The best of the best films of 2022

December 15, 2022 5:26 AM

A roundup of major critics' lists of the best of 2022
Rogerebert.com: The Ten Best Films of 2022, The New York Times: Best Movies of 2022, Slate: The 10 Best Movies of 2022, Indiewire: The 25 Best Movies of 2022, Polygon: The best movies of 2022, The Guardian: Best films US 2022, Rolling Stone: 22 Best Movies of 2022, The Atlantic: THE 10 BEST FILMS OF 2022, Washington Post: The 10 best movies of 2022, The Ringer: The Best Movies of 2022, The New Yorker: The Best Movies of 2022

A few of these may be paywalled for you so don't forget about archive.ph for all your workaround needs.

posted by octothorpe (59 comments total)

Metacritic has both a list of best of lists and an aggregation.
posted by dances_with_sneetches at 5:30 AM on December 15, 2022 [5 favorites]

Here's a gift link to the WaPo's piece, for whatever that's worth.
posted by martin q blank at 6:06 AM on December 15, 2022 [1 favorite]

If you haven’t see Everything Everywhere All At Once yet, set aside whatever you’re doing right now and do that instead.
posted by mhoye at 6:21 AM on December 15, 2022 [22 favorites]

RRR is on Netflix. I highly recommend it. I've seen about 100 Indian films and this is easily the most anticolonial one I've seen. It has the best one man versus one hundred fight ever.
posted by dances_with_sneetches at 6:23 AM on December 15, 2022 [13 favorites]

For what it's worth, my favorites of the year are (in no order):

Everything Everywhere All At Once
The Fabelmans
Glass Onion
Prey
Top Gun: Maverick
Kimi
Three Thousand Years of Longing
posted by octothorpe at 6:29 AM on December 15, 2022 [2 favorites]

Any list that doesn't include Everything Everywhere All At Once is not worth the paper it's printed on.
posted by JustSayNoDawg at 6:34 AM on December 15, 2022 [14 favorites]

Movies I still need to see:
Tar
Avatar 2
Babylon
The Banshees of Inisherin
Decision to Leave
RRR
Nope
All the Beauty and the Bloodshed
Aftersun
posted by octothorpe at 6:40 AM on December 15, 2022 [1 favorite]

Okay: I decided to get really, really data-wonk on this and combine the lists.

A word about the methodology I used first, which I kind of made up on the fly (please, someone who is better at statistics, feel free to pick holes in this): I noticed that some lists were top-ten, some were top-20, and one list just listed films without assigning any of them a number value. To account for that:

1. I made a table listing each film as it came up on each list. If it was assigned a top-ten place, I logged that listing. If it got a score of under 10, I just assigned it an 11.

2. For the list that just listed films, I assigned a score of "1" for just that list.

3. For any film that was on one list but not another, I also assigned a score of 11.

4. I then calculated what the average score was across all lists, as calculated above, and then sorted the resulting list in terms of lowest average (and thus, highest "top-of-the-list score") to highest.

So, using that admittedly uneducated system, here is the combined ranked list of all the movies listed in all these lists, starting from "Number 1":

Tar
Decision To leave
Nope
The Banshees of Inisherin
Aftersun
The Fablemans
Top Gun: Maverick
No Bears
EO
All The Beauty And the Bloodshed
Armageddon Time
Saint Omer
The Eternal Daughter
Hit The Road
Happening
Benediction
RRR
Everything Everywhere All At Once
All That Breathes
Marcel The Shell With Shoes On
Petite Maman
Lingui, The Sacred Bones
Good Luck To You, Leo Grande
Till
Three Thousand Years of Longing
She Said
Kimi
Barbarian
The Northman
Crimes Of The Future
Both Sides Of The Blade
The Woman King
Earwig
Saloum
The Wonder
We're All Going To The Worlds Fair
Triangle of Sadness
Amsterdam
Memoria
After Yang
Three Minutes: A Lengthening
Expedition Content
Ambulance
Athena
Babylon
After Yang
Fire Of Love
Murina
The Martha Mitchell Effect
The Cathedral
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 6:46 AM on December 15, 2022 [22 favorites]

