Jet fighter pilot Maverick (Tom Cruise) was not the only one who achievedhighs in the 2022 film year: the Flemish fiction film, the wild Belgian natureand the dancing Tom Hanks also scored unprecedentedly high. But which longplayer did we find the most beautiful of the year? Who was the best actor, whowas the best actress, who gave us the most painful spasm of laughter, and whogets the trophy for the worst sex scene? Here is Humo’s Sparkling Film YearReview!
Eric StockmanTuesday December 6, 202212:00
THE TUNEST ACTRESS
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1.Jennifer Lawrence
In many scenes she could easily have turned it into a theatrical ‘Here withthat Oscar!’ show, but no: wonderfully faithful to the less is more principlethat, for example, also Anthony Hopkins wielded in ‘The Remains of theDay’, late Jennifer Lawrence in the psychological drama ‘Causeway’ onlyoccasionally her far left eyelash twitches. Here with that Oscar!
2. Lea Seydoux
In the beautiful ‘Un beau matin’ shook Lea Seydoux definitively shed herimage of tough Bond girl and showed that she is also capable of gossamerperformances.
3.Florence Pugh
In the lame ‘Don’t Worry Darling’ she went down with Harry Styles but whenthe pop star isn’t around, as in the intriguing historical drama “The Wonder,”let Florence Pugh see with verve that she is one of the most promisingactresses of our time.
THE TUNEST ACTOR
1.Michael Thomas
Like the charm singer Richie Bravo, who roams around in wintery Rimini – checkout his delicious schlagers on Spotify! – puts the German actor MichaelThomas in ‘Rimini’ the most beautiful rendition of the year as far as we areconcerned.
2.Tom Cruise
Crawling into the cockpit of an F-18 at the age of 58, exposing your body tocrushing G-forces and looking infinitely cool in the meantime: a real top gun,which Tom!
3. Matteo Simoni
Who honks that Frank Verstraeten and Dennis Black Magic are glorifiedin ‘Zillion’, has clearly not seen the equally pathetic and fantasticallyrendered scene in which schlemiel Dennis, who has fallen off his pedestal,begs his naked buddy Frank for help.
THE MOST PAINFUL LAUGHTER
1. Coupez!
What starts out as an annoying zombie film, blossoms into a brilliant farce inthe second half that made us – the carpet of the Kinepolis was immediatelyflattened – make us roll on the floor with laughter.
2.Triangle of Sadness
To make you laugh: the crazy puke and shit scene aboard the drifting cruiseship in Palme d’Or winner ‘Triangle of Sadness’.
3. RRR
There is only one word for the frenzied stunt work in the campy Indian epic’RRR’ – watch that policeman catapult himself over a fence – hilarious!
THE WORST SEX SCENE
The Next 365 DaysImage Netflix
1. The Next 365 Days
Is it a baby sucking on his baby bottle? A Chinese who slurps down a bowl ofsoup? A collie that empties his water bowl? No: those loud smacking soundscome from Massimo ( Michelle Morrone ), who tries to practice the nobleart of the cunnilingus in one of the countless kee scenes in ‘The Next 365Days’.
2. Don’t Worry Darling
The convulsive way in which Harry Styles in ‘Don’t Worry Darling’ is rampanton the dining table with Florence Pugh – like a haddock out of water – can becalled worrying, to say the least.
3. 365 Days: This Day
Erotic scenes like the one where Massimo is on the golf course licking his ownlips while his sweetheart Laura ( Anna Maria Sieklucka ) sensually pullsthe flag out of the hole in slow motion, make us look forward to even moresequels in the ‘365 Days’ franchise. Or no, nevermind.
THE BIGGEST TURN OFF
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1. Pinocchio
Nothing or no one, not even Massimo and Laura, drove us higher than thecurtains this year Tom Hanks the one in the horrible ‘Pinocchio’ ofRobert Zemeckis in his nightgown the hornpipe is dancing.
2. Bardo
Is Alejandro Gonzales Inarritu (‘Babel’, ‘The Revenant’) a visionarygrandmaster or a showy boaster? The self-indulgent ego trip ‘Bardo’ providesthe definitive answer.
