Matt Donato

What The Bad Guys 2 has to say about turning over a new leaf isn’t profound, but it’s effective nonetheless, especially when accentuated by so many goofy laughs and sticky-fingered thrills.

XX is a mundane horror anthology at best, and a slow-burn experience that never reaches a boil at its worst.

Ready Or Not is an exquisite horror comedy heavy on familial dysfunction, heavier on gameplaying brutality, and always a reminder that Samara Weaving deserves to be the biggest of megastars.

Rarely is a performance so strong that it’s able to carry an entire production, but – thankfully for John Madden – Chastain wills Miss Sloane into relevance through nothing but sophistication, spunk and champion grit.

Furies is a double-barreled adrenaline shot of ladies-first action extravagance that shines a light on Vietnamese genre cinema.

Ready Player One isn’t slick enough a commentary worth getting riled up about or distracting enough to hide glaring structural issues underneath a barrage of “HEY I KNOW THEM!” cameos like dangling keys in front of a dog.

In A Valley Of Violence is built on intense shootouts, vicious criminals, crooked lawmen and everything that makes Westerns exciting, but its entertainment value comes from a tonal brew of all the right tonally-combative spices.

Thrilling sci-fi exploration that ponders the melancholic state of self-worth, existence, and what it truly means to be alive.

Anna And The Apocalypse is an enthusiastic coming-of-age musical that cares just as much about bellowed heart and soul as it does keeping horror fans entertained.

Atomic Blonde strikes a deafening blow thanks to enjoyable characters, furious fight-play and Charlize Theron’s brand of screen command. She’s always in control, whether toying with feminine wilds or slugging another glass of Stoli on the rocks.

There’s a brooding tonal growth that Pesce is able to establish, as he unravels a film that becomes more horrific with each passing second.

There's nothing uniquely surprising or exceptionally rousing, which is a shame given the unfathomably dreadful predicament and an interesting turn of a performance from Dave Bautista. It's a film without sensation that feels like it's pulling its punches across the board – development is stunted, ideas lack passion, and the camera avoids visible violence – before the ending strolls off into the sunset with barely any goodbye.

Never does Soderbergh’s projection strike me as B-movieness or popcorn entertainment. His mix of arthouse iPhone Hollywood and downplayed character accentuation (by way of misrepresented screen shrinkage) makes for a thriller that fails to spike excitement via a villain who’s always right where he has to be.

Terrifier 3 is a bounty of practical effects riches that cannot be denied, but its storytelling is scattershot in ways that hold the sequel back.

Split is never as clever or poignant as it thinks it is, but James McAvoy won't let it be forgotten, either.

Blue My Mind is a provocative Swiss origin story about sex, drugs and trials no person can possibly be prepared for. Whether Mia’s transformation is true or a ruse, the proposition of underwater DNA is only bested by Lisa Brühlmann’s execution.

Kramer plays with surreal department store catalog visuals and body-swap quirkiness, leaning heavily on interpretive dance to convey meaning. There's nothing like it, but with such extravagant boldness comes risks, and they don’t always pay off.

12 Hour Shift never takes itself seriously enough to make the calamity that ensues anything more than “dumb fun,” and I mean that positively.

Obvious and sometimes aggravating no doubt, but still effective in raising blood pressure given a backstory so instilled with old-school cultism.

Mayhem is a wonderfully violent middle finger to corporate culture, gleeful in its desire to redecorate cubicles with red blood splatters.

How does a movie about the galaxy's most dashingly roguish outlaw end up being the safest Star Wars to date?

Totally Killer tries to skirt responsibilities by having you laugh at its self-awareness, which works as much as it doesn't. Kiernan Shipka will be the reason people talk about Totally Killer, even if the film's foundation of paper cards is one strong gust away from collapsing at any second.

Holder's wayward romantic indie chases meaning through quiet reflections that navigate hardship somewhat cleanly. While it's a delightful representation of Brooklyn's playground, scenes flow through motions like a wandering observer.

Kong: Skull Island is a grand cinematic adventure powered by furry fury, as the horrors of war blend with chest-beating creature confidence.

This is a boxing drama that scrappily battles for its recognition, determined to win you over at any cost.

It’s an odd “rock and a hard place” production about survival of the fittest mentalities that can’t help but indulge soapy relationship dramatics amidst an otherwise dire entrapment, which will probably leave most laughing and irritated at the wrong times.

