Wyrm slides into the fifteen spot on this list because for the first forty-five minutes it's the funniest movie of the year, and even though the next forty-five minutes try too hard to be serious, it has enough delightful weirdness to earn a mention. Wyrm is what happens when you watched too much Napoleon Dynamite and then transplant those characters into a universe where everyone is required to wear an electronic collar until they pass their level one sexuality requirement—most commonly, kissing. Wyrm is our awkward main character who is the last in his class to achieve this pivotal moment, and is thus at risk of becoming lonely. And lonely people—especially lonely boys—are dangerous. There's an awkward Uncle, they eat nachos for every meal, and multiple characters perform dance routines. Seriously, it's Napoleon Dynamite. If you don't like stupid yet brilliant deadpan humor, don't watch this movie. For everyone else, watch at least the first forty-five minutes and you can turn it off after if you want. See if I care. It's currently on Hulu.
As someone who didn't love Petite Maman (the most anticipated film about children playing outside this year), I didn't expect another in the genre to be one of my favorites of 2022, but The Innocents is a pretty solid film about kids playing outside—and developing superpowers. Don't be confused. This isn't Sky High or Shazam. The Innocents is a slow drama about how terrible kids are and why you should avoid having them at all costs. These kids happen to have mild telekinetic powers and spend their afternoons practicing them. Unfortunately, when you practice something, you tend to get better at it; and if you've ever met a child, you'd know that they really don't have the emotional capacity to not murder people with their superpowers. Of course, just like in real life before the Internet, none of the parents know what their kids are up to; so if one of our characters goes rogue, playground justice is the only answer. The Innocents is on Shudder if anyone has that and AMC+.
Airbnb's are a scam. Especially when you show up to your rental in a totally safe part of Detroit and there is someone already staying there. Sure, he claims he booked the Airbnb too, and the booking company must have make a mistake, but his character is played by Bill Skarsgard, so he might be a murderer. Guaranteed to go in a completely different direction than the other two 2022 movies about accidentally booking the same Airbnb as someone else, Barbarian is a horror movie about how some men are scary, and some men are too stupid to get scared, and sometimes the scariest men are the ones you're not scared of. You'll understand what I mean, just watch the damn thing. It's much better than watching Men, I promise. Also, Justin Long shows up to generate some great square footage jokes. Honestly, the square footage jokes might be the reason Barbarian is on this list. Currently on HBO Max.
The most responsible financial decision you can make with a child is to sell it to someone else, and in Broker, that's exactly what our ragtag group of characters sets out to do. When a baby is abandoned at an anonymous Baby Drop, two employees pick him up and attempt to sell him on the baby black market. They don't want the baby to end up in an orphanage, and it's always nice to turn a tidy profit while finding him a nice home. The baby's mother discovers what they're up to, and comes along for the ride. Unbeknownst to our heroes, they are also being followed by the police (it turns out human trafficking is a crime). From the director who brought you Shoplifters—which is probably the greatest movie about random people becoming a family of all time—comes the second greatest movie about random people becoming a family of all time. Okay, it's not for sure second, but I'm not actively tracking the genre. It's a drama about being lonely and alienated. Maybe it will make you feel something. Maybe it will make you feel angry because it's not available on any streaming services except as a paid rental.
It was a great year for sharing awkward meals with questionable company. It was also a great year for satirizing the rich, because if you can't beat em, you might as well watch movies where they get taken down. The Menu is the dramatic version of Waiting, in which the staff finally get so fed up with their terrible customers that they start mocking them, belittling them, and—heaven forbid—refusing to give them bread. And probably worse, but you'll have to watch it to find out. The Menu takes place in a high end restaurant that serves stupid food that only rich morons would pay to eat at. Nicholas Hoult is the stupidest, most enthusiastic moron of them all, and his date (Anya Taylor Joy) is the only patron of the restaurant who realizes how stupid the food is. Ralph Fiennes, who is probably a sadistic monster in real life, plays the sadistic chef who is sick of everyone's bullshit, and finally ready to let them know. The Menu is as much a comedy as it is a thriller, and it features the second best cheeseburger of the year. The Menu is available on HBO Max.
