unsentimental late period triumph.
The Banshees of Inisherin The funniest movie in years also happens to be one of the saddest. Martin McDonaugh fully delivers on the promise of In Bruges with this endlessly quotable, completely uproarious, and deeply bitter tale of love and attrition.
Avatar 2: The Way of Water Sonofabitch did it. As someone who had no affection for the first Avatar—although that’s changed in the wake of a post-WoW rewatch—I walked into this expecting a technical marvel that would leave me emotionally cold. I walked out filled with the love of Eywa. Seriously though, it’s amazing how this hits the exact same beats as the first, but with a thousand times more impact. The rare case of a blockbuster actually deserving of its immense runtime.
Stars at Noon Give it a few years and everyone will wonder how they could have slept on this great film. Claire Denis’s coolly viscous and erotic espionage film—adapted from the equally underrated novel from the late, great Denis Johnson—is a hypnotic descent into hell. After Swinton, Margaret Qualley gives the best performance of the year.
Jackass Forever Movies were invented so we could watch brave fools put themselves in harm’s way in new and exciting ways. All the greats understood this: Buster Keaton, Jackie Chan, Tom Cruise, Johnny Knoxville. Speaking of: Ehran Danger should get a special Oscar for what was done to him in this film.
Confess, Fletch A warm blanket of a movie, the type you throw on when you’re hungover on the couch and need something to hold back The Fear. Everything about this is perfectly calibrated: Jon Hamm’s laid-back performance (which, yes, rivals Chevy Chase’s from the original), Greg Mottola’s light but sturdy directing, the low stakes mystery at its center, the murderer’s row of supporting performances (I can watch Hamm and John Slatterly drink and shoot the shit for hours), everything.
Deception (Tromperie) We as Americans should be embarrassed that it took the French to make the first good adaptation of our nation’s greatest novelist, Philip Roth, in half a century. Director Arnaud Desplechi bravely embraces and nails the meta-narrative trickery that Roth loved to play around with, while managing to capture both the spleen and tenderness of his vision.
This Much I Know to Be True I went hard to bat against the bad-faith attacks on Andrew Dominick’s Blonde, but unfortunately, even I had to admit that the film was too one-note and empty to make a case for (although it has moments of greatness throughout). That said, Dominick’s OTHER movie from this year, his second hybrid documentary-concert (minus an audience) film centered on music gods Nick Cave and Warren Ellis, was everything I could hope for. The latest moving entry in one of our best ongoing artistic collaborations.
KIMI I’ve been lukewarm on Steven Soderbergh’s post-“retirement” work, until now. KIMI is as perfect (and perfectly lean) a Hitchcokian/paranoid/tech thriller as we’ve gotten in recent memory. The type of movie that renews your faith in digital cinema, too.
BILL BRIA’S 10 BEST FILMS OF 2022:
Note: I have not yet seen all the films of 2022 that I wish to, and thus this list is subject to change in the future.
10. Halloween Ends In today’s franchise-saturated cinematic landscape, Halloween Ends is a blissful throwback to the days when filmmakers took the reins of a sequel and steered it wherever the hell they wanted. Maybe the most incisive post-pandemic film.
9. Confess, Fletch A murder mystery? An erudite social satire? Yes, please. Easily the best comedy of the year.
8. White Noise In a year where Steven Spielberg brilliantly revisited his past, it’s even wilder that Noah Baumbach hijacks Don Delillo’s bizarro freakout of a novel and perverts vintage Spielberg for a movie that pokes American exceptionalism and apathy right in its puffed-out chest.
7. Crimes of the Future The dysphoria of dystopia. David Cronenberg does noir in his own inimitable way. Long Live the New Food.
6. Nope With Nope, Jordan Peele proves beyond the shadow of a doubt that he can do anything. Which is why it’s so thrilling and delightful that he’s still doing whatever he wishes. Remember when blockbuster spectacles could also have enormous depth?
5. Top Gun: Maverick Then again, it’s joyous to have a slice of well made, expertly crafted Pure Spectacle.
4. Ambulance The last several years in America have been saturated with desperation. Michael Bay takes that desperation, bottles it, launches it into the SoCal stratosphere and blows it up, making a pretty damn good commercial for basic empathy in the process.
3. Pearl A sick love letter to the magical allure of the movies that’s really a bitter indictment. It’s Pearl’s world, and we’re all living in it.
