Worst of 2022 - End of Year Report

2022 was a fine year for film...but some stinkers crept through and gummed up the piping (in fairness, many of them were not actually from last year). Enjoy.

[Click on the titles of the bottom three for links to full reviews]

10. The Gray Man (2022)

The Russo Brothers tried to bring their money-bagging to Netflix and seemed to be doing ok, until the film apparently dropped off a cliff after the first week - though it's very hard to trust the 'box office' returns of streamers. At any rate, this wasn't great, wasting the star wattage of Chris Evans, Ryan Gosling and specifically Ana de Armas and Jessica Henwick. It was positioned as a franchise with an open ending but let's hope they reconsider. Not the worst (obviously, there are nine to come) but a solid disappointment.

8. Moonfall (2022)

Nobody should be surprised that Roland Emmerich has made a dud here, but the cast maybe should have known better. Halle Berry is a fine actress and Patrick Wilson is underrated, even Donald Sutherland pops up for a cameo (I say 'pops up', in fact, he's in a wheelchair for his few seconds of screen time). The cast isn't the issue, it's just a flat out stupid story. The Moon is getting closer to earth and perhaps there's a sentient being involved. So the plan is to nuke the lunar mutha! I can't think of anyone who might have liked this, outside of some QAnon fruit baskets.

7. Venom: Let There Be Carnage (2021)

The first Venom in 2018 was bad enough. This one added another symbiote in the human form of Woody Harrelson to try to raise the stakes. Tom Hardy has some fun and he's the best element to the film, but the whole thing is paced badly, it can't find a consistent tone and crucially, it's boring.

6. Wild Wild West (1999)

I hadn't seen this late 90s flop but someone (Parizad) had it in their top 5 a year or two ago, so I thought I'd give it a crack. Well, the best I can say is that it's 'of its time'. Kevin Kline is a solid comic actor, Ken Branagh goes fatally over the top and Big Willy Smith is at the peak of his zeitgeist. But it has either aged very badly or it was never any good. I'll plump for the latter. When the annoyingly nostalgic song is the best thing about a film, you know something went wrong along the way.

5. The Fable: The Killer Who Doesn't Kill (2021)

This is an odd one. Perhaps it lost me in translation but this Japanese film about an almost mythical assassin who is obliged to not kill for a year (due to storyline considerations) is interminably dire. It tries to be funny and sure, some of the humour works better for the local audience, but wow, it's rubbish. The acting is broadly broad, most of the set pieces are workmanlike at best and the plot has zero initiative or originality. It only sneaks in one spot higher than its predecessor (see below) thanks to a passable scaffolding fight scene.

4. The Fable (2019)

The original and the worst (just) of the Fable 'canon'. Stupidly unfunny lead character, played irritatingly by Jun'ichi Okada, nonsensical plot contrivances, and shoddy acting all around. This is based on a manga but how it got a sequel greenlit, I can't begin to fathom. Different strokes for different folks, I guess.

3. Thor: Love and Thunder (2022)

Taika Waititi has a lot of credit in the bank, with the refreshingly odd Ragnarok adding to his Kiwi stuff (Flight of the Conchords, What We Do in the Shadows, Hunt for the Wilderpeople, etc). What happened with this 4th Thor film, then? Probably hubris, I'd reckon. It's tonally all over the place and smug, with overcooked sentimentality and attempts at zany set pieces unbalancing the dish. Only Christian Bale comes out with any kudos. This is maybe the bottom of the bag for the MCU - the only way is up?

2. After Blue (2021)

What an oddity. Usually, I'm all over nutballs films but this French sci-fi muddler with student filmmaker sensibilities boiled my piss no end. The story, if it can be called that, sees a young woman and her mother tasked with hunting down 'Kate Bush' on a planet with no dudes but stacks of cheap looking landscapes, peopled with pretentious antagonists. At a tad over 2 hours, you really need your wits about you to stay awake.

1. See How They Run (2022)

It's a shame to put this at the top (bottom) of the list, as it stars two of my favourite actors in Saoirse Ronan and Sam Rockwell, but it's so pedestrian and dull that I really had no choice. Set around a murder during the original run of The Mousetrap, the story had potential. Sadly, the 'creatives' behind it either didn't have the chops or things broke down in production, though going by the credits of the director and writer, I'd favour my first guess. Not at all funny, boring and annoying is a fine hat-trick of shite.

