The best movies of 2022, so far

Here’s what’s excited us the most on screen so far this year

We’re gearing up for the back stretch of 2022, and there’s been no shortage of great movies to delight us at the theaters and at home. There have been big theatrical events like Top Gun: Maverick and Nope, straight-to-streaming hits like Prey, and much more to thrill and surprise us this year at the movies.

So even though it’s there’s still plenty of time left in the year, we’ve been keeping up this list of which 2022 releases have excited us most, from big action-adventures to small indie genre movies. All of these are worth a watch.

Below you’ll find entries are in reverse order of release. The most recent releases are first, so it’ll be easy to see the newest additions to this list. We’ll be updating it throughout 2022. We’ll also be doing the same for the best games, the best anime, the best books, and the best TV shows of 2022. Our latest update adds Prey, Thirteen Lives, Nope, and Hustle.

PREY

Midthunder is Naru, a young woman who wants to prove herself as a warrior, despite the mockery of many young men in her tribe. It’s the perfect conflict for the Predator to wade his way into, as a creature whose only concern is challenging himself against the mightiest foes he can find.

Prey is available to watch on Hulu.

THIRTEEN LIVES

Thirteen Lives, the adaptation of the true story of the 2018 Thai cave rescue, is a perfect match of director and material. Ron Howard is a deeply sentimental filmmaker who loves inspirational stories — Apollo 13, Cinderella Man, and his excellent sports drama Rush, for instance — and there are few more inspirational stories in recent memory than this one. It’s also one that’s quite impossible for him to overdramatize, because of how unbelievable the true story is.

An old-school tense, edge-of-your-seat thriller, Thirteen Lives avoids the pitfall of similar Hollywood adaptations by not locating the story as a journey of a singular group of outsider heroes (in this cave, the eccentric specialty cave divers portrayed by Viggo Mortensen and Colin Farrell). Instead, the movie effectively showcases how this was a group effort by volunteers from around the world. The heroics of the divers wouldn’t have been possible without the efforts of local villagers and other volunteers from around the world, and the movie does not forget it. The diving scenes are electric and incredibly tense, too — Howard and the crew built a gigantic set to replicate the caves, and Mortensen and Farrell shot their own diving sequences. —PV

Thirteen Lives is available to watch on Prime Video.

NOPE

Jordan Peele’s alien-invasion movie has its flaws, particularly a leisurely pacing that doesn’t fully serve the film’s tension. But it also stands out as one of 2022’s most visually indelible and memorable films, packed with horrors that imprint directly on the psyche. It’s a callback to an era when movies were allowed to be more mysterious, and horror leaned more directly on the unknown and unknowable. At the same time, it’s an incisive character piece, easily read as an analysis of fame, of response to tragedy, and many other things. It’s a thoughtful, well-constructed puzzlebox of a film, worth considering and unpacking at length — but it’s also just plain scary, and horror fans could hardly ask for more than that. —Tasha Robinson

Nope is currently in theaters.

HUSTLE

Sandler is Stanley Sugerman, a former college star who is now a veteran NBA scout for the Philadelphia 76ers. He has a close relationship with the team’s owner (Robert Duvall), a father-like figure to Sugerman who sees Stanley’s value as a basketball mind. The owner promotes Sugerman to assistant coach, a position where he can spend more time around his wife (Queen Latifah) and their young daughter. But when tragedy gets in the way of Stanley’s new job, he has to prove himself yet again and find a winning prospect for the team.

Hustle is available to watch on Netflix.

FIRE ISLAND

This delightful adaptation of Pride and Prejudice brings Jane Austen’s classic story to the gay vacation destination Fire Island. Comedian Joel Kim Booster wrote the movie and stars as Noah, the Elizabeth Bennet of this story. Noah and his friends travel to Fire Island every year to vacation for a week, but this year appears to be the last. Noah’s best friend, Howie (Bowen Yang, playing the Jane Bennet role here), has never been in a relationship, and Noah makes it his mission to get Howie laid this week. When the pair meet a group of rich guys also on vacation, tensions flare as some hit it off and some don’t.

Fire Island is available to watch on Hulu.

TOP GUN: MAVERICK

The sequel was so much better than the original” isn’t something movie fans say or hear often, but it’s true in the case of Top Gun: Maverick, a 36-years-later check-in on the high-flying 1986 action movie that gave Tom Cruise the need for speed. Cruise is back as Pete “Maverick” Mitchell, the Navy test pilot who continually lives up to his name by breaking rules, flouting superiors, and charting his own course.

Top Gun: Maverick is currently in theaters.

HATCHING

Hanna Bergholm’s debut feature film is a shocker — a horror movie that’s partly about living a fake life online for an anonymous audience, partly about adolescent growing pains, and partly about fraught family relationships, but with all those ideas filtered through the body of a hideous, murderous monster. 

Hatching is available to watch on Hulu.