The Guardian's list was a bit of a wild card - they have been gradually revealing their "top ten" on their list, and they only got up to #7. Their top 6 films are still to come. The data-wonk in me had enough fun that I may want to revisit this and recalculate when they've revealed their full list, since that will impact some scores, I think.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 6:55 AM on December 15, 2022 [1 favorite]

So many of the movies on these lists are so hard (or even impossible basically) to see now, not available in streaming and not playing in a theater near you (I'm dying to see EO and might train it all the way to chicago just to see it at the Siskel before its run ends). Surprised All Quiet on the Western Front is on so few of these lists, I thought it was a masterpiece, one of the best war films I've ever seen, a pretty good answer to the problem of making a war film that is not pro-war despite itself.
posted by dis_integration at 7:01 AM on December 15, 2022 [2 favorites]

Everyone in unison: Tar! RRR! Banshees! Everything Everywhere! Top Gun! (pause to take breath)

Polygon: Ambulance!

Go home Polygon, you're drunk.
posted by Molesome at 7:14 AM on December 15, 2022 [2 favorites]

RRR is a freaking ride! I'm fully cognizant of all the hindutva elements in that movie (siiiigh) but goddamn it is a masterpiece of pulp cinema. My kids and I loved it to pieces, I don't remember the last time we laughed this much in delight at a movie.

A few days after we watched, my son decided he wanted the same haircut as one of the heroes in this movie... I think it's the first time he's ever been able to identify with a movie star in his whole young life. I could BAWL. (My kid is technically from an upper caste hindu family and privileged as hell in terms of representation on screen, but he is also the child of immigrants, he lives away from the motherland as a minority, and gets to watch maybe 3-4 desi movies every year. The fact that he found in that small sample a way to identify with a hero is really moving for me.)
posted by MiraK at 7:27 AM on December 15, 2022 [20 favorites]

My partner and I are taking about what we want to catch up on that we haven't seen yet before the end of the year. I just watchedAfter Yang, and it was really beautiful. Right now on the list is:
The Banshees of Inisherin
Armageddon Time
Aftersun
Tár
All That Breathes
Decision to Leave

I hope most of these are streamable, so we'll see. There are doing in these lists that I just don't understand though. I have to wonder if we saw the same movie when I saw Top Gun: Maverick I was very underwhelmed for instance. But there the beauty I guess.
posted by Carillon at 7:28 AM on December 15, 2022

The original Top Gun was one of the most offensively terrible movies I've ever seen. It was like a music video in movie form, but also jingoistic. Is Top Gun: Maverick different in some kind of way that makes it deserve such praise?
posted by mcstayinskool at 7:46 AM on December 15, 2022 [1 favorite]

Is Top Gun: Maverick different in some kind of way that makes it deserve such praise?

I'm lost on the praise for this movie, too, to me it was a slickly-updated version of the original, but was basically the same movie. Less homoerotic, I guess.
posted by LooseFilter at 7:50 AM on December 15, 2022 [3 favorites]

Is Top Gun: Maverick different in some kind of way that makes it deserve such praise?

No! It's everything in the original but turned up to 12! If you reflexively cringe at the US military, or airplanes or Tom Cruise, please select another film. If you want to see the best fighter jet nonsense ever put to film, TGM is your jam.

The single best review I've heard of it is from the Pop Culture Happy Hour podcast, where someone described it as a film that "understood the assignment".
posted by Superilla at 7:56 AM on December 15, 2022 [6 favorites]

The best way to download YouTube I've found is this site. Just paste YT URL into the bar, and the great thing is the number of formats you can select. Not sure if it lets you choose quality setting though, and without adblock also has popups I think.
posted by blue shadows at 7:59 AM on December 15, 2022 [2 favorites]

Is Top Gun: Maverick different in some kind of way that makes it deserve such praise?