Comments

Ghost Cat Anzu (Me & Kid)

Here's a nice surprise. I find Japanese anime to be hit and miss, and the first look at this boof-headed feline didn't promise too much, but Ghost Cat Anzu knocked the bails off. It riffs on the Ghibli theme of children being forced to grow up quicker than they should, with 11 year-old Karin (Noa Gotô) as our focus. Her dad's a bit of a scally and he does a runner while visiting his father at his temple home in a sleepy town, leaving Karin alone with kindly grandad and huge, anthropomorphic cat, Anzu, voiced by Mirai Moriyama. Karin wanders the town, waiting for dad to return and meeting various locals, while being casually monitored by Anzu. The pace is a little pedestrian but the shenanigans make up for this. Anzu is pulled over by the police and told he needs a license to ride a scooter, though he protests that he's not actually a human, so surely these rules don't apply. He works as a masseur but also takes a gig to scare birds away from the river, roping Karin...

Bird

This is such a fine film and going in blind might just be the best way to see it. It's not that it's a twisty, spoilery mystery, just that sometimes knowing nowt about a film is the best way to appreciate it. Zero expectations and all. So if you want the same groundwork that I had, read no more. . . . . Ok. If you're still reading, let's kick off. This is Andrea Arnold's sixth feature and I really have to see more of her work. It's set in the Kent town of Gravesend, and boy, is that a suitable name for this place. Not far from London, on the river Thames, seems like it's wall to wall chavs out there. Bailey (Nykiya Adams) lives with her dad, Bug (Barry Keoghan), and half-brother, Hunter (Jason Buda) in a graffiti covered squat. Pissed off that Bug wants to get married to newish girlfriend, Kayleigh (Frankie Box), Bailey rebels and follows her brother and his mates on a small-time vigilante mission. Things get messy, she does a runner and ends up sleeping in...

The Wolves Always Come at Night

My first taste of the Perth Festival schedule for the coming season was a 'hybrid' film called The Wolves Always Come at Night , directed by Gabrielle Brady. The term 'hybrid' really just seems to mean tweaking the traditional methods of documentary production, in this case, adding some clearly set-up shots and situations, but also, calling on the subjects to help in the writing process. This film is about a family of goat farmers in Mongolia whose difficult existence is made even harder by an unforeseen event that forces them to relocate to the city. The family are led by mother, Zaya Dashzeveg and father, Davaa Dagvasuren, and Brady made the film with their input in mind. She says; Our intention was that Davaa and Zaya have agency within the making of their own story. So, in working together as co-writers, we were able to shape the story together. They would share ideas for what could be filmed and I would translate this into the cinematic language for the film. It...

Audrey

This Perth Fest entry is a very black comedy with a large splosh of Muriel's Wedding about it. Ronnie Lipsick (Jackie Van Beek) has high hopes for her daughter Audrey (Josephine Blazier) to succeed as an actress. Ronnie had some of her own fame years before in Australian TV and is now stage-mothering Audrey to within an inch of her life. But Audrey is a proper arsehole to everyone, including her sister with cerebral palsy, Norah (Hannah Diviney), and her romantically conflicted father, Cormack (Jeremy Lindsay Taylor), so when Audrey's melodramatic antics see her slide off the roof of the house and into a coma, the family have mixed feelings about the situation. Ronnie incongruously decides to pose as Audrey in order to be accepted onto the acting course she had her signed up for. Nobody seems to notice, Norah begins to be more accepted by Audrey's friends (and boyfriend), and Cormack turns his meekness around, reinvigorating his sex life with Ronnie. The family feel guilty...

The Monk and the Gun

This Bhutanese comedy drama is part of the Perth Festival and it follows the country's attempts to move from a monarchy to a democracy in 2006. In the small town of Ura, a novice monk, Tashi (Tandin Wangchuk) is tasked with finding two guns for his Lama, played by real life monk Kelsang Choejay. He's not told why but he gets on with the job. At the same time, a 'fixer/tour guide' from Thimphu, Benji (Tandim Sonam) gets a gig driving a newly arrived American, Ronald (Harry Einhorn) around the country in search of a particularly valuable US Civil War rifle. You might be able to see where this is going... This is satire in deep cover. It might even be satire adjacent, such is its mildness. This is not a bad thing. At times I felt like I was experiencing an old Ealing comedy, or maybe a low-key Ken Loach. The government sends officers around the country to run a mock election to show people how to vote, and one of them, Tshering Yangden (Pema Zangmo Sherpa) wanders through...

