Kimber Myers

Less would have been more here; a less scattershot approach would have yielded a more resonant film.

Rogers Park is populated by real people with real problems, though the dialogue in Carlos Treviño's script doesn't always serve them well. The lines sometimes feel manufactured, but there's real warmth — or frustration or anger, depending on the scene — present in these authentic performances.

Throughout the documentary, infectious joy leaps off the screen with the same energy the color-guard teams display.

The resulting film is a gripping story about a search for justice amid systemic corruption.

This is largely a well-made movie from the technical perspective, but a stronger hand in the editing room would’ve made for a more watchable one.

Women Who Kill is delightfully specific in its approach to its characters and their community. It takes a familiar theme of romantic comedies — the fear of commitment — and gives it new life by adding a morbid element to the mix.

Rattlesnakes imagines itself as a neo-noir, but that genre is more evident in its themes of revenge and ambiguous characters rather than in its nondescript style. This is a bland, unpleasant watch, all set to an equally grinding score.

High Flying Bird is often serious in how it deals with issues more substantial than just sports, but even beyond McCraney’s sharp, witty script, there’s a sense of joy here. The fun Soderbergh had making the film radiates off it, with this masterful movie that reminds the audience why we’re lucky one of the greatest living directors is still in the business.

Where In Between does succeed is in showing the relationship between the women and in refusing to judge them for their choices.

Directors Mark Blane and Ben Mankoff bring a kinky sweetness to this oddball dramedy, but audience’s appetites for it will depend on their patience with its lead character.

It’s a humane, compassionate film, simultaneously full of beauty, sadness and struggle.

There’s been no shortage of study on Welles, but They’ll Love Me When I’m Dead offers a new understanding of the elusive, cunning filmmaker with a verve the man himself would have admired.

Isn't a bad freshman effort, but it doesn't offer anything to set it apart from dozens of other indie dramedies.

Wetlands is more than just a film that shares far more about anal fissures than you ever wanted to know; it’s a surprisingly sweet coming-of-age comedy brimming with punk-rock energy and an impressive performance from Swiss actress Carla Juri.

Its bubbly tone is often at odds with the casual cruelty present. Status Update layers in a message about social media's filters and fakery, but it isn't enough to make this a movie worth sharing

Director Yoonessi and deGuzman perfectly balance the contrast between Joy’s cuteness and innocence and the darkness and sexuality of her experience.

Hotel Transylvania 3 may lack the indelibility of the medium’s best offerings for kids, but hopefully its clear theme of acceptance lingers long after the inoffensive odor of its fart jokes dissipates.

Steinfeld’s performance and the script from Kelly Fremon Craig have created a young woman who feels entirely familiar, while never feeling like a retread of the other teenagers who have walked the cinematic high school halls before her.

The Breaker Upperers features a distinctly New Zealand style of comedy: dry, awkward and utterly hilarious. But directors, writers and stars Jackie van Beek and Madeline Sami still give this film a wild energy that’s absolutely their own, with jokes that take the audience from giggles to cackles to all-out shrieks.

While The Storyteller aspires to be a feature-length Hallmark card, it only manages dollar-store sentimentality in its plot and platitudes.

For those who like their jokes on the cruel side, Goran is a darkly comic treat that is a far better experience for the audience than its characters.

At 127 minutes, Giannoli’s script feels overlong and a bit repetitive in its heroine’s disastrous performances. Lucien, the critic who helps propel Marguerite and her story forward, disappears for a large chunk of the film, only to randomly appear toward the end. Other than these missteps, Marguerite is worth watching with a well-earned grimace, largely for Frot’s pitch-perfect performance.

The characters in The Lovers and the problems they face and struggle with feel entirely authentic, as does the magnetic chemistry between the leads.

This isn’t just a necessary or powerful story; it’s a well-told one.

Ostensibly aimed at an adult audience that craves equal parts romance and raunch, Fifty Shades Freed appears to have been written by a teenager – and not just because of its groan- and giggle-inducing dialogue, lack of emotional investment and thinly drawn characters. There’s no knowledge of any element of how the world functions, particularly in its approach to relationships.

Other than showing moments of in-fighting, Meow Wolf: Origin Story is an almost entirely positive exploration of the collective and their art — but it’s an effective one.

National Bird is powerful cinematic journalism.

Giroux’s film is a quietly moving drama that can be a little too quiet and slow at times, but it deserves credit for never jumping into melodrama.