Between Steven Spielberg’s utterly enchanting West Side Story, Jane Campion’s resolutely sobering The Power of the Dog and the pure, untethered joy that was experiencing Jon Watts’ Spider-Man: No Way Home in a packed crowd on opening day, I feel it goes without saying that the movies, if any doubt still remained, were back and back with a vengeance.
With that in mind, 2022 is set – at least in theory! – to be the first year in what feels like a lifetime where cinemas remain open all year round, starting with Simon Kinberg’s The 355 and ending, triumphantly, with the nausea-inducing spectacle experience of watching both Aquaman: The Lost Kingdom and the as-of-yet untitled Avatar 2 on the same day! And that’s not considering the hotly anticipated debut of Idris Elba’s Knuckles in Sonic the Hedgehog 2, or the climactic end of Michael Myers in Halloween Ends, or even the film I am least convinced actually exists in DC League of Super-Pets, which does indeed star Kevin Hart as Batman’s dog. And not a single one of those six films is on my list – that’s how crazy 2022 is set to be!
Like all years, it’s going to be a spectacular one for film, so here’s to 2022!
#10. Demolition Divas: Ambulance and Moonfall
Sometimes you need a movie that is as braindead as it is barking mad. Take, for example, Roland Emmerich’s somewhat self-explanatory Moonfall, the latest in a long line of disaster flicks for the famed demolition diva that promises tidal waves of destruction betwixt explosions the size of moons in one of the primetime popcorn-movie events of the year. Alternatively, on the more self-serious side of stupidity lies Michael Bay’s Ambulance, a high-octane heist thriller starring Jake Gyllenhaal and Yahya Abdul-Mateen II as two thieves that escape a bank heist gone using a nearby ambulance. When compared to Moonfall, the premise is admittedly not that showstopping, but if there is one thing Michael Bay can do other than ruin franchises and commercialise tragedy, it is make stuff go BOOM, and that is all Ambulance needs to do. Just, uh, preferably not at Pearl Harbour.
#09. Video Game Movies: Uncharted and Untitled Mario Movie
Video games, much like comic books, require great care when adapting into films because even the slightest misstep in recreating a character’s shoes can be fatal for you and your loved ones. Two upcoming films that, whether justly or not, have been subjected to such scrutiny are Ruben Fleischer’s Uncharted and Illumination’s as-of-yet untitled Mario film. In both cases, the respective castings of Nathan Drake (Tom Holland) and Mario (Chris Pratt) have caused outrage, and for my own family’s safety, I won’t disagree. However, the trailer for Uncharted nails everything else about the games – from the wisecracking tone to the spectacular action set pieces – while the cast around Pratt in Mario, similarly, feels eerily spot-on: needless to say, Donkey Kong is the role Seth Rogen was born to play. Fidelity, to any extent, shouldn’t matter with the quality of a film anyway, and both have such potential beyond the supposed missteps that it feels unfair to damn them solely on that … although that Chris Pratt casting is, admittedly, f*cking dreadful.
#08. Entering the Real World: KIMI and Alice
This may be the most niche category I’ve ever justified for a Most Anticipated Movies list: two relatively unknown films, one by an established great (Steven Soderbergh, KIMI) and the other a directorial debut (Krystin Ver Linden, Alice), with fundamentally different premises that have little to nothing in common beyond a shared theme of entering the real world. For KIMI, this theme is rooted firmly in the present day, following an agoraphobic tech worker who is forced to leave her home amidst the COVID-19 pandemic to solve a violent crime — boom, solid-enough sounding thriller. Alice, in contrast, is a period piece: firstly set during slavery as a young black woman named Alice yearns to break free, but subsequently changing setting entirely when she escapes and discovers the year is actually 1973, a hundred years since slavery had been abolished. Little else is known about either film beyond this, and neither has had a trailer to iron out the finer details. But after two years of entrapment – physical, emotional and ideological – the notion of films about escape and freedom is too tantalising to ignore.
