Top Twenty Films of 2022

The universe is so much bigger than you realise; Everything Everywhere All at Once

2022 was a year where cinema continued to redefine itself in a post-lockdown world. That's one where multiple streaming platforms offer new home-viewing opportunities, while certain film production companies (I'm glaring at you, Warner Bros.) have continued with dubious same day cinema/TV release strategies. As a result of the above, cinema chains and independent theatres continue their struggle for survival with their target audience's viewing habits still in flux. 

It's a miracle, therefore, how much original writing and filmmaking has been showcased on our bigger screens over the past twelve months. Many examples on my list are based on original screenplays with no connection to any existing property. Okay - there's a scattering of very recognisable IPs (that's intellectual properties) too, but those are required to buoy up a flagging industry in its latest hour of need.

All my choices were released in the UK during 2022, and either showed up in a cinema close by me, or on streaming sometime later. Thus titles such as The Fabelmans, Babylon, The Whale, and Tar don't feature. As for Avatar: The Way of Water, I haven't mustered the enthusiasm to go see it yet, but by all means tell me if you think I'm missing a treat. Also, neither Wakanda Forever nor Bullet Train have made my list, somehow, which is a shame. I really enjoyed them both. 

Enough caveats. Here goes.

20. See How They Run

The first of two whodunit mysteries in my list, See How They Run is an underrated gem. While riding unashamedly on the coattails of 2019's Knives Out, the film is ingeniously meta in its own right, dealing as it does with a 1950s murder investigation on the set of Agatha Christie's London stage play The Mousetrap. Sam Rockwell and Saoirse Ronan are an enjoyable detective pairing, the latter's knowledge of crime fiction tropes adding much of the knowing humour. The period production design is sharp and the script is crafty, and if the energy sometimes lacks, there's still much here to enjoy.

19. Smile

In a great year for horror, Smile is a deliciously scary first feature from writer/director Parker Finn. True it wears its influences (like 2014's It Follows) quite openly, but it has enough gutsy drama at its heart to work on its own terms. And while the film delves deep the big scary-movie box of tricks, it uses them with an expertise of which many filmmakers can only dream. Everything about Smile gets its audience shuddering and squriming, while Sosie Bacon (grown-up daughter of Kevin) makes for a sympathetic and thoroughly harrowed protagonist.This is some of the most fun I've had this year being frightened.

18. The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent

Someone wrote that The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent was for Nicholas Cage fans only. I couldn't agree less. I'm not any kind of Cage fan, but by the end of this film I felt way better disposed towards this opinion-splitting actor. Here he plays Nick Cage, a caricatured version of himself whose career is in freefall. How far has it bombed? To the extent that he's willing to take payment for a showing up at the birthday party of a billionaire playboy super-fan (played by Pedro Pascal). With a screenplay that makes good-natured fun of Cage's career and media persona, this is clever without being smug and frequently hilarious. It even turns exciting as crime thriller elements take over, Cage forced to become the hero he only play-acted in films like Con Air. Also, his relationship with Pascal rapidly becomes movie bromance of the year, in a film that still makes me smile when I think about it.

17. Decision to Leave

What kind of romantic drama do you get from Korea's provocative Park Chan-wook, a filmmaker notorious for his stylishly brutal tales of crime and vengeance? Turns out, something that's elegant and restrained but still truly twisted. Park Hae-il is an insomniac cop investigating the death of a climber who pitched headfirst off a vertiginous clifftop. Tang Wei is the woman suspected of lending said climber (her husband) a helping hand. Cop falls haplessly for widow - so far, so noir. But Park frames events in his own oblique style, adding layer upon layer to the psychological drama. The cinematography is luscious, the editing style fascinates even as if frustrates, and the performances run deep - painfully so. If you expect this to end happily, you haven't seen Park's other films.

16. The Woman King

Director Gina Prince-Brythewood (best known for 2000's Love and Basketball) brings us this satisfyingly tough and rousing historical epic, inspired by the all-female warrior guard of West African kingdom Dahomey. Viola Davis is all kinds of muscular as the guard's leader General Nanisca, while young South African actress Thuso Mbedu excels as Nawi, the trainee warrior through whose eyes the story is told. There are great roles for rising Ugandan star Sheila Atim and Marvel/James Bond alumnus Lashana Lynch, while John Boyega puts proper distance between himself and his former Star Wars self as the young Dahomey king. However historically accurate this may or may not be, it's got grit and spirit aplenty.