Timestalker

Here's an odd little number about reincarnation and love across the ages, or more to the point, dawning self-determination. Alice Lowe writes, directs and stars as Agnes, a woman besotted with Aneurin Barnard's Alex. Always. In many different time periods. We kick off in 1688, where Alex is about to be executed before Agnes steps (trips) in, and saves him. We zip forward to 1793, Alice this time bored of her pampered lifestyle in a manor house with pets, wigs and servants. Oh, and a disgustingly oafish Nick Frost for a hubby, George. But who's the stalker in time? Is it Agnes? She's the clear favourite. Or the object of her desires, Alex, who for the most part, isn't too keen on reciprocating? Is it the boorish George, who does physically stalk in one of the episodes. It may even refer to the peripheral figures of servant, friend & potential lover, Meg (Tanya Reynolds) or wily Scipio (Jacob Anderson - Grey Worm from Game of Thrones ). To be fair, it's hintin...

Merchant Ivory

Here's the first of a few films I'm planning to catch at the British Film Festival so I'll attempt to keep the reviews relatively brief. This a documentary directed by Stephen Soucy about the legendary filmmaking team, Merchant Ivory Productions. The formidable ensemble consisted of producer Ismail Merchant, director James Ivory, writer Ruth Prawer Jhabvala, and composer Richard Robbins. After meeting in 1961, Ivory and Merchant started a fruitful partnership, both professionally and romantically. The film shows us their somewhat ramshackle early films, made in India, moving on to marginally more assured productions in the US, and finally to the English period dramas they became known for in the 80s and onwards. Together, they made over 40 films, some absolute gems among them. A Room with a View , Howard's End , and The Remains of the Day are probably their best, though you could throw in Heat and Dust , Maurice , and The Golden Bowl as very strong examples of their...

Lee

Biopics are tough to get right. For every Lawrence of Arabia , there's a Diana , for every Raging Bull , there's an Ali . The film Lee shines some natural light of the life of renowned war photographer Lee Miller, played by Kate Winslet. She gives it full welly in this - physically and emotionally nude, with camouflage painted boobs, close-ups with no make-up, moles, wrinkles, rage and tears. It's very much the kind of 'brave' performance that the Academy loves to reward. The film starts with Miller crustily answering questions to a young man in 1977, and as she remembers things from her past, we head to flashback territory. It seems a fairly cack-handed framing device until we realise why it's happening. A modicum of research reveals that the film is a pretty accurate retelling of Miller's life - first her carefree bohemian days in pre-WW2 France (including her intro to future hubby, Roland Penrose, played by Alexander Skarsgård), then how she started with...

Gladiator II

There's a lot to enjoy in this sequel to Sir Ridders' original from 2000. The film picks up about 16 years after the end of the first one, where we find Rome ruled by a pair of foppish twats, Geta (Joseph Quinn) and Caracalla (Fred Hechinger). Tasked to expand the empire, General Acacias (Pedro Pascal) leads an attack on Numidia in North Africa, coming up against Paul Mescal's Verus. Once this speccy set piece is over, now-widower Verus finds himself on route to the fighting stadia, where he catches the eye of Macrinus (Denzel Washington), a kind of antiquity Don King. Verus is driven by rage, hungry for revenge on those who killed his wife, but there seems to be more to his story. And those familiar with the original (or anyone who's read anything online about this film) will probably know what, but I'm not about to drop the cat bag. It's beautifully shot by lenser supremo, John Mathieson, especially one silvery sequence near the start where Deaths arrive on a...

Sand Land (Me) (Kids)

Popped down to Palace cinema in the city for a packed screening of Sand Land , part of the Japanese Film Festival Australia . Created by Akira Toriyama (of Dragon Ball fame), this started as a manga book series in 2000. It seems this film was made slightly before, or at the same time as a TV series covering similar ground. That ground being a Mad Max style wasteland where the water supply is controlled and sold by a rotund King (Chafûrin). An old, local sherriff, Rao (Kazuhiro Yamaji), suspects there's a source of water in the desert a few days drive away and so decides to investigate. Knowing he'll need help, he approaches the gang of demons who live nearby. The demons chosen to accompany Rao are the keen Beelzebub (Mutsumi Tamura) and the less enthused Thief (Chô). The trio head off but are soon beset by issues, including enormous sand snakes, marauding punks and the King's military units. As their vehicles tyres were punctured by said punks, Rao commandeers a tank, set...

Film Shapes

Search This Blog