2022 was a sad year for films, as the movie going public didn't flock back to theatres in the way studios would have hoped. This may have more to do with the quality of films offered up to viewers than all the other reasons oft cited for box office decline. Sadly, it seemed easier to compile a list of the worst films I've seen this year than it was to brainstorm a Top 10 Best List off of the top of my head.
Going back through the 59 new release films I saw this year (which includes streaming debuts and movie network premieres) that included 14 trips to the cinema, there was a real unevenness to the quality of content. Though a number of films earned an A-/B+ grade, there were very few that came with a hands down, "you HAVE to see this film!!" rave review. It's very clear what was the greatest film this year, followed by very few surprises and a bunch of well done, good job, pat on the back efforts. Here's to better offerings next year! So with this, I offer to you, the Top 10 Best Films I saw in 2022...
10.
Bullet Train; Theatres used to be filled with films like these; fun, action packed stylized joy rides with a good amount of humour. Convincing Brad Pitt to play a role more generally reserved for the Channing Tatums and Ryan Reynolds of the world may speak more to the dearth of roles for leading men like him or it could just be a symptom of the type of work outside of superhero films that can appeal to action loving audiences and filmmakers alike. The casting of this train's cadre of characters works well to the film's benefit, adding to the carefully orchestrated mix of comedy, mystery and fight choreography. This is a true crowd pleaser in the vein of 90s indie action of an upper echelon. It doesn't compromise on its style, with a pace that pulls the audience along to the final frame, enjoying every minute of it.
9.
The Worst Person in the World; Few films take the time to show us more than a single chapter in someone's life, unless it's a biopic of a celebrated famous person that showcases the highlights of their time on earth. Rarely do we see someone floundering through mid-life, messing up as often as they live it up, in the manner of Julie in the aptly titled The Worst Person in the World. A full performance of a full life, filled with the multitude of emotions, experiences and entanglements that people find themselves navigating through simply living life and trying to find one's footing despite conflicting goals and desires. Never exactly likeable, as the title suggests, but often highly relatable, Renate Reinsve is excellent embodying everything that can make us love and hate a person, filmed in a manner that captures the mundane, the heartbreaking and the hallucagenic quite perfectly imperfect.
8.
Pink Skies Ahead; Technically a 2020 release, this slice of life living with anxiety popped up on the Movie Network and impressed with its honest depiction of the subtle aspects of crippling anxiety. Anchored by a wonderful performance from a favourite ingénue, Jessica Barden, this semi-autobiographical work comes from a place of profound truth, shying away from the trappings of stereotypical depictions of mental illness for the sake of movie machinations. The moments captured in the film are cute, sweet and common for coming of age dramas so when the anxiety enters the frame, it's a brilliant reminder of how people living with the struggle have their ordinary lives constantly threatened by this invisible monster always lurking under the surface, ready to explosively appear under the most inexplicable circumstances. Small budget filmmaking with a big impact for those impacted.
7.
The Gray Man; Gosling finds a franchise role that he could play until the cows come home. In theatres, this very well may have been a blockbuster, as it checks all the boxes that spy thrillers like Bond and Bourne have delivered, to lesser returns than this film offers up. From the action and comedy masters, the Russo brothers, The Gray Man has three of the most charismatic, charming and alluring leads play cat and mouse for two hours. Gosling's deadpan delivery is nicely complemented by Evans' relishing his opportunity to take a villainous turn, while de Armas shows why she's much more than eye candy and continues to steal films from bigger box office drawing leading men despite being given underwritten roles. If Netflix continues to churn these out, it's only a matter of time The Gray Man series settles in nicely alongside the Mission: Impossible, Bourne and Bond series in the hearts and minds of movie lovers.
6.
Run Woman Run; The antithesis to the film above, this small budget, small story has huge emotional returns and continues to demonstrate the strength of talent found in Indigenous filmmakers these days. Set in Six Nations of the Grand River, the film lovingly shoots the scenery between scenes of brutally honest self-questioning and self-delusion when it comes to pondering the state of our own physical/mental health and wellness. Dakota Ray Hebert heads up a down to earth cast that contains the diversity of personalties you're bound to likely run into on the reservation. The film solidifies the work of director Zoe Leigh Hopkins as a mainstay in the industry with a promising, long career ahead of her. The balance of sadness, hilarity, heart and humour can be a tonal shift struggle for some, but it's reflective of the reality that self-love is hard to come to terms with.