15. Barbarian

Did I mention horror's great year? Here's an example that plays with all your genre expectations from the beginning and scarcely lets up. Delivered fresh from the mind of another first-time feature writer/director, Zach Creggar, it stars Kentish gal Georgina Campbell as Tess, who finds herself sharing an isolated Airbnb apartment with the vaguely creepy Keith (Bill Skarsgard) due to an unfortunate double-booking. 'Do I look like some kind of monster?' he asks, whereupon every audience member who recognises Skarsgard as Pennywise from the recent IT movies thinks Hell yes! Things, however, won't necessarily go like you're expecting. They might turn out much worse. And if your tastes in horror are similar to mine, you totally love it.

14. Guillermo del Toro's Pinocchio

Please don't confuse this with Disney's live-action Pinocchio remake, of which I have heard nothing good. This is a stop-motion adaptation of the original fairytale, created with love and ingenuity by the man who most recently brought us Oscar-contenders The Shape of Water and Nightmare Alley. In fact, according to the Mexican filmmaking genius it forms the final part of a thematic trilogy he began with The Devil's Backbone and Pan's Labyrinth. This version is as dark as it is beautiful, dealing as it does with love, war, and mortality. Gepetto the carpenter is maddened by grief, Pinocchio's nemeses include Benito Mussolini himself, and the Blue Fairy has a terrifying sphinx-like alter-ego, both characters voiced by Tilda Swinton. In other words, it's an undiluted del Toro vision of the living wooden puppet's story and all the better for it.

13. X

The final 'pure horror' entry in my countdown is X, Ti West's terrific evocation of the era that spawned 1974's The Texas Chain Saw Massacre. This is what happens when you make a grubby grindhouse slasher but put love into every frame. The sleaze and gore is elevated in the way that only the A24 entertainment company can do, helped by West's clever script and a clutch of great performances by the likes of Wednesday's Jenna Ortega, Virgin River's Martin Henderson, and the just plain awesome Mia Goth. (We in the UK have to wait till March 27th, 2023 to see Goth in X-prequel Pearl, which is nothing short of outrageous!!!)

12. All Quiet on the Western Front

Not a horror film as such, yet ultimately more horrific than Smile, Barbarian, and X combined. This is the third adaptation of Erich Maria Remarque's 1929 novel and, directed by Deutschland 83's Edward Berger, the first one made with a largely German cast and crew. It's a grimly superb war movie on a par with Saving Private Ryan and 1917. James Friend's cinematography is haunting in its beauty, a counterpoint to the Great War terrors that ravage the mind and soul of naive schoolboy protagonist Paul (a heart-rending performance by newcomer Felix Kammerer). Deserving of a theatrical release, you'll probably have to make do with watching it on Netflix - once you've steeled yourself for a hellishly convincing trek through the trenches of World War One.

11. Licorice Pizza

Licorice Pizza, a UK January release, is another sojourn by cinema wunderkind Paul Thomas Anderson in '70s California, his first having been 1997 tour de force Boogie Nights. If anything, this latest film is even more of free-wheeling odyssey - full of the offbeat, the eccentric, and the just plain weird. It's the tale of an awkward and stumbling first love between precocious teen go-getter Gary and his object of desire, 25-year-old cynic and misfit Alana. Their odd-couple adventures amid the casual madness of the San Fernando Valley, 1973, are unpredictable and freakily funny, while never less than stunningly captured on camera. Feature first-timers Alana Haim and Cooper Hoffman are strikingly authentic in the lead roles, and it's particularly touching to see the son of tragic Philip Seymour Hoffman making a movie with the director who helped propel his father to acting greatness. 

10. Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery

According to Rian Johnson, his love of the murder mysteries stemmed from watching those big starry Agatha Christie film adaptations from the '70s and '80s with Peter Ustinov as Hercule Poirot. With that in mind, Glass Union gives more than a nod to 1982's Evil Under the Sun. Daniel Craig's Benoit Blanc character, the Knives Out franchise's Kentucky-fried Poirot homage, is this time basking in Greek island sunshine among a group of tech billionaires, online influencers, and fashionistas, one of whom is feeling murderous. It's a hugely entertaining second outing for the detective, in a Bond villain location befitting Craig's other famous role. Knives Out may inevitably be the fresher of the two, but Glass Onion is both funnier and more stylish - with its predecessor's satirical edge and a deviously structured narrative that begins as a masterpiece of misdirection and then doubles back on itself to pile twist upon gleeful twist. Craig is terrific, but it's Janelle Monae who truly shines. Long may these Blanc investigations continue.

