Fractured friendships & realities, romantic cannibal road trips, brand new organs and blue aliens, musical icons both royal and disgraced, sincere action epics and even more sincere directors looking back to their pasts.
By Cody Workman, Joseph Shin, Nathan Alligood, and Reagan Jones
After months of heated debate and rigorous tallying, four of our intrepid editors have finally settled on a list of the 100 best films of 2022. This list reflects the collective view of these four editors and will shock most readers. There are some shocking omissions and even more shocking inclusions, but what we all agreed on was that 2022 was an exceptional year at the movies. We hope you enjoy our picks for the 100 best films released in the United States in 2022.
100 | Sharp Stick
2022 was the year of Lena Dunham. The controversial filmmaker returns with the hilarious Sharp Stick, a wholesomely crude look at sexual innocence and relationships in the modern world. A stellar cast and brisk pace makes Dunham’s film one of the year’s best films and has us all here at Scrawls On Cinema hyped for Dunham’s future projects. – C.W.
99 | The Munsters
With an oeuvre that seems to have maniacal killers, dried blood, and a love for grindhouse baked in, it’s hard to see how Rob Zombie would do on a cinematic revival of beloved 60’s sitcom The Munsters, but thankfully Zombie’s love of classic horror and monsters shines through. Using an aesthetic closer to the zaniness of classic television cheese, The Munsters (2022) has a style all its own, using its small budget on some pretty impeccable set design to bring the world of Herman, Lily, and The Count to life. Rob also brings along his regulars to populate the world, albeit in heavy makeup, but true devotees can spot Richard Brake in Orlockian makeup a mile away. – N.A.
98 | My Tinder with Andre
Backyard Atlanta auteur Logan Austin delivers a remarkably thoughtful, charming riff on both My Dinner with Andre and Richard Linklater’s Before trilogy with this cheekily-named film, delivering a convincing and realistically awkward modern romance on a shoestring budget with some very charming actors you’ve never heard of. Now streaming on Tubi. – R.J.
97 | EO
84-year-old Polish filmmaker Jerzy Skolimowski received quite possibly the best reviews of his entire career this year for his experimental reimagining of Robert Bresson’s canonical Au Hasard Balthazar, and while it may be awfully low on this list, I assure you it is only because I am the sole member of our intrepid quartet to have seen it. EO is an emotional, creative, and surprisingly-funny film that weds a remarkable sense of stylistic experimentation with Skolimowski’s deeply empathetic portrayal of the central jackass. Highly recommended. – R.J.
96 | Chip ‘n Dale: Rescue Rangers
Before the insurgency of Andor, there stood alone one title that challenged the fetid atmosphere that had long since defined the Disney+ imprimatur. That film was Turning Red. But after that, perched on a molehill was an unexpected chestnut of a comedy. Helmed by Akiva Schaffer, who had delivered such minor masterpieces of pantomime as Hot Rod and Popstar: Never Stop Never Stopping, and buoyed with a host of memorable voice actors, led by frequent Schaffer collaborator Andy Samberg and John Mulaney, Chip ‘n Dale: Rescue Rangers begins as a shameless riff of the canonical cartoon hybrid Who Framed Roger Rabbit?, but lives by the outrageousness of its parody, clashes of IP so monstrously preposterous that they carry the film out of its humdrum detective plotting. Ugly Sonic quickly became the face of the film’s farce but it is the spectre of Batman vs ET that will haunt my memory. – J.S.
95 | Deep Water
Adrian Lyne’s steamy, misunderstood thriller Deep Water brilliantly captured the power dynamic between a psycho couple played by Ben Affleck and Ana De Armas. Both actors ooze sexuality and violence as Lynne’s camera captures the bourgeoisie world surrounding our couple and becomes as enamored with their crimes as the couple is with committing adultery. Affleck is especially great here, showing a menacing side that is terrifyingly low-key. The film also contains the car chase of the year; you are not prepared for just how magnificently silly this one gets. We can’t recommend this steamy thriller enough and hope this leads to more opportunities for the great Adrian Lyne. – C.W.