The dogfighting / in the airplane scenes in particular are remarkably different and more thrilling than about any other dogfighting movie I've seen before. It really made a difference to catch this one in theaters. Otherwise it was a pretty standard, well made movie. But Cruise stealing the jet and proving they can do the run in time while everyone watched? And the climactic mission scenes? Pure movie magic! I wouldn't put it in my top 10 this year necessarily because I basically remember nothing from the movie except that those scenes were great. Everything else was just filler.
posted by dis_integration at 8:01 AM on December 15, 2022

Need to watch more - Tar and Armageddon Time are on my list. Top Gun: Maverick is very well made and entertaining for what it is, but the clumsy newgen angle, the jingoism, the toxic masculinity leave a bad aftertaste. And just how many times do they have to show that computer generated target anyway.
posted by blue shadows at 8:04 AM on December 15, 2022 [1 favorite]

Is Top Gun: Maverick different in some kind of way that makes it deserve such praise?

It's not great, but I think it's a fine movie, maybe one of Michael Bay's best. It even rips of Star Wars directly, so it's not taking itself that seriously.
posted by The_Vegetables at 8:16 AM on December 15, 2022

As a counterpoint, somewhat, John Water's Top Ten of 2022.

"Bones and All (dir. Luca Guadagnino) "Is there such a thing as a butch twink? Yes, there is, and Timothée Chalamet goes all Larry Clark on us here, a soft-trade hetero cannibal who kills an evil closeted gay trick so he and his flesh-eating girlfriend can feed. Is that gay-bashing or cannibally correct love? Just asking."

posted by Ashwagandha at 8:17 AM on December 15, 2022 [7 favorites]

Is Top Gun: Maverick different in some kind of way that makes it deserve such praise?

A couple of dudes I chatted with a few weeks back actually had a good argument on its behalf. I was right there with you - and I hadn't even seen the original Top Gun to boot, and told them why (the whole thing seemed like a big jingoistic testosterone-fest and I assumed the sequel would be more of the same).

They argued that the sequel actually dealt with aging as well, and how Tom Cruise's character did some wrestling with how the times had changed and he couldn't deal with things by applying The Need For Speed any more - and on top of that, he wasn't capable of that any more, and he had to come to terms with that too.

I mean, I still get the sense that there's plenty of the jet-action ball swinging to satisfy fans of that from the former, but....at least it sounds like they're aware a bit? So, like, while there is no way in hell that the Avatar sequel would be able to overcome my gut-level hatred for that franchise, for this....they made a convincing enough argument that I'd at least be able to entertain the idea.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 8:18 AM on December 15, 2022 [1 favorite]

Thank you for pulling all these together! I need to rework my queue, and this is perfect.

I eagerly await David Ehrlich's Best of for this year.
posted by Caxton1476 at 8:21 AM on December 15, 2022 [1 favorite]

They argued that the sequel actually dealt with aging as well, and how Tom Cruise's character did some wrestling with how the times had changed and he couldn't deal with things by applying The Need For Speed any more - and on top of that, he wasn't capable of that any more, and he had to come to terms with that too.

Oddly enough, none of that is correct. The resolution of the movie is the exact opposite of that.
posted by The_Vegetables at 8:22 AM on December 15, 2022 [4 favorites]

I eagerly await David Ehrlich's Best of for this year.

It looks like the page you linked to has that up already.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 8:23 AM on December 15, 2022 [1 favorite]

It's not great, but I think it's a fine movie, maybe one of Michael Bay's best.