5.
Nope; There's very few auteurs out there that can command an audience to show up in cinema seats based solely on their name alone, but Jordan Peele has become one of them. Though Nope may not come as a surprise given the initial images and themes hinted at in the trailers and previews, its carefully constructed and crafted filmmaking certainly takes the audience along for a surprisingly gripping ride. The fun of experiencing a thrilling, suspenseful film in the confines of a dark cinema is not lost on Peele. It's as though he made this film with the thrill of summer movie going in mind. A summer blockbuster mentality with genre chills reminiscent of the summer of Jaws, turning cloudwatching into the new showering or swimming of horror films past. You'll never see inflatable tube men again without thinking about the layered storyline of Nope.
4.
Guillermo del Toro's Pinocchio; Speaking of auteurs, there may not be another as passionate and affectionate about his love of monsters and monster movie making than Guillermo del Toro. People love to hear and see him express his love of the unloveable, and with his latest take on an age old tale, he managed to make me care about a story I never engaged with before. The meticulous workmanship of stop motion animation lends itself perfectly to the vision of del Toro and the story's obvious connection of bringing inanimate objects to life through the love and care we give them and how they return that love to us tenfold. This telling of the Pinocchio tale doesn't shy away from the horrors and grotesqueness inherent in the aspects of the story, while carving deep into the core of its themes of what makes humanity equally horrible and hopeful. Another beautiful fairy tale from del Toro.
3.
Glass Onion; Sometimes watching a cast having so much fun can be less fun for the audience. This is NOT the case of Glass Onion, the latest Rian Johnson mystery in the Knives Out series. We could watch this group brought together to solve a murder on a gorgeous Greek island for much longer than it takes for Daniel Craig to solve the mystery. Janelle Monáe refreshes the reminder of how she is the consummate renaissance woman, while playing off a very playful cast of characters. Though the mystery isn't that perplexing, what is confounding is how exquisite this cast collaborates on a fun, entertaining diversion that we never knew we needed more of. I'm game for another instalment of this series, but I'm not sure if I want more Knives Out with Benoit Blanc, or more movies starring this exact same cast. Go along for the ride. You'll be glad you did.
2.
The Woman King; There wasn't a more powerful performance this year than Viola Davis embodying the epitome of kingly power in The Woman King. Taking its tale from the true life Agojie, the film manages to out perform the fictional Dora Milaje found in the Black Panther movie in terms of ferocity, inspiration and fortitude. A real crowd pleaser of a film, it has the typical movie moments designed to make you stand up and cheer, but the cast and direction manages to elevate it above the tropes. The female thespians find ways to impart humour, pathos and heart wrenching emotion out of a script that could play simply as a pure run-of-the-mill action film. In that area, the film does not fail to deliver, with brutal, exhilarating fight scenes buttressed by background story that infuses the action with meaning and consequence.
1.
Everything Everywhere All At Once; Funny story. We were going to go see Pulp Fiction in a theatre the night before seeing this film. At the last minute, I decided that I shouldn't force my youthful love of a once in a generation film on my daughter. In retrospect, I had come to realize that the moment wasn't right, it wasn't a film for her and isn't of her time or era. The next day we decided to go see Everything Everywhere All At Once, sight unseen. The most we knew was from 30 second ads on TV and 5-10 second social media spots that told us nothing. It looked like a fun kung-fu film starring Michelle Yeoh. We weren't prepared for the tour de force that is this film from the insanely gifted minds of the Daniels. Indescribable yet all encompassing in its offering of every genre blended together in a way that works infinitely better than anyone could imagine. It has to be seen to be believed and then rewatched to appreciate it on the many levels it operates on. We didn't go and see Pulp Fiction that evening. Instead, we went and saw the Pulp Fiction for this generation.
With that, I offer up some of the other films I enjoyed this year that didn't quite make the Top 10 of 2022 but are worth a watch. Check out the reviews by clicking the titles and decide if you want to give them a try in 2023. There's something for everyone in this strange mix of movies from this past year.
Honourable Mentions:
The Batman,
Crush,
Drive My Car,
Emily the Criminal,
Enola Holmes 2,
The Fallout,
Pig,
Sing 2,
Sneakerella,
Spirited,
Vengeance,
West Side Story
Sadly, this year offered up more than its share of awfulness on screen. I don't take joy in writing about horrible movies. I see it more as a service to others so you don't waste your time when there's so much other content available to spend your time on. There's seriously SO much content out there it's impossible to keep up with it all and to be swindled into suck just doesn't sit right with me. So, you've been warned...here are the Top 5 Worst Movies I saw in 2022:
5.
