The movie business is slowly recovering from the devastation of COVID-19 and it felt to me like many films this year reflected a universal feeling of fatigue and isolation that has touched all of us in the past two years.
‘The Card Counter’
Available to rent on Apple TV, Amazon Prime and Google Play among others.
A superb Oscar Isaac stars as a military vet haunted by his involvement in Abu Ghraib who is now a professional gambler crisscrossing America. Tiffany Haddish delivers warmth and tenderness as his love interest in a film from Paul Schrader (“Taxi Driver”) who specializes in isolated men whose circumstance reveals larger moral failings in American life.
‘Petite Maman’
Atlanta release date coming in 2022
If you see one foreign film in 2022 make it this delicate, fairy tale-like film from French director Celine Sciamma about a little girl who has just lost her beloved grandmother and finds solace when she meets a girl her age who lives a short walk through the woods. Sciamma has a gift for rendering the intense relationships between children that can make adults seem almost tangential.
‘The Lost Daughter’
On Netflix Dec. 31
This was a great year for women filmmakers including actress Maggie Gyllenhaal’s directorial debut working from a novel by Elena Ferrante. Oscar-winner Olivia Colman is a professor vacationing on a Greek island who becomes fascinated by the beautiful young mother (Dakota Johnson) she sees at the beach. The mysterious woman ignites painful memories of early days with her own daughters in this examination of the emotional messiness of motherhood.
Credit: Handout
Credit: Handout
‘Drive My Car’
Opens Jan. 14 at Atlanta’s Plaza Theater
A theater director staging a multilingual version of Chekhov’s “Uncle Vanya” in Hiroshima develops a profound relationship with his young female chauffeur in this deeply moving Japanese film about the power of storytelling adapted from a book by Haruki Murakami that is Japan’s entry for the Best International Feature Film at the 94th Academy Awards.
‘Titane’
Available on Amazon Prime, Google Play, iTunes and more
Some have called this French horror film directed by Julia Ducournau the most shocking film of the year. In a powerhouse film debut, Agathe Rousselle is a showgirl at underground car shows who has an unusually erotic relationship with a vintage Cadillac. There is no way to predict or prepare yourself for the twists and autoerotic turns in this wild ride, but if you are up for something audacious, “Titane” is for you.
‘Hive’
Streaming now on Kino Marquee
A woman tries to navigate the cruel, patriarchal culture in her tiny village and come to terms with the disappearance of her husband during the war in Kosovo. Based on a true story, this second film from director Blerta Basholli about the long-lasting ripples of war was a big winner at the Sundance Film Festival.
Credit: KIRSTY GRIFFIN/NETFLIX
Credit: KIRSTY GRIFFIN/NETFLIX
‘The Power of the Dog’
Netflix
Jane Campion (“The Piano”) hasn’t made a film in twelve years and her return to form packs a wallop. Her revisionist Western about rival rancher brothers (Benedict Cumberbatch and Jesse Plemons) in 1920s Montana is an unsettling, tense examination of violence and misogyny tied up in our definition of manhood.
‘Flee’
Atlanta release date coming in 2022
This innovative blend of animation and documentary from Danish director Jonas Poher Rasmussen tells the story of Afghan refugee Amin as he recounts his escape from war-torn Afghanistan in the ‘80s to Russia and then Denmark, and the cruelty and sense of rootlessness he experiences along the way in this powerful rendition of the immigrant experience.
Credit: Sony Pictures Animation
Credit: Sony Pictures Animation
‘The Mitchells vs. the Machines’
Netflix
Genuinely clever and occasionally subversive, this animated film is about a budding film student Katie grappling with her identity and her strained relationship to the family that has never quite “gotten” her. But Katie proves unusually resourceful in saving the folks from a legion of demonic robots under the command of a Siri-like iPhone personality in this very funny, fast-paced film that makes a lot of on-point jokes about our dependence on technology and Apple’s cult of tech.
Credit: Alison Rosa
Credit: Alison Rosa
‘The Tragedy of Macbeth’
Limited theatrical release Jan. 1. On Apple TV+ Jan. 14
Denzel Washington stars in this adaptation of William Shakespeare’s play about power and its corruptive influence. Director Joel Coen (“No Country for Old Men”) delivers a stylish, spooky retelling with incredible black and white cinematography by Bruno Delbonnel that has echoes of the best work of Orson Welles, Ingmar Bergman and the German Expressionists.
Felicia Feaster is the co-founder of the Atlanta Film Critics Circle and a member of the Southeastern Film Critics Association.
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