The reason it was an especially good Michael Bay movie is because it was actually directed by Joseph Kosinski.
posted by Strange Interlude at 8:34 AM on December 15, 2022 [1 favorite]

You are correct, I meant Jerry Bruckheimer, who to me is the same guy as Michael Bay, but maybe with a mustache. Enough about that movie from me though, I thought Smile, Everything Everywhere All at Once, and DC's League of Superpets were all better.
posted by The_Vegetables at 8:39 AM on December 15, 2022 [2 favorites]

Here's my non-horror Top 10 (with trailers for most):
-Everything Everywhere All at Once -well of course I loved this
-Triangle of Sadness - I laughed until I was wheezing
-Boiling Point - harrowing one-shot film of a stressful night at a fine dining restaurant
-Dinner in America - riotous punk rock romcom that sadly escaped notice in US; who could resist a movie with a love song whose chorus is: "Fuck the rest of them/Fuck 'em all/Fuck 'em all but us"
-Beyond the Infinite Two Minutes - positively delightful Japanese one-shot sci-fi/comedy about a TV that gets images from precisely two minutes into the future
-Marcel the Shell with Shoes On - this is beautiful and meditative... seriously
-Next Exit - sort of sci-fi; gave me the feels
-RRR
-A Life on the Farm - hilarious and affecting documentary about a UK farmer who made extended videos about his life
-Weird: The Al Yankovic Story - 100% true and factual

And my alternate, all horror list, not precisely ranked, but with notes and trailers where helpful:
-History of the Occult - Argentinian, from 2020 but not watchable legally in the US until last week; BANGER; starts off as a B&W journalism/conspiracy movie then gradually goes Lovecraftian; low budget marvel
-The Menu - positively perfect
-Nope - only gets better on reflection and rewatch
-Resurrection - seems like a thriller, then takes a positively bonkers turn starting with a mind-blowing 12 minute Rebecca Hall monologue
-Barbarian - the surprise/shock part is oversold but this is really fun and good, with sneaky thematic depth
-The Black Phone - simple, almost rudimentary, but also elemental and riveting
-Deadstream - next to The Menu and EEAaO, the most fun I had watching a movie this year
-Satan's Slaves 2: Communion - pop horror from Indonesia, but terrifically well-made and culturally distinct enough from Western films to hit on different notes and feel fresh
-Speak No Evil - the most upsetting movie I saw this year; not a horror film until it is, and then holy shit, it really is
-X/Pearl (tie) - cheating to get these both on here, but wow what a pair

Horror Honorable Mentions: Terrifier 2; Men; Nightsiren; Hatching; Hellbender; Saloum; The Innocents; Orphan: First Kill (I mean it; it's bonkers and campy and a blast); Glorious; Moloch; Offseason; You Are Not My Mother; Who Invited Them; Bodies Bodies Bodies; Prey; Smile; Woodlands Dark & Days Bewitched: A History of Folk Horror; The Leech; Slash/Back; Significant Other; We're All Going to the World's Fair.

For the purposes of these lists, I am treating anything that didn't see US release until 2022 as a 2022 film, as well as Boiling Point, which did see a US release but only in like a dozen theaters at the end of November and the rest of us had to wait for streaming.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 8:41 AM on December 15, 2022 [15 favorites]

As a counterpoint, somewhat, John Water's Top Ten of 2022.

"Bones and All (dir. Luca Guadagnino) "Is there such a thing as a butch twink? Yes, there is, and Timothée Chalamet goes all Larry Clark on us here...."

Huh - it wasn't until you posted this that I even noticed that Bones and All wasn't on anyone else's list. And as much as I loved Luca and Timothee's previous work, I'm...okay with this one being an also-ran. I liked it, mind you, it was just way more of an intellectual appreciation than a passionate and fervent "omigooooooooooooooooood i looooooooooooooooooooooooooove this" freakout.

....And yeah, I totally buy "butch twink" as a description for Timothee.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 8:51 AM on December 15, 2022

John Waters tends to have some left field and non-American choices on his lists so he is always a good to have a look at. He got me to watch Everybody Wants Some!! (which I wouldn't have normally watched) by describing it as "[t]he best accidentally gay movie ever made by a known heterosexual director" which he wasn't wrong about.
posted by Ashwagandha at 9:01 AM on December 15, 2022 [5 favorites]

Metafilter: the same guy, but maybe with a mustache.
posted by MiraK at 9:17 AM on December 15, 2022 [1 favorite]

"[t]he best accidentally gay movie ever made by a known heterosexual director" which he wasn't wrong about.

