It happens that you turn on the movie and pulls you to sleep. It seems like explosions and action, but that’s boring and that’s it. And sometimes a film can even be a chamber drama with one actor in one room, but filmed and played in such a way that it takes your breath away. This article contains just such films – high-quality, addictive, with excellent actors, beating stories from which you don’t want to tear yourself away from the first to the last minute.
“Tenet” (Tenet)
- Kinopoisk: 7.5.
- IMDb: 7.3.
- Genre: fantasy, action, thriller.
Christopher Nolan has a knack for making cool, twisted stories, whether it’s a dream-travel thriller (Inception) or science fiction about space exploration (Interstellar). Therefore, when he announced that his new project would be a film about temporary anomalies, no one doubted that this would be the most incomprehensible work for the viewer. And so it happened. The film is a beautifully filmed puzzle with beautiful visuals that after all the time inversions and travel to the beginning and end of the story is very difficult to solve. Surely, even the author does not know what happened to some of the characters in the final part of the film. But it’s very interesting to watch. In addition, the soundtrack, the cast (John David Washington, Robert Pattinson, Elizabeth Debicki, Kenneth Branagh, Aaron Taylor-Johnson) and other puzzles for collecting a quality tape are perfectly matched in Tenet.
“Father” (The Father)
- Kinopoisk: 7.8.
- IMDb: 8.2.
- Genre: drama.
“Father” is a film adaptation of the play of the same name by Florian Zeller, filmed by the author himself. And in the film, there is actually a certain theatrical intimacy and truthfulness. Because of this, the film is also very strong in terms of dramaturgy. Zeller (along with Christopher Hampton) won the Oscar for Best Adapted Screenplay. The main role in the film was played by the inimitable Anthony Hopkins, who received his second Oscar in his career for this work. However, Olivia Colman, Mark Gatiss and other actors looked no less convincing on the screen. In the story, 82-year-old Anthony believes that he still does an excellent job with all household chores, so he tries to get rid of the nurses that his daughter is looking for. However, over time, strange things begin to happen in his apartment – then an outsider turns up in the living room, his daughter suddenly changes her appearance, and her favorite watch constantly disappears somewhere.
“Tick-tock, boom!” (Tick, tick… Boom!)
- Kinopoisk: 7.9.
- IMDb: 7.5.
- Genre: musical, biography, drama.
“Tick-tock, boom!” is a biographical film about Jonathan Larson, an American composer and playwright who received a posthumous Pulitzer Prize for the rock musical La bohème. Interestingly, the film was the directorial debut of Lin-Manuel Miranda, best known as the creator of the successful Broadway musicals In the Heights and Hamilton. Miranda is the recipient of many prestigious theater and music awards, including the Pulitzer Prize. The role of Larson was played by Andrew Garfield, who eventually received a Golden Globe for his work. According to the plot, a young composer, moonlighting as a waiter in a New York eatery, wrote the musical of his dreams for 8 years. The girl is already tired of waiting, the best friend went to a prestigious job, and John begins to worry that he wasted all these years. In addition, he has less and less time left, because he was recently diagnosed with a disappointing diagnosis.
Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings
- Kinopoisk: 7.3.
- IMDb: 7.4.
- Genre: Fantasy, Action, Comedy, Adventure.
The fourth phase of Marvel was, to put it mildly, not very good. Virtually none of the films lived up to their expectations. Somewhere they frankly cheated, somewhere they didn’t reach it a little, but in general, there was something wrong in every film. One unexpected exception was Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings. According to viewers, a simple Chinese guy from comics could hardly compete with heroes in nanoarmor and space supervillains. However, in the film, the character’s history was slightly changed and powerful artifacts were given to him for such confrontations. True, this has nothing to do with the success of the tape. The main advantages of “Shan-Chi” is how the authors were able to plunge the viewer into the atmosphere of Chinese mythology, reviving the legendary Chinese lions and dragons on the screen, as well as adding epic battle scenes in the style of films with Jackie Chan. The latter was possible thanks to the involvement of Bradley Allan, who had long been the leader of Chan’s stunt team.
“Protagonist” (Free Guy)
- Kinopoisk: 7.4.
- IMDb: 7.1.
- Genre: Fantasy, Comedy, Action.
Every other big-budget action comedy now comes out starring Ryan Reynolds (Deadpool, Red Notice). Shaun Levy’s “Protagonist” about NPCs (from the English Non-Player Character – a non-player character or bot) from a game in virtual reality was no exception. Fans of Taika Waititi will also rejoice, who appears as a stereotypical greedy video game developer eager to churn out sequels, prequels, spin-offs and other offshoots of his successful projects. The film takes place inside an open-world game called Free City. There Guy works in a bank, is friends with a security guard named Buddy and does the same thing every day. But one day the artificial intelligence of the game begins to develop and the Guy gets freedom of action. One day he meets a player who reveals to him the truth about his world.
