Jourdain Searles

It feels alive like an open, bleeding heart. It’s a tragic story told with hope that doesn’t ring saccharine or overwrought. Sometimes it moves like water, flowing from ugliness to beauty. There are few American films that come close to what it accomplishes, as either film or adaptation. Nickel Boys suggests a miracle, with the makings of a classic.

The film is a staggeringly impressive debut, blending color, sound and story to create an intricate emotional tapestry.

Our Land is an urgent film with a bleeding heart that deserves to be seen by everyone around the world. Martel has made an essential work.

At times, the film feels like a musical nightmare full of sadness and raw angst.

Neptune Frost is an intimidating film, both in scope and pure cinematic power.

One of the smartest things about Parmet’s film is the way it portrays internalized misogyny in her female characters. The Starling Girl is a complex, often disturbing portrait of the way women have been pressured to shrink themselves and pass on that shame to their daughters.

Hedda is a delightful, sexy ride made that reminds us that Thompson is a star and DaCosta has many more tricks up her sleeve. It’s good to hear her unique narrative voice again.

On Swift Horses is about the shapes love can take, the varied lives we live and the many different ways one can make a home. It’s beautiful, heartbreaking and demands to be seen on the biggest screen possible. Here’s hoping it brings the romantic epic back into fashion.

Schwartzman has been a lead before, but never quite like this.

Packed with visual gags and a cast of gifted comedic actors, Maddie’s Secret straddles the line between comedy and melodrama, creating a wholly unique cinematic experience.

Power exposes the myth of good policing for what it is: one of the most expensive and calculated PR campaigns in history. And by extension, the film dismantles the idea of America as the land of the free, emphasizing that freedom only belongs to those with enough power and social capital to avoid the oppressive boot of law enforcement.

Dark, unnerving and thrilling, The Novice is poised to become a genre-breaking success. A film this raw made with such a steady, assured hand only comes along once in a while. We should take notice.

Blue Film provokes and captivates in equal measure, with the naked honesty of a black box off-off-Broadway play. It’s a two-hander chamber piece that doesn’t pull any punches in its dialogue or presentation.

The real star of the show is Dunham, whose sharp dialogue and direction equips every actor with an acidic tongue and knowing gaze.

Familiar Touch is a gorgeous drama with an open, aching heart.

Beautiful, melancholy and intellectually stimulating, “Dahomey” is a documentary that should be seen by all.

Fancy Dance reminds us of how communities care for each other, regardless of the risk involved. Tremblay’s narrative debut is simply beautiful, and hopefully, there’s much more to come.

Mothers can’t leave, and when they do it’s considered to be the ultimate sin. Bronstein’s script is a brave, searing interrogation of the roles they’re forced to play in society and the massive weight of holding a life in one’s hands.

Despite the jumps from reality to fantasy and back again, Kiss of the Spider Woman has one clear, loud emotional heartbeat. Every musical and dance number is well-performed and bursting with thematic meaning; the music is fun, the jokes land, and the overlapping characters are compelling to watch in both the real and fantasy world.

Ultimately, American Fiction is an impressive debut from Jefferson, who has seamlessly made the leap from the small to big screen with a strong comedic voice and characters crafted with empathy and care. While the satire could have been sharper and more complex, the film is mostly saved by its humor.

The film comes to life when Majors and Powell are in the air. Dillard and cinematographer Erik Messerschmidt make the sky feel vast and alive, threatening to swallow up Jesse and Tom at any moment. Along with the film’s thrilling flight scenes, Majors is the biggest draw of Devotion, showcasing his distinctly masculine vulnerability to portray a man as strong as he is silent.

Maintaining a feel-good tone without becoming saccharine, “Rez Ball” is a charmer with enough of an edge to keep viewers on their toes.

Writer-director David Lowery sets the stage for Mother Mary, but it’s Coel—playing the jilted, acidic fashion designer Sam Anselm—who steps out center stage. Coel dominates the screen, keeping all our senses at attention; though she has been in films before, Mother Mary feels like her grand entrance.

The insights and artistic inclinations that populate Kramer’s work aren’t for everyone, and there’s a good chance By Design won’t connect with most viewers. But the alienating nature of the premise is what makes it fascinating, pushing us to question how we want to be seen and experienced as people in the world.

Cobb’s face is a canvas for a world of yearning that can’t fully be revealed to us because she doesn’t have the language to articulate it yet. That truth allows the film to feel both specific and universal at the same time.

Optimism is indeed at the heart of The Burial, a film that genuinely believes in the ability of the legal system to fight injustice.

With Nanny, Jusu crafts a contemplative, thematically rich story that deftly explores the emotional and spiritual costs of leaving your homeland behind for an uncertain future in a strange land.

Come See Me in the Good Light is relentlessly emotional and intentionally uplifting, with an intimate quality that makes it feel like a home movie.