Bradley Warren

With the bar for breakout genre flicks being set so high in recent years, one can’t help but feel that Radio Silence is capable of something more substantial and memorable in its craft. Like most of Grace and Alex’s wedding gifts, Ready or Not is certainly diverting but hardly essential.

A flimsy, unremarkable story of obsession.

In Bed with Victoria is buoyed by irresistible performances on the part of the titular lead (Virginie Efira) and inevitable romantic interest Sam (Vincent Lacoste). It is their turns that imbue the film with its energy, even if its generic formula and social milieu is at times too familiar.

As a policier, Oh Mercy! is an affectionate homage to crime cinema but also an engaging variation on the genre’s tropes.

Unfortunately, “Tommaso” is far more navel-gazing and long-winded than intimate, in as much of a creative funk as its protagonist.

A handsome production and ambitious in scale, the impact of The Traitor is muted by the familiarity of its well-worn tropes.

A demented and often-uproarious class-conscious satire, Parasite falls slightly short of Bong’s greatest work.

While not quite arriving at the delirious cult highs of a classic like “Ichi the Killer,” “First Love” is Miike’s most accessible work in years.

This comedic thriller is witty and diverting without selling out on the Romanian reputation of thoughtful, challenging work.

Absent from Young Ahmed is the frenetic urgency that defines the directors’ greatest work, replaced here by the titular character’s unshakable tunnel vision.

Kapadia’s tight focus and compelling viewpoint make “Diego Maradona” a must-see for soccer fans, and certainly a biographical doc of interest to wider audiences.

A beautiful, full-hearted celebration of the craft of filmmaking.

As typical as it may sound from the outside, tender and devastating in turn, “Sorry We Missed You” is essential viewing.

There may not be a map for navigating this gonzo film, but nevertheless, Bacurau is a blood-soaked adventure worth seeking out.

A hilarious and twisted festival amuse-bouche with tremendous cult appeal.

As a film, it shuffles around, shouting out the one thing it’s desperate for: ‘Purpose!’

It’s a very watchable — if occasionally frustrating— first effort, but one hopes that the director will carve out more original territory with his second film, regardless of where he settles.

The world of the film is bracingly immediate and constantly overflowing—dubious sound design or a shift in image quality, while glaring, can’t puncture the holistic nightmare of Matti’s vision.

Our House, doesn’t set its ambitions much higher than the VOD market, and its haunting is passable if not all that spooky.

The Third Murder functions well as a topical genre detour for the acclaimed director, but a degree of incongruity between the demands of the procedural formula and Kore-eda’s usual languid pacing keep the film from reaching the upper echelons of his greatest work.

Cocote is an entirely different beast—a challenging watch that swings from the avant-garde to an ethnographic model of filmmaking.

Dumont’s uncompromising approach to the material makes for a love-it-or-hate-it affair, and it should be clear where this particular viewer fell on that spectrum.

There is a more polemic, thought-provoking work somewhere in 7 Days in Entebbe, held hostage by its commercial appeal.

Ergüven’s sophomore film is a tonal disaster, jerking from shrill melodrama to screwball comedy and always at the most inappropriate of moments.

Unlike traditional Westerns that depict a historical moment. the movement of people and money in Europe remains in flux, and consequently, so does this new breed of cowboy.

It is Olshefski’s humanist portraiture of one family’s quotidian lives that is certain to stir audiences.

Though undeniably watchable...Mateo Gil’s film fails to rise above the well-trodden genre film language nor does it meaningfully contribute to its central existential questions on mortality .

Despite some flat moments, Nobody’s Watching is consistently engrossing,

Unfortunately, some fumbled melodrama and the thorny issue of nationalism that hung over Hayao Miyazaki’s “The Wind Rises” compromise the finer impulses in In This Corner of the World.

Focusing on the indigenous community of the Pine Ridge reservation, Zhao reimagines the entrenched masculine persona of the cowboy. The result is an entrancing, deeply moving effort, one that is certain to steal the hearts of audiences on its wider release.

The collaborative energy between the two makes for an endlessly charming documentary, as “Faces Places” manages to look forwards and backwards with touching insight.

24 Frames snaps still-life photography out of its stasis, giving its images a brief history and miniature stories, even if it’s just the movement of cows in and out of a shot.

All in, the film is an unprecedented misfire for Denis.

It’s perhaps not a huge step-up to those already well-versed in recent Korean action cinema, but sturdy direction by helmer Jung Byung-gil, restrained hat-tips to genre films past and the well-paired male leads keep The Merciless from feeling like the summation of more famous films.

If Hong is often a filmmaker who can be accused of making the same movie over and over again, this latent muse brings a veritable freshness to his output by offering an emotional gravity that hadn’t significantly figured into his creative sphere.

One Week And A Day is at times a genuinely funny diversion amongst the Critic’s Week selection. However, a sentimental streak and a series of precocious narrative turns diminish the impact of the film.

Bragança’s ambitions exceed his reach, and Don’t Swallow My Heart fails to reconcile its various story strands, conflicting tones and genre aspirations.

If the film’s climax comes off as thematically clear — an outgrowth of the tension heretofore developed — it otherwise leaves an aftertaste of slightness.

Yourself and Yours lacks the narrative intricacy of the South Korean filmmaker’s most celebrated work but nonetheless serves as a charming introductory point for unfamiliar audiences.

An above average, carnage-driven Korean crime drama.

Underneath the dark humor and holistic mise en scène, there remains the nagging suspicion that what is onscreen is — in spite of the film’s best intentions — another patriarchal interpretation of Lady Macbeth.

While often hamstrung by genre conventions, particularly in the picture’s first half, Tom of Finland is a passable entry into the LGBT film canon and largely successful in selling the subcultural relevance of the eponymous artist’s beefcake drawings.

It’s an endlessly entertaining, challenging investigation of history that confirms Ruizpalacios’ status as the next big thing in Mexican cinema.

For the most part, Kahn’s latest effort is a tenderly observed portrait of the transformative power of religion, even if it occasionally fails to convince.

The Villainess confounds its audience on two levels: firstly, how the filmmakers pulled off the elaborate set pieces and secondly, leaving them to wonder what the hell is going on in the plot.

For all the artists that populate Hong’s cinematic universe, the director has yet to foreground the creative psyche in as thought-provoking of a manner as he does in Grass.