2022 was not a great year for romantic comedies. To be fair, Fire Island did serve up a deliciously gay version of Pride and Prejudice; but Bros was kind of a sausage fest, Rosaline was a flash in the pan, and Meat Cute was terrible. Maybe a few had some meat on their bones, but with very few exceptions, the romances weren't fleshed out. Thank God for Fresh, which is definitely a romantic comedy and is SO surprisingly romantic that you shouldn't watch the trailer or look at its thumbnail on Letterboxd. Fresh is the story of Noa, a young woman who is sick of Tinder users treating her like a piece of meat, and is astonished when she spontaneously meets the charming Steve while shopping for vegetables (Steve doesn't eat animals, so this is a great movie for vegans). Steve is a definitely a catch, and he whisks Noa away on a weekend getaway. They spend the evening at Steve's luxurious home, where Noa realizes that Steve really brings home the bacon. I don't want to spoil anything, but Noa is treated to romantic dinners, long talks in the basement, and she begins to feel that Steve truly sees her as more than a piece of ass. Please note that you should not watch Fresh if you have trigger warnings for nudity, gore, exceptionally romantic men, female directors, or human abduction. Your appetite for Fresh can be sated on Hulu.
Okay. I take it back. There was one good romantic comedy in 2022, but I really didn't want to spoil anything in the last entry. Sure, it's not as romantic as meeting a cute boy and consuming human meat with him (I'm clearly talking about Bones and All, and nothing else), but the point here is the comedy. Charlie Day and Jenny Slate team up to convince each other's exes into breaking up with their new significant others in hopes that they will come crawling back to them. It's a simple premise that rides on the talent of the two leads and better than expected writing. Sure, Charlie Day leaps from a balcony into a hot tub and Jenny Slate fills in for a children's musical, but they also develop passable relationships with each other's exes and have earnest conversations about relationships and self-analysis. Nothing life changing here, but it's refreshing to get strong comedy and genuine moments instead of stolen Reddit jokes and Hallmark moments written by the Netflix AI. Okay, maybe it ends with a Hallmark moment but at least it was a payoff to an earlier setup. I Want You Back is on Amazon Prime.
Say what you will about 2022, but it was a great year for cannibalism. Some Like it Rare is about a struggling butcher and his wife who accidentally kill a vegan and discover he is delicious. This may absolutely, without question, be the only film on this list about killing humans to sell their meat, but it's a great premise and a great business plan. I do recommend if you ever turn a human being into a delicious ham in order to dispose of the body, that you at least let your wife know so that she doesn't accidentally eat some and also sell it to the townsfolk. Because once the townsfolk try it, they want to buy more. But where do you find vegans to murder for their meat? Is there an app for that? Our couple begins scouring vegan restaurants, vegan food festivals, and taking political action on rival butcher shops in order to find vegans to hunt. They kill a lot of vegans. They really start to enjoy it. I also really enjoyed it. Murdering people for their meat can be really funny.
There were a record number of donkeys on film this year, and The Banshees of Inisherin has the best donkey. It also has a few jackasses. Colin Farrell lives on a small Irish island and visits his friend Brendan Gleeson for their daily visit to the pub. Unfortunately, Brendan Gleeson has decided that he no longer wants to be friends with Colin Farrell because it's important that he writes a song before he dies and Colin Farrell spends too much time talking about donkeys. It's a really annoying premise because Brendan Gleeson is being a dick and Colin Farrell is just a nice guy who wants his friend back. But it's really good anyway because it's written by Martin McDonagh, the man who figured out how to make billboards interesting. Since Colin Farrell got dumped by Brendan Gleeson, he starts hanging out with Barry Keoghan, who provides fun comments about sticks with hooks on the end and flirts with Farrell's sister. Anyway, if you want to be entertained by biting Irish dialogue and dudes who don't realize drinking beer with your friends is the only thing there is to do in life, you can find it on HBO Max.