The Void is a portal back to the 80s, hinged on immersive practical effects work that picks up the slack of a slighter story.

Beverly Hills Cop: Axel F is a standardized comeback that moderately succeeds in balancing tradition with reinvention. The film doesn’t kick your door down and challenge your Beverly Hills Cop fandom—Molloy knocks politely on your door and shows you what you want to see. It’s a humble nostalgia bomb à la Live Free or Die Hard, one afraid to upset the apple cart and detrimentally one-note. But Eddie Murphy’s still Eddie Murphy, and that’s like sneaking in a cheat code.

While Wyrmwood: Apocalypse might be described as a brains-off zombie flick that’s best when at its most insane, it’s certainly not braindead. Engines rev as zombies breathe toxic-colored fumes, homemade outposts defend against hungry undead outside, and horror-action excitement ramps almost with a vivid, videogame cinematography that’s escapism through extreme, baddie-brutalizing violence.

Let The Corpses Tan is a stunning display of visual seduction and slaughter-first gunplay, if not somewhat distracted by a skeletal script that’s been stripped of all meatiness.

Annabelle: Creation is no lifeless dummy. Plotting may run a bit thin and coincidental, but David F. Sandberg whips up bone-chilling scares and hefty doses of peek-through-your-fingers imagery.

Daddio is a repetitive and reductive experiment in dialogue-driven storytelling.

The magic here is in underground experiences and questionable decision making, all twisted like junky copper wiring that’s unraveled into something more useful.

Gareth Evans’ Apostle is The Wicker Man, Safe Haven and Silent Hill thrown into a boil that bubbles over during a ruthless third act that certainly delivers if you have the patience.

This is dirty, abusive, sticky, heartfelt (?), enlightened (??), intellectual (???), deranged, offensive, damningly provocative filmmaking at its…most…unhinged?

We Bury The Dead is a sprawling but sparse zombie remix that's too far removed from the genre it's exploiting.

As punishing as it is grotesquely poetic, Headshot is a healthy dose of breathtaking brutality that makes you hold on for dear life.

Run Sweetheart Run is a passionate Los Angeles marathon that severs heads, scolds abusive norms, and gets loud about the ways society needs to reflect upon bettering itself. Shana Feste finds action-packed elegance in rage and reflection, borrowing from fast-moving midnight flicks that aren't afraid to challenge oppressive stigmas.

It's a heartbreaking tragedy, dreamer's comedy, and saucy stumble through double-edged "success" stories, but most of all? It's a bloated, brass-band-swingin' mess.

Black Phone 2 is a template for how sequels can reach further and push for standalone appeal, bringing us as close to Freddy Krueger as we'll get until there's another A Nightmare on Elm Street.

Sweeney takes plenty of risks in a lead role that’s rigorous and emotionally demanding, but the film ultimately feels a bit surface level considering how it approaches horror.

The Rehearsal is much like any coming-of-age melodrama, and while its meat is a little overdone, its intro and finale bookends do make up for a lack of flavor in between.

Tetris tries its best to make a story about international video game rights into something infinitely more thrilling, with a smidge better than mixed results.

Hellraiser is a reinvigorated reboot that gets the blood pumping, starting with Jamie Clayton’s worthy Pinhead performance that sets a fresh tone with immense reverence paid to Clive Barker's works.

Scary Stories To Tell In The Dark is gateway horror that treats intended audiences to many a scream, pulling no punches nor watering down nightmarish conjurings that remind how healthy fearful emotions can be at any age.

Birds of Prey proves that it's no longer a man's world, it's Harley Quinn's - and we should be so lucky.

Like Me is a bombastic feature debut for Robert Mockler, benefitting heavily from visual artistry and Addison Timlin's strong performance.

While its minimalist approach keys into creepy unknown anxieties about our extraterrestrial neighbors, Duffield’s signature dose of emotional heft floats away into the clouds this time around.

Tom George succeeds in telling an excitably ambiguous case within a self-deprecating whodunit satire, even when employing the easiest tricks in the manual.

Glorious might not save the world, yet it's still a wonderful way to pass the time while humanity as we know it is devoured by threats we'll never comprehend.

Allied is a prestige drama without the prestige, wooden in appearance and lacking any true drama.

Yes, the movie where a girl falls in love with a Tilt-A-Whirl