The next three posts will be different for this Substack. Rather than survey a particular issue or question, I want to offer a few rundowns of my favorite movies, TV series, and music of 2022. I should say upfront that I don’t pretend that these lists are exhaustive. I tend to plod through shows a little at a time, usually from about 11pm until I fall asleep (much to my wife’s chagrin). Movies are reserved for more special occasions, when I can spare two or three hours at once—not often enough! Music is typically imbibed while working at my desk or driving. Point being, these are not the “working conditions” of a professional critic but of a pop-culture enthusiast. There are some acclaimed works that I’ve yet to watch (EO, Avatar: The Way Of Water, etc.) or listen to (Sick!, Blue Rev, etc.), and there are others that I probably won’t get to no matter what. As a friend of mine once put it: “It’s just finitude.”
The same is true of the current (but possibly diminishing) challenge of keeping up with the so-called “streaming wars” on the Internet. Myself, I’m a regular user of HBO Max and Spotify, followed by Amazon Prime (where I’ll usually buy or “rent” films). I’ll dip into Netflix and Paramount+ as well but don’t keep permanent subscriptions. Alas, I must admit that I’ve never subscribed to Hulu, and, apart from watching Ted Lasso in 2021, I’ve barely used Apple TV+. Showtime? AMC+? Disney+? Yeah, I’ve occasionally gotten access to those platforms, but I can’t really say how. I think the former two were bundled with other services. Disney+ was a birthday present to one of my kids, and I have stolen utilized it on rare occasions (The Beatles: Get Back, The Mandalorian, and Andor). Here, again, the point is that such fluctuating availability has made my TV/movie viewership slapdash and incomplete. Caveat Lector!
One final point: these are impressions of the works in question, not reviews per se. Such snapshots cannot replace sincere critical reflection. Nevertheless, I hope they will give a sense of why I found these pop-culture iterations the most significant of 2022.
With all that said, it’s now time for the lists. This post will focus on movies, the next on music, the last on television.
My Ten Favorite Movies of 2022
Violent Night (dir. Tommy Wirkola): Imagine Die Hard (1988), except John McClane (Bruce Willis) is now Santa Claus—like, the real Santa Claus, with flying reindeer, a naughty-and-nice list, and a big bag of presents. It’s an absurd premise that David Harbour, in the role of Santa Claus, somehow makes irresistible.
Thirteen Lives (dir. Ron Howard): Most people already know the story on which Thirteen Lives is based: in June 2018, a youth soccer team was trapped by monsoonal rains in Tham Luang Nang Non—a cave complex in northern Thailand. After nearly three weeks of rescue efforts, the stranded were all brought to safety. Yet, as Thirteen Lives taught me, such boilerplate synopses fail to do justice to the courage and perseverance needed to save these boys. Ron Howard is known for blockbuster movies such as Apollo 13 (1995) and The Da Vinci Code (2006), but here he dials down the melodrama, seemingly aware that the story is powerful enough on its own.
The Batman (dir. Matt Reeves): This is, in my estimation, the second best film in the Batman franchise, trailing only The Dark Knight (2008) and squeezing ahead of Batman Begins (2005). So, how did director Matt Reeves manage to compete with two classics by Christopher Nolan? Much has been made of Reeves’ indebtedness to film noir, not to mention Robert Pattinson’s understated turn as the “Caped Crusader.” Yet, as I wrote in March 2022, what particularly distinguishes The Batman is its attempt situate Batman amid contemporary debates about political corruption and populist angst.
Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery (dir. Rian Johnson): I have a certain ambivalence about the second installment in the Knives Out franchise. On the one hand, Glass Onion is a well-crafted and entertaining picture, featuring an excellent cast led by Daniel Craig as detective extraordinaire Benoit Blanc. On the other hand, it is a political satire—and not a particularly profound one at that—masquerading as a mystery film. I can understand wanting to mock “Big Tech” moguls and social-media mavens, but to do so after signing a nearly 500 million dollar deal with Netflix suggests a lack of self-awareness. Still, director Rian Johnson has created a hit franchise that isn’t based on a comic book. That has to be worth something.
The Fabelmans (dir. Steven Spielberg): One of the classic debates of film theory centers on whether cinema records and reveals the physical world (Siegfried Kracauer, André Bazin) or manipulates and ideologizes it (Jean-Louis Baudry, F.E. Sparshott). The tension between these perspectives is explored in Steven Spielberg’s semi-autobiographical The Fabelmans. Now celebrated as one of the great directors in cinematic history, Spielberg suggests that his early forays into filmmaking sought to capture the reality of his own life. Yes, in the face of mounting personal challenges (his parents’ eventual divorce, getting bullied in school), making movies became a means not only of escape, but also of transformation. The Fabelmans is a peek into Spielberg’s career and, indeed, into the nature of art.
Top Gun: Maverick (dir. Joseph Kosinkski): As a genre film, Top Gun: Maverick is nearly flawless. It ticks every box in the “action drama” category: it’s fast-paced, romantic, and alluring, with enough weighty themes (e.g., the tension between human ingenuity and technological advancement) to make you feel like it’s not “mindless entertainment.” Some commentators have even begun to argue that Top Gun: Maverick should win “Best Picture” at the Academy Awards in March. I myself would not go that far—better films were released this year—though Top Gun: Maverick seems to have accomplished something even more important. In the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, it may have saved the very idea that movies are meant to be seen in theaters.
