It's safe to say 2022 won't go down as one of the greatest cinematic years of all time, but that doesn't mean it's inherently been a bad 12 months for movies. While there might not be an Oscars field crowded with big beloved favorites, and most of the big box office movies not involving Tom Cruise in a fighter jet seemed to leave the general public relatively tepid, there were big screen gems to unearth. From quiet sci-fi meditations to killer slashers to epic Indian action buddy flicks to multiple films boasting characters with googly eyes, here are the Inlander critics' picks for the best movies of 2022.
CHASE HUTCHINSON
10. Saint Omer
9. RRR
8. Everything Everywhere All at Once
7. After Yang
6. Mad God
5. Nope
4. Tár
3. The Banshees of Inisherin
2. We're All Going to the World's Fair
1. Aftersun
The understated French drama Saint Omer tore through the stories we tell ourselves about the law and justice. S.S. Rajamouli's epic Indian action musical RRR put any and all other blockbusters to shame by flouting the laws of gravity in magnificent fashion. The reflective multiverse family dramedy Everything Everywhere All at Once rocketed through time and space. After Yang's exploration of memories in an A.I. robot — both thematically and visually — upended sci-fi conventions to build a new cinematic grammar. A descent into the rubble of a dark world, Phil Tippett's Mad God was a visionary work of stop-motion animation 30 years in the making. Sci-fi blockbuster Nope made us question what we give of ourselves in search of spectacle. An evocative character study of a conductor considered to be a musical genius, Tár was an unsettling yet uproarious portrait of power. The Banshees of Inisherin told a hilarious and haunting tale of conflict via two friends finding themselves having a prolonged falling out. A remarkable horror film that finds poetry in how the psychological is intermixed with the technological, Jane Schoenbrun's We're All Going to the World's Fair captured the loneliness and liberation of the internet.
However, nothing resonated as much as writer-director Charlotte Wells' feature debut Aftersun. A delicate yet devastating story of a father and his young daughter on a vacation that will be their last time together, it never sets a foot wrong no matter how boldly it dances into the darkness. For all the ways Wells draws us into a profoundly personal story, she makes us feel as though we are all living under the same sky together.
NATHAN WEINBENDER
10. Aftersun9. Apollo 10½: A Space Age Childhood
8. Pearl + X
7. RRR
6. Nope
5. Triangle of Sadness
4. Decision to Leave
3. The Fablemans
2. The Worst Person in the World
1. The Banshees of Inisherin
The future of the movies is out of focus. The theatrical distribution model is in shambles. Mid-budget, adult-oriented dramas are an endangered species. The streaming bubble seems apt to pop at any moment. Dispassionate terms like "content" and "IP" have infiltrated discussions of the artform.
And yet there are still daring, exciting, actually original new movies being made. I try not to intellectualize the exercise too much: These are, quite simply, the movies that have stuck with me and reminded me of the infinite possibilities of the medium. Whether I was laughing in disbelief at the bombast of RRR, puzzling through the plot of Decision to Leave or wincing in recognition at The Worst Person in the World (editor's note: which many people categorized as a 2021 movie), these were the films that made me a bit more hopeful about our cinematic future.
Martin McDonagh's story of men behaving like boys, The Banshees of Inisherin happens to be his most grown-up film to date. Set a century ago, it's about two civil wars rocking the bucolic Irish isle of Inisherin: the literal one booming across the sea, and the metaphorical one brewing between a gloomy man with artistic aspirations and the guileless friend he abruptly cuts out of his life. The fallout is sad, shocking and brutally funny, a study of the precarious nature of friendship, the emotional quicksand of small-town groupthink and the universal fear of being lost to time. With a quartet of astonishing performances by Colin Farrell, Brendan Gleeson, Kerry Condon and Barry Keoghan, McDonagh has crafted a tonally audacious, deeply moving fable that makes us laugh, somehow, in between the pangs of existential despair.
JOSH BELL
10. The House
9. Confess, Fletch
8. Crimes of the Future
7. The Northman
6. After Yang
5. Turning Red
4. Apollo 10½: A Space Age Childhood
3. Marcel the Shell with Shoes On
2. X
1. Mothering Sunday
I've noticed over the last few years that, contrary to typical awards-season patterns, my best-of lists skew heavily toward movies released earlier in the year, which is the case again here. Contemplating these movies for longer means I can say for certain that they stuck with me. I'm still thinking about the existential questions raised by Kogonada and David Cronenberg in their respective sci-fi movies After Yang and Crimes of the Future. The emotional experiences of adolescence portrayed in Domee Shi's gleeful animated fantasy Turning Red and in Richard Linklater's rotoscoped memory piece Apollo 10½: A Space Age Childhood still resonate with me, and I'm still humming the tunes by Turning Red's fictional boy band. I can still viscerally recall the thrills in Robert Eggers' Viking epic The Northman and Ti West's delightfully scuzzy 1970s-set horror movie X, and I'm still laughing at the deadpan humor of comic murder mystery Confess, Fletch. I'm still marveling at the breadth of this year's achievements in animation, including Turning Red, Apollo 10½, and stop-motion wonders The House and Marcel the Shell with Shoes On.
And I still remember when my top movie of the year — Eva Husson's period drama Mothering Sunday — took me by surprise back in March with how emotionally powerful and staggeringly beautiful it is. Set mainly in 1924, it starts out like a more sexually explicit take on Downton Abbey, but expands to encompass the entirety of the main character's internal life. Odessa Young is astonishingly good as a young housemaid whose future as a writer is shaped by her affair with the wealthy neighbor of her employers. All of it will stay with me: the impressionistic, nonlinear storytelling, the vibrant colors, the hushed secrets that even the viewer never fully understands, and the sense of grief combined with a renewed hope for the future.
SETH SOMMERFELD
10. Top Gun: Maverick
9. After Yang
8. Weird: The Al Yankovic Story
7. Decision to Leave
6. Confess, Fletch
5. RRR
4. Sweetheart Deal
3. Fire Island
2. Marcel the Shell with Shoes On
1. Everything Everywhere All at Once
Top Gun: Maverick has a hilariously dumb script, but it fully leans into that fact and the action scenes were truly thrilling on the big screen. Weird and Fire Island were both nonstop laugh fests despite coming from completely different places, a parody biopic and gay Pride & Prejudice. Sweetheart Deal (a documentary that was part of the Seattle International Film Festival) provided a harrowing and heartfelt portrait of sex workers on Aurora Avenue in Seattle with heart-wrenching twists along the way. The sci-fi contemplation of After Yang and the deadly romantic drama of Decision to Leave hit their targets on both intellectual and emotional levels. Confess, Fletch boasts top-end quality across the board, a perfect example of the adult-targeted mid-budget cinematic romp that barely exists anymore. And Marcel the Shell with Shoes On radiated with a playful warmth that can connect with viewers of all ages.
But my top film of 2022 hasn't changed since March. I like to joke that Everything Everywhere All at Once has run a brilliant Oscars campaign by making sure no other great movies were released for the rest of the year. Writers/directors Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert crafted a manic multiverse that had mass appeal despite its bizarre nature. The cast absolutely crushes the material at every turn, with Michelle Yeoh and Ke Huy Quan rightfully finally getting their flowers (if Quan doesn't win Best Supporting Actor, I personally demand a recount). The Daniels seem to throw every idea they have against the wall, and most of it sticks, because the inherent heart of family drama never gets fully buried by the frenetic visuals and comedic absurdity. ♦