I only got around to seeing Everybody Wants Some recently. And I liked it quite a lot. But I don't know how "accidental" the gay was. I mean, I was there at the time -- roughly the same age as those guys in the late 70s, early 80s. And though I did a pretty good job of steering clear of frats and locker rooms, I had many ex-high school acquaintances who were right in the middle of all that, and yeah, Everybody Wants Some nails the absurdity of it perfectly, and to its credit, rather affectionately. It was the times that were accidentally gay. Linklater just did a good job of capturing them.

Somebody referred to him recently as the master of low stakes cinema. I like that. And wish we had more like him.
posted by philip-random at 9:37 AM on December 15, 2022

Speaking of Linklater, did no one see Apollo 10 1/2? I loved it but it seems like it came and went without anybody noticing. I'm always down for a Linklater rotoscoping joint.
posted by downtohisturtles at 9:43 AM on December 15, 2022

But I don't know how "accidental" the gay was. I mean, I was there at the time -- roughly the same age as those guys in the late 70s, early 80s.

Based on the interviewed I heard with the director he was very oblivious to the gayness of his movie.
posted by Ashwagandha at 9:49 AM on December 15, 2022

Speaking of Linklater, did no one see Apollo 10 1/2? I loved it but it seems like it came and went without anybody noticing. I'm always down for a Linklater rotoscoping joint.

That's the thing about the streaming era. They pay big name directors so make films and then just dump them onto the channel without fanfare.
posted by octothorpe at 10:17 AM on December 15, 2022

… and then just dump them onto the channel without fanfare.

We have FanFare at home.
posted by Songdog at 10:24 AM on December 15, 2022 [5 favorites]

Just looking at Empress Callipygos’s list, it looks like the only one I’ve seen is Saloum. I know I watched some movies this year, but apparently not many new ones.
posted by Mister Moofoo at 10:33 AM on December 15, 2022

I saw about 40 movies in the theater this year but half of those were at either the EbertFest film festival which is mostly not about new movies or at the Cinemark Oscar Marathon which were all 2021 films.
posted by octothorpe at 10:37 AM on December 15, 2022

I just want to call Prey to people's attention in this thread, not that it's a Great Film, but it's one of my personal favourites of the year. It's a wonderful little sci-fi action pic without ridiculous CGI set pieces and everything about it (Amber Midthunder as the lead, cinematography, location shots, writing) is way better than it needed to be for the direct-to-Hulu release of the fifth movie in the Predator series. I recommend watching it in the Comanche dub.
posted by Superilla at 11:07 AM on December 15, 2022 [6 favorites]

Prey is right there with Smile for me as among the most entertaining films of the year, even if neither is a "great" film.

Greatly entertaining is nothing to sneeze at.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 11:12 AM on December 15, 2022

Is Top Gun: Maverick different in some kind of way that makes it deserve such praise?

I was on the on young side of old enough to see this movie when it came out and I was fully committed to being a naval aviator when I grew up for the next two or three years. The opening sequence of the original, even just first couple bars of the intro song, gives me goosebumps still. So the fact that the opening was near enough the same sequence and the rest of the movie put little spins on all the same beats was pretty satisfying to me.

Like they cleaned up, restored, and improved a treasured childhood toy for me.


Prey is right there

That this is technically a Predator movie is totally incidental. Speaking of "testosterone-fueled" movies (the protagonist is a woman). Really excellent action movie, incredible action sequences. And holy-shit the lead goes hard. Hands down the most bad-ass movie I've seen this year.
posted by VTX at 11:27 AM on December 15, 2022 [2 favorites]

Nice lists! I think All the Beauty and the Bloodshed and EEAAO were the movies that impacted me most this year, but there were so many I haven't seen yet! Also appreciated Marcel the Shell. I like a movie that is doing something different and new, and also I like that it is not super ambitious as a movie. It picked a thing to do and did it really competently and didn't try to do more than that.

