My Favorite Films of 2022

2022 is in the rearview mirror, but before we leave it behind entirely, I thought I’d do a bit more listmaking. I deliberately titled this post “favorite” rather than “best”. Movies fall into a strange middle ground for me. Unlike books or TV, I don’t watch so many of them, or so varied a range, to feel like I can make strong pronouncements on the state of the field. Unlike games, I watch too many to just talk about every movie I saw (and some, of course, simply aren’t worth discussing). And my taste, as you’ll see from this list, runs towards the middlebrow. So while I’m confident in my affection for each of these movies, I know that there’s a vast range of works that never even pinged my radar. Feel free to talk about them (or any other movies) in the comments.

(I realize that LGM is currently preoccupied with some highly engrossing real-life entertainment and might not be in the mood to talk about movies. But I’ve got an unexpected seven-hour layover at the Dubai airport after missing my connection home, so you get a blog post.)

Best Movie of the Year: Everything Everywhere All at Once (dir. Daniel Kwan and Daniel Sheinert)

As I wrote in my review of this wonderful, exhilarating movie, the most amazing thing about it—and also the thing that makes it hard to effectively praise—is that there are so many great things in it that you hardly know where to start. You could talk about the cleverness of its script, which never misses the chance to turn the screw or deepen an emotional moment. Or its glorious production design. Or the inventiveness of its multiverse worldbuilding. Or the fact that it is both a continuation of and a response to The Matrix. You could talk about the fact that this is the movie that finally, after twenty-five years, gives Michelle Yeoh the Hollywood starring role she has always deserved, or the triumphant return of Ke Huy Quan, or Jamie Lee Curtis’s best role in years, or Stephanie Hsu’s hopefully star-making performance. You could discuss the film’s benevolence towards its flawed heroine, and its insistence that she make amends for the harm she’s caused others. Or you could talk about the butt plug joke. Any approach you take to this movie will prove rewarding and exciting, and I continue to be amazed, delighted, and grateful that it exists.

Rest of the Best:

Catherine Called Birdy (dir. Lena Dunham)

I haven’t read the beloved YA novel from which this is adapted, but Dunham’s screenplay is clever, thoughtful, and hilarious, somehow marrying the cusp-of-womanhood story to an intelligent, unsentimental examination of women’s lives in a period where they are not seen as fully human. Bella Ramsey is wonderful as a medieval teenager trying to avoid an arranged marriage, switching effortlessly between a winning, gawky silliness and profound rage at her situation. And in the women around her, Dunham creates a multifaceted view on how people maintain their humanity under conditions of dehumanization.

Decision to Leave (dir. Park Chan-wook)

What if Vertigo was a deranged romantic comedy, and about a thousand times more visually and formally inventive? A quirky police detective becomes convinced that a recent widow is actually a murderer, even as the two of them grow closer. But this is only the first act in a story that has many more twists and turns (including a delightful riff on the old joke about the woman who meets the man of her dreams at a funeral). Along the way there are some amazing feats of filmmaking—the sequence in which the detective works out how the murder was committed is a tour de force—while also deepening and complicating a romantic relationship that we can’t help rooting for, even as its logic demands a shocking conclusion.

Emily the Criminal (dir. John Patton Ford)

Aubrey Plaza gives a career-best performance as a college graduate locked out of white collar employment by a criminal conviction, who is working grueling gig work to barely-service her student debt, when she’s offered the opportunity to make some extra money in not-quite-legal ways. Before long, she’s discovered an aptitude for criminality, and a desire to take what she’s been denied legal avenues to. Most critics have described Emily the Criminal as a movie about the gig economy and economic precarity, and while that’s certainly in the mix (a scene in which Emily is castigated for her “entitlement” in refusing an unpaid internship is very incisive), to me it feels more like a millennial Breaking Bad. As much as Emily wants to strike back against a system that has relegated her to poverty, there’s also a strong sense in the movie that in doing so, she is discovering her truest self.

Fire Island (dir. Andrew Ahn)

Do I love this movie more for being a clever, surprisingly faithful transposition of Pride and Prejudice into a setting—the gay bacchanalia of the titular summer resort—where it would seem to have no points of connection, or for being a sweet, intelligent romantic comedy about gay men of color? Why not both? Joel Kim Booster writes and stars in a funny, smart story about finding love in a place where the only things you’re meant to care about are looks, abs, and social strata, finding new angles on an old story while giving us a view on a world that most of us weren’t even aware existed. (Full review.)

Guillermo del Toro’s Pinocchio (dir. Guillermo del Toro and Mark Gustafson)

This new take on the familiar children’s story marries gorgeous stop-motion animation to del Toro’s familiar feats of production design. It is full of baroque detail—a detailed, half-completed crucifix in a bombed-out church—and flights of fantasy—an afterlife staffed by talking rabbits who play cards amidst ranks of coffins. As has been widely reported, del Toro reimagines Pinocchio as a tale of wide-eyed innocence set against Italy’s descent into fascism, which turns out to be very effective. But I also thought the film worked extremely well as a meditation on parenting a child with ADHD or learning disabilities. This Pinocchio isn’t bad, but he’s prone to impulsivity and bad judgment, and it’s up to his guardians—including Ewan McGregor in a scene-stealing performance as Sebastian J. Cricket—to learn to love him for himself.