THE NORTHMAN

Few things go better together than Vikings and revenge, and The Northman is the perfect proof. Drawing inspiration from the same Norse myth that inspired Shakespeare’s Hamlet, director Robert Eggers (The VVitch, The Lighthouse) has created a historical epic of the sort we rarely get to see anymore. The story follows Amleth (Alexander Skarsgaard) as he seeks revenge against his Uncle, who murdered his father and usurped his throne.

The Northman is available to watch on Peacock.

WE’RE ALL GOING TO THE WORLD’S FAIR

Casey, an internet-obsessed lonely teenager (Anna Cobb, in an unforgettable feature film debut), stumbles across The World’s Fair Challenge, a horror-themed online challenge that promises physical changes to those who take part. Casey begins to create videos of her participation in the challenge, opening the door to new experiences (and spectators) in her physical and virtual lives.

We’re All Going to the World’s Fair is available to watch for free with a library card on Hoopla, or available for digital rental on Amazon and Apple.

AMBULANCE

Ambulance follows two brothers who steal an ambulance after a botched bank heist and lead the Los Angeles Police Department on a chase across the city, all with a couple of accidental hostages in the back. The robbers are played by Yahya Abdhul Matteen II, who brings a sympathetic presence to the high-stakes chase, and Jake Gyllenhaal at his unhinged best. But it’s action director extraordinaire Michael Bay who is the real star of the show.

Ambulance is available to watch on Peacock.

EVERYTHING EVERYWHERE ALL AT ONCE

Part metaphorical attempt to reckon with the chaos of the internet age, part life-affirming argument against despair, and part reckless absurdist action movie, it’s simultaneously hilarious and touching, an impressive special-effects experiment and a tremendous mental reboot on the order of The Matrix. This is the only movie you’ll see this year (or probably ever) where one man gets beaten to death with oversized floppy dildos, while another changes the world with the Kurt Vonnegut-derived message “Be kinder to each other.” —TR

Everything Everywhere All At Once is available for digital rental or purchase on VOD platforms.

YOU WON’T BE ALONE

A story about a young witch that uses her power to shapeshift to live among humans in a small village, You Won’t Be Alone is a folkloric tone poem that uses horror as a form of yearning. As villagers disappear and the film’s protagonist replaces them, You Won’t Be Alone drifts into a dreamy, Terrance Malick-esque rumination on gender, community, and memory. Grotesque and lovely, You Won’t Be Alone lingers in the mind, wistful and aching, longing to wear your skin. —Joshua Rivera

You Won’t Be Alone is available to watch on Peacock.

RRR

RRR is the biggest, loudest, and most bombastic movie that’s likely to come out in theaters this year. The movie’s historical fantasy follows two Indian men on opposite sides of the country’s British occupation in the 1950s — or so they think. Both acting on parallel secret missions, the two men end up bonding over their bravery and strength and forming a friendship great enough to free the entire country.

RRR is available to watch on Zee5, and the Hindi dub is available to watch on Netflix.

X

The new slasher X is the best Texas Chainsaw Massacre movie of 2022. Set in 1979, writer-director Ti West’s loving homage to all things exploitation cinema follows a porno director and his cast as they head to a small farm in Texas to shoot their next movie. Unfortunately, the farm’s owners don’t approve one bit of the filmmakers’ immoral ways, and that results in a lot of blood and guts. There’s sex, murder, quite a few uncomfortable scenes, and every minute of it is a film-grainy, old-school blast. —AG

X is is available for digital rental on Amazon and Apple.

THE LONG WALK

A Lao hermit living in a tech-oriented future periodically travels 50 years into the past and intervenes in events in his own traumatic childhood, with the help of the ghost of a woman who died in the nearby forest when he was a kid. These are bold, striking elements that don’t entirely seem to fit together, but The Long Walk is exquisitely constructed in a way that reveals its puzzlebox methods slowly, building toward an emotional end that ties all its genres, timelines, and threads together in a startling, impressive way. —TR

The Long Walk is available to watch on Shudder, for free with ads on Tubi, or for free with a library card on Hoopla.

JUJUTSU KAISEN 0

Yuta’s personal journey parallels well with that of Yuji, making for a relatable protagonist who’s easy to cheer on and root for. Though the movie as whole is the kind of “prequel” that benefits from prior knowledge of the series it precludes, Jujutsu Kaisen 0 is nevertheless an exciting watch that more than merits inclusion among the best animated movies to come out of 2022. —Toussaint Egan

Jujutsu Kaisen Zero is currently in theaters.

THE BATMAN

Matt Reeves’ reboot of the Dark Knight isn’t as bold as it might be, but it sure is stylish. A long, slow-burning mystery in the vein of David Fincher’s Seven, The Batman infuses a familiar story with darkly beautiful imagery and magnetic performances from stars Robert Pattinson and Zoë Kravitz. When it isn’t too enamored with ideas already explored in Christopher Nolan’s Batman trilogy, The Batman lays exciting groundwork for a richer, stranger sort of Batman movie, which will hopefully materialize as a sequel reuniting everyone who made this one such a pleasure to watch. —JR

The Batman is available to watch on HBO Max.

Thank you