Licorice Pizza (dir. Paul Thomas Anderson): Paul Thomas Anderson has often been compared to Martin Scorsese. To be sure, Boogie Nights (1997) can be seen as an homage to Scorsese’s manic directing style and interest in the underworld, while There Will Be Blood (2007) recalls Scorsese’s fondness for complex character studies. Yet, there is nothing in Scorsese’s oeuvre quite like Licorice Pizza. As in Boogie Nights, Licorice Pizza is set in the San Fernando Valley in the 1970s. But here Anderson explores a different side of that era, namely, the shambolic, absurd, and poignant nature of teen romance. In a sense, then, Licorice Pizza is a romantic comedy, but Anderson is too idiosyncratic to obey generic conventions. The plot is loose and occasionally strains credulity, but, then again, the same is true of high school. Watch Licorice Pizza because it’s a PTA film; stay for the needle drops and generous dose of buoyant nostalgia.
Tár (dir. Todd Field): If Cate Blanchett were to steal away Meryl Streep’s presumptive title of “greatest actress of all time,” Tár may go down as “exhibit A.” Indeed, her astonishing performance as (fictional) composer and conductor Lydia Tár runs the gamut of human possibility—from mastery to impotence, from seductiveness to repulsiveness, from self-aggrandizement to self-abasement. Of course, significant credit should also go to Todd Field, who has released only three films since 2001, all triumphs. If there is a common theme in Field’s work, it has to be that human beings are exceedingly complex, almost unknowable. In a sense, then, it is not surprising that he would write and direct a film that would juxtapose the human self’s convolution with the blunt instrument of “cancel culture.” Wisely, and with great skill, Field sets the story in the relatively insular world of classical music, thereby suggesting that the multifaceted influence of social media has seeped into all facets of Western life. Indeed, one of Lydia Tár’s great mistakes (and there are many) is believing that her personal genius, however enthralling, can protect her from the cascading effects of what Kierkegaard called “leveling.” In an interview, Cate Blanchett has said that Tàr shows that “power is a corrupting force.” This is true—but not just of Lydia Tár. It is also true of the digital mob that, by the film’s end, has transformed artistic excellence into public degradation.
The Banshees of Inisherin (dir. Martin McDonagh): Summoning Aesop and Dubliners-era James Joyce, Martin McDonagh’s The Banshees of Inisherin is a dense, oblique tale of abandonment, despair, and mortality. Brendan Gleeson plays Colm Doherty—a talented musician in a remote corner of Ireland, who, entering the last phase of his life, is determined to compose a song (“The Banshees of Inisherin”) that will survive his death. Thus Colm swears off anything that might stand in his way, including his longstanding friendship with a simple yet kind farmer named Pádraic (Colin Farrell). When Pádraic refuses to let his friend go, violence ensues. For McDonagh, the price of great art is sacrifice, both of oneself and of others. This is a grim conclusion, which McDonagh interrupts, thankfully, with stunning shots of Ireland’s coastline and disconsonant helpings of dry wit and Catholic imagery.
Babylon (dir. Damien Chazelle): Simply put, this movie is a tour de force. Everything is big, loud, and over-the-top—the acting, the costumes, the piles of cocaine, the elephant. Writer-director Damien Chazelle has described Babylon as “a hate letter to Hollywood, but a love letter to cinema.” This probably doesn’t make for a great marketing slogan—famously, Babylon has struggled at the box office—but such tension does lead to some remarkably inspired filmmaking. In a manner that unmistakably recalls Scorsese classics Goodfellas (1990) and The Wolf of Wall Street (2013), Chazelle overloads the viewer’s senses, stuffing the movie with ornate (excessive?) set pieces and the thumping pulse of Justin Hurwitz’s jazz score. Babylon clocks in at 189 minutes, but you hardly notice. Of course, for many critics, this is precisely the problem. Babylon, they say, is all style and no substance. But this is not quite right. Yes, the movie could spend more time developing its characters, but, in the end, the characters are not the point—which in fact is the point. In showing Hollywood’s inevitable yet often merciless transition from silent films to “talkies,” Chazelle invites us to ponder our current cinematic moment, as the industry moves away from theatergoing to streaming. Some will survive for a time, but more will be lost—and so has it ever been. Stars come and go, and happily we find respite in their work. Only Hollywood, our modern-day Babylon, endures as a force of barbarity, moneymaking, and influence. Doubtless Chazelle has in mind the role of Babylon in the Bible, especially in the Book of Revelation:
So [the angel] carried me away in the spirit into the wilderness: and I saw a woman sit upon a scarlet coloured beast, full of names of blasphemy, having seven heads and ten horns. And the woman was arrayed in purple and scarlet colour, and decked with gold and precious stones and pearls, having a golden cup in her hand full of abominations and filthiness of her fornication: and upon her forehead was a name written, MYSTERY, BABYLON THE GREAT, THE MOTHER OF HARLOTS AND ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH. And I saw the woman drunken with the blood of the saints, and with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus: and when I saw her, I wondered with great admiration (Rev. 17:3-6).
Honorable mention (in no particular order): Nope; Confess, Fletch; The Black Phone; Barbarian; All Quiet on the Western Front; Everything Everywhere All at Once.
This was awesome. Your reviews (pardon impressions) are amazing. It make me want to see the films you mention that I have missed and you have added insight to those I have seen. Don’t apologize for this work. It is not LESS than a full review (which most people don’t have the time for). As you say in this post, we often don’t have the time to do all that we want. What you are doing here (even an impression) is amazing. I am now committed to seeing all these films. Thank you for these powerful “impressions”.
Thanks, Chris! I appreciated this wry gem: "In a sense, then, Licorice Pizza is a romantic comedy, but Anderson is too idiosyncratic to obey generic conventions. The plot is loose and occasionally strains credulity, but, then again, the same is true of high school." [occasionally!?] I came away for your excellent impressions wanting to see "Tar" and "Banshees." It's truly hard to keep up. My husband and I only really subscribe to Netflix, but I also go onto Paramount only for "Evil," my favorite comedy-horror-religious-themed series.