TAGGED AS: festivals, Film Festival, movies, venice
(Photo by Netflix / Courtesy Everett Collection)
The Venice Film Festival 2022 Scorecard
2022’s awards and festival season begins with the Venice Film Festival, this year celebrating its 79th edition with Julianne Moore as Jury President. Venice 2022 opened with Noah Baumbach’s White Noise, an adaptation of the Don DeLillo novel and starring Adam Driver and Greta Gerwig. Beyond the red carpet, highlights as the festival unfolds include inescapable tabloid fodder Don’t Worry Darling, the latest black comedy from Martin McDonagh (The Banshees of Inisherin), and Blonde, the NC-17 Marilyn Monroe drama starring Ana de Armas. Call Me By Your Name‘s Luca Guadagnino reunites with Timothee Chalamet in Bones and All, director Todd Field returns after 16 years with Tár starring Cate Blanchett, and Darren Aronofsky’s Brendan Fraser-starring The Whale got a standing ovation.
Below, we’re gathering up every title at the fest that’s getting enough reviews for Tomatometer score, up until closing night on September 10. —Alex Vo
#1
Adjusted Score: 110944%
Critics Consensus: Led by the soaring melody of Cate Blanchett's note-perfect performance, Tár riffs brilliantly on the discordant side of fame-fueled power.
Synopsis: From writer-producer-director Todd Field comes TÁR, starring Cate Blanchett as Lydia Tár, the groundbreaking conductor of a major German Orchestra....
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#2
Adjusted Score: 116953%
Critics Consensus: Featuring some of Martin McDonagh's finest work and a pair of outstanding lead performances, The Banshees of Inisherin is a finely crafted feel-bad treat.
Synopsis: Set on a remote island off the west coast of Ireland, THE BANSHEES OF INISHERIN follows lifelong friends Pádraic and...
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#3
Adjusted Score: 102531%
Critics Consensus: All the Beauty and the Bloodshed is a bone-deep look at a photographer's fight against addiction and the institution responsible for her pain through her gritty lens.
Synopsis: Directed by Academy Award®-winning filmmaker Laura Poitras, All the Beauty and the Bloodshed is an epic, emotional and interconnected story...
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#4
Adjusted Score: 102119%
Critics Consensus: A gut-punching contemplation of a woman's immigrant experience, Saint Omer puts a mother on the stand and the audience in the jury box to find humanity in the inhumane.
Synopsis: Saint-Omer court of law. Young novelist Rama attends the trial of Laurence Coly, a young woman accused of killing her...
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#5
Adjusted Score: 94000%
Critics Consensus: Other People's Children perceptively explores motherhood outside traditional biological confines and delivers sobering truths with an ample side of levity.
Synopsis: Rachel is 40 years old, with no children. She loves her life: her high school students, her friends, her ex,...
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#6
Adjusted Score: 101707%
Critics Consensus: Bridging times past with issues that are still current, Blue Jean resonates intellectually and emotionally thanks to thoughtful direction and authentic performances.
Synopsis: England, 1988 -- Margaret Thatcher's Conservative government is about to pass a law stigmatizing gays and lesbians, forcing Jean, a...
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#7
Adjusted Score: 82824%
Critics Consensus: A Compassionate Spy's personal approach to its real-life story makes the end result mostly compelling despite an uncritical tone that verges on hagiography.
Synopsis: Directed by two-time Oscar® nominated filmmaker Steve James (HOOP DREAMS, LIFE ITSELF), A COMPASSIONATE SPY is a gripping real-life spy...
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Starring:
#8
Adjusted Score: 108120%
Critics Consensus: Living sets a high bar for itself in setting out to remake a Kurosawa classic -- and director Oliver Hermanus and star Bill Nighy clear it in triumphant fashion.
Synopsis: LIVING is the story of an ordinary man, reduced by years of oppressive office routine to a shadow existence, who...
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#9
Adjusted Score: 101942%
Critics Consensus: Tilda Swinton² is haunting in the gothic ghost story The Eternal Daughter, an ode to familial female ties that leaves much to unravel after the fog lifts.
Synopsis: An artist and her elderly mother confront long-buried secrets when they return to a former family home, now a hotel...
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#10
Adjusted Score: 97950%
Critics Consensus: Although its subject matter may be hard to stomach, Bones and All proves a deeply romantic and thought-provoking treat.
Synopsis: BONES AND ALL is a story of first love between Maren, a young woman learning how to survive on the...