#07. Action Extravaganzas: Mission: Impossible VII and Bullet Train
Christopher McQuarrie and David Leitch are two of the finest action directors working today. The former is a veteran of the Mission: Impossible franchise who has returned once again to herald the seventh entry in the iconic spy saga and direct Tom Cruise’s latest attempt at hurting himself for our amusement (not that I’m complaining). Leitch, quite similarly, has ample experience hurting himself in pursuit of moviegoing magic, originating as a stunt double for Brad Pitt before subsequently redefining American action as the director of John Wick and Atomic Blonde. His latest effort, Bullet Train, gathers an impressive ensemble cast (of which Pitt plays a crucial role) for a high-octane thrill-ride set in one of the speediest venues on Earth, one whose title also presumably doubles as a spectacularly violent pun. And with almost every other blockbuster this year set to take place in the emerald valleys of a green screen studio, it is comforting to know there’s still room for kick-ass thrill rides, too!
#06. Reimagined Childhoods: Lightyear and Matilda
Anyone that argues their childhoods were ruined by a movie needs to seriously reevaluate why their childhood had the depth of a puddle. Because while Toy Story is one of my all-time childhood favourites and Roald Dahl’s Matilda, likewise, helped spark my love of literature in the first place, their upcoming reimaginings fail to arouse much trepidation or fear. Matilda, just by casting Emma Thompson as Miss Trunchbull and Lashana Lynch as Miss Honey, secured itself a spot on this list no matter what, and the musical element just made the honey even sweeter. But with Lightyear – a film I have somewhat disparagingly dubbed the Snyder Cut of Toy Story – I took a lot more convincing. My first impression of the trailer was utter bewilderment. The second impression, upon rewatch, somehow escalated that bewilderment into utter disdain. But then I saw it again in the cinema before a film and realised, after David Bowie’s Starman pops with glorious purpose, how wrong I truly was. On the big screen, the trailer felt mature, dignified, grand, and sincere – a reimagining of my childhood that nonetheless evokes the child-like glee of reaching for the stars.
#05. Men Are Awful: She Said, The Woman King, and Don’t Worry, Darling
As a proud gay man, it is my utmost belief that men are insipid creatures. My first case study to support this claim is Maria Schrader’s She Said, a compelling true story about the journalists (played by Carey Mulligan and Zoe Kazan) that helped expose the heinous crimes of Harvey Weinstein — this should be fairly self-explanatory. My next case study is Olivia Wilde’s Don’t Worry, Darling, a condescendingly-titled psychological thriller that follows a 1950s housewife (the brilliant Florence Pugh) as she seeks to uncover disturbing truths about her husband — again, fairly self-explanatory. My final case study, likewise, is Gina Prince-Bythewood’s The Woman King, a rousing historical drama about an all-female African military unit – led by General Viola Davis – that exacted cold-blooded vengeance against their enemies centuries ago. Three compelling films; three brilliant sets of actors; three more reasons as to why men, honestly, are just the absolute worst.
#04. Multiversal Madness: Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse Part I, and Everything Everywhere All At Once
I don’t need to explain why Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness and Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse are, to my nerdy brain, super exciting films. They’ve been discussed to death, have great trailers, and promise fan-service galore in their weaponisation of the multiverse for commercial gain: if nothing else, they sound fun. Unfortunately, Everything Everywhere All At Once doesn’t have the luxury of a bottomless budget and has thus, until this point, gone relatively unknown. The plot is deliciously bonkers – a woman named Evelyn effectively discovers she can transcend the multiverse and experience the lives of Every Evelyn, Everywhere, All At Once – and the trailer only confirms the wonderment: Michelle Yeoh, Jamie Lee-Curtis, black comedy and some potentially superviolent action. All that’s missing now is for Andrew Garfield to deny his involvement, and Everything Everywhere All At Once is set to be one of the most tantalising multiversal adventures in a year chock-full of them.
#03. Movies About Movies – The Sequel: Babylon, The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent, and In Search of Tomorrow
My number one category last year was the first entry to the “Movies About Movies” Saga, a very disappointing first instalment with neither Babylon nor The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent even bothering to come out. Alas, this year’s sequel promises to be bigger and better, promising not just Babylon (Damien Chazelle’s love-letter to the Hollywood Golden Age … no, it’s not just a sequel to La La Land) and the spellbindingly-meta Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent (in which Nicolas Cage plays himself!), but also David A. Weiner’s In Search of Tomorrow, a documentary exploring 1980s science-fiction. The first is a primetime drama with a great cast and “Oscar” written in its blood; the second promise an uncaged Cage performance as unabashedly eccentric as it is earnestly introspective; the last is an ode to the glory days of the blockbuster – what celebrates cinema better than all of that?
