Josh Larsen

Hang in there with Together Together. What may seem at first like a slender character study eventually grows into a more expansive exploration of loneliness, before ending on a perfect, powerhouse final shot.

Thanks to little filmmaking touches, Kong has real personality, which helps us come to care for his plight.

A triumph of design, Raya and the Last Dragon is held back by a lackluster story, one cobbled together from various influences (Indiana Jones, Star Wars, an array of Southeast Asian cultures) and bent in service of a tortured—and somewhat confused—lesson about learning to trust.

This is too neat, tidy, and digestible of a take on such a wrenching topic—especially when we know the forces of injustice at work here were only temporarily stymied by this trial, and hardly defeated.

When Pieces of a Woman is at its best, it’s focusing on this traumatized couple and how neither knows how to make room for the other’s grieving process, partly because their respective processes conflict. Unfortunately the movie wants to be so much more.

You’re guaranteed to come away with new respect for the octopus as a species and astonishment at the intimate connection Foster experiences.

Day has a startling combination of confidence and corruptibility as the legendary jazz singer, but the film itself is a jumble of barely established characters, over-stylized techniques, and didactic dialogue.

Murphy is committed, bringing back the same low-key charm he showcased in the original, while also undercutting Akeem by showing how he has come to represent the repressive Zamundan traditions he once rebelled against.

A tender, fictionalized memoir anchored by two stellar performances.

As for Hopkins, he gives a precisely observed performance, capturing Anthony’s confusion without limiting the character to that single quality. He’s dazzling, for example, when turning on the charm for a potential new caregiver.

Part poetry slam, part dance performance, part survivalist nightmare, Night of Kings imagines narrative as a saving grace, even in the darkest place.

I don’t know if I’ve ever seen a pair of performances—no, it’s really a singular, joint performance—like what we get from Kristen Wiig and Annie Mumolo in Barb and Star Go to Vista Del Mar.

This is history, but it’s also alive. It’s the story of a weasel caught—and complicit in—a crossroads, one that leads directly to where we find ourselves today.

Just putting us in Maud’s head—even as grippingly as the filmmaking does here—is not the same as trying to empathize with her. Still, the movie marks Glass as a filmmaker to watch.

Considering the limited material, what we get from Washington and Zendaya is doubly impressive. There’s not enough in the text for them to form full characters, but wow do they nail individual moments, shifting from tenderness to cruelty to scorn to reluctant introspection (in this way the film comes across as a series of successful auditions).

It takes a special sort of confidence to make a quiet movie, and that’s exactly what director Fernanda Valadez displays in her debut feature, Identifying Features.

Even taking a step back from current events, News of the World registers as a fine film at best. Hanks is sturdy, though this is also one of those performances where there isn’t much surprise in those kindly eyes.

There’s no doubt that Fennell has made something that shows impressive filmmaking promise and pulses with real pain.

Without such careful world-building, to an outside observer Bacurau feels like a bunch of bonkers set pieces in a vacuum.

One Night in Miami—adapted by Kemp Powers from his own play, as well as the directorial debut of actress Regina King—manages to elevate that conceit (and its obvious stage origins) with sharp performances and a bold directorial hand.

Wunmi Mosaku (Ruby on HBO’s Lovecraft Country) has a fierce sense of determination, even if her character has to defer in this traditional marriage, and Sope Dirisu keeps revealing more and more layers to the husband, a man struggling to survive under what ultimately feels like the curse of assimilation.

It’s a given that the sound design would be a crucial element in a film about a drummer who suddenly loses his hearing, but Sound of Metal is so artfully crafted on that front that it nearly develops a new way of experiencing a movie.

Boys State is a thoroughly depressing portrait of American teen masculinity, Texas politics, and the overall state of democracy.

When you hit a home run with Gadot, who was so thrilling in the 2017 film, you might want to make a sequel that keeps her at the center.

By its bittersweet ending, Nomadland delicately suggests that Fern’s experience is a choice, but one born out of hardship. The “choice” represents the potential of the United States. The “hardship” is the nation’s capitalist curse.

Brosnahan trades in the quick quips of Mrs. Maisel for a quieter intelligence and vulnerable uncertainty.

The Truffle Hunters has a great subject—aging Italian foragers and their dogs, carrying on the storied tradition of searching forests for the rare fungi—but its true strength is in its compositions.

Witheringly funny and willing to explore her own (her character’s?) flaws, Blank brings a vibrant brand of comic honesty to the screen.