Is there anything more infuriating than being outdone by something (or someone) more unqualified than you, being beaten at your own game? You’re majoring in History of 18th Century Art at college, and yet, your friend who appears to be good at everything is only minoring in the subject and has far superior knowledge of the course’s studies than you. Ultimately, the same can be said for the best comedies of 2022 — these films are closely akin to that friend or acquaintance who is irritatingly talented at anything they turn their hand to.
Most of the best comedies from this year didn’t actually major in Comedy at all, with most only minoring in the genre, instead specializing in either Drama, Mystery, Romance, or Action. A few others are so dark they might as well not be comedies at all. The point is, this wasn’t a year for comedies in their purest, most unadulterated form. Instead, 2022 was the year of the comical hybrid, with a lot of action, romance, and drama films which just happen to be frequently hilarious. Here are the best “comedies” of 2022…
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11 Bullet Train
Sony Pictures Releasing
Bullet Train struck up a new bromance we didn’t know we needed between Aaron Taylor Johnson’s Tangerine and Brian Tyree Henry’s Lemon. David Leitch’s comic-strip-like action-comedy set on a Japanese train places us at the heart of an assassin’s attempt at retrieving a suitcase with unknown contents. Unfortunately for Ladybug (Brad Pitt), he is faced with a plethora of hired-killer adversaries, all with equally lethal ulterior motives. Tangerine and Lemon do most of the comedic lifting here, with a love-hate relationship that oozes a really authentic on-screen chemistry.
MOVIEWEB VIDEO OF THE DAY
MOVIEWEB VIDEO OF THE DAY
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10 Brian and Charles
Focus FeaturesUniversal
Brian and Charles is a very British comedy — dry, witty, and slightly strange. It incorporates the nation’s love for comedy of a sadistic, schadenfreude nature, and it tells the tale of Brian, an isolated, solitary individual who lives on his own in a remote part of the UK. A wacky inventor, Brian develops and creates weird and wonderful gadgets with minimal success.
After years of fruitless inventions, Brian builds Charles, an AI robot who has an inexplicable obsession with cabbages and an extraordinary command of the English language. Shot in the mockumentary style, Brian and Charles is an understated and unassuming comedy that acts as food for the soul, and is absurdly funny.
9 Fire Island
Hulu
One of the best Hulu original movies of 2022, Fire Island was a delightful Pride and Prejudice adaptation. Relocating the setting to a legendary queer vacation spot, Fire Island is brimming with fun characters and performances (especially Saturday Night Live’s Bowen Yang) that are extremely relatable, even if viewers don’t identify as LGBTQ+. Funny and sweet, Fire Island embraces rom-com tropes while oh-so-subtly subverting them, resulting in a joyous Pride and Prejudice like you’ve never seen before.
8 Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent
Lionsgate Films
Nicolas Cage went all-in with his reputation as an over-the-top, ridiculous actor in The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent, playing himself (along with a hallucination of his cockier, more successful younger self). A feel-good meta comedy that veers hard into action-adventure territory, Cage stars as a formerly huge movie star named Nic Cage who is having trouble getting parts. When a lucrative offer comes in to visit a rich drug lord on his birthday, he finds it hard to pass up; before you know it, the two of them are writing a script together while fighting a drug war.
7 Dinner in America
Best & Final Releasing
Along with Terrifier 2, Dinner in America just might be one of the sickest movies of the year, but it’s impossible to predict just where it will go. An extremely misanthropic, nihilistic, and punk rock comedy, Dinner in America follows a pyromaniac as he causes a lot of property damage (and emotional damage). While evading the police, the angry young punk comes across a social outcast, who he proceeds to treat horribly despite her taking him in and saving him.
Extremely politically incorrect and filled with cruelty and disgust, Dinner in America can be a tough watch, but it’s perfect for people who hate people, and everything else. However, as mentioned, it does evolve into something genuinely surprising and special. This combination of an extremely uncomfortable and mean first half with an unexpected, surreal second half, along with playfully kitschy and pretty visuals, makes Dinner in America something special, if you can stomach it.
6 On the Count of Three
United Artists
Another extremely bleak comedy movie from 2022 (and one of the most violent outside the horror genre), On the Count of Three follows two friends who agree to kill themselves after one breaks the other out of a mental hospital. Starring and directed by stand-up comedian Jerrod Carmichael, the film is grim but often hilarious thanks to the effortless chemistry between Carmichael and co-star Christopher Abbott. A great supporting cast (J.B. Smoove, Henry Winkler, Tiffany Haddish) and beautiful music from Owen Pallett seal the deal in this great dark comedy.
