10. “All the Beauty and the Bloodshed” (Laura Poitras)
Most movies these days barely deliver on the price of their ticket; Laura Poitros’ exhilarating documentary offers the viewer two first-rate films for the price of one. It is, first and foremost a bio-doc of the artist Nan Goldin, one of the most innovative photographers of the ‘80s downtown New York scene; it’s also an on-the-ground chronicle of her current activism, specifically her attention-getting “actions” at respectable museums where buildings and wings are branded with the name of the Sackler family. The Sacklers built their fortune manufacturing and marketing OxyContin, and use their art world donations to “wash their blood money.” Goldin’s not just shooting off her mouth; her own work is part of the permanent collection and many of these museums, so she’s unapologetically risking her livelihood and reputation. In between that work, she talks about her life and work, and she’s a marvelous talker, recalling (with vivid detail) her busy life and times. Had Poitras chosen to go one way or another–the bio-doc or the in-the-moment activism narrative–she could have made a fine documentary. But by crafting them concurrently and intertwining them delicately and devastatingly by the picture’s end, she’s made the year’s best non-fiction film. – Jason Bailey (Our review of “All the Beauty and the Bloodshed”)
9. “Top Gun: Maverick” (Joseph Kosinski)
This doesn’t always happen, but “Top Gun: Maverick” is a standout: one of the year’s most financially successful movies is also one of its best. Directed by Joseph Kosinski but more or less commandeered by its star Tom Cruise, the blockbuster movie beats suspicions about unwarranted nostalgia sequels by incorporating an exciting mix of the old and new. Cruise is not a star who sees himself in that former category, and the snappy script from Christopher McQuarrie, Ehren Kruger, and Eric Warren Singer, has him working with a new team of young pilots through a life-or-death mission that’s thrilling just to see them practice. The stakes are raised by filmmaking that placed Cruise and others in real airborne cockpits, a sensation carried over by Kosinski’s tactile editing. Delayed from its original Covid era release, “Top Gun: Maverick” gave us a thrilling reason to see a blockbuster on the big screen again. – NA (Our review of “Top Gun: Maverick”)
8. “Athena” (Romain Gavras)
If there’s any film deserving of time-capsule status from an era of heightened tensions between cops and civilians, it’s Romain Gavras’ “Athena.” The setup feels frighteningly familiar: a cell phone video depicting the brutal shooting of an unarmed man sets the internet ablaze. Infuriated residents of the titular Parisian banlieue take their outrage directly to their frequent terrorizers and tormentors, a burst of unbridled fury that Gavras captures with stunning immediacy through the energetic extended takes of Matias Boucard’s cinematography. Rather than rehashing tired, theoretical talking points about how a population should respond to their targeting, Gavras subjects those philosophies to the stress test of all-out urban warfare. It’s revelatory and riveting to watch arguments and theories unravel in near real-time. Gavras’ infusion of both mythological and tragic contextualization into the events of “Athena” is a clarion call not to forget the strong sensory response evoked by his dazzling, dizzying film. – Marshall Shaffer (Our review of “Athena”)
7. “The Fabelmans” (Steven Spielberg)
The first few scenes of Steven Spielberg’s “The Fabelmans” are like the big reveal we have waited decades for. This is how one of Hollywood’s greatest imaginations started—as the wide-eyed gaze of a boy watching “The Greatest Show on Earth.” That boy was then inspired to destroy his train set until his mother encouraged him to film it so he could watch it over and over. The rest is Hollywood history. For all of the personal touches that have elevated Spielberg’s blockbusters, he goes deepest into his own story with “The Fabelmans,” which has him reimagining formative moments with a camera in hand, watching his family dynamic change, coming into his own in high school, and learning how to harness the power of what to put in the shot. Co-writing this cinematic memoir with Tony Kushner, “The Fabelmans” looks back at these many chapters with the closeness and warmth of a home movie, especially with scenes that involve characters painted by incredible ensemble work, like classical pianist mother Mitzi (Michelle Williams), engineer father Burt (Paul Dano), Uncle Benny (Seth Rogen), and circus-traveling Uncle Boris (Judd Hirsch). It is one of Spielberg’s most sensitive works of art, and its focus on what he was moved by as a teenager—dreaming of creating heroes while sleeping with a Bolex camera under his bed—helps us appreciate more about how the modern Hollywood blockbuster came to be. – NA (Our review of “The Fabelmans”)
6. “Guillermo del Toro’s Pinocchio” (Guillermo del Toro, Mark Gustafson)
Guillermo del Toro is such a seriously great filmmaker that it may be easy to forget his incredible sense of humor. Thankfully we now have his take on Pinocchio, which is miles more inventive than your gut may think given the source material, or any flashbacks to Robert Zemeckis’ curdled live-action take from last September. Collaborating with co-writer Patrick McHale and co-director Mark Gustafson, del Toro has essentially one of the most gorgeous parody movies ever made, a stop-motion animation wonder that stretches, discards, and sometimes dynamites the many strange but softened pieces of this tale to create something of a “Not Another ‘Pinocchio’ Movie.” For starters, this version is less sentimental about how naive Pinocchio would be; it also features him buddying up with a screaming monkey named Spazzatura (voiced by Cate Blanchett), training to kill during World War II, and facing death multiple times in a realm that transcends logic. Throughout, the movie has the true stamp of its namesake when ruminating on death, creating laugh-out-loud moments and poignant statements in equal measure. It’s all pulled together by a sincerity to strange beauty, evident in the immersive stop-motion animation and sly music from Alexandre Desplat, which includes a handful of musical numbers that can hold their own against a certain Disney classic, and make “Guillermo del Toro’s Pinocchio” a delightfully deranged spectacle like no other this year. – NA (Our review of “Guillermo del Toro’s Pinocchio”)
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