Kate Erbland

When Lindon isn’t at the mercy of her but-I’m-a-teenager ruse, Spring Blossom and its filmmaker get a chance to show off some real creative sparks, including a trio of musical numbers that offer cinematic style and emotional flair.

Evans, Hall, and Heathcote exhibit major chemistry (in every permutation) possible, but they also don’t wink at the storyline, playing a provocative story totally straight.

While Poser works up to a somewhat predictable ending, the details and ideas that get us there are fascinating and unique.

Morales and Duplass are both appealing enough that their charm shines through in even this seemingly limited format, and the result is an intimate feature that earns that closeness through every stilted video message and free-flowing video conference.

The Willoughbys is different — or, perhaps, just different enough to stand out, as it sends up the vast assortment of kiddie stories about missing, dead, or just plain bad parents, and finds something fresh and funny in the process.

Set in Gillan’s own hometown of Inverness, the film uses the tragic history of the Scottish Highlands (which has the highest suicide rate in the U.K.) to spin out an intimate coming of age tale, bolstered by Gillan’s dark sense of humor and a firm understanding of how to play with narrative conventions.

Enola Holmes doesn’t just use its heroine as a cute way to nod at progressive thinking; it fully embraces a story that is, at its heart, deeply feminist.

In just his second feature, Burns exhibits a real knack for world-building, mythology-making, and crafting real tension, but a series of stumbles in the film’s final act — the worst of which is run through with icky implications Burns seems terribly unaware of — end the film on a wearisome final point.

The filmmaker manages to bring much of his sensibility and overall texture to the series. Part of that is due to the nature of the prequel itself (go back to where it all began!), part of that is due to the relative freedom to build in new characters and stories, but much of it is thanks to Sarnoski’s ability to pull deep emotionality out of his stars and audience almost immediately.

The eventual twists might shock, but Horvat lands it all with a bruiser of an ending, as funny and scary as anything Hollywood itself has churned out in recent years. If this is do-it-yourself cinema, more filmmakers would benefit from being as laser-focused as Horvat is on making something that truly has something to say.

When White Fang focuses on its real stars — animals, Alaska, the spread of untamed country — it’s as visionary as any animated film. Placed alongside ham-fisted humans, it loses its power.

Although Doucouré steeps Cuties in emotion and experience, she abandons its grace to make crazier gestures.

Gabrielle is at the center of all things, but what about her center? Well, it’s not going to hold. And there’s no one better to portray that than Drucker, who has become one of our foremost portrayers of women on the edge.

Jason Clarke opts for a more low-key approach to Teddy Kennedy, eschewing a big accent or showy mannerisms, and fully disappears into the role. It’s his finest work yet, and proof of his ability to excel given the right material.

An impeccably produced look at a heinous crime, Popplewell’s documentary meticulously weaves together a wealth of information . . . that it almost feels too readymade for the film treatment. Almost.

Maybe the pictures should get small again; it might be the only way to save an MCU that seems dangerously close to getting too big to do anything but fail.

Despite the stars’ strong performances and the high level of craft, the film struggles in its final act.

It’s as wild and unhinged as the other films in its brethren (the MPAA does not typically rate original Netflix films, but “Ibiza” would absolutely be on the receiving end of an R). However, Ibiza subverts plenty of expectations in service to a story that’s both funny and sweet.

Freaky has enough snappy fun to keep it ticking along to the inevitable “shock” ending, forcing together two delightful powerhouses in a battle royale that seems primed to kickstart another new franchise for Landon.

While Souza and his life and work are more than interesting enough topics for a documentary, what The Way I See It is really about — what it really wants to be about — is not the man who took the photographs, but the man who was the subject of those photographs.

Garbus, who has long been motivated by stories about remarkable women and horrible crimes, makes a strong showing with Lost Girls, her first narrative feature in her decades-long career.

While Worth is most literally concerned with a stupefying question — what is a life worth? — it’s more precisely about the price of calculating such a wrenching ask.

Feig goes for the spaghetti method of storytelling: Throw a whole bunch of stuff at the wall and something has got to stick. Only some does, but the good stuff — the really campy, trashy, nutty stuff — is the kind of thing popcorn cinema hasn’t so happily embraced in years.

You’ll laugh, you’ll gasp, you’ll have, yes, a very good time. You’ll also marvel at the introduction of a newly-minted filmmaker with a crystal-clear vision of both what the world is and what it could be, at least if the women were in charge.

The only thing scarier than Prey at Night is the possibility that we might have to wait another decade for more of its very special mask-faced chills.

Capaldi doesn’t go for neat and tidy endings, so it’s a real shame that this too-glossy documentary does.

Mulan is perhaps the best example of how to marry the original with something fresh. The Ballad of Mulan has always been an epic-scale story about the power of being yourself in a world not ready to accept that, a tale that will likely always have resonance. In Niki Caro’s “Mulan,” that story elegantly and energetically moves forward, a timeless message made for right now.

The Last Showgirl is both the role of a lifetime for Anderson, one that can fully capture her incredible emotional intensity and vulnerability, and (we can only hope) the start of a brand new career for her.