Chase Hutchinson

The grim absurdity of it goes hand in hand with the horror, making the escalations and chaos properly fun.

Patterson’s latest film sees him painting on a broader canvas with such boundless care and unwavering confidence that it becomes beautiful to witness him spreading his wings as fully as he does here.

It won’t be remembered as the best Paddington film by any stretch of the imagination, but that’s okay, as that’s a high bar to clear. It still proves to be a trip worth writing home about, and when the traveling companions are as charming as these, it is one you’d happily take again.

With Carousel, Lambert’s new romantic drama starring the excellent duo of Chris Pine and Jenny Slate, she strikes gold yet again.

Saccharine is not a film that goes down easy, but you may just find yourself hungering to return for a second course to get a better sense of what James is serving up.

That there is a genuinely clever current running through it about the cinematic history of sharks and the fear they hold in our imagination is just a little added bonus that offers a bit more to chew on.

While he isn’t an unstoppable hitman, the cold capitalist Julio Blanco rivals the most ruthless and calculating characters Bardem has ever portrayed. Even when the film can’t match his strong performance, he still elevates everything with overwhelming ease.

Stopmotion is a one-of-a-kind, hand-crafted horror film with a great performance from Aisling Franciosi.

It's a frequently fascinating and often moving film despite its many, often glaring, flaws.

While Landon has made fun genre outings before with “Happy Death Day,” “Happy Death Day 2U,” and “Freaky,” Drop is, at its best, never more than just down the middle. At its worst, it’s an oddly clunky experience that strands its performers with little to work with.

Along with his co-writer Bossi Baker, Erkman has made a distinctly eerie and sinister debut that succeeds at sneaking into the depths of your subconscious.

What makes The Damned so effective is how grounded it all is in the characters and their perception of the world.

It is very much an ensemble film, yet it also serves as one of the final demonstrations of how Cloud could command a scene like no one else. That alone makes Your Lucky Day a bittersweet gift, but the sharp film also has quite a lot else going on as well.

Each time you think you’re seeing the daylight of something potentially better to explore on the horizon, “Buddy” keeps dragging you back into the banal darkness. Like the kids, you deserve far better than whatever this lackluster production amounts to.

That this is Bonilla’s feature directorial debut makes one only hope she keeps making comedies like this, as every escalation, cutaway, and lighting cue is perfectly executed. Doug may be a terrible director, but she proves to be a great one.

There is just enough magic that it discovers by the end to give it a closing spark, but there is a mighty long road to get there, ensuring it all just remains merely okay as opposed to comprehensively good.

It’s a feel-bad film like no other where you have to squint for even the smallest sliver of hope as we, along with the characters, get put through the wringer with little potential for salvation.

Much as he’s done in the past, this film dissects the casual cruelty of love and relationships through a combination of the filmmaker’s distinct sense of dark humor that occasionally flirts with something closer to a more strange sociological horror.

While it is undeniably a character study with both the actors at the very top of their game, the story itself is perfectly suited for them to shine.

Unabashedly silly, yet effectively sincere, it is a film that grows on you.

Shyamalan’s latest cinematic confrontation with mortality and meaning, Knock at the Cabin, is among his best work.

Lopez, while certainly dancing all the right steps, is only ever a composite of a movie star who feels trapped in a surprisingly stiff production. She deserves better than what the film gives her, but there’s never a moment when she gets it.

You can practically see the more complicated layers of the two men through the eyes of the performers alone, but they’re both left staring at a story that almost stubbornly refuses to excavate them.

As long as Odenkirk’s grumpy sheriff has his coffee and mustache intact, he is the key to finding the perfect balance. No matter how many blows the film and he take, the joy in seeing him swing freely makes it all good, family fun.

Rather than serve as a shallowly classical body swap story that provides a moral lesson about her growing to appreciate the life she had, the aftermath of this decision is more thematically complicated and engaging. It’s also sincere, tapping into anxieties about being not just liked or even loved, but truly seen.

The Sweet East ends up saying quite a bit, though little leaves any real impression.

Hell Hole is a solidly gory, goofy little ride that cuts through any hiccups to get to the meat of a madcap indie monster movie.

Without all of the performers being completely at the top of their game, none of this would work, and it could grow tiresome rather quickly. Luckily, all of them give such refreshingly vulnerable, funny, and lived-in performances that make you more than happy to spend time with all of them.

Even when it can risk falling into being a little repetitive and dulling its impact, it will swerve in just the right way to keep you on your toes.

For all the ways the film holds us at a bit at a distance, the performances do wonders in closing this gap.

That it holds together is a testament to the cast who it feels like are battling against clumsy escalations that go bigger and louder when the quieter moments carry with them a far more tactful deployment of emotion.

A captivating portrait of a man who can’t seem to remember who he is and may not ever be able to, Duke Johnson’s live-action feature debut is an enrapturing film that speaks in this language of half-remembered dreams before descending into something closer to a nightmare.

While there is certainly still much that you feel like you want to know about Stallone at the end when it all neatly wraps up, Sly manages to be a documentary befitting of its subject with unexpected poignancy and just enough revelations to land some key punches before dancing away with a one-of-a-kind smile.

For all the ways it takes flight towards the end, Plane is an action flick that is mostly plain, the greatest sin for any film that should and could have gotten wilder.

