The directors I watched most often are similar to last year, which shows the influence of the excellent French collections of film streaming site Mubi. The runaway winner this year was Eric Rohmer, whose frothy, witty romances were a pleasant highlight, particularly the 'four seasons' pairing of A Summer's Tale (1996) and An Autumn's Tale (1998). In 2022 I saw nine of Rohmer's films, spanning five decades from 1954's Bérénice to An Autumn's Tale; he made his last feature in 2007 at the age of 88.
I followed last year's top director (10 films by Agnes Varda) by seeing a further five Varda titles in 2022, the highlight being 1985's peerless Vagabond. Five Billy Wilder films, all first-time watches for me, ranged from the middling Bad Seed (1934) to the solid war film Five Graves to Cairo (1943), to the classic noir of Double Indemnity (1944) and the Hogan's Heroes and The Great Escape-inspiring Stalag 17 (1953), for which William Holden won the Best Actor Oscar. A new find this year, again thanks to Mubi, was English short-film director John Smith, whose compact narratives are full of whimsy and social commentary. I also expanded my Francois Truffaut catalogue from the two obvious front-runners (The 400 Blows and Jules et Jim), and finally watched Ingmar Bergman's superb films for the first time, with The Seventh Seal and Wild Strawberries (both 1957 - two greats in one year!) being the standouts.
In terms of lead actors, this year Burt Lancaster, Tom Cruise and Sigourney Weaver came out on top. I saw seven Lancaster films for the first time in 2022, with Robert Siodmak's postwar noir The Killers (1946) being by far the best. Mr Cruise featured thanks to my first-time viewing of the Mission Impossible films, plus the bravura Hollywood showcase of Top Gun: Maverick. Sigourney Weaver was chiefly due to the four Alien movies, the two Avatar films, plus a first-time viewing of Galaxy Quest, featuring a lacklustre lead male performance by Tim Allen. And there were six first-watches of James Stewart films too, ranging from the daft and somewhat forgettable Pot O' Gold (1941), about which Stewart has little good to say, to the Civil War western Shenandoah (1965). It was also great to see plenty of the ever-intriguing Tilda Swinton this year, with the highlight being Joanna Hogg's The Souvenir (2019).
And here's my top 10 films for the year - which, due to the NZ release cycle, includes 2021 films first viewed in 2022.
1. Moonage Daydream (dir. Brett Morgen, US)
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I'm always a sucker for a compelling music documentary, and Moonage Daydream was perfectly targeted to my interests, given my decades-long fascination with David Bowie. There are several delightful moments in Brett Morgen's expertly-assembled Bowie documentary in which the subject is being quizzed by earnest, well-meaning interlocutors - including Russell Harty and the LA limo backseat chats with Alan Yentob that formed the Cracked Actor telefilm - in which they offer up plausible explanations for Bowie's art and motivations, and he acquiesces entirely, agreeing that they've cut to the quick of his inner self. It may even have been true at the time, but the overwhelming sense of this film is that during the marvelous decade or so from his glam explosion through to blockbuster stadium rock royalty with his 1983 EMI contract, Bowie was constantly expanding, re-inventing, and writing his own narrative like few individuals have ever been able to. The doco is best experienced with fine Dolby Atmos ('to be played at maximum volume'), and is replete with constant musical treasures - some expected, but many a rewarding surprise, with the filmmaker using every trick up his sleeve and the many diamonds in the Bowie canon to envisage the man's artistry on the biggest possible canvas.
2. Top Gun: Maverick (dir. Joseph Kosinski, US)
The real star of this bombastic, ludicrously entertaining production - and I hope a potential Oscar-nominee - is film editor Eddie Hamilton, who also cut Mission Impossible: Rogue Nation and Mission Impossible: Fallout - it's genius work stitching together all those aerial sequences into a thrilling, coherent narrative. But seriously, this is all-round quality action movie filmmaking, offering impossible odds, far-fetched aviation exploits, an audaciously silly (and highly entertaining) final-reel twist, and a scrupulous attention to toning down the rampant sexism and homoeroticism of the original (a bit). While the opening fighter school sequences resort to the same egotistical cliches of the original, it's all to serve the greater plot, and anyone who quibbles over the age of Goose's fighter pilot son is missing the point entirely.
3. Avatar: The Way of Water (dir. James Cameron, US)
A spectacular success in terms of powerful visual storytelling and action filmmaking, The Way of Water builds on its 2009 predecessor thanks to the simple expedient of having co-writers, which avoids some of the clunking dialogue of the original. The CGI production design is an order more impressive than the already stunning visuals of Avatar, with gleaming high frame-rate action sequences, particularly during the underwater portions. The lengthy runtime won't be for everyone, but in the environs of an 3D IMAX cinema it makes perfect sense, allowing the sumptuous treasure-box of Cameron's imagination full rein to impress the viewer. The final act's multi-layered Götterdämmerung may exhaust some of the more sensitive viewers, but it allows the director every opportunity to smash things together, topple them over, submerge them and cause them to explode and/or be monstered by angry alien whale-things.