The Menu (dir. Mark Mylod)

Sharp and perfectly crafted, this satire of both the haute cuisine world and the excesses of the wealthy who patronize it invites comparisons to recent black comedies of the class war like Ready or Not. But to me it felt more like a violent, culinary-themed riff on An Inspector Calls, more interested in castigating its rich foodie characters than in killing them (though of course, it does the latter too). And despite the prominence of the class theme, I thought the most interesting thing the film had to say was about the increasingly toxic relationship between art and capitalism, and how the demands of the latter can leave artists feeling deranged, and audiences starved for sustenance. (Full review.)

Nope (dir. Jordan Peele)

An ode to cinematic spectacle that is also a sharp Hollywood critique, Peele’s latest is a story about the people on the film industry’s periphery, who are aware of their exploitation but unable to resist the dream of stardom. It’s also just a damn good horror/action flick, with some amazing set-pieces, one of the most terrifying monster reveals I’ve ever seen, and creature design that is ingenious in its simplicity. There have been a lot of films in the last few years that have tried to make the argument for the cinematic experience, but to my mind Nope is the only one that succeeds, its desert vistas demanding a wide screen, and its action scenes drawing you in as only a top-notch movie can. (Full review.)

RRR (dir. S.S. Rajamouli)

I don’t watch a lot of Bollywood movies, so for all the praise it’s received I wondered if I’d be able to connect to this movie. But it wasn’t very long into this three-hour, song-and-dance-laden fictionalized biopic of the early lives of two early 20th century Indian activists, who are here imagined as near-superheroes locked in an epic bromance, before I realized that I was fully invested. RRR is thrilling, funny, and moving (and the songs are incredibly catchy). Its Departed-esque plot, in which the two heroes find themselves caught between their devotion to one another and their conflicting agendas, unfolds in constantly surprising ways, with gonzo action scenes that are always rooted in a satisfying, engrossing story.

Thirteen Lives (dir. Ron Howard)

Even before it was concluded, it was obvious that the rescue of a Thai boys’ soccer team from a flooded cave would make great cinematic fodder, and it’s wonderful to discover that the result does justice to one of the most amazing, and uplifting, events of the last few years. Though the film’s focus is on (some of) the foreign divers who spearheaded the boys’ discovery and rescue, it gives space to the wide variety of bodies and individuals who came together the make the rescue possible, as well as the boys themselves. It’s also an amazing cinematic achievement, the sort of film where you find yourself amazed that so little of its running time has passed, because so much has already happened. And the diving scenes are thrilling and terrifying. If nothing else, it’s wonderful to discover that Ron Howard had another Apollo 13-tier movie in him, but also a little depressing that it has been mostly ignored on streaming.

Honorable Mentions:

Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery (dir. Rian Johnson) – Smarter, funnier, and more incisive than the first Knives Out movie, this film is an utter delight that persuasively argues for mid-tier, non-franchise entertainment, and gives Daniel Craig another crack at his best role.

Prey (dir. Dan Trachtenberg) – A simple, good idea, impeccably executed. Buoyed by a killer central performance by Amber Midthunder (and a very good dog), this riff on the Predator concept shows that the material has endless life in it, so long as it’s approached with imagination and skill.

Three Thousand Years of Longing (dir. George Miller) – Miller’s follow-up to Mad Max: Fury Road doesn’t reach the heights of that movie, and it slightly mangles the ending of the A.S. Byatt novella it’s adapted from. But do you really need anything more in your life than Tilda Swinton and Idris Elba telling each other stories for two hours, against an increasingly imaginative visual backdrop?

The Woman King (dir. Gina Prince-Bythewood) – I skipped everyone’s favorite 2022 dad movie, Top Gun: Maverick, but I still feel like I got a Top Gun-esque story in this historical fantasy about African resistance to the slave trade. For all the back-and-forth about the film’s copious liberties with history, what’s actually here is an immensely satisfying adventure about a fresh recruit and the grizzled general trying to mould her into a warrior, with scene-stealing turns from Thuso Mbedu and Lashana Lynch.

Best Scene of the Year: the After Yang opening credits (dir. Kogonada)

I wasn’t quite as blown away by After Yang as the early praise for it had led me to expect, but the film’s opening credits remain one of the most delightful things I’ve seen this year, and never fail to put a smile on my face. As well as being visually inventive, they also tell you a great deal about the film’s future world, and how the idea of family has been reimagined within it.

Most Annoying Movie of the Year: The Lost King (dir. Stephen Frears)

A gentle, low stakes drama about solving the historical mystery of Richard III’s final resting place sounded like just the thing in the waning days of the year. What I should have remembered is that when dealing with Richard III, one must also deal with Ricardians, and The Lost King thus ends up paying very little attention to the story of how the lost grave was rediscovered, and is instead two straight hours of “Richard III was a sweet cinnamon roll, too good for this world, too pure”. It just feels like it should be possible to acknowledge that Shakespeare’s take on the man was agenda-driven historical fiction, without pretending that the last in a long line of power-hungry murderers (who, let’s face it, probably did kill his nephews) was nothing but a maligned saint.

Worst Movie of the Year: Don’t Worry Darling (dir. Olivia Wilde)

For quite a while, I was sure that this title would be taken by Netflix’s utterly misbegotten adaptation of Persuasion, which tries to “modernize” the novel by transforming it into a particularly shallow version of Fleabag. But Wilde’s latter-day, lesser Stepford Wives reimagining takes the cake for the loftiness of its ambitions, and its complete failure to live up to them. Amassing a stellar cast and placing them in a gorgeous and impeccably designed setting, the film clearly thinks of itself as making a serious feminist statement, despite the fact that it has absolutely nothing to say. Its ideas are tired, trite, underdeveloped, and utterly unworthy of all the effort put into conveying them.