Film Comment produces one of my favorite podcasts. here's their best of 2022. I also enjoyed their recent episode: TÁR WÁRS. Made me decide against seeing it!
posted by latkes at 11:28 AM on December 15, 2022

MetaFilter: I recommend watching it in the Comanche dub.
posted by kirkaracha at 11:29 AM on December 15, 2022 [2 favorites]

Dirty Old Town thanks for your list!

I don't know how you do it, but you may have seen every movie ever made!!
posted by latkes at 11:34 AM on December 15, 2022 [2 favorites]

Okay, a question for the people who are good with data and statistics -

So, several of these lists were only the top 10, but others went up to 20 or 22 and the Guardian went up to 50. To reconcile that disparity, I just went up to 10, and anything that got under a 10 or didn't turn up on other lists at all got an 11.

In the interest of scrupulous accuracy: should I use the actual number from one of the longer lists where that's available, and use something like 25 for the things that didn't make it any higher than that, say?

If you REALLY want, I could do all 50 films the Guardian mentions, but that may make things way longer....

Oh, hell, I'll do it both ways. This is fun.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 12:20 PM on December 15, 2022

> Molesome: "Everyone in unison: Tar! RRR! Banshees! Everything Everywhere! Top Gun! (pause to take breath)

Polygon: Ambulance!

Go home Polygon, you're drunk."

I had to go check to see if there was a different movie called Ambulance released this year. Nope, they are indeed talking about the one from Michael Bay aka "Michael Bay Gets To Futz Around With Drones". It's as if neither the Polygon author nor Michael Bay were aware of the current state-of-the-art in drone photography/filmography and are having their minds blown seeing such shots for the first time.
posted by mhum at 12:54 PM on December 15, 2022

You'd think at least one of these articles would have mentioned Goncharov....
posted by tzikeh at 1:34 PM on December 15, 2022 [5 favorites]

I could have gone to see Top Gun: Maverick, but instead I watched the trailer redone with Owlkitty. Owlkitty can be my wingman any time.
posted by rmd1023 at 1:48 PM on December 15, 2022 [1 favorite]

Polygon: Ambulance!

Go home Polygon, you're drunk.

If it helps, so far Ambulance is coming in on my uber-composited list below Glass Onion and She Said.

Although, it is sadly beating Moonage Daydream, Apollo 10-1/2, Prey, and White Noise.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 2:01 PM on December 15, 2022

Speak No Evil - the most upsetting movie I saw this year; not a horror film until it is, and then holy shit, it really is

This is the film that stuck with me more than all others I saw this year - it's nearly perfect in its setup and payoff.
posted by Jessica Savitch's Coke Spoon at 2:38 PM on December 15, 2022 [1 favorite]

Thank you for the Waters link, Ashwagandha. It made me happy.
posted by doctornemo at 5:21 PM on December 15, 2022 [1 favorite]

DirtyOldTown, thank you for the excellent horror list.

Woodlands Dark & Days Bewitched is excellent.
posted by doctornemo at 5:28 PM on December 15, 2022 [1 favorite]

For anyone who might be wandering in here looking for new movie suggestions: proceed with extreme caution on Speak No Evil. Even as a lifelong fan of horror and dark cinema that one caught me off guard in how grim and unsettling it was. It's up there with Funny Games and Spoorloos; great movies I will probably never revisit.

Anyhow, my personal tops of 2022:
Tar
The Northman
Fire of Love
Decision to Leave
Nope

w/ honorable mention to Speak No Evil and Soft & Quiet, another non-traditional horror that'll happily crush your spirits for a week or so.
posted by mannequito at 7:36 PM on December 15, 2022 [1 favorite]

I forgot to include After Yang in my best-of list and I need to rewatch that. Kogonada is really a singular filmmaker.
posted by octothorpe at 6:26 AM on December 16, 2022

Okay! Just for kicks, here is the latest data-wonk composite list, with everything. I took The Guardian's 50-film list into account, and so for any movie that wasn't mentioned on a particular list, I assigned a score of 51. Slate didn't assign scores to any of its list so I gave everything it did mention a score of 1.