The Menu probably had a more delicious cheeseburger, but the cheeseburger in Triangle of Sadness has better comedic timing. I was not expecting a Ruben Ostlund movie to be one of the only 150 minute movies I didn't find too long in 2022, but something about Woody Harrelson and a Russian fertilizer kingpin shouting Marx and Reagan quotes over the PA while everyone else on a luxury yacht has food poisoning really hit me in the right spot. Triangle is split into three segments: the first introducing us to a couple who argue about gender roles and the nature of their relationship; the second following the couple and a broader cast of characters on a high class yacht filled with rich, idiotic passengers; and the third taking place on an island where some of our characters end up after the yacht is hijacked. Don't shout about spoilers, this isn't a narrative in the conventional sense. If you want a narrative, just watch The Menu instead. This is probably the film on this list you're most likely to hate, but watching rich people be awful and the upending of class dynamics in the last act worked for me. Your mileage may vary. Triangle of Sadness is also only available as a paid rental, and I'm starting to think you should cancel all your services except for HBO Max.
Every year is a great year for white dudes to start a podcast and, in Vengeance, BJ Novak is creating a podcast investigating the death of a woman he used to hook up with. He flies to a small Texas town to interview her family who believes she was murdered. He's a know-it-all New Yorker who assumes the small-town Texans are morons, but he's never had Whataburger, so what can he possibly know? Ashton Kutcher shows up as a cowboy philosopher working as a record producer—perfect for a white dude's podcast—and is just one of many characters who challenges Novak's perception of small town Texas. Sure, there are the plenty of references to guns and football, but Ben slowly realizes that the other characters are much more than the caricatures he thought they were. If you're hoping for a satisfying true crime mystery story, you're better off with an actual podcast, but if you enjoy smart comedy with passable commentary on American culture, Vengeance is available on Amazon Prime.
Would you like to feel pure joy? Because RRR is pure joy. It is also most genres of film at the same time. It is also three hours long and you won't be bored for a moment. Everything that happens is done to the maximum: whether it be fighting a tiger, single-handedly battling an unruly mob of hundreds, or meeting your new best friend by tethering yourselves together and jumping off a bridge to save a child from certain death. Those are three of infinite action scenes; and there are also bromance montages, a budding romance, extended torture, a splendid dance number, and epic escapes. It's all extremely over-the-top, but in the best of ways. Most importantly—it is so much fun. I know you all hate subtitles, but I'll allow a dub in this case if you insist. Just watch this movie. After all, RRR is the only reason to still have a Netflix account.
If I were ever going to enthusiastically watch another biopic in my life, a Weird Al biopic would be one of the better choices. Even better, it takes less than ten minutes to realize—in perfect Weird Al fashion—that Weird is a complete parody of actual events. The film follows Weird Al as he follows his dream of writing words to other people's songs and becomes the most famous musician in the world. With his newfound fame comes bigger and bigger pressures. Pablo Escobar wants Al to play his birthday party. He starts dating Madonna who is a bad influence (with alcohol, not plastic surgery). He writes an original song called "Eat it" and that washed up hack from the Jackson Five writes a parody of it. Certainly, Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story is still the pinnacle of music biopic parodies, and Weird tackles a lot of the same tropes; but the fictional accounts of actual people and events is enough to set it apart. I assume it's funny even if you don't know who Weird Al is, but I'm old now so I can't be sure. Weird is available on the Roku Channel—which is apparently free with ads.
When you watch a billion movies per year, there are always long stretches where you see so many duds that you start to wonder if you even like movies anymore. Then you watch something like Everything Everywhere All At Once, feel surprised for the first time in years, and remember that most movies are just trash. I'm sure for most people (and all dads), that "I-love-movies-again" movie was Top Gun, but every time someone told me how good Top Gun was, all I could do was ask, "Have you seen Everything Everywhere All At Once though?" They hadn't. But I bet most dads would like it. You will like it. It's about Michelle Yeoh, a laundromat owner, who is in the middle of a tax audit when her husband's body is taken over by a visitor from an alternate reality. He teaches her to borrow skills from the Michelle Yeoh's in other universes who—because they made slightly different choices in life—know karate, have increased lung capacity, or have hot dogs for fingers. All of these skills will assist her in defeating the all-powerful evil who is trying to destroy the multiverse. The result is an action comedy better than all 31 Marvel movies, which is especially relevant as it came out around the same time as that terrible Dr. Strange multiverse sequel. If you're not excited about hot dog fingers, I don't know what else to tell you. Go watch Tar or something. You can stream Everything Everywhere All At Once on Showtime.
