Alonso Duralde

“Raise Hell” reminds us of the never-ending importance of those skilled observers with the ability to speak truth to power. And if, like Ivins, they can make us laugh while doing so, then they’re all the more essential.

Sweet and sharp and exciting and hilarious, Big Hero 6 comes to the rescue of what's become a dreaded movie trope — the origin story — and launches the superhero tale to pleasurable new heights.

The three lead performances cut through Dolan’s showier tendencies, creating relatable, empathetic characters; we share in their glimmer of optimism for a better future, making it all the more painful when reality comes crashing down.

It’s not hard to imagine a young audience completely losing their minds over the thrills and action of Thor: Ragnarok, and then loving it all over again when they realize how funny it is.

Jones and Murray (who previously teamed on Coppola’s “A Very Murray Christmas” special) achieve the kind of effortless rapport that spawns “I want them to go solve mysteries” memes, and the key ingredient of that chemistry is that Jones never allows Murray to steal the show.

Bloodlines reminds us of why these hilarious horrors have been such crowd-pleasers, and why their creators might never call it quits.

Frantz too often belabors the obvious and ultimately blunts its own message.

By necessity, Inside Out 2 goes to even more complicated places than its predecessor, but it does so with real understanding, illustrating the ways that leaving childhood behind and forming the earliest stages of what will become an adult identity can be both liberating and terrifying, exhilarating and mortifying.

At 126 minutes, The Fall Guy overstays its welcome for a bit, but the stunts, the comedy, and the spark between the film’s dynamic leads make the movie a delectable kick-off to the popcorn pleasures of the summer-movie season.

This adaptation of the Broadway musical – the first half, anyway – offers a lot of craft but not enough magic.

Hoffman doesn't get a lot of flashy, awards-show-clip moments, but he's all the more engrossing for underplaying and revealing volumes with the slightest of reactions and inflections.

Breeziness is a quality Queen and Country has plenty of, making for a lovely journey that never ends up anywhere particularly groundbreaking.

If the script undercuts the enormity of what their characters are enduring, the two lead actors rescue the film from utter negligibility.

Hoppers tells an effective story with wit and ingenuity, not to mention distinctive character design for every corner of the animal kingdom, from a kind-hearted shark (Vanessa Bayer) to a bratty caterpillar (Dave Franco).

Unsettling and bizarrely humorous, The Clan is the sort of film that ups the ante of any movie that dares open with those dreaded five words: “Based on a true story.”

For all the inherent familiarity of the hit-man genre, Fincher and Walker have nonetheless crafted an absorbing tale; what it has to offer that’s any different from countless similar tales lies in the minutiae rather than the mayhem.

Ferrari emerges as that rarest of films: the complex, complicated biopic. Like his subject, Mann appreciates beauty and power while never forgetting that beauty can wither and power can destroy; within that matrix of messy contradictions, he creates haunting drama.

News of the World nestles comfortably not only in the canon of the Western but also among the films by European artists who make a movie in the United States and find themselves overwhelmed by all that space. To his credit, Greengrass finds an emotionally engaging way to fill it.

Wherever it winds up going, the Judy-Nick friendship emerges as one of the more complex and satisfying bits of character interplay in contemporary Disney animation.

Even with its raunchier aspects, the film’s devotion to plotting the course of true love would probably meet with Miss Austen’s approval.

Star and co-writer Billy Eichner spins a lot of plates here, crafting a hilarious and heartfelt film that also acknowledges the challenging and often hidden history of queer people in American society.

Skate Kitchen is a funny and stirring saga of female empowerment that will no doubt delight young women who skate while inspiring many more to pick up a board. It also heralds Moselle as a director who can easily switch stance on both sides of the fiction/non-fiction divide.

The movie really belongs to Mortensen, who allows Ben to be exasperating, arrogant and impatient but also warm, loving and caring. He’s a tough but adoring father, a grieving widower and an angry defender of his wife’s final wishes, and Mortensen plays all these notes and more with subtlety and grace.

Queer pundits will no doubt take “Love, Simon” to task for being too white, too cisgender, too heteronormative. And they won’t be wrong. But even if this is “Call Me By Your Name” through the lens of the Disney Channel, there’s a place in the culture for adolescent gay kids to enjoy the shiny, shallow, pop-song-infused coming-of-age stories that their straight peers consume on a daily basis.

This is gut-punch, feel-bad studio filmmaking, all the more notable for how rarely it happens.

As the story builds, these characters become richer and more complicated — and the stakes become more deadly — resulting in a movie with a delayed but no less potent dramatic punch.

The Coens revel in both the glamour and the squalor of post-war Hollywood with a film that more than makes up in wit and flash what it might lack in substance.

What some might find dramatically unsatisfying about the film’s climax directly comments on the inequities of the era and the limited options offered to women, and there’s no shortage of rich storytelling, acting, and visual potency leading up to it.