I’ve finalized my grades and rankings for my personal 2022 movie season over at Letterboxd, so I decided to write down a list of my top 25 favorite films from the year accompanied by plot descriptions provided by the social cataloging site.
25. Elvis
The life story of Elvis Presley as seen through the complicated relationship with his enigmatic manager, Colonel Tom Parker.
24. The Woman King
The story of the Agojie, the all-female unit of warriors who protected the African Kingdom of Dahomey in the eighteen hundreds with skills and a fierceness unlike anything the world has ever seen, and General Nanisca as she trains the next generation of recruits and readies them for battle against an enemy determined to destroy their way of life.
23. Chip N’ Dale: Rescue Rangers
Decades since their successful television series was canceled, Chip has succumbed to a life of suburban domesticity as an insurance salesman. Dale, meanwhile, has had CGI surgery and works the nostalgia convention circuit, desperate to relive his glory days. When a former cast mate mysteriously disappears, Chip and Dale must repair their broken friendship and take on their Rescue Rangers detective personas once again to save their friend’s life.
22. Bardo
Silverio, a renowned Mexican journalist and documentary filmmaker living in Los Angeles, who, after being named the recipient of a prestigious international award, is compelled to return to his native country, unaware that this simple trip will push him to an existential limit.
21. Guillermo Del Toro’s Pinocchio
During the rise of fascism in Mussolini’s Italy, a wooden boy brought magically to life struggles to live up to his father’s expectations.
20. Downton Abbey: A New Era
The Crawley family goes on a grand journey to the south of France to uncover the mystery of the dowager countess’s newly inherited villa.
19. Mrs. Harris Goes To Paris
A fifties London cleaning lady falls in love with an haute couture dress by Christian Dior, and decides to gamble everything for the sake of this folly.
18. The Outfit
Leonard is an English tailor who used to craft suits on London’s world-famous Savile Row. After a personal tragedy, he’s ended up in Chicago, operating a small tailor shop in a rough part of town where he makes beautiful clothes for the only people around who can afford them - a family of vicious gangsters.
17. The Northman
Prince Amleth is on the verge of becoming a man when his father is brutally murdered by his uncle, who kidnaps the boy’s mother. Two decades later, Amleth is now a Viking who’s on a mission to save his mother, kill his uncle, and avenge his father.
16. Thor: Love And Thunder
After his retirement is interrupted by Gorr the God Butcher, a galactic killer who seeks the extinction of the gods, Thor enlists the help of King Valkyrie, Korg, and ex-girlfriend Jane Foster, who now inexplicably wields Mjolnir as the Mighty Thor. Together, they embark upon a harrowing cosmic adventure to uncover the mystery of the God Butcher’s vengeance and stop him before it’s too late.
15. Glass Onion
World-famous detective Benoit Blanc heads to Greece to peel back the layers of a mystery surrounding a tech billionaire and his eclectic crew of friends.
14. Puss In Boots: The Last Wish
Puss in Boots discovers that his passion for adventure has taken its toll - he has burned through eight of his nine lives, leaving him with only one life left. Puss sets out on an epic journey to find the mythical Last Wish and restore his nine lives.
13. Nope
Residents in a lonely gulch of inland California bear witness to an uncanny, chilling discovery.
12. The Fabelmans
A coming-of-age story about a young man’s discovery of a shattering family secret, and an exploration of the power of movies to help us see the truth about each other and ourselves.
11. Women Talking
A group of women in an isolated religious colony struggle to reconcile their faith with a string of sexual assaults committed by the colony’s men.
10. TAR
The film, set in the international world of classical music, centers on Lydia Tár, widely considered one of the greatest living composer/conductors and first-ever female chief conductor of a major German orchestra.
09. The Banshees Of Inisherin
Two lifelong friends find themselves at an impasse when one abruptly ends their relationship, with alarming consequences for both of them.
08. Living
A veteran civil servant and bureaucratic cog in the rebuilding of Britain post-WWII, Williams expertly pushes paperwork around a government office only to reckon with his existence when he’s diagnosed with a fatal illness.
07. Marcel The Shell With The Shoes On
Marcel is an adorable one-inch-tall shell who ekes out a colorful existence with his grandmother Connie and their pet lint, Alan. Once part of a sprawling community of shells, they now live alone as the sole survivors of a mysterious tragedy. But when a documentary filmmaker discovers them amongst the clutter of his Airbnb, the short film he posts online brings Marcel millions of passionate fans, as well as unprecedented dangers and a new hope at finding his long-lost family.
06. Top Gun: Maverick
After more than thirty years of service as one of the Navy’s top aviators, and dodging the advancement in rank that would ground him, Pete “Maverick” Mitchell finds himself training a detachment of TOP GUN graduates for a specialized mission of the likes which no living pilot has ever seen. Facing an uncertain future and confronting the ghosts of his past, Maverick is drawn into a confrontation with his own deepest fears, culminating in a mission that demands the ultimate sacrifice from those who will be chosen to fly it.
05. Avatar: The Way Of Water
Set more than a decade after the events of the first film, learn the story of the Sully family (Jake, Neytiri, and their kids), the trouble that follows them, the lengths they go to keep each other safe, the battles they fight to stay alive, and the tragedies they endure.
04. RRR
A fictional history of two legendary revolutionaries’ journey away from home before they began fighting for their country in the twenties.
03. Babylon
A tale of outsized ambition and outrageous excess, tracing the rise and fall of multiple characters in an era of unbridled decadence and depravity during Hollywood’s transition from silent films to sound films in the late twenties.
02. The Batman
In his second year of fighting crime, Batman uncovers corruption in Gotham City that connects to his own family - while facing a serial killer known as the Riddler.
01. Everything Everywhere All At Once
An aging Chinese immigrant is swept up in an insane adventure, where she alone can save what’s important to her by connecting with the lives she could have led in other universes.
