David Rooney

A lot of solid craftsmanship has gone into Spaceman, and there’s a disarming guilelessness to the solemn storytelling that has some appeal.

The knockabout humor just isn’t all that funny; its transgressive spirit too often feels forced.

Even if the film ultimately strays too far into virtuosic theatricality, betraying its origins, La Cocina is a gripping reflection on the dehumanizing grind of labor and the ways that its soul-crushing routines stifle hope. Even if he takes too long wrapping up an overwrought climactic crescendo, this is a compelling vision of the immigrant experience as a hellish limbo in which even the seeming ballast of community, brotherhood and love can be illusory.

Suspended Time does provide some of the pleasures frequently associated with Assayas’ work. . . Mostly, however, the project feels like the result of a writer-director killing time, sketching impressions of a life put on hold by outside circumstances, without figuring out what he wants to say with it all.

At its best, the movie is kind of like The Stepford Wives meets Rosemary’s Baby, with side orders of Cronenberg, J-Horror and Lynch.

It’s subtle but resonant, intimate but emotionally expansive and at every step crisply unsentimental.

Newton, Sprouse and the delightful Soberano are all more appealing than the sloppy package and undercooked characters deserve.

All the nervy cutting, the pirouetting pans and off-kilter angles, the dexterous split-screen and the bombardment of eclectic music cues — many of them dropped in with archly emphatic force — can only distract from the lack of depth for so long.

Valadez and Rondero again mix grit and lyricism, this time to trace the coming of age of a boy growing up in a climate of lurking cartel violence. The new feature doesn’t match its predecessor’s distinctive spell or cumulative power, but its undertow of menace is expertly sustained, and its dread buffered by hope.

An assured nonfiction storyteller, Smith works with editor Joey Scoma to weave together a nonstop, inventive collage of ephemera around concert footage, music videos, pre-existing and new interviews and a generous sampling of Mark’s graphic arts contributions, often spinning into animation.

One of the aspects that makes Super/Man so satisfying is that for a biographical film in which tragedy and loss play such a central part, it’s rich in evidence of hope and kindness, gratitude and the resilience of the human spirit.

While Hammel might be aiming for an ensemble comedy, Stress Positions lacks focus; the director can’t seem to decide who should be the heart of her shapeless narrative, a feeling compounded by dueling voiceovers.

There’s a core of authentically devastating family experience and personal investment that saves Suncoast from its unskilled handling, giving this grief drama, coming-of-age combo a heart to counter its predictability.

My Old Ass is a slender film, but it’s so nicely judged and so infused with a generosity of spirit toward all its characters, across the generations, that its sentimentality acquires substance.

The Outrun — the title refers to tracts of outlying grazing land on arable farms — is slightly overlong and at times feels cluttered. But it depicts the protagonist’s brutal struggle with enough distinctive elements — in every sense of the word — to make it more than just another draining addiction story.

All three principal performances are expertly synced and feel entirely lived in. But it’s Collias who gives the minimalist character study its lingering emotional amplitude, conveying the volatile inner life of a woman making discoveries not only about her camping companions but also about herself.

The real stars are the magnificent black and white images shot by Dweck and Kershaw. The co-directors’ eye for composition allows them to find visual magic and an arresting sense of drama in every frame.

The strong cast and distinctive approach to a widely trafficked subgenre make it a soulful rumination on loss.

With A Real Pain, [Eisenberg] demonstrates impeccable judgment and great skill at balancing sardonic wit with piercing solemnity in a movie full of feeling, in which no emotion is unearned.

Love Lies Bleeding is a hallucinatory trip down the darkest byways of Americana. It’s too blunt to be as unsettling as Saint Maud but it will leave no one indifferent.

It’s an engaging blitz of nostalgia guaranteed to leave core viewers misty-eyed.

This is an enormously satisfying watch for haunted house movie fans, favoring sustained anxiety over big scares and practical effects over digital trickery.

The film reflects on issues of aging and autonomy with a mostly light touch, its protagonist making a strong case for the enduring spirit of elderly folks too often infantilized by both society and their loved ones.

Freaky Tales is a genre-defying riot. Come for the crazy mix tape of circuitously connected plotlines, stay for the joyous explosion of vintage breakdancing on the end credits.

Taking two of the most magnetic actors on the planet, Kristen Stewart and Steven Yeun, and transforming them into emotionally stunted virtual avatars for more than half the running time is the least of the miscalculations.

Watching the bullet-headed action star take down squads of government agents and thuggish mercenaries alike, mostly while unarmed, is fun enough. Probably even more so in Imax.

All the effervescence and fun have been drained out of the material in this labored reincarnation, a movie musical made by people who appear to have zero understanding of movie-musical vernacular.

Daniel Levy has made a first feature that’s a glossy drama of love and loss and the restorative power of friendship. But it’s more earnest than affecting.