The Matrix Resurrections; There's a good movie to be made in the concepts presented in this film. It's just not this one. It's sad to see an influential, original film desecrated by its own franchise follow ups, but that's what's happening with the Matrix. Anyone who wasn't around to see the original but has caught wind of the sequels won't have any interest taking the blue pill and falling down the rabbit hole that made the first film so groundbreaking and mind bending. At least the first two follow ups offered some interesting action scenes on a scale larger (or at least different) from the first film. Sadly, this one starts to steer into a silly, meta commentary that sparks some creativity and cleverness but then takes a hard right into boringness, confusion and carelessness. I bet this isn't the last we've seen of this franchise. Here's hoping a series can revive its ideas to much better effect.
4.
Death on the Nile; The death in question occurs in the audience by way of boredom. This film would work best as a screensaver, showing off its exquisite locales and stunning luxury. Unfortunately, this must be the fault of falling in love with one's own film work and failing to find the editor's skill of trimming to get to the mystery at hand. Coming out the same year as Glass Onion, you can contrast the two as opposites in introducing the audience to your cast and stunning setting in equally enticing and excruciating ways. There's no way to get into this film that never seems to start and then never knows when to end either. One shouldn't have to struggle to get into a mystery. We should be smitten and hooked from the get go. This film works better as travel fodder than mystery material and if you don't believe me, then you're in denial (insert dad joke or Jungle Cruise comment here).
3.
Zombies 3; This sequel to a sequel of a Disney Channel made for TV movie isn't on here because it should have been amazing. The bar isn't set too high to begin with. However, the charming charisma of its likeable leads and a funny supporting cast game for goofy monster movie shenanigans and musical numbers that made the first Zombies film a surprise hit in our household fails to serve up anything hummable or watchable this time around. You might be thinking I'm crazy to expect anything less, but the guilty pleasure of watching Meg and Milo, both on and off camera, crumbles before our eyes. These two have a fun chemistry reminiscent of old time rom-com duos we've come to love in the past and they could be recast in any number of projects that aren't the stale, well past its due date that this Zombie franchise has become.
2.
Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore; The only secret worth knowing is how this franchise manages to string along an audience that lost interest several films (and TERF tweets) long ago. Thankfully, it's rumoured that the extent of this follow up franchise is being downsized to mercy kill the unpopular screenwriting, yet doing so, of course, without fully isolating its creator for fear of losing the suckling at the teat of the mass merchandising machine it brings to a studio in need of the money this franchise brings. It's astounding just how disinteresting this series has been, turning Dumbledore into a Dumblebore (am I right???). I can't even recall what the fun Dan Fogler did in this film, while the repulsive Redmayne and Miller (the latter off screen and the former on screen) are equally stunningly unmemorable. Did I see this film or did my muggle mind only imagine that I did?
and the worst film of 2022 is...
1.
Black Adam; This atrocity may very well be the worst film of this century. Black Adam will go down in history as either a turning point in the DC Universe (all hail our new hope, James Gunn!!), the film that made Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson come back down to earth (his historic run of crowd pleasing box office hits stuck by lightning), or the beginning of the end of superhero films (which is unlikely, but it sure as hell tried). It's no wonder that heads rolled over at Warner Bros. before the release of this stinker. The stench was in the air long before this hit theatres, and I pity those of you who went into a dark theatre and endured the assault of this craptacular. Films like these make my worst lists all the time, often because they disappoint, more than they fail to entertain, but this one is in a league of its own. It is unworthy of your couch time, and not even admissible to be left on in the background. Stay FAR away from Black Adam. I'd even suggest watching Shazam! for the first, second or tenth time before pressing play on this overstuffed bag of suck. You DON'T want to smell what the Rock was cooking with this film.
And there you have it. 2022 wasn't a great year for film, but it did supply one of the greatest cinematic experiences of my lifetime in the form of a surprise multiverse adventure that was equally hilarious and heartbreaking in multiple ways. I hope you have an opportunity to enjoy a movie in theatres sometime soon, and that it offers you the escape the films on this list did for me, while also reaffirming the humanity and shared experience of love and laughter that we commonly call life. Peace and Be Wild.