I would like to go on record stating that it is impossible to compare Decision to Leave and Everything Everywhere All At Once in any objective way, and you should just accept that they are polar opposites and the only 2022 films that actually matter. With that said, 2022 was a great year to potentially murder your significant other, and Chan-Wook Park decided to run with that and make the most romantic movie of the year. The movie opens with a detective investigating the death of a man who appears to have fallen while rock climbing. The detective suspects foul play and begins investigating the man's wife; watching her regularly on stakeouts as if that will somehow help him solve the murder. It does allow him to develop a crush on her because men are perverts. There's a lot of lingering gazes and a murder mystery. Think Portrait of a Lady on Fire mixed with Vertigo. We could call it Surveillance Photos of a Lady Eating Ice Cream. My biggest criticism is that it's not Oldboy or The Handmaiden, but we can't count on every Chan-Wook Park film to be a masterpiece. Almost masterpiece is going to have to be good enough this year. You can rent Decision to Leave for money or stream it on Mubi—whatever that is.
Amazon Prime: 1
I think it's time to go back to cable.
The Worst Person in the World - Norwegian Fleabag without any character development.
Official Competition - This is somehow not a Pedro Almodovar film.
The Black Phone - Ethan Hawke tries to reenact a twisted version of Boyhood.
Bones and All - Armie Hammer told Timothee Chalamet about cannibalism and he had to try it.
The Whale - Alright Aronofsky. You get fat by eating like a madman. We get it.
The Fabelmans - Michelle Williams likes a man other than her husband again.
Armageddon Time - It's The Fabelmans if it was about doing hood rat things with your friends instead of filmmaking.
Fabian: Going to the Dogs - A three hour romantic drama that I really liked but can't remember why.
Bullet Train - Everyone On A Train All At Once
Emily the Criminal - At this point I think Gen Z has to go black market to have a career.
Good Luck to You, Leo Grande - Emma Thompson hires a hooker to get back at Alan Rickman for doing her dirty in Love Actually.
Top Gun: Maverick - One thousand times better than we all expected.
Hustle - Adam Sandler teaches Flash Forward what a good basketball player looks like.
Mona Lisa and the Blood Moon - Kate Hudson really channeled the trashy in 2022.
Causeway - I assumed this was Oscar bait, but it's one of the year's best dramas.
Brian and Charles - A lonely man builds a robot and they become friends and eat cabbages.
Nude Tuesday - Jermaine Clement and some other folks get naked and speak gibberish.
The Northman - Pretty sure this is a True Blood prequel.
Cha Cha Real Smooth - A female version of Leonardo DiCaprio grooms a 22-year-old boy.
THE GOOD:
Delicious - A chef starts the first restaurant and throws shade at the rich folk.
She Said - Did you guys know that Harvey Weinstein was a bad dude?
Nope - They say "Nope" a lot. That's the best part of the film. There's a monkey for some reason.
Glass Onion - Was Knives Out as silly as this and I'm just misremembering?
Athena - This is the Antifa the Republicans are afraid of.
Fire Island - Worth it for the karaoke scene.
Confess, Fletch - John Hamm should be in only comedies.
The Sadness - Bloody zombie movies are usually fun.
You Won’t Be Alone - All whispery voiceover movies remind me of Terrence Malick.
The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent - Nicolas Cage kisses Nicolas Cage.
Smile - I must be broken because I liked this more than X and Pearl.
The Lost City - I will watch anything with Channing Tatum in it.
