The Third Annual Awards Radar Awards (Part One): The Best Performances of 2022

Wow. Welcome to the end of the year! With only a few days left in 2022, it’s time to start giving out some prizes. Today, we kick off the Third Annual Awards Radar Awards, also known as the Joey Awards (because, as mentioned last year and the year before, when you own a site, you get to name a prize after yourself). Throughout the week, we’ll be highlighting my favorites of the year. What makes a worthy winner for me? It’s simply a gut feeling, so don’t necessarily expect just Oscar contenders on these lists. Academy hopefuls are represented, to be sure, but it’s hardly just prestige titles. After all, it’s my tastes, which are decidedly eclectic.

For part one of this awards series, we’re again going to start by tackling the best performances of the year. Who took home the first wave of the third installment of the Awards Radar Awards, acquiring the clearly coveted Joey Prizes? You’re about to find out. Here we go, ladies and gentlemen…

The Best Performance by an Actor in 2022 – Brendan Fraser in The Whale

The Whale shattered me, of course led by the work of Brendan Fraser. It truly is the performance of a career, which Aronofsky accentuates at every turn. It’s impossible not to be blown away by the work. Now, for a film so full of empathy, it also can come off as mean to some as well. I didn’t have that issue, but it’s a movie that will generate a range of reactions. The only emotion that everyone will share? Fraser’s pitch perfect work.

Brendan Fraser deserves to win the Academy Award for Best Actor, full stop. With all that makeup and prosthetics on, it would be easy for him to be lost inside of it all, but somehow, that’s never once the cast. You feel every movement, be it a lean or a step. The purity of heart that Fraser gives to Charlie is stirring. You can’t take your eyes off of this performance. 

The Top Ten Performances by an Actor in 2022

10. Diego Calva in Babylon

9. Sebastian Stan in Fresh

8. Brendan Gleeson in The Banshees of Inisherin

7. Tom Cruise in Top Gun: Maverick

6. Paul Dano in The Fabelmans

5. Ke Huy Quan in Everything Everywhere All At Once

4. Colin Farrell in The Banshees of Inisherin

3. Adam Sandler in Hustle

2. Nicolas Cage in The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent

1. Brendan Fraser in The Whale

Honorable Mentions

Austin Butler in Elvis

Tom Hanks in A Man Called Otto

Paul Mescal in Aftersun

Bill Nighy in Living

Pedro Pascal in The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent

Channing Tatum in Dog

The Best Performance by an Actress in 2022 – Michelle Yeoh in Everything Everywhere All At Once

This isn’t my review of the latest from the filmmaking team known as Daniels. We already have a rave here on the site, in fact. So, while I wholeheartedly agree that they did amazing work, with leading lady Michelle Yeoh really going above and beyond, it would be repetitive to do just that. Instead, while I won’t completely ignore the movie itself, the aftermath of its release is really something to behold.

-Yeoh delivers a performance that’s both fearless and vulnerable, fully committed to her portrayal of a woman slowly coming to appreciate all that life has given her. – From Myles Hughes’ review

The Top Ten Performances by an Actress in 2022

10. Carey Mulligan in She Said

9. Ana de Armas in Blonde

8. Michelle Williams in The Fabelmans

7. Janelle Monáe in Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery

6. Margot Robbie in Babylon

5. Mia Goth in X

4. Cate Blanchett in Tár

3. Zoe Kazan in She Said

2. Sofia Kappel in Pleasure

1. Michelle Yeoh in Everything Everywhere All At Once

Honorable Mentions

Hong Chau in The Whale

Kerry Condon in The Banshees of Inisherin

Daisy Edgar-Jones in Fresh

Stephanie Hsu in Everything Everywhere All At Once

Anna Kendrick in Alice, Darling

Emma Thompson in Good Luck to You, Leo Grande

Stay tuned for Part Two tomorrow, where you’ll see my Top Ten films of 2022!