9. Living

Bill Night fan alert! This is probably his best ever performance and a contender for the most beautiful film in which the laconic actor has ever starred. The story is inspired by Akira Kurusawa's 1952 drama Ikiru about a Japanese bureaucrat who reassesses his existence when his doctor gives him brutal news about his health. Living alters the setting to post-war London, with Nighy funny and touching as Mr Williams, the stuffed-shirt civil servant who embraces life as never before in response to his dire diagnosis. Sex Education's Aimee Lou Wood provides great support as Williams' unlikely friend, office temp Margaret. It's all shot with the look and feel of a technicolour '50s classic, has a gently satirical screenplay courtesy of novelist Kasuo Ishiguro, and, while melancholy, is ultimately a life-affirming treat. 

8. Elvis

No other director could have re-envisaged the life and legacy of Elvis Aaron Presley Jr. quite the way Baz Luhrmann does. For a conventional biopic, look elsewhere. This is about Elvis as superstar and icon, and the Aussie auteur brings his divisive directorial wizardry to bear on the subject matter, crafting some of the most electrifying film sequences of the year. In the same way that he summoned the spirit of fin de siecle Paris in Moulin Rouge and America's Roaring Twenties in The Great Gatsby, so he conjures the raw energy of Presley's live performances like no literal form of filmmaking ever could. It doesn't hurt either that Austin Butler, in the title role, contributes the most stunning breakout performance of the year. 'Colonel' Tom Parker's insidious influence on the rock-and-roll prodigy's career provides the film's narrative spine, and, while Tom Hanks' performance in the role hasn't proved to everyone's taste, this is an all-round dazzling piece of cinema - for fans and Elvis agnostics alike.

7. The Batman

Not another Batman movie? Yes - exactly that, but unlike any of the others. Director Matt Reeves accesses a hitherto untapped aspect of the comic books' 80-year lore - that of Batman as detective noir. In this murkily lit opus Bruce Wayne is an embittered and vengeful gumshoe (gumboot?), Gotham is corrupt like the 1940s Los Angeles of Philip Marlowe, and the Riddler is a Zodiac-style serial killer taking out the city's great and less-than-good one nasty kill at a time. It helps that The Batman exists in isolation from any wider cinematic universe. Thus its production and sound design, its pithy screenplay and its brooding score are all very much the movie's own. This is a properly cinematic comic book film, with Robert Pattison giving us more antihero that the super kind. It's also got a killer Catwoman in Zoe Kravitz, and Colin Farrell's prosthetic-laden second-best performance of the year. (His absolute best is at No. 3.)

6. Nope

On a single viewing Nope doesn't quite rival Get Out in my affections where Jordan Peele's films are concerned. That said, this is a flipping huge movie, both in the way it bursts free of the horror genre to embrace epic science-fiction, and in the sheer number of fascinating ideas with which it bristles. The brand of alien activity experienced on the Haywood horse ranch run by Daniel Kaluuya's and Kiki Palmer's brother-and-sister-act is initially reminiscent of Steven Spielberg's Close Encounters; when things get properly close, however, this movie's extra-terrestrials are like nothing you've experienced before and all the scarier for it. Even more disturbing is a tangentially related subplot involving a recognisably Earth-bound creature. Did I say this breaks from horror? Let me rephrase. This isn't just a horror film - but it does know how to frighten in that unique Jordan Peele way. The more I think about it, the closer it gets to matching Get Out in quality. Time for a rewatch.

5. The Northman

You may think you've seen Viking dramas, but until you've watched The Northman, I venture to suggest you haven't. Filmmaker Robert Eggers proved his devotion to historical accuracy back in his 1630s-set horror The Witch. Here he achieves, if anything, an even greater sense of authenticity, delving deep into 9th century Nordic culture and myth to craft this brutal but mesmerising revenge tale. Rooted in the Viking saga that spawned Hamlet (and by extension The Lion King), The Northman stars an unfeasibly ripped Alexander Skarsgard as the one-time Prince Amleth, hell-bent on avenging the father-murder and mother-abduction both carried out by his uncle. Refusing to soften the tribal ferocity of the time, Eggers lets the story play out with a savagery only tempered by the presence of Anya Taylor Joy's Slavic sorceress Olga. Yes - there's mysticism too, adding a fever-dream trippiness to the violence, and the drama plays out against the stark beauty of Northern Irish locations (aside from one crazy sequence with an exploding volcano). The film is only accessible by Eggers' crazy standards, but damn is it magnificent. Plus there's Willem Dafoe and Nicole Kidman and Ethan Hawke. Basically, the cast is as formidable as Skarsgard's manly torso.