5 Triangle of Sadness
NEON
Filmmaker Ruben Östlund is an auteur in demand after the riveting success of 2015’s Force Majeure, and 2017’s Palme d’Or-winning film, The Square. Naturally, the pressure was turned up a notch when his latest project, Triangle of Sadness, was announced. It certainly didn’t disappoint, equaling its predecessor by earning its own Palme d’Or triumph at this year’s Cannes Film Festival.
As is typical for Östlund, the film is a dark satire that hilariously mocks both classism and the inherent pretentiousness and excessive self-indulgence of the rich. Triangle of Sadness follows the story of an assortment of extremely affluent business people and those with considerable social status on a luxury, and their exclusive cruise that goes both drastically and (quite literally) hideously wrong. This is a movie that is unapologetically self-aware and teaches us a lesson in the social dimensions of the capitalist society in which we find ourselves.
4 White Noise
Netflix
Noah Baumbach’s White Noise received its curtain-raiser at the Venice Film Festival in August and is set for its worldwide Netflix premiere on 30th December. Based on author Don DeLillo’s 1985 novel of the same name, the dark comedy stars Adam Driver, Greta Gerwig, Don Cheadle, and Lars Eidinger as characters who get swept into an apocalyptic ‘airborne toxic event.’
The Gladney family consists of father Jack (Driver), a Professor of ‘Hitler Studies’ at the local college, mother Babette (Gerwig), and their four children, and White Noise chronicles the family’s attempts at navigating the catastrophic toxic waste spillage caused by a nearby train crash, which launches the world in the direction of an apocalyptic state. In typical Baumbach fashion, White Noise is deeply and attentively satirical, an idiosyncratic delight that continues to laugh at the preposterousness of being even in the midst of a potential nuclear disaster.
3 The Worst Person in the World
While it competed in last year’s Academy Awards for Best International Feature Film, The Worst Person in the World wasn’t released in the United States or the UK until February 2022, so it technically qualifies here (plus it received a glorious home media release through the Criterion Collection this June). The Norwegian film had critics raving upon its release earlier this year, and we still haven’t forgotten about it.
Having an existential crisis is a common occurrence among 20-to-30-somethings. Education officially finishes, and that inevitable question begins to jolt your mind — “What next?” Joachim Trier’s movie The Worst Person in the World is sadly not the best person in this list, though its story is both poignant and ultimately hopeful. It follows four years in the life of Julie, a young woman from Oslo who wrestles with problematic relationships, lack of an occupational muse, and attempts to find answers for her life’s real purpose. With incredible needle cuts and some really unexpected directorial choices, along with a great lead performance from Renate Reinsve, The Worst Person in the World remains a funny, poignant, and relatable little gem.
2 Everything Everywhere All at Once
A24
Everything Everywhere All at Once seemed to take both critics and filmgoers alike by surprise. A film that plays on the concept of the multiverse, and other traditionally Marvel-y tropes so loved by Marvelites, Everything Everywhere All at Once actually outdoes the franchise at its own game. In this crazily alternative flick, Evelyn Wang (Michelle Yeoh) lives a fairly pitiful existence, drowning in excessive taxation and in the running of her laundry business.
Enduring the final, drab remnants of a loveless marriage, dealing with a problematic father, a rebellious daughter, and a pedantic IRS auditor (hilariously and perfectly played by Jamie Lee Curtis), Evelyn’s life is on the verge of utter capitulation. However, when she discovers alternate universes and is subsequently required to navigate them in order to save the world, she embarks upon a more personal calling of individual discovery, filial understanding, and self-fulfillment.
1 The Banshees of Inisherin
Searchlight Pictures
In the eagerly-awaited reunion of Martin McDonagh, Colin Farrell, and Brendan Gleeson after the rip-roaring cult success of 2008’s In Bruges, the announcement that the celebrated trio would be collaborating once more was greeted with predictable glee. The Banshees of Inisherin is a typically great McDonagh film, with refined and distinctive dialogue that is both cutting and hilariously straight to the point.
Set against the backdrop of the Irish civil war, this period comedy-drama depicts two best friends, Padraic (Farrell) and Colm (Gleeson), following Colm’s shocking declaration that he no longer wants to be acquainted with Padraic. As the progressively bemused, bewildered, and despondent Padraic tries to get to the bottom of why Colm has suddenly taken a disliking to him, the cause of an existential crisis begins to unravel. This is a sad, melancholic film that has a tangibly serious edge, despite the brilliant array of humorous techniques.
