Chase Hutchinson

The result is a film that’s not just incisive and compassionate, but fully attuned to the rhythms of this modern family.

An exercise in riveting restraint and painful poetry, If I Had Legs I’d Kick You is an emotional knockout.

Even as Paulson is putting her all into the film and can firmly grab hold of you at some moments as her strong-willed matriarch comes undone, much like the dust that is floating around the confined setting, it all slips through her fingers.

Even with a more gleeful performance by Kate Hudson, Shell is merely a fine film that’s far too tame to completely pay off.

Seo excavates universal truths that transcend all generational and cultural divides. The many geographical, social and emotional pains these young people are grappling with are ones everyone faces down. As they find ways to fight this, coming to realize all the many ways they may not be so easily able to, there is something both genuinely heartfelt yet quietly haunting about it.

It’s a meandering experience defined by the broadest of narrative strokes, cardboard cutout characters and musical numbers that start fun before growing more oddly obligatory in nature.

It’s a movie about the forces that consume anything and everything to make them into something that is a part of a collective. The more it expands on this, the better it gets, sweeping you up in stunning visuals that swallow you whole.

This void of a movie has plenty of the right pieces to work with at hand, but continually arranges them in the most blunt, least interesting manner possible. It’s a film that bolds, underlines and then shouts at you what it’s about, though never authentically earns your emotional investment.

As Salles shows us, such a seismic loss spans many generations just as it does entire histories that are still being written. We must then always remember the people, their individual stories, and what it was that they endured so that others may never have to do so again.

Like the imposing, unadorned structures of brutalism (think: Boston City Hall, the blocky public housing of the Soviet Union, modern additions to any university campus), it can feel at times intentionally ugly or rudimentary. But it’s also a breathtaking work that’s simultaneously maximalist and minimalist – a searing movie that’s poetic on a formal, storytelling, and thematic level.

When Queer wanders in its own direction in the shaky latter half and captivating conclusion, it may lose some watchers in this descent into dreamlike despair. Still, it crafts a critical last paint stroke in its delicate portrait of desire.

Anora is Sean Baker's most searing and shattering film yet with a breakout performance from Mikey Madison.

It’s not only his best film yet, but it’s the work he’s been building up to over his entire career.

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

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.

For every moment where it seems like it’s getting somewhere more thoughtful, it will dance away into something else, lacking focus even as it remains faithful to the rather short source material.

It may not always come alive in the way Heller, or us, would entirely hope for, but one can still be glad “Nightbitch” exists, especially with Adams there to lead the way. In every facet of her performance, she paints a full portrait of a character herself figuring out who she now is.

In every piercing stare, you can see Terry’s determination and drive just as you do brief flashes of overwhelming despair at the depravity that surrounds him. It becomes surprisingly emotionally impactful at key moments, all of which Pierre plays perfectly. For all the restraint both actor and character embody, the joy of the film comes in how you see the righteous fury growing inside him. It's just waiting to burst free to set things right in a world gone awry.

Slingshot is more of a murky mystery where the big revelations don't hold up under scrutiny.

Andra Day delivers a commendable performance as matriarch Ebony Jackson, but the entire experience is neither scary enough as a horror film nor insightful enough as a drama to leave a mark.

This is no romanticized look back at a past film, but a deeply honest one. In every frame, both within the production of the film and outside of it, it feels like we're witnessing something profoundly personal that may soon slip through our fingers. It's worth cherishing every moment of.

It’s a breathtakingly melancholic film infused with mourning, journeying its way through subtly painful yet often poetic conversations about searching for something lost that may never be found. That only makes all the discoveries it makes that much more stunning to behold.

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.

All through the scattered experience, Page is a shining light. Every move he makes gives the film something greater that it is never able to grasp.

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.

There is much that could easily lose some people when they behold elements of its grand design, but for those willing to get on its wavelength, you’re in for a treat as beautiful to look at as it is unexpectedly haunting.

Jérémy Clapin’s Meanwhile on Earth is a mesmerizing work of science fiction with a magnificent performance by Megan Northman.

Oddity is another horror gem from writer-director Damian McCarthy with an enthralling performance by Carolyn Bracken.