Baker's Dozen: Best Screen Animals of 2022

by Nathaniel R

One of the underdiscussed joys of cinema, at least if you're an animal lover, are the non-human creatures that swim, gallop, slither, hop, and play across the screens. Debates continue about the use of non-human actors onscreen, but animal characters can be as memorable as their human scene partners whether they're computer generated, stop motion puppets, or furry or feathered actors. 2022's cinema gave us the full menagerie. Among the most memorable "real" animals, for better and worse, were Empire of Light's wounded pigeon, A Man Called Otto's feral yet easily domesticated cat, Everything Everywhere All At Once's weaponized pom, the homicidal chimp and lion of Nope and Beast, respectively, and Babylon's diarrhetic elephant. If you prefer fantastical beasties, the titular animated characters from The Sea Beast, My Father's Dragon, and DC League of Super Pets had their charms while "Socks" the robot cat of Lightyear was that misjudged film's MVP.

Speaking of fantastic, the following list is dedicated to Meilin in Turning Red for embracing her inner red panda, even if she isn't technically eligible being an all-too relatable teenage human girl person... 

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Dozen Best Movie Posters of 2022

Our "Year in Review" continues. Let the List-Mania commence... 

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by Nathaniel R

Movie posters are not what they used to be. This is not an aesthetic  "everything was better in the past" complaint but a fact; they aren't as present an advertising force as they were when one tall rectangular image and tagline would do the bulk of the advertising work to define a film. Now that work is dispersed in multiple shapes and images and visual modes, the old school poster included. Posters aren't quite a lost art but they are in Big Hollywood which prefers to make every poster a hideous inhuman collage of movie stars, think Frankenstein's Monster if Dr Frankenstein, had eschewed body parts and just used hundreds of faces in mismatched sizes to build his undead "man".

But enough complaints. Let's celebrate the posters that did right by their movies this year...

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30 Biggest Subtitled Hits (and where to watch them)

Our daily "Year in Review" lists have begun!

Even before the pandemic, box office reporting was becoming more secretive. Netflix was the chief disruptor since their Oscar hopefuls got theatrical releases but numbers were never reported. Other streaming distributors followed and once you added in the increasing regularity of movies simultaneously doing theatrical (generally reported) and VOD (generally not reported) it was chaos. The COVID-19 pandemic was the ultimate disruptor of course, changing global viewing habits, by virtue of Father Time. International cinema in the US has been increasingly demoted to streaming-only since adult audiences have been the toughest to lure back to the theaters. That said there are subtitled pictures that played theatrically this year and we wanted to honor them by noting the success stories...

Curiously the only foreign country that habitually reports big box office numbers in the US is India but those numbers are often reported as "estimates" in the way, say, European titles didn't tend to be. Furthermore Indian pictures, RRR being an obvious exception, don't tend to get much US media coverage even though they sell tickets, at least in specific areas of the country which makes it all kind of confusing in terms of "what is a success?".  But here are the numbers that were reported, some surely more accurately than others. The numbers are primarily drawn from two sites (box office mojo and the numbers). Titles with up arrows are still in theaters 

TOP 33 SUBTITLED HITS OF 2022 AT THE US BOX OFFICE
Rank for the calendar year / Movie Title / $ Estimate Domestic Gross / $ Global Gross
Figures updated as of 01/15/23

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November. It's a wrap.

There's only one month left of 2022? Crazy talk! Here are a dozen highlights from November in case you missed them...

• Mahler's 5th in Tár & Decision to Leave Lynn enjoys the renaissance
• The Fabelmans Cláudio's review of Spielberg's confessional family melodrama
• She Said's Modern Marriages Ben with a 'no big deal' observation
• All Quiet on the Western Front Christopher on the overwhelming new war film
• Black Panther Wakanda Forever Nathaniel on the underwhelming sequel. Namor, tho!
• Young Men and Oscar The Academy resists young leading men but quite a few are in buzzy films this year
• European Film Awards Close, Holy Spider, and Triangle of Sadness are popular
• Team Punditry We're polling our writers on where they think the Oscar races stand
• Till Nathaniel is bowled over by Danielle Deadwyler's star turn
• AFI Fest Pinocchio Eurocheese finds Guillermo del Toro's latest dazzling
• Best Supporting Actress is Overcrowded It might be the most volatile race right now
• The Crown Season 5 Cláudio loves the new cast. The show not so much
• Dorothy Dandridge is Carmen Jones Baby Clyde remembers the icon on her Centennial

Coming in December
Avatar The Way of the Water, Empire of Light, Spoiler Alert, several new interviews, the return of the podcast, the Oscar finalists in various categories, and more Oscar volleys

October. It's a Wrap

A dozen highlights from the month in case you missed 'em...

• "Hot Ones" as Oscar stop Best Actresses getting spicy
• Angela Lansbury in Death on the Nile as tribute when she passed
• Paul Mescal x 2 Eurocheese on Aftersun and God's Creatures
• Podcast Guesting Nathaniel had fun on "Hallmarkies" talking Bros and "Oscar Wild" taking pre-season Oscar Predictions
• Middleburg w/ special guests Nathaniel with Stephanie Hsu (Everything Everywhere All At Once) and Dolly DeLeon (Triangle of Sadness)
• Banshees of Inisherin Nathaniel on Martin McDonagh's Oscar hopeful
• TÁR Nathaniel on Todd & Cate's incredible collaborative drama
• TÁR's ending Ben thinks it's a major misstep. You? 
• Brainwashed Glenn on the controversial gender/film theory doc
• Mars One Juan Carlos talks to the director of Brazil's Oscar submission
• Alcarràs Jason on Spain's Oscar submission
• Decision to Leave Cláudio on South Korea's Oscar submission

COMING IN NOVEMBER
The Spirit Award nominations, that long awaited 1951 Smackdown (sorry sorry), Centennial tributes to both Dorothy Dandridge and Veronica Lake, and a whole slew of new films as we hit the busy season like Black Panther Wakanda Forever, The Fabelmans, The Son, The Wonder, Bones and All, Good Night Oppy, She Said, The Inspection, and more!