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#11
Adjusted Score: 78302%
Critics Consensus: White Noise may occasionally struggle with its allegedly unfilmable source material, but Noah Baumbach succeeds in finding the humorous heart of its surprisingly timely story.
Synopsis: At once hilarious and horrifying, lyrical and absurd, ordinary and apocalyptic, White Noise dramatizes a contemporary American family's attempts to...
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#12
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#13
Adjusted Score: 86709%
Critics Consensus: Bolstered by a powerful lead performance from Trace Lysette, Monica follows a personal quest that's as beautifully filmed as it is emotionally resonant.
Synopsis: Monica is an intimate portrait of a woman who, for the first time in 20 years, returns home to the...
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#14
Adjusted Score: 99183%
Critics Consensus: Justice is served in Argentina 1985, a crusading courtroom drama that shines a light on historically somber times with refreshing levity.
Synopsis: Argentina, 1985 is a feature inspired by the true story of Julio Strassera, Luis Moreno Ocampo and their young legal...
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#15
Adjusted Score: 59715%
Critics Consensus: Ana de Armas' luminous performance makes it difficult to look away, but Blonde can be hard to watch as it teeters between commenting on exploitation and contributing to it.
Synopsis: Based on the bestselling novel by Joyce Carol Oates, Blonde boldly reimagines the life of one of Hollywood's most enduring...
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#16
Adjusted Score: 83414%
Critics Consensus: Held together by a killer Brendan Fraser, The Whale sings a song of empathy that will leave most viewers blubbering.
Synopsis: A reclusive English teacher suffering from severe obesity attempts to reconnect with his estranged teenage daughter for one last chance...
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#17
Adjusted Score: 104595%
Critics Consensus: Pearl finds Ti West squeezing fresh gore out of the world he created with X -- and once again benefiting from a brilliant Mia Goth performance.
Synopsis: Filmmaker Ti West returns with another chapter from the twisted world of X, in this astonishing follow-up to the year's...
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#18
Adjusted Score: 88236%
Critics Consensus: Nuanced performances and patient, perceptive direction infuse Love Life with a poignant perspective on familial love and the secrets that can endanger it.
Synopsis: Taeko and her husband Jiro are living a peaceful existence with her young son Keita, when a tragic accident brings...
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#19
Adjusted Score: 88884%
Critics Consensus: Although it may arguably fail to do justice to its deeper themes, Athena makes for electrifying, hard-hitting viewing in the moment.
Synopsis: Hours after the tragic death of their youngest brother in unexplained circumstances, three siblings have their lives thrown into chaos....
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#20
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#21
Adjusted Score: 80766%
Critics Consensus: Master Gardener suggests Paul Schrader might need to find a new patch of creative soil to till, but some strong performances make it difficult to dismiss.
Synopsis: Directed by Academy Award® nominee Paul Schrader based on his original screenplay, MASTER GARDENER follows Narvel Roth (award-winner Joel Edgerton),...
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#22
Adjusted Score: 37766%
Critics Consensus: Despite reliably solid work from Laura Dern and Hugh Jackman, The Son remains mired in off-puttingly aggressive melodrama.
Synopsis: A cautionary tale that follows a family as it struggles to reunite after falling apart. THE SON centers on Peter...
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#23
Adjusted Score: 56358%
Critics Consensus: There are certainly worse Westerns, but with Walter Hill behind the camera and a killer cast reporting for duty, Dead for a Dollar should have higher entertainment value.
Synopsis: When it appears a young woman has run off with an army deserter, a hired gun, Max, is contracted to...
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#24
Adjusted Score: 68770%
Critics Consensus: As deeply personal as it is demanding, Bardo, False Chronicle of a Handful of Truths unsteadily walks the line between brilliance and sheer self-indulgence.
Synopsis: Five-time Academy Award®-winner Alejandro G. Iñárritu brings us BARDO, False Chronicle of a Handful of Truths. BARDO is an epic,...
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#25
Adjusted Score: 58010%
Critics Consensus: Despite an intriguing array of talent on either side of the camera, Don't Worry Darling is a mostly muddled rehash of overly familiar themes.
Synopsis: Alice and Jack are lucky to be living in the idealized community of Victory, the experimental company town housing the...
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#26
Adjusted Score: 35943%
Critics Consensus: Tonally unbalanced and burdened with a distracting Shia LaBeouf performance, Padre Pio is one of Abel Ferrara's less divine works.
Synopsis: As events surrounding the first free election in Italy threaten to tear a village apart, Padre Pio struggles with his...
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91%
64%
42%