All Quiet On the Western Front - Some stuff blows up. War is bad. Soldiers steal snacks.
Mrs. Harris Goes to Paris - A lady buys a dress and it's an adventure I guess.
Prey - The metaphorical version of She Said.
Kimi - A decent Soderbergh thriller than no one saw.
The Batman - The Patman.
Orphan: First Kill - This was also a good horror movie somehow.
White Noise - This was one of my favorites of the year for about thirty minutes.
Matilda The Musical - Kids sing songs and fight teachers.
Jerry and Marge Go Large - Brian Cranston takes his Breaking Bad money and doubles down.
Petite Maman - A little girl meets the little girl version of her mom and they build a fort.
Resurrection - The art house version of Watcher.
Watcher - The general public version of Resurrection.
Tar - I liked the first act and when she threatened the child.
Day Shift - Jamie Foxx and Dave Franco fight vampires.
The Good Nurse - A nurse kills people for some reason.
7 Days - A cute COVID romcom. Are we done with these yet?
Hatching - IS IT A METAPHOR?
Pretty Problems - Glass Onion but without the Knives Out franchise money.
See How They Run - Sam Rockwell solves a mystery.
Dog - Channing Tatum takes a dog for a road trip.
Frank and Penelope - A trashy romance/crime/cannibalism drama that I loved anyway.
Holy Spider - The true horror of this movie comes after they catch the killer.
The Greatest Beer Run Ever - It's like All Quiet on the Western Front but with beer.
Where the Crawdads Sing - This is a very watchable bad movie that plenty of people will like.
The Outfit - Let's give Mark Rylance an honorary award for something this year.
The Woman King - The best Marvel movie of 2022.
Deep Water - We need more erotic thrillers with snails.
After Yang - Colin Farrell drinks tea and attempts to fix a robot.
Hellraiser - It is a horror movie you can watch if you want to watch a horror movie.
Fourth of July - The only person that makes worse Woody Allen clones these days is Woody Allen.
X - Guys, it's just a slasher. I don't understand.
Pearl - This is better than X just because Mia Goth is a creep.
Inspector Ike - A stupidly dry detective comedy that seemed like something I'd like more.
Honor Society - It's kind of like Gen-Z Election.
Next Exit - The existence of an afterlife is proven so everyone kills themselves.
Bros - I watched this to prove that I wasn't a bigot.
Persuasion - The novel purists were upset, but it's not that bad.
Piggy - A fat girl lets a serial killer kill Regina George.
Girl Picture - Some girls are friends and hang out but get mad at each other or something.
Tiny Cinema - A horror anthology. Some stories are good, some are bad.
VHS 99 - A horror anthology. Some stories are good, some are bad.
Terrifier 2 - They tried to add a story to the Terrifier series, which was a bad idea.
Thor: Love and Thunder - The Internet is pretending this is worse than all the other recent Marvel movies for some reason.
Black Panther: Wakanda Forever - Convince me that James Cameron didn't steal the Avatar concept from the Black Panther comics.
Incredible But True - Just watch every Quentin Dupieux movie to see what happens.
The Quiet Girl - A girl with a shitty mom hangs out with her Aunt who is much nicer to her.
Sundown - How much money do I need to retire to Mexico with Tim Roth?
The Fallout - School shootings are sad.
Elvis - Everything is sad in this movie except for Austin Butler's performance.
About Fate - If you like watching straight-to-streaming romcoms written by AI's you could do worse.
Violent Night - Santa Claus fights people.
Do Revenge - This just seems like the type of movie Timothee Chalamet would show up in. He didn't.
Luckiest Girl Alive - This starts off with Gone Girl vibes and then gives up on them thirty minutes in.
Christmas with the Campbells - Worth watching just for Justin Long's dialogue.
Glorious - Jason from True Blood talks to a gloryhole voiced by JK Simmons.
Red Post on Escher Street - Sono made a movie where nothing insane happened. This better not be a new trend.
Dual - How dare this movie not be great. I am so disappointed.
I Love My Dad - If this movie doesn't make you cringe painfully it's actually really good.