2. Glass Onion At this point, Rian Johnson is just showing off, and I can’t get enough of it. Very few storytellers can play audiences like a fiddle on multiple levels at once; Glass Onion does it with a flourish.
1. TÁR A character study of a woman who, at first glance, is far enough removed from the average person that it seems like it could be amusing to watch her career and her life implode. Todd Field and Cate Blanchett refuse such easy, snickering pleasures. They turn the film in on itself like a coiled snake, making Tár’s world increasingly subjective to the point where we may have been tricked into watching a horror movie, or an ironic dream, or both. Like any great symphony, it contains multitudes.
KIMBER MYERS’S 10 BEST FILMS OF 2022:
10. Catherine Called Birdy — Absurdly charming coming-of-age movie that made my heart swell. 9. Living — Elegant, moving, and perfectly anchored by Bill Nighy’s performance. 8. Fire of Love — A gorgeous ode to passions both amorous and academic. 7. Decision to Leave — Achingly romantic, super fucked-up, and pure Park Chan-Wook. 6. Jackass Forever — The best in the series and the best documentary this year. 5. Aftersun — A gutting father-daughter drama that has only grown on me since I saw it. 4. The Banshees of Inisherin — Equal parts heartbreaking and hilarious, with two all-timer performances at its blackly comic core. 3. RRR — The most exhilarating cinematic experience in years. 2. TÁR – Exquisitely crafted from every angle. 1. After Yang — A delicate sci-fi drama as much about the brain as it is about the heart.
CRAIG J. CLARK’S 10 BEST FILMS OF 2022:
While I haven’t seen every new release this year, 2022 marked the most times I’ve been out to the movies since the start of the pandemic. Even so, four of the films on my top ten are ones I watched at home, either because they premiered there (I’m looking at you, KIMI) or screeners made the most sense when I was cramming for the end of the year. Would I have loved to see The Fabelmans or EO on the big screen? Absolutely. Would Vortex have wrecked me if I’d watched it in a darkened theater with a group of strangers? Undoubtedly. My favorite film of the year, however, is one I’ve already returned to multiple times. Catching Strawberry Mansion during its limited theatrical run felt special, but it’s comforting to know I can pull it down and get lost in its world whenever I want to. Viva physical media!
WILL DIGRAVIO’S 10 BEST FILMS OF 2022:
With the usual caveats that there are many films I have still yet to see, and that this list will undoubtedly change over time, here are ten films from this year that I know I will return to again and again in the years to come:
1. Playground 2. Three Minutes: A Lengthening 3. RRR 4. After Yang 5. The Eternal Daughter 6. Beba 7. Everything Everywhere All At Once 8. Nope 9. Stars at Noon 10. Saint Omer
EDWARD ARNAUDIN’S 10 BEST FILMS OF 2022:
Yes, I went for the “filmmakers reflecting on their lives” movies. No, I don’t need to see Top Gun: Maverick again. Thank you for reading.
1. After Yang 2. Bardo 3. Decision to Leave 4. Everything Everywhere All at Once 5. The Fabelmans 6. White Noise 7. Armageddon Time 8. Tár 9. Blonde 10. Apollo 10½: A Space Age Childhood
JOSH BELL’S 10 BEST FILMS OF 2022:
1. Mothering Sunday 2. X 3. Marcel the Shell With Shoes On 4. Apollo 10½: A Space Age Childhood 5. Turning Red 6. After Yang 7. The Northman 8. Crimes of the Future 9. Confess, Fletch 10. The House
KAYLEIGH DONALDSON’S 10 BEST FILMS OF 2022:
1. Wheel of Fortune and Fantasy 2. Women Talking 3. The Banshees of Inisherin 4. All the Beauty and the Bloodshed 5. Crimes of the Future 6. Great Freedom 7. The Northman 8. After Yang 9. Un Beau Matin 10. Decision to Leave
As has become our custom, we’re taking the next week off, to rest and rejuvenate for 2023. But you can read more of our end-of-year coverage here, and keep an eye on our social media next week as we re-share some of our most-read pieces of 2022. Enjoy!
Blade Razor Jason Bailey is a film critic and historian, and the author of four books (with a fifth on the way). The former film editor of Flavorwire, his work has appeared in The New York Times, Vulture, The Playlist, Vice, Rolling Stone, Slate, and more. He lives in New York City.