“For beer!” (The Greatest Beer Run Ever)
- Kinopoisk: 7.4.
- IMDb: 6.8.
- Genre: military drama, comedy.
Despite the title, the film is a military drama, albeit with elements of comedy. It is based on the autobiographical book by John “Chicky” Donoghue. In 1967, he had already retired from the Marine Corps, while his comrades went to the Vietnam War. The news from there was not very encouraging. Once Donoghue came up with a brilliant idea: in order to morally support his comrades, he decides to personally bring real American beer to the front. During this campaign, he is truly imbued with all the horrors of war. Why is it needed, why are his comrades risking their lives, what is happening on the ground? The answers to these questions are obvious. The film turned out to be dramatic, interesting, not very sentimental, but thought-provoking. Of the actors, it is worth noting Zac Efron, who is moving further and further away from trash comedies, and Russell Crowe, once again pleasing to the eye.
“Everything Everywhere All at Once” (Everything Everywhere All at Once)
- Kinopoisk: 7.3.
- IMDb: 8.0.
- Genre fiction.
“Everything Everywhere” is the film that created the multiverse of madness before Marvel. And he did it even better. True, it is worth immediately making a reservation that it will be necessary to wait out a slightly lengthy prologue, because the first five to ten minutes of the film resemble some kind of Chinese family drama. A woman lives with an ailing father who needs to be watched over, an ingenuous husband who has her head in the clouds, and a troubled teenage daughter who, moreover, likes girls. It is not entirely clear where such a hype around the project came from. Then, literally every minute, something unexpected and completely crazy will happen. What is the scene with the dialogue of two stones. The film received the title of the best in 2022 from many reputable publications, and the inimitable Michelle Yeoh (Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Shang-Chi) has already won the Golden Globe for this role and is the main contender for the Oscar.
“Top Gun: Maverick” (Top Gun: Maverick)
- Kinopoisk: 7.8.
- IMDb: 8.3.
- Genre: Action, Drama.
Top Gun: Maverick is the sequel to the 80s hit with Tom Cruise and Val Kilmer. However, given the huge time gap between the tapes, it is not necessary to know the old one to understand the new story. Moreover, the dialogues of familiar characters and the audience as a whole are very harmoniously spelled out in the film, and so they understand what could happen to them in the past. While Top Gun: Maverick is billed as a summer blockbuster with mind-blowing fighter jet stunts and record-breaking box office records, it’s not just another action movie. This is a story about life choices, mentorship, friendship, the ability to make difficult decisions, and how not to lose your head at critical moments. “Top Gun: Maverick” looks in one breath, despite the fact that the ending as a whole can be predicted. No wonder the movie was included in the shortlist of nominees for the Oscar in the Best Picture category.
The Banshees of Inisherin
- Kinopoisk: 7.6.
- IMDb: 7.8.
- Genre: drama, comedy.
Colin Farrell is currently experiencing another peak in his career. He brilliantly embodied the brutal image in “Northern Waters”, the heroic image in “13 Lives”, and also became the new Penguin in “Batman” by Matt Reeves. However, his best role over the past few years was the work in the black tragicomedy “Banshee Inisherina” by Irish director and screenwriter Martin McDonagh (“Lie Under in Bruges”). During the premiere of the film at the Venice Film Festival, Colin Farrell received the Volpi Cup for Best Actor, then he won the Golden Globe, and now he is the main contender for the Oscar. The film tells the story of two bosom friends, one of whom decided to end the relationship abruptly. Moreover, he does this by very categorical methods, promising to cut off his fingers on his left hand for every attempt to communicate. Banshee of Inisherin has a 97% positive review on the Rotten Tomatoes aggregator website.
“Production” (Prey)
- Kinopoisk: 6.6.
- IMDb: 7.2.
- Genre: fantasy, horror.
The most difficult choice in writing this article was with horror films. Classic horror films have recently turned out so disgusting from filmmakers that they don’t want to watch them, but don’t want to turn them on. The way out of this situation was the inclusion of the film “Prey” in the list, which formally also has a horror subgenre, although it is rather science fiction. The tape is part of the Predator franchise and tells about the arrival of an alien on Earth long before the events of the original films. The action takes place in 1719 on the territories of the Great Northern Plains, where the Comanche tribes lived. The film, of course, has many questions: from the logic of many characters, to the incomprehensible physics of an ax on a rope. Nevertheless, they come after watching the tape, because when on the screen a two-meter alien deals with a bear with his bare hands, somehow there is no time for reflection. In general, the film is filmed atmospherically, there are many beautiful landscapes, the life of ancient tribes and many other pleasant bonuses.