THE MEH:
Rosaline - Romeo's ex-girlfriend gets snarky.
Meet Cute - A terrible romcom that could have done better with its premise.
Aftersun - A father and daughter perform skin care for 100 minutes.
Benediction - A gay soldier reads poems.
Corsage - An Austrian Empress lounges about.
To Leslie - A drunk lady is saved by Marc Maron.
Bodies Bodies Bodies - How badly do you want to see Pete Davidson dead?
Funny Pages - A high schooler draws dirty cartoons and hangs out with scumbags.
Bardo: False Chronicle of a Handful of Truths - Cinematography occurs.
Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore - Was this the second one or the third one?
On the Count of Three - Two friends agree to kill each other at the end of the day.
Both Sides of the Blade - A boring middle-aged love triangle.
Crimes of the Future - Worth watching for Kristen Stewart being weird.
Something In the Dirt - Two dudes smoke weed and stare at the window.
Scream - Watch this if you would like to watch a Scream movie.
Eo - A donkey wanders around and people liked it for some reason.
The School For Good and Evil - Harry Potter on a stringent budget.
Spiderhead - Chris Hemsworth tests the COVID vaccine.
Lady Chatterley's Lover - Some lady has a lot of sex in fields.
Baby Assassins - High School girls are great assassins but bad roommates.
Flux Gourmet - Uh. Farting is a major plotline in this movie.
Catherine Called Birdy - The Last of Us girl doesn't want to get married.
Sharp Stick - A babysitter becomes obsessed with sex and The Punisher.
Spin Me Round - Aubrey Plaza and Allison Brie are in it. Do with that what you will.
The Invitation - It's always vampires.
Halloween Ends - This better be the actual end or I'm going to sue someone.
Hellbender - A girl discovers she's a witch and her mom keeps her at home so she doesn't become transphobic.
The Eternal Daughter - Tilda Swinton acts for Tilda Swinton, who acts back.
Babylon - Singing in the Rain but with an R-rating and a lot more nonsense.
THE BAD:
Soft and Quiet - Racist white ladies start a hate group.
Disenchanted - No one asked for this.
Empire of Light - Olivia Colman discovers racism exists.
The Gray Man - Ryan Gosling must have needed a pay day.
Significant Other - This took a turn that was great for fifteen minutes or so.
My best Friend’s Exorcism - Do Revenge but with exorcism.
Amsterdam - A star-studded disaster.
Don’t Worry Darling - The press tour was one of the best films of the year.
Women Talking - I don't think this passed the Bechdel test.
Pleasure - Someone should really warn people that the porn industry is not great.
Senior Year - Rebel Wilson is obnoxious and in high school.
House of Darkness - Justin Long plays a douche again.
Clerks 3 - The exact plot of Clerks, but everyone is old.
Falling For Christmas - Lindsay Lohan makes a triumphant comeback.
Black Adam - It's okay, DC. You tried.
Not Okay - A cringy lady pretends to survive a terrorist attack for the Gram.
The Wonder - A girl refuses to eat because of God.
Jurassic World Dominion - DINOSAURS 6: The Search for More Money.
Till - I'm sorry. When he whistles at the lady, I couldn't stop laughing and the movie was over for me.
Eating Miss Campbell - A Troma film about eating people.
Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness - I watched this and thought, "There is no way Morbius is worse than this."
Morbius - It was worse.
CINEMATIC TRAVESTIES:
Poker Face - Russell Crowe makes all his poor friends play a high stakes poker game that they only play two hands of before he tells them that he poisoned them and then all that stops mattering because some dude breaks in to steal paintings. AKA Billionaire Panic Room.
Blonde - The talking fetus was the best part.
Men - If all the men are played by the same man, can you use the argument, "Not all men?"
We’re All Going to the World’s Fair - Can someone teach me to like these one character movies where nothing happens?
Emergency - College kids make a series of stupid decisions and blame the results on racism. I've actually almost convinced myself that this was the intent of the movie and I think that makes it a better movie and the writer a white supremacist.
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