Cuckoo will most certainly not be for everyone, but for those looking for a horror film that draws you in just as it defies any of your expectations for where it is supposed to go, it’s hard to think of a trip this year you’ll find that is as bold and bonkers as this one.

Life and death is one big joke in The Monkey, with the sense that Perkins is manically cackling along while he never skimps on the craft to make it all hit brutal pay dirt.

While Snook does all she can to give the experience some heft, Run Rabbit Run is a horror film in search of something greater others have already achieved that it is never able to find.

While it takes a while to get there after dancing around its premise, when Run Sweetheart Run hits its stride it is more than worth running along with it.

Giving life to a horror vision that would not have nearly the same power and potency without her at the forefront of it, Sweeney has never been better than she is here. What a darkly beautiful yet brutal, bloody and bold film this is for her to wield.

Returning directors Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett show they have an eye for immersing us in well-constructed set pieces that earn their terror and are all distinct from each other.

Some well-timed edits maximize the impact of the jokes and help leave necessary horror elements up to the imagination. Even when we don’t see everything, our minds fill in the gaps to make the gore and gags that befall Wes land.

Is it a bit baggy and less amusingly chaotic than past entries? Absolutely. However, Bell's return as this character is still grimly fun when he's given room to let loose. Even as time isn't always on his side, he makes the most of nearly every moment.

For every interview there is with a journalist offering more of this, there is one that just meanders with a notorious influencer that should have probably been cut.

While neither Tommy nor the film itself was ever likely to be immortal, the closing frames prove to be a fitting sendoff for him as well as his long, sad saga. For what could very well be the last time, he and Murphy burn bright.

Carter may remain quite lousy, but with Krumholtz at the helm, this film is anything but.

Even as Fuze is not a great film, let alone one that will be remembered as a classic new take on the genre, it’s an endlessly watchable one.

All you need to do is open your mind to its wonders and you may too discover something about yourself along the way.

Even with its many narrative flaws, The Silent Twins gives us an insight into not just the lives of the two sisters but the way they made sense of it through stories of their own.

In the end, “Rhythm Is A Dancer” remains a classic banger, but Pretty Lethal never finds any remotely memorable rhythms of its own.

Even with Fiennes and Chastain giving it their all in a manner that makes the story far more engaging than you would expect, they can’t carry it all on their own. The most ambitious and audacious performances in the world can’t overcome storytelling that is otherwise safe to the point of being timid.

Despite how transgressive and inventive Dalí was as an acclaimed artist, Dalíland is content to create a story that plays it all too safe.

While there are many promising pieces being assembled, with arresting visuals bolstered by the performances of Mescal and Barrera, any awe to be had in Carmen becomes dashed by its own emptiness.

Despite its title, it’s unable or unwilling to surrender itself to being more than just another celebrity documentary.

All you’re left with is the echo of what was better before. You watch only able to wish Weaving was given more to work with than this, or, at the very least, greater room for her iconic scream to rattle you once more.

It is a thriller that frequently flirts with becoming an out-and-out horror film only to never quite arrive there. The result is a middling work that is occasionally interesting, as we see how it attempts to strike a balance between these two distinct ideas. Regrettably, it ultimately can’t hold itself together when it counts.

Even as Reinhart does solid work with the shaky material, her character remains adrift in a meandering psychological thriller that offers only a superficial look into her psyche.

The performances are all giving the necessary punch even when the writing is not. It may frequently get lost in its own narrative woods, but Bana manages once again to bring it all back to humanity.

There is a winning buddy comedy deep inside The Accountant 2, but it’s buried under so much tedious meandering that it never gets to fully see the light of day.

Even without the questions about the veracity of the story, its rah-rah style makes it feel superficial rather than sweeping. In the end, Flamin’ Hot comes across as a selling of a story and a brand rather than a genuine retelling of one.

It succeeds about half the time, making for a split decision where Sweeney and Christy both emerge as champions while the film itself can’t quite go the distance.

If Howard and Sweeney can make movies together like this all the time, may neither of them ever stop.

While the title promises fire, the only riddle remaining is where the adventure it was searching for ended up disappearing to.

Rabbit Trap finds some occasionally effective moments of atmospheric dread and sadness, only to leave those moments stranded.

There are layers of complexity in both Wright’s performance and that of the late Williams which elevate the experience, making for a sturdy enough riff on the Western that still could have been so much more.

From a talented cast in Léa Seydoux, Louis Garrel, Vincent Lindon, and Raphaël Quenard to an initial willingness to be ruthless in tearing apart the messy art of moviemaking, it could have been something truly great. nstead, just when you think this movie about making movies is starting to get somewhere interesting, it reveals itself to be only a sporadically funny satire with a surprising lack of teeth.

For all the fun that the cast seems to be having with Dicks, it’s never as creative in execution as it needs to be. There are chuckles to be had, but the overall experience is defined by narrowness rather than naughtiness.

Not only is director Benjamin Brewer’s Arcadian a good Nicolas Cage movie, but it’s one of the most fun cinematic experiences that he has been a part of in recent memory. It's a work of horror worth taking seriously even as things go gloriously off the rails.

Even a lesser Kore-eda is still at least interesting, even frequently insightful, about the ways that we move through a world of pain and loss. It’s just a shame that, for a film that’s ultimately about the power of imagination and our ability to tell stories as a way of enduring, this one was unable to dream bigger.