94 | Bros
One of the greatest scourges to plague the quickly-evaporating art form of the comedy blockbuster is the soulless automaton known as Judd Apatow. With film after film, whether he produces, directs and/or writes, he presents a vision of encroaching conservatism, characters whose often-hilarious dysfunctions are procedurally sanded down into a numbing conformity. While the Apatow-produced Bros does not completely buck this formula, it is a film that despite what its cloying marketing and the painfully-belabored online presence of Billy Eichner would have you think, takes no prisoners in presenting its refreshingly unapologetic milieu of queer modern life. Bros fears neither sex nor intimacy, a rare combination that proves to be its most quiet subversion. – J.S.
93 | Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness
Sooner or later the Marvel Universe was bound to break into yet another dimension, bringing about all the narrative snafus that entails, but thankfully Sam Raimi was tapped to guide us through our first full foray. For a film still steeped in MCU-style, there’s some welcome deviations, with battles and developments that somehow feel like truer adaptations of the comics on which they’re based, and some clear genre elements borrowed from Raimi’s roots in horror. It’s a fun, simple affair that remembers what we’re watching, and fully leans in to give the people across the multiverse what they want. – N.A.
92 | Lingui: The Sacred Bonds
Chad filmmaker Mahamat-Saleh Haroun’s Lingiu: The Sacred Bonds depicts the harrowing story of a mother and daughter tirelessly seeking an emergency abortion after the young daughter becomes pregnant. Full of religious commentary and observations on gender roles in modern day Chad, Haroun’s film is ultimately about the bond between mother and daughter and how that bond holds during times of great stress. Solid performances and Haroun’s confidence behind the camera make this film one of the best films of 2022. – C.W.
91 | Fire of Love
*Born-again Christian Bob Dylan voice* I NEED A FIREEEEEEEE OF LOVE
While occasionally stifling in its preciousness (most notably in the fanciful bits of animation interspersed throughout), Fire of Love presents so delicious a metaphor of interpersonal relationships, an intertwining of professional obsession and romantic love fired in the crucible of volcanic activity (with a tragic ending to boot), so as to reach beyond the confines of its humble National Geographic origins. Those who find themselves less inclined to the human-interest story, much less the poetical narration of Miranda July, will still find it hard to resist the awesome (in the most biblical sense of the word) footage shot by the doomed volcanologists themselves, who have as much a claim in being called the filmmakers of the piece as credited director, Sara Dosa. – J.S.
90 | Big Bug
Big Bug is yet another misunderstood film from the streamers that somehow has been completely ignored by mainstream critics. This futuristic chamber piece about technology and government control is a cautious tale about the dangers of authoritarianism and the importance of keeping our world human. As automation continues to swallow our jobs and our governments become more authoritarian, Jean-Pierre Jeunet uses satire and imaginative visuals to sound the alarm before it is too late. – C.W.
89 | Peter von Kant
Sacrilege be damned, Peter von Kant proves the superior film to The Bitter Tears of Petra von Kant. Whereas the earlier film predicated itself on icy repression, the François Ozon reimagining is instead, to borrow a description of Roy Orbison’s singing by Bob Dylan, all blood and fat. Featuring a towering Denis Ménochet performance (absolutely serving Kant, as the kids are wont to say) that cheekily doubles as a remixing of the explicit God of the picture, Mr. Rainer Werner himself, along with welcome incursions by the eternally-iconic Isabelle Adjani and direct Fassbinder-link Hanna Schygulla, Peter von Kant irreverently disavows the prevailing prejudices against remakes. – J.S.
88 | Catherine Called Birdy
Great fun, Lena Dunham can’t miss in 2022. – C.W.
87 | Prey
For all those left dangling by an oddly specific 20 seconds in Predator 2, your prayers were finally answered this year in one of the smash successes of the newly minted 20th Century Studios and their pipeline to Hulu. Set in the Great Plains and focusing on Naru, a young Comanche woman working to earn her rightful place as hunter, the film starts slow in building up a people and way of life rarely depicted on screen. Before long, oppressors of both the European and extraterrestrial appear, leading to that familiar gory showdown of Predator and Prey, but with the interesting caveat of both parties using the technology of their respective pasts. What follows is an exciting, fresh match-up for a franchise that perhaps jumped the shark with the battle of Alien vs Predator, but Prey proves there may be a road back. – N.A.