3. Blonde
The longer we think about the very one-dimensional image of Marilyn Monroethat director Andrew Dominik down our throats, the more we come to theconclusion that the filmmaker was not interested in the versatile womanMarilyn really was.
THE BEST FLEMISH FILM
1. Rebel
Some of you may not like the fact that we have a controversial film about aSyrian fighter – albeit very narrowly! – prefer a fragile drama about a boyfriendship. But what Adil & Bilall have prepared, in our opinion,testifies to a virtuosity, daring and audacity never seen before in Flanders.
2.Close
In some shots the over-emphatic symbolism was just a bit too obvious, butotherwise it showed Luke Dont with the soul-touching ‘Close’ that he is onhis way to becoming a very big one.
3. H4Z4RD
Director Jonas Govaerts signed for the joyride of the year. And DimitriVegas wore the coolest black and yellow tracksuit since Uma Thurman inKill Bill!
THE BEST DOCUMENTARY
1. Ennio
Even the man with no name takes off his cowboy hat for this delightfulportrait of the great Ennio Morricone.
2. Our nature
Thanks to the impressive camera work of Pim Niesten we know that the wildBelgian nature is not inferior to the Amazon forest or the African savannah.
3. The Empire of Silence
This sobering documentary from Terry Michel reminded us that a terriblewar is currently raging not only in Ukraine but also in Congo.
THE BEST MOVIE
1. Licorice Pizza
When Paul Thomas Anderson (‘Boogie Nights’, ‘Magnolia’) released itslatest throw on our retinas on January 3, we already had such a light bluesuspicion that we wouldn’t see a sublime film in 2022. Plot-wise, nothing ofinterest happens in ‘Licorice Pizza’: what you get is a simple coming-of-agestory set in 1970s Los Angeles. But the beautifully meandering narrativestructure, the freewheeling film style, the subcutaneously tremblingmelancholy, the sensitive interpretations of Alan Haim and CooperHoffmann and the occasional fragments of cinematic poetry elevate ‘LicoricePizza’ in our opinion to a magnificent, straight-to-the-heart masterpiece.
2.Top Gun: Maverick
BÁNG: 36 years after the original ‘Top Gun’ came the eternally youthful oneTom Cruise blasting right through the wall of sound with an immenselysatisfying and impossibly entertaining sequel.
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3. Decision to Leave
Who to the new movie from ‘Oldboy’ director Park Chan Wook went to see,slipped into a magical masterpiece by a true visual artist.
4.Vortex
At King T’Challa’s funeral ceremony in ‘Black Panther: Wakanda Forever’ we hada tear on our right cheek, but we couldn’t keep it dry in this split-screenAlzheimer’s drama from the inimitable Gaspar Noe.
5. The Northman
Roaring warriors, bloody ax blows and a good portion of surreal strangeness:’The Northman’ gave us everything we would expect from a Viking epic by theidiosyncratic filmmaker. Robert Eggers (‘The Lighthouse’) could expect.
6. L’event
What begins as a poignant drama about a schoolgirl who searches in vain for away to interrupt her pregnancy, grows into a powerful portrait of a woman whoclaims the right to control her own body in the oppressive male society of the1960s. Le pouvoir aux femmes, nom de dieux!
7. Rebel
The Flemish film industry had a booming year, with the showers of prizes for’Close’ and ‘De eight mountains’ and with the immense success of ‘Our nature’.But the singing cut off head from ‘Rebel’ stood out in our humble opinion.
8.Close
The universal chord that Lukas Dhont struck with his moving film about thetragic friendship between two teenage boys vibrates loudly in eighth place.
9. Tori and Lokita
They will probably never reach the spiritual level of ‘Le fils’ again, butshared it with ‘Tori et Lokita’ Jean – Pierre and Luke Dardenneyet again an impressive sledgehammer.
10. No. 10
It would have been strange if the wonderful ‘No. 10’ from Alex vanWarmerdam – aaahhh, that masterful final shot! – would not have been number10. And now we are zooming into the new film year together with Maverick atsupersonic speed!