The 22 Best Movies Of 2022, Ranked

Let’s talk about the best movies of 2022! In this article, we’ll go over the 22 best movies to be released in 2022 (how original!).

I’m going to say it so that it’s just out of the way: 2022 has not been the best year on record as far as movies are concerned. It’s actually been a pretty torrid year for films, especially as far as Hollywood blockbusters are concerned.

That said, the lack of brilliant blockbusters has paved the way for more independent and genre movies to shine. We’ve seen some incredible films come out this year, especially when it comes to movies ‘not-in-the-English-language’ (as the Academy likes to call them).

We’ve also seen some brilliant genre movies that have been breaking box office records and getting people talking. I’m thinking specifically of films such as Terrifier 2, Violent Night, Smile, The Mean One, and RRR, which have been getting people talking this year.

It’s actually been a really good year for horror. Terrifier 2 got most of the headlines, but we’ve seen the likes of The Black Phone, Smile, Nope, X, Prey, Pearl, The Menu, Barbarian, and Scream just to name a few of the many impressive horror films that were released in 2022.

2022 has been a great year for horror

Credit: Bloody Disgusting

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But, then again, there haven’t just been good horror films that have come out this year. We’ve seen some impressive films in cinemas this year, even though filmmakers had to make them during a global pandemic.

I think this is a testament to the determination of people working in cinema. I’m hopeful that cinema will never die, and these movies prove that fact!

However, even though we said that it wasn’t a great year for movies, there have been some incredible movies that we got to watch in cinemas. They include independent ones and big Hollywood blockbusters.

That said, I have to mention that there are still some movies I haven’t been able to watch that I really want to. Rian Johnson’s Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery is one of those movies! So, I might have to update this list according.

Also, I was thinking very hard about putting Werewolf By Night and Guardians Of The Galaxy Christmas Special on this list. Ultimately, I decided that they were more like TV specials and less like feature films. That said, I thought they were both brilliant!

However, without any further ado, let’s go over the 22 best movies to be released in 2022:

Here at the 22 best films to be released in 2022

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22. Black Adam

Dwayne Johnson’s Black Adam might not have been the box office hit that Warner Bros. Pictures was hoping for, but what I found after watching the movie was that it was a heck of a lot better than I was expecting it to be.

That might sound like damning with faint praise, but I mean it. I thought that Johnson was excellent as the titular character, and I also felt that compared to the previous DC Comics movies, the film’s plot made a lot more sense, and I enjoyed the spectacle and the fight scenes.

It’s a dumb summer blockbuster that was released in October, and any movie starring Pierce Brosnan gets extra marks from me. He was terrific as Doctor Fate!

21. Thor: Love And Thunder

I could write an essay on the many issues I have with Thor: Love And Thunder, but I won’t. What I will say is that I was expecting a lot more from this movie, especially given that it was written and directed by one of my favourite directors ever: Taika Waititi.

However, I do feel that the movie got a pretty bad rap. It wasn’t as bad as people were making it out to be. It had some standout scenes and a great performance from Christian Bale as the film’s villain, Gorr The God Butcher.

I do feel that they toned his actual performance down a lot, and that’s an issue in my mind. When this movie was announced, I was expecting it to be at the top of my best movies of 2022 list. Well, it’s pretty close to the bottom instead. That should say enough.

20. Scream

Credit: Paramount Pictures

I am a huge fan of the Wes Craven Scream movies. I love them to bits, and they kind of got me into the horror genre. Well, when it was announced that they were making a new movie, I was a bit worried because Craven had passed away, and it would be the first movie to be made after his passing.

Could you make a good Scream movie sans Wes Craven? Turns out you can, and it ended up being the best Scream movie to be released since the 1996 original.

The movie also introduced us to the brilliant Jenna Ortega who’s career has gone from strength to strength ever since. I also love the fact that it brought back the original Scream trio in Courteney Cox, David Arquette and Neve Campbell.

19. Spirited

I love Christmas movies, I just can’t help it. When I turned on Apple TV+ and saw that Ryan Reynolds and Will Ferrell starred in a new Christmas movie called Spirited, I was intrigued. However, when I discovered that it was a musical, I wasn’t so sure about it.

I don’t dislike musicals, but Reynolds and Farrell aren’t all that well-known for their musical prowess. Well, I put the movie on over the Holiday period, I was really impressed by the movie, the performances, the musical numbers, and the songs were also really catchy.

Spirited is a really good movie to watch over the winter break with the whole family. Everyone will have a good time with it.

18. Don’t Worry Darling

There are problems with Don’t Worry Darling. Quite a few problems. The movie is pretty unoriginal, and it’s basically a remake of The Stepford Wives, which I think is a better film. However, that movie doesn’t have a barnstorming performance from Florence Pugh.