#02. Soundin’ Spooky: Nope, You Won’t Be Alone, The Black Phone, Fresh, Scream, and Hellraiser
You can never have too much horror, and these SIX horror films I couldn’t choose between are all a testament to that. First up is Matt Betinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillet’s Scream, the first big-screen venture for the infamously meta franchise since Wes Craven tragically passed away and the latest film from its director duo after the deliciously witty – albeit no less razor-sharp! – Ready or Not in 2019. Next up are David Bruckner’s remake of Hellraiser – a film whose cinematic source material I have no strong attachment to but whose director is coming hot on the heels of 2021’s The Night House, one of the best-directed horror films of the year – and Mimi Cave’s deliberately vague Fresh, an indie horror-thriller starring Sebastian Stan as a boyfriend with, quote, an “unusual appetite” (sounds freaky!). Following this is Goran Stolevski’s deeply confounding You Won’t be Alone, a period-piece horror whose trailer explained absolutely nothing but whose lead star – Noomi Rapace – was last seen absolutely stealing the show in Valdimar Jóhannsson’s Lamb this year. Furthermore, Scott Derickson will return to the silver screen for the first time in six years (Doctor Strange, 2016) with The Black Phone, a serial killer thriller whose exceptionally creepy trailer and fascinating premise make it a must-watch even before you find out Ethan Hawke is playing the central psychopath. Also, some fella called Jordan Peele is making a movie this year called Nope. Some dude called Daniel Kalulya is gonna star in it and apparently the last flick they made together was something called Get Out? Idk, never heard of it … but that poster sure is rad!
Honourable Mention: Killers of the Flower Moon
The only reason that Martin Scorsese’s Killers of the Flower Moon is not on this list is that, as of today, it is not technically confirmed as a 2022 release – it almost undoubtedly will be and has a greater chance, frankly, than even some of the films on this list. But while everything from the quasi-surrealist title to the giddily good cast (the Scorsese/DiCaprio/De Niro love triangle must finally come to an end!) to the fact it is Martin freakin’ Scorsese would all but guarantee it a spot on this list … I regretfully can’t justify it. Sorry, Marty … I eagerly anticipate you blowing me away nonetheless!
#01. World’s Greatest Detectives: The Batman and Death on the Nile
Three figures are in contention for World’s Greatest Fictional Detective: Arthur Conan Doyle’s iconic Sherlock Holmes, Agatha Christie’s moustache-laden Hercule Poirot, and Bill Finger’s brooding Batman. And heck, for good fun, let’s add Knives Out‘s very own Kentucky Fried Benoit Blanc for good measure too! Unfortunately, the first and last exist in a similar boat to Killers of a Flower Moon wherein neither officially has a film coming out this year (although both are likely), and are thus unfortunately ineligible. Blissfully, however, Keneth Brannagh and Matt Reeves are content to pick up the slack by releasing both Death on the Nile and The Batman before March even comes to a close. A combination of lush visuals, playful performances, and gloriously thick Belgian moustaches made Murder on the Orient Express an earnest delight back in 2017. Its follow-up, likewise, combines a similarly talented gaggle of thespians to uncover, in a classic whodunnit!, which among them is the killer, and with a cast as … controversial as this, it means rooting for a victim becomes part of the fun, too!
Ultimately, however, it is not too hard to deduce – being the master detective that you are! – that it is Matt Reeves’ The Batman which takes the true top spot on this list. It will allegedly be the first Batman film to legitimately focus on his status as, ahem, the “World’s Greatest Detective,” plunging a freshly Batted Robert Pattinson (who, hear this now, will absolutely nail it) into a serial killer story potentially darker and scarier than the franchise has ever gone before. Colin Farrell, Jeffrey Wright, Zoe Kravitz, Andy Serkis and Paul Dano all round out the incredible cast that gives Gotham City its gritty texture, while the trailers have been similarly electrifying and Reeves’ track record remains exceptionally clean. This is the fourth unique Batman to grace the big screen in a decade, but while Bale was a beefcake, Arnett a parody, and Affleck the victim of a drive-by Whedoning, Pattison has long-since moved past the need to prove himself capable of the role. He may be vengeance, but I am f*cking stoked!
Film Scribe 