4. The Menu

Just look at that poster. The Menu is a delectable prospect that should have you salivating. Set almost entirely in an high-end island restaurant run by a renowned chef (Ralph Fiennes) and his devoted staff, it's a charcoal-black comedy with the most uncomfortable of laughter blended into its horror-thriller aspects. Fiennes is at his deadpan best as the gourmet genius on a bizarre culinary mission, and Nicholas Hoult heads up the array of hilariously pretentious foodies, critics, and assorted elitist assholes dining at his prestige establishment. Only Anya Taylor Joy's accidental guest casts a skeptical eye over the increasingly unsettling proceedings and well she might; this night's dining is only going to turn more sinister, and not in any way you might expect. The Menu is dark and delicious chamber piece that never gets an ingredient wrong on the way to an extraordinary climax - the flavour of which will stay with you long after you've finished watching.

3. The Banshees of Inisherin

Back in 2008 Martin McDonagh brought Colin Farrell together with Brendan Gleeson in a modest little film named In Bruges. Anyone acquainted with that cult classic will likely have rushed to see the Irish trio's reunion - darkly comic drama The Banshees of Inisherin. Set on a fictional island off the west coast of Ireland in 1923, it concerns a conflict between lifelong friends Padraic and Colm - smaller-scale than the Irish Civil War that rages on the mainland, but just as keenly felt. The humour is more bitter than a pint of plain, the overriding mood one of impending doom, and the characters' humanity only serves to heighten that sense of approaching catastrophe. If that all sounds too bleak, then let me stress the lyricism and nuance of McDonagh's writing, Farrell's and Gleeson's crackling chemistry, beautifully judged support performances from the likes of Kerry Condon and Barry Keoghan, achingly gorgeous cinematography, and one of the year's most evocative scores from Carter Burwell. All that and a donkey named Jenny. I can't promise you a happy tale, just a strange and hauntingly brilliant one.

2. Everything Everywhere All at Once

Empty your thesaurus of every synonym for 'bizarre' and you still haven't got enough words to describe this film. It's made, after all, by the Daniels (Dan Kwan and Daniel Scheinert), whose previous film Swiss Army Man starred another Daniel - Radcliffe - as a floating, flatulent corpse. Everything Everywhere All at Once is in essence about Evelyn, a middle-aged Asian-American woman questioning every life choice she's ever made - as her marriage, her relationship with her daughter, and her laundromat business, co-owned with her husband, all take a turn for the worse. This standard mid-life crisis is explored through the very non-standard prism of a science-fantasy multiverse narrative. Evelyn's reality splinters into countless alternative versions of herself, all of whom must combine to save - well - everything from obliteration. You have to see it to believe let alone understand it. And even then... Okay, look, Everything Everywhere mightn't be to everyone's taste, but it's undeniably a herculean achievement of storytelling in terms both of technical achievement and of frequently unhinged imagination. The lunacy is grounded - barely - through amazing performances from Michelle Yeoh (goddess of Chinese cinema), Ke Huy Quan (you know, from The Goonies and Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom before he vanished for two decades), and Stephanie Hsu (in a multiverse-shattering breakout role). It's a modern movie wonder, and a huge success story for cutting-edge independent cinema. Let this defiantly unique film melt your mind.

1. Top Gun: Maverick

I was going to try and be cool, and choose something artsy and obscure for my top pick, but sod that. No other film this year has given me the euphoric buzz of Top Gun: Maverick, and I'm not even a big fan of the original! It's not just the awe-inspiring practically shot flight sequences, though they go a long way to making this a special movie experience. It's the expertise with which the screenplay engages nostalgically with Top Gun '86, while achieving a fresh identity of its own. It's the way the action is rooted in character, resulting in swells of emotion you just didn't expect to feel. It's the knowledge that even a big crowd-pleasing blockbuster legacy sequel can have heart and humour wrapped in masterful storytelling, enough to banish all cynicism and carry its audience on an adrenalised thrill-ride seldom matched in modern cinema. If for nothing else, I love this film for dragging us Gen-Xers out of our pandemic-induced Netflix stupor and back to actual theatres to gasp and laugh and cheer and well up with emotion as part of a large group. The global film industry needed Top Gun's speed even more than Capt. Pete 'Maverick' Mitchell did, and I'm glad that this big, supremely entertaining movie provided.

That's it for 2022, although by the time you've read my review, I may have seen something else from the year that's vying for one of those twenty places. Let me know your favourites of the year, and let's all raise a glass to cinema's continued fightback in 2023.

Happy New Filmic Year. 🍻🎦