Leila Latif

Once you get used to some of its perplexing choices, there’s fun to be had here. De Niro has delicious chemistry with himself, which becomes more amusing when imagining how he would have been performing these duologues to an empty void.

In the end, Silent Friend is a film of contradictions, profound, complex, and beautiful, but occasionally interminably boring.

The film is at its most powerful, however, when Almodóvar relies on his muse and intensely fixates on her character as Janis silently absorbs waves of devastation or allows herself to confess, the words rapidly, cathartically tumbling out of her. In those moments, Parallel Mothers becomes a beautiful tribute to their enduring, working relationship and the trust the director regularly puts in Cruz, whose performance he never surrounds with flashy flourishes.

Chevalier is ultimately a devastating reminder of a greatness that was nearly entirely expunged from history, and how equal talents lived and died without even being given a chance to put a little more beauty into the world.

The sequel has everything that made the first film so special, but most thrillingly, it puts away childish things. There’s moral ambiguity, meaningful stakes and commentary on race, capitalism and the state of cinema that have matured alongside its protagonist.

Life may have been very beautiful in this mountain town but even during its most tumultuous years, spending time within it isn’t exactly fascinating.

The idea of them getting justice never feels on the table, but the film instead is a path out of the madness of a system where to simply have what happened to their father admitted would fill some of the void he has left behind.

Even setting aside its subject matter, it is an astounding feat of dramatising real events with an eye on the cinematic, yet it delivers such a punch to the heart that one hesitates to recommend it without qualification.

Garrone’s film has a three-dimensional and devastatingly realized human soul at its core. The world could do with paying attention to Seydou’s story and the millions of other real ones like it.

The story focuses on the mutual gratification the protagonists provide each other, and how two imperfect humans meeting can prove a shared antidote for worldly ills.

As much as Jenkin’s film is hypnotic and strikingly realized, in the final half hour it runs out of tricks up its sleeve.

It has as many superfluous sequences as great ones, with moments that serve no grander purpose than landing a single joke.

While the biopic is determinedly feel-good, and sometimes a little over the top, Williams holds true to the spirit of someone who - like Gael García Bernal - was a born entertainer.

Director Green may get the best out of Smith, and his directorial style is, in general, very robust, yet his hyper-competence occasionally works to the detriment of the film, feeling cautious and out of step with the bold ambition of hi subjects.

DuVernay’s film is unable to fuse melodrama and academia into a single narrative, even with such rich source material and as fascinating a subject as Isabel Wilkerson. The only possible conclusion it invites is every film critic’s least favorite sentence: Just read the book.

Even in the most crass jokes, where fluid pours out of orifices, Babes is a delightful and profound study in growth.

Heretic may seek to rock your faith in the divine, but it truly fortifies one’s belief in Hugh Grant.

It’s a challenge to conclude a documentary on an ongoing and fast-evolving conflict. The news will continue to tally up the dead bodies and destroyed cities, from which the film refuses to allow us to distance our emotions. But where “Freedom on Fire” proves valuable isn’t in the brutality of the corpses but in the reminder that these are individual people being broken, and real families being torn apart.

Sundown has more substance, and a more intriguing premise, than most of Franco’s proudly sadistic work. But it still amounts to just a lot of artfully composed bleakness.

At its heart is Tessa Thompson, giving a performance so commanding that it seems to reshape the molecules around her. Her Hedda is poised and sensual with a magnetism that affects virtually every interaction. The glance is a seduction and the lightest curled lip becomes a threat, with DaCosta trusting her leading lady to convey the power of this woman in silent, lingering close-ups.

There is a lack of catharsis in the conclusion which, to the film’s credit, feels apt. It’s a powerful story with no easy way forward for anyone concerned.

While it would be hard to argue that none of this film’s two hours, 20 minute runtime could be trimmed, its final minutes are well worth the wait, with Cooper selling the intense darkness with everything he’s got.

Much like what the film’s themes speak to, this debut alludes to a brighter future, and serves best as the foundation upon which Malcolm Washington’s greatness will be built upon rather than a monument to it.

In creating material so close to her lived experience, Lindon is able to avoid the common clichés of teenage stories.

There’s promise here. A broader cinematic universe that feels cohesive, filled with amusing cameos and, for the first time in years, a DCU that feels like it has a faint pulse are all very welcome. But whenever the film strains to address Big Ideas, it’s painful.

Van Sant directs with a steadiness that occasionally borders on pastiche. He resists sensationalism, which is no small feat given the bombastic source material. The hostage sequences are gruellingly tense, but the film never quite finds a rhythm beyond escalation, monologue, negotiation, repeat. For a story and subject this strange, the filmmaking flourishes are conservative.

Zoë Kravitz makes a phenomenal debut as director with this heightened, gripping thriller.

Cordelia is a film of two halves and, unfortunately, only one of them is good.