The Guardian has yet to announce its top 5 films, so this is subject to change a bit, but here's how it looks now:

Tar
Decision To Leave
Nope
The Fablemans
Aftersun
The Banshees of Inisherin
Saint Omer
All The Beauty And the Bloodshed
No Bears
EO
RRR
Top Gun: Maverick
Everything Everywhere All At Once
The Eternal Daughter
Benediction
Armageddon Time
Happening
All That Breathes
Marcel The Shell With Shoes On
Crimes Of The Future
Hit The Road
Till
After Yang
Descendant
The Northman
Funny Pages
Jackass Forever
Triangle of Sadness
Official Competition
Lingui, The Sacred Bones
Living
Fire Of Love
Beba
The Woman King
Corsage
Petite Maman
Good Luck To You, Leo Grande
She Said
Three Thousand Years of Longing
Barbarian
Both Sides Of The Blade
Kimi
Earwig
Amsterdam
Saloum
The Wonder
We're All Going To The Worlds Fair
Glass Onion
Memoria
Three Minutes: A Lengthening
Ambulance
Athena
Expedition Content
Babylon
Murina
The Cathedral
The Martha Mitchell Effect
Don't Worry Darling
Moonage Daydream
Saturday Fiction
In Front Of your Face
Apollo 10/12
Playground
Bones And All
Framing Agnes
X
Ahed's Knee
You Won't Be Alone
Prey
The Novelist's film
32 Sounds
Resurrection
The Inspection
A Couple
Empire of Light
Return to Seoul
Master
The Tsugua Diaries
Fire Island
The Innocents
Clytaemnestra
Nitram
Introduction
A New Old Play
White Noise
Cow
All Quiet On The Western Front
Great Freedom
Small Body
Everything Went Fine
We
Brian and Charles
Vortex
Holy Spider
Paris, 13th District
Broker
Bros
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 7:50 AM on December 16, 2022 [2 favorites]

I’m glad EEAAO is doing well, but the editing gave me a panic attack in the theatre. Very well made, very much not for me.
posted by pxe2000 at 12:19 PM on December 16, 2022 [1 favorite]

BBC: The 20 best films of 2022
posted by kliuless at 6:56 PM on December 17, 2022

Don't worry, I'll be withholding updates on the compiled ranking until the Guardian is done with its list...but so far it looks like I may want to consider getting Tar and Aftersun under my belt before the Oscar nominations are announced.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 9:14 AM on December 19, 2022

Right then! I have data!

Since this comment, I started incorporating the Guardian's top films of the UK as well as their top of the US list; the Guardian US list included an Irish-language film I'd never even heard of in the number 2 spot, so I assumed that was a weird mistake and threw in the UK list as well. And then I discovered the Time Out NY Worldwide Top 33 best films and incorporated that as well.

To recap: a) I included ALL films mentioned in ANY in my calculation, b) I used the actual score for a given film where available, and c) if there was a film that was mentioned on one list but not another, I assigned it a score of 51 for any list where it wasn't mentioned. And d) for the one list that didn't give anyone ANY score, I assigned it a score of 1.

Based on that, here are the top 20 films from 2022, as scored by 13 different critics' lists:

1. Aftersun
2. Decision To Leave
3. Tar
4. The Banshees of Inisherin
5. Nope
6. The Fablemans
7. RRR
8. Saint Omer
9. Top Gun: Maverick
10. No Bears
11. Hit The Road
12. All The Beauty And the Bloodshed
13. Everything Everywhere All At Once
14. EO
15. Benediction
16. Happening
17. The Northman
18. The Eternal Daughter
19. Living
20. Armageddon Time
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 10:53 AM on December 23, 2022 [1 favorite]