Best Of 2022

Our Favourite Everything

December 23 2022 by Forty

'Tis the season, isn’t it? During the last twelve months over here at the LDWN headquarters, we’ve watched way too many movies, we were glued to our tele when not reading thousands and thousands of pages or fighting tinnitus from all the new music we’ve listened to in the red. So here’s a list with a few things that stuck. This happened all a bit last minute, so we didn’t even find the time to write a line or two about the music. Well, it is what it is. At least it's in chronological order.

MOVIES.

01. ATHENA by Romain Gavras
Bold, big and intense: who would’ve thought that a film about social unrest in a Paris banlieue could play its cards like a Greek tragedy?

02. BEAUTIFUL BEINGS by Gudmundur Arara Dudmundsson
A very different coming of age story that isn’t defined by its hip soundtrack or snappy dialogue, but instead goes to places the majority of similar movies wouldn’t dare to go. The result is a rather bruising watch.

03. EO by Jerzy Skolimowski
In one way, it’s a dark fable, an allegory on modern Europe via a surreal rod trip experienced by a donkey, in another. A metaphorical cinematic experience on life itself, maybe. Whatever it is, it’s definitely deeply moving, stunningly beautiful and downright brilliant.

04. EVERYTHING EVERYWHERE ALL AT ONCE by Dan Kwan & Daniel Scheinert
There isn’t any other film out there which tackles profound subjects such as loneliness, aging, depression and forgiveness via a restless narrative filled with buttplugs, small stones with googly eyes and multiverse jumping.

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05. FUNNY PAGES by Owen Kline
The debut of Kline Jr. feels a bit as if John Waters would’ve directed a remake of a Noah Baumbach flick, which is a perfectly fine endeavor in my book.

06. MARCEL THE SHELL WITH SHOES ON by Dean Fleischer-Camp
By far the sweetest, funniest, weirdest, most heartfelt and original (animated) features of the year that totally deserves all the buzz. Jenny Slates’s voicing of eponymous character feels like the best thing ever.

07. NOPE by Jordan Peele
It’s overambitious and a bit messy, but strangely this actually benefits the movie. I surprisingly found this to be not only one of the most entertaining and gorgeous-looking movies of the year, but to be Peele’s best so far.

08. RESURRECTION by Andrew Semans
Proves that a psychological thriller doesn’t necessarily need to be thrilling first and foremost when it’s as dark, fucked up and well-acted as this one here.

09. SKINAMARINK by Kyle Edward Ball
If you didn’t suffer from nyctophobia before, Ball’s debut is here to change that. This is the most consciously polarizing, effective and overall eerie horror film I’ve seen in quite some time. Brought me back to the time when I first watched “Begotten“ and wasn’t able to shake it off for days.

10. SOMETHING IN THE DIRT by Justin Benson & Aaron Moorhead
The writer/director/actor-duo continues their quest for the pitch-perfect lo-fi, doomsday-ridden sci-fi flick. And once again, they came impressively close to it.

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11. THE STRANGER by Thomas. M. Wright
The last years proved that crime pics from Down Under hit a lot harder than the rest. And even though this is much more a mood piece than a classic thriller, the second feature of actor turned director Wright easily underlines this.

12. THE WORST PERSON IN THE WORLD by Joachim Trier
Trier’s take on, well, let’s say, romantic comedies is one of the most profound, honest yet playful films about love and being in a relationship. Depending on where your heart (and head) is watching this is either a very joyful or absolutely terrifying experience - a bit like life itself, isn’t it?