86 | Ticket to Paradise
There has been much ink spilled over the perceived devaluation of the movie star. Yet, in 2022, Tom Cruise rode that supposition into the ground to the tune of 1.5 billion dollars, and on a more modest scale, George Clooney and Julia Roberts took two tickets to paradise in a gambit to prove that they could still coax a profitable number of asses to seats. The result is a picture of immense charm evoking, with great aplomb, the delightful textures of a screwball comedy. Clooney has eternally been likened to Cary Grant and the likeness emerges intact and ready-to-rumble with his very own Rosalind Russell, a just-as-game Julia Roberts. With pretty-as-a-postcard scenery and a utopian outlook (sustainable seaweed farming anyone?), Ticket to Paradise is escapist entertainment of the highest order. – J.S.
85 | Lost Illusions
While Coda was picking up the top gong at the Academy Awards, across the sea, our French compatriots awarded the César for Best Film (along with 6 other awards) to this handsome period picture. It’s the sort of film that typically evinces a sort of middlebrow taste culture, but the excellence of its direction, production, and performance mark it a cut above the Bridgerton-adjacent costume dramas that are currently peddled. Based on the famed work by Honoré de Balzac, the film’s claim to contemporary relevance is expressed through the phenomenon of “fake news,” which is handled with much brio, but also nestled within are some more eternal thematics: the commingling of artistic expression with social mobility, sex, politicking and no small degree of rapaciousness. Benjamin Voisin carries the film on his shoulders, whose natural charisma was on display since his debut in Francois Ozon’s similarly excellent Summer of 85, along with supporting turns from such strange bedfellows as Canadian enfant terrible Xavier Dolan and the always larger-than-life Gerard Depardieu. – J.S.
84 | God’s Country
One of the year’s most underseen films comes from filmmaker Julian Higgins adapting his 2015 short film Winter Light into a narrative feature. Starring the amazing Thandiwe Newton, God’s Country tells the story of a feud between a college professor and a group of hunters who repeatedly trespass on her land. Set in the snowy mountains of Montana, the story moves at a slow pace with characters festering in their anger before the inevitable violent conclusion. God’s Country is a mean, melodramatic modern day western with easily one of the great endings of the year. – C.W.
83 | Moonfall
The master of disaster is back with one of the most ridiculous films of all time. A film so mind-numbingly stupid it transcends into a plane of brilliance this viewer has never experienced. With harrowing depictions of disaster and a who’s who of famous actors, Roland Emmerich assembles the most entertaining and surprisingly moving film of his accomplished career outside of his other disaster masterpiece 2012.
Drawing influence from Melancholia and Armageddon, Emmerich embarks on a near impossible task on making his audience believe the moon will attack Earth. He accomplishes this through his confidence behind the camera and an incredible emphasis on human cooperation. In a time where the House of Representatives can’t agree on a new speaker and the country seems more divided than ever, it is moving to watch humanity bind together to work to prevent the destruction of Earth via aliens who live inside the moon. Moonfall is baroque blockbuster filmmaking at its finest: a humanist heart and the balls to be unabashedly stupid for the sake of entertainment. – C.W.
82 | Incantation
The heyday of found footage may be firmly in the rear-view mirror as time marches on past 2007, but diamonds still pop up occasionally, such as Taiwanese filmmaker Kevin Ko’s Incantation. Starting with a direct address to the audience asking us to memorize a symbol and string of words, the film starts by embedding us further into the diegesis of the film than any other I’ve seen in recent memory, a feat for a subgenre that already places the audience in the film via its use of camera as character. In true found footage fashion, we’re given frightened characters exploring bumps in the night and forbidden, malevolent areas, but we’re also treated to the sort of pseudo-documentary that recalls the splendidly scary Noroi: The Curse, a nice respite to those prone to motion sickness. Of course, all this playing with genre framework would be for naught if the film wasn’t actually frightening and if the amount of time I spent watching the story unfold through my fingers is any indication, it is. – N.A.
81 | Fall
Fair warning to all of the readers of Scrawls suffering from acrophobia, this film is not for you. Fall first frightens with a shaky setup and some very questionable visual effects, saving the budget and lurid genre thrills for the main event, that being two young women, one reluctant and one a thrill seeker, scaling 2,000 feet up a decommissioned TV tower in the middle of the desert. Even those with nerves of steel may squirm in their seats on the ascent, as the ground gets farther and farther away and stays that way as our intrepid climbers fight to survive in one of the most grueling B-films of the year. – N.A.
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