4. Licorice Pizza (dir. Paul Thomas Anderson, US)
Paul Thomas Anderson's personal vision offers up a reverie of warm nostalgia for the Los Angeles of his youth, when for a confident teenager anything seemed possible, even getting to hang out with an intriguing 25-year-old woman with time on her hands. While the film lacks the clear narrative arc of Anderson's best work, it benefits from strong and believable characters, expertly portrayed by newcomers Alana Haim and Cooper Hoffman. The casting is crucial, because Hoffman's unfeasible charm has to be convincing enough to break down the audience's disbelief that Haim would be deigning to associate with this spotty youth, let alone enter his life as fully and wholeheartedly as the film depicts. And Haim's dead-end job and stuck-at-home life perfectly justify there being a Hoffman-sized hole in her existence, despite the age difference. Haim should've been nominated for an Oscar for this role. As always with Anderson, there's a marvelous supporting cast of names (Sean Penn, Bradley Cooper) and relative unknowns, but the main thrill is simply seeing a genuine friendship (and more) spiralling through teenage adventures and suburban scrapes. In Tarantino's Once Upon a Time in Hollywood the nostalgia for 1969 LA felt like a well-crafted simulation; for Anderson the exercise is joyous coming-of-age wish fulfilment at its finest.
5. The Northman (dir. Robert Eggers, US)
I enjoyed The Northman but can see why it wouldn't be everyone's cup of tea. It effectively conveys the unhinged mystical madness of Icelandic revenge sagas, which at times makes for challenging, confronting viewing. Very bloody and grim, which is authentic, and in a way, a breath of fresh air after the sanitised derring-do of so many TV Viking outings. Superb cinematography from Director of Photography Jarin Blaschke (The Witch, The Lighthouse), who savours the brutal and jagged Icelandic vistas. Good performances across the board from its talented cast. And of course if you want to cast a Norse witch then Bjork is definitely your A1 go-to.
6. Glass Onion (dir. Rian Johnson, US)
A crowd-pleasing murder-mystery confection with a splendid ensemble cast and the near-limitless budget of a cinema-killing streaming service has enabled Rian Johnson to build a deftly-plotted, frequently charming and bitingly satirical whodunnit with the heart of a sitcom. Endearing murder mystery hokum is dialled up to 11 throughout, and while it may perhaps run a little long and at times lose track of the mission at hand, that can certainly be forgiven when it's this entertaining. Great to see Kathryn Hahn and Dave Bautista as always, and the multi-talented Janelle Monae unsurprisingly offers a compelling star turn. It's also nice to see Kate Hudson given a decent role that befits her comedic talents.
A splendid execution of a disarmingly simple premise - a young girl mysteriously travels back in time and befriends her own mother at the same age - Petite Maman's success hinges on its wonderfully natural and unaffected performances of the young leads Joséphine and Gabrielle Sanz. A Hollywood remake would be sure to pile on the pathos and swaddle the narrative in emoting, whereas director Céline Sciamma (Girlhood, My Life as a Courgette, Portrait of a Lady on Fire) opts for a matter-of-fact protagonist who accepts her fantastical situation without a moment's hesitation. The film wisely refrains from attempting to tie the story up with a pretty bow by explaining everything, and instead savours the joyful bond of youthful friendship, with audiences being perfectly able to identify poignant moments without hand-holding. A genuine treat for audiences of all ages.
An Icelandic odyssey in which a 19th-century Danish priest treks across the blasted wilderness, enduring Fitzcarraldo-like hardships to build a new church in a remote settlement, where he wins the attention of the local farmer's beautiful daughter - but all is not as it seems. The outsider learns harsh lessons of the Icelandic way of life and how men take the law into their own hands in a land where crime and retribution live on in the spirit of Norse vendettas. The film's visual appeal is considerable, with tremendous cinematography, and its premise - based on real seven wet-plate photographs discovered from the era - is intriguing. My only minor niggle is the use of Academy ratio throughout, when the Icelandic scenery cries out for widescreen treatment.
9. Navalny (dir. Daniel Roher, US)
A compelling slice of high-energy documentary journalism, with lashes of espionage and resistance against the authoritarian Moscow regime, replete with jaw-dropping evidence of state-sponsored attempted murder. The film makes no attempt to explain Alexei Navalny's backstory, and little attempt to unpick his motivations - rather, the filmmakers are unashamedly along for the ride as he wages his quixotic campaign of rebellion against the Kremlin, famously exposing his would-be murderers, and heroically (and/or self-destructively) plunging back into the viper's nest by flying back to certain arrest in Moscow in January 2021.
10. Apollo 10 1/2 (dir. Richard Linklater, US)
A lovingly-created and semi-autographical Linklater rotoscope animation of wild, youthful imagination in the space age. The film's successful blending of the mundanity of childhood family memories, coupled with the flights of fancy of bored youth make for endearing family viewing, and the period detail of Texan life in the 1960s is both well-observed and amusing.
See also:
Blog: My top 10 films of 2021, 2020, 2019, 2018, 2017, 2016, 2015, 2014, 2013, 2012, 2011, 2010
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