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For a moment, let’s forget the struggles cinemas are facing — not many people want to schlep to see non-Marvel movies anymore, turns out — and let’s celebrate what was an energizing, unexpected and often freaking weird year for film.
2022 marked a comeback for many major directors. Baz Luhrmann ended a nine-year feature hiatus to direct a fantastic “Elvis” biopic, while James Cameron finally finished “Avatar: The Way of Water” after 13 years and constant delays. And Todd Field triumphed with “Tár” after the longest break of anybody — it was the first movie he directed since 2006’s “Little Children.”
We also were treated to a feast of fantastic performances by women. Cate Blanchett in “Tár,” Michelle Williams in “The Fabelmans,” Michelle Yeoh in “Everything Everywhere All at Once” and Angela Bassett in “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever” all scorched the screen.
And, at 75, Steven Spielberg made the finest movie of the year. Here are the best films of 2022 — for a bunch of them, you won’t have to schlep any further than your couch.
My favorite film of 2022 was “The Fabelmans.” We all know Spielberg can make a good movie. The visionary behind “Jaws,” “ET” and “Jurassic Park” still works at a regular clip decades into his career, churning out seven flicks over the past 10 years alone. But his entrancing semi-autobiographical new film about a young kid named Sammy, learning to love the movies during the 1950s and ’60s while facing difficult family drama, was a blissful return to his scrappy past in more ways than one. You learn a lot about the emotional life of a genius — and about his mom, played by the miraculous Michelle Williams — and get swept away by what he’s made.
In theaters
Todd Field’s “Tár” is about a genius, too, only she’s fictional — and a monster. Cate Blanchett, like a bulldozing ballerina, plays Lydia Tár, the most famous conductor in the world. But when rumors about her inappropriate behavior start to knock her off her godly cultural perch, Field’s meticulously directed movie spins into a psychological thriller — but with much more sophistication and awe than that genre usually musters.
