The 25 most memorable film performances of 2022
From Michelle Yeoh to Tobey Maguire to Keke Palmer, these are the big-screen MVPs, star-is-born breakouts, and unforgettable cameos from the past year
Film Lists Jane Austen
Actors tend to get a lot of credit when their film is a success—especially this time of year, when that little gold man is looming larger. But in compiling this list, we knew we needed to look beyond just the obvious awards contenders. Sure, we have the likes of Michelle Yeoh in Everything Everywhere All At Once or Cate Blanchett in Tár, but we also felt it was important to train our spotlight on other performances: the new faces who simply jumped off the screen, the cameos we couldn’t stop talking about, and the roles that confirmed an actor is also a movie star. We’re only allowing one performance per film (with one notable exception, since we couldn’t resist!) and we’re including many actors who got bonus points for having a great 2022 elsewhere. Our list, which follows close on the heels of our ranking of 2022’s best films, is all about the 25 buzziest and most memorable film performances, presented chronologically by their film’s premiere date. As always, The A.V. Club encourages any and all agreement or dissent in the comments.
16 Comments
If someone had asked me who the most popular person in pop culture was, I never would have guessed “Keke Palmer”. Nope wasn’t even that big of a hit.
“squaring off against one of cinema’s most iconic baddies” Michael Meyers…Who was sadly living alone in a sewer somewhere, and then got his ass kicked and mask stolen by some dork that kept getting bullied by band geeks.
I couldn’t stand Keke Palmer character in Nope. Like at all but I will say as an actress she killed that role of an annoying sister to a big brother busting his ass trying to do the work to keep his family business going. Justin Long was so great as a sleeze ball. Like he fucking nailed that and I’m glad you gave the credit to the correct person in Glass Onion as Janelle stole that film!Colin Farrell went from years ago being an annoying preety boy always getting into trouble to one of the best actors in film. Banshess was the best new movie I saw in all of 2022.
Justin Long has been killing it as a “nice guy” sleazeball for a long time. (Hence the schadenfreude of Tusk, if you can take that movie.) I think it only works because he actually seems like a good dude in real life.
You’re “allowing one notable exception” to your already arbitrary one-actor-per-film rule. So why not making it two exceptions and give props to Stephanie Hsu for EEAaO? Her performance was a revelation; she made Joy arguably one of the best (and most surprising) antagonists in cinematic history. Or how about Ke Huy Quan—he came out of acting retirement to give one of the most heartfelt performances of this or any year (think of Waymond’s “be kind” speech, or his monologue to Evelyn about how’d he would’ve enjoyed doing laundry and taxes with her in another life). Or what about James Hong, or for that matter Jamie Lee Curtis? Hong is a character actor who’s given consistently mischievously funny performances for decades, and when his “Alpha” self reveals he’s actually in charge, that was worth the price of admission alone. And Curtis is in the running for best supporting actress, but it’s for the great work she did in EEAaO, not that godforsaken Halloween sequel. I agree that “highlighting just [Charan or Rao] as a 2022 favorite” for RRR would “feel wrong”, but by equal measure singling out one performance in one of the best ensemble casts of all time feels bafflingly shortsighted.
Everyone in EEAAO brought their A-game.
Hsu was phenomenal.
If we’re doing literally “memorable” and not “so so good”… I will never be able to think of Jamie Lee Curtis without hot dog fingers.
Tobey Maguire or Paul Reubens?
I have a question: There were definitely a few snippets of film used in Everything, Everywhere, All At Once that were seemingly pulled from Michelle Yeoh’s past films, including one featuring James Hong as her father.
Can anyone ID those for me?
Michelle Williams really irks me. She’s one of those movie actors who REALLY REALLY LOOKS LIKE a movie actor.
Chloe East’s outright theft of THE FABELMANS must be acknowledged.
Nothing is more capricious or arbitrary about this list than selecting Farrell as the lone representative from Banshees of Inisherin. Justice for Jenny!
I thought Everything Everywhere all at once was very overrated. Sorry. Just another martial arts movie with not so great martial arts with a done to death multiverse thingy
Just gonna ignore best actor front-runner Brendan Fraser?
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