For that reason alone, I had to put Don’t Worry Darling in this top 22 best movies of 2022 list. The film, which is directed and stars Olivia Wilde, does show a lot of promise, but I feel like it ended up settling for a rather uninspired script.

That said, I did enjoy my time with it, and I also thought that Harry Styles was OK in the film. I say this because I read a lot of reviews of the movie that really criticised his performance in the film. I thought he wasn’t one of the movie’s problems.

17. Amsterdam

Credit: 20th Century Studios

I love it when David O. Russell and Christian Bale work together. I always think they make interesting stuff, and Amsterdam is no different. Bale is joined by an incredible cast. I would argue that this is the best cast of the year.

We’ve got the likes of Margot Robbie, John David Washington, Chris Rock, Anya Taylor-Joy, Zoe Saldaña, Mike Myers, Michael Shannon, Timothy Olyphant, Andrea Riseborough, Taylor Swift, Matthias Schoenaerts, Alessandro Nivola, Rami Malek, and Robert De Niro in this movie. I would also argue that they all deliver excellent performances in the film.

The movie isn’t one of Russell’s best, but even his less successful movies are worth watching. That said, I would have liked to have seen more of Amsterdam in the actual movie.

16. Waiting For Bojangles

Waiting For Bojangles is a French movie, that I highly doubt many of you reading this list would have heard about. The movie’s original title is En attendant Bojangles, and it stars Romain Duris and Virginie Efira, and they are both brilliant in the movie.

I will say that it’s a rather tough watch because it covers mental illness, and it’s pretty full-on. However, it’s an exquisitely made movie that I think you will appreciate it should you decide to go and watch it.

15. RRR

RRR is one of the most bonkers and bombastic films I think I’ve ever watched. It’s a Bollywood action movie, and it kind of puts Hollywood blockbusters to shame. There was a lot of buzz surrounding this movie, and for good reason.

I think it has some of the best action set pieces I have ever watched in my life. However, the reason why the film isn’t higher up the list is because it’s just too long. This is a common issue with Bollywood films for me. They’re just too long.

The movie is directed by S. S. Rajamouli, who co-wrote the film with V. Vijayendra Prasad, and I think you should check it out if you’re in the mood for some insane action sequences and watching topless men fight tigers!

14. Guillermo del Toro’s Pinocchio

Credit: Netflix

Guillermo Del Toros is one of my favourite directors of all time. I genuinely think that the man is a genius, and when I heard that he was looking to make a Pinocchio movie, I could wait to watch it.

The movie was released on Netflix pretty recently, and it really didn’t disappoint. Pinocchio is actually an incredibly dark tale, and Del Toro’s movie encaptures that perfectly. I also loved the fact that he opted to make the movie using stop-motion animation.

The film is beautiful, magical, and a bit scary. Exactly what I wanted!

13. Doctor Strange In The Multiverse Of Madness

This was a film that I was very much looking forward to watching. I love the Doctor Strange character in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. When I was announced that the film was going to be directed by Sam Raimi after Scott Derrickson had left the project due to ‘creative differences’, I could not wait to watch Doctor Strange In The Multiverse Of Madness.

The movie was released, and it was a real crowd-pleaser. It featured some brilliant movies of pure Sam Raimi magic, which made me love the film even more. However, I will say that the movie lacked some substance.

Maybe I was expecting too much from the film. But, that does mean that I didn’t enjoy it immensely. It’s a great movie to go and watch on the biggest screen possible. However, it’s not a film I’ll go and revisit in a hurry.

12. The Black Phone

Speaking of Scott Derrickson, the director left Doctor Strange In The Multiverse Of Madness and then went and made a little horror movie called The Black Phone. This was one the biggest surprises of the year.

I wasn’t expecting much from the movie, but Derrickson managed to make a really creepy and moving movie with some very young actors. Derrickson wrote and directed the movie, and it demonstrates that he really knows what he’s doing when it comes to horror.

I also loved Ethan Hawk’s performance in the film. He’s just so wonderfully creepy and unhinged! The Black Phone is well worth a watch!

11. Prey

Credit: Hulu

Prey is the movie that I’ve been waiting to see for many, many years. When it was announced that Dan Trachtenberg – the director of 10 Cloverfield Lane – was going to be writing and directing a new Predator movie, I could not wait to see it.

The movie was better than I could have imagined. It was a stripped-down Predator movie which took the franchise all the way back to the 1700s. It also introduced us to Amber Midthunder, and I really believe that she’s going to be a huge star moving forward.

The top 10 best films of 2022

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10. Minions: The Rise Of Gru

Now we enter the top ten movies of 2022, and Minions: The Rise Of Gru was easily the biggest surprise of the year for me. I didn’t stop laughing throughout the whole movie. Yes, it’s a kid’s movie, but boy, was it funny!

9. Everything Everywhere All At One

Everything Everywhere All At Once is arguably one of the most ambitious and fascinating movies to have been released this year. It features a terrific performance from Michelle Yeoh and has some of the best action sequences I’ve ever watched.

The film is probably a better Multiverse film than Doctor Strange In The Multiverse Of Madness, which is amusing. The only reason I didn’t put it at the top of this list (as many other people have done), is that I found the middle section of the film to be a bit meandering, and the movie as a whole is just too long. At least, it started to feel long, which other films in this list didn’t, even though they probably were longer.

8. Bullet Train

Credit: Lionsgate

Bullet Train is a movie that people just don’t seem to make anymore. It stars Brad Pitt as an assassin who ends up on a train full of other assassins, and they’re all after the same thing: a briefcase. That’s a brilliant premise.

The movie is directed by David Leitch who’s directed films such as Atomic Blonde and Deadpool 2, and he also worked on the first John Wick movie. He’s a director that knows how to make very good action films, and I think Bullet Train is his best yet!

It’s just so much fun and beautifully crazy. It also has a terrific turn from Aaron Taylor-Johnson!

7. Turning Red

Turning Red is Pixar at its very best! A fun and moving movie about growing up and womanhood! It’s a movie that I think everybody needs to watch this year!

6. Smile

I mentioned above how 2022 has been a great year for horror movies, and I would argue that Smile was one of the very best to be released this year.

There’s a great premise here, and I always think that the very best horror movies are the about something bigger than just trying to scare people.

Smile is actually about depression and the struggles to rid ourselves of it, which is nigh on impossible.

5. Avatar: The Way Of Water

Credit: 20th Century Studios

Avatar: The Way Of Water is something of a blockbuster masterpiece. What it lacks in plot, it makes up for in spectacle. It’s a long movie, but unlike some of the other films on this list, it really didn’t feel all that long.

As far as I was concerned, the time flew by, and I had an incredible time with this movie. All I would say is try not to watch the movie in 3D. It’s rather headache-inducing.

4. Elvis

Elvis is a biopic unlike any other. It’s a biopic about Elvis Presley, which was written and directed by Baz Luhrmann, and watching the movie, you can really tell. It stars Austin Butler as Elvis and he is remarkable in the film.

He delivers an incredible performance, and if he doesn’t win the Oscar come Awards season, I would be very, very surprised.

3. See How They Run

See How They Run is a sort of Agatha Christie-esque ‘whodunit’ movie, with the iconic writer are the centre of the mystery. It stars Sam Rockwell, Saoirse Ronan, Adrien Brody, Ruth Wilson, Reece Shearsmith, Harris Dickinson and David Oyelowo.

They are all marvellous in the film, but I think it’s Ronan who really stands out. She’s wonderful in the film. It’s a movie that I really wish had gotten a little bit more love this year. I think you should all check it out if you’re into whodunits and Agatha Christie.

2. Top Gun: Maverick

Credit: Paramount Pictures

Top Gun: Maverick is a movie that I really didn’t think should work, but it did. I mean, a sequel to Tom Cruise’s original Top Gun movie…? Really? But, it turned out to be one of the best, and most profitable movies to have been released this year.

It’s an incredible experience, and Cruise has never been better! I had such a good time with this film, and it was one of the best cinematic experiences of my life!

1. The Batman

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I’ve been thinking long and hard about which movie I felt was the best and my favourite of 2022, and Matt Reeves’ The Batman was the movie that kept on coming back into my head. I just loved the movie to bits. It was the only film that I went to see at the cinema three times this year. I think it’s the only movie I’ve ever watched three times in the cinema.

There’s something very special about Reeves and Robert Pattinson’s take on the Dark Knight, and this movie was the Batman film that I was always hoping for. I know this might sound like a lot, but over time, The Batman has become my favourite Batman movie ever made.

It’s a noir-thriller, set in Gotham, with Batman. What more could you ask for? That’s why it’s my number one movie of 2022.

What do you make of our top 22 best movies of 2022 list? Let us know if there are any films you think we’ve missed and ones that you really loved that we didn’t include. Again, we only have so much time in the year, and we can’t watch every movie that is released. We do try, though!

What do you make of this story? Let us know in the comments below or on our Facebook, Twitter or Instagram pages! And if you enjoy listening to film podcasts, why not check out our podcast, The Small Screen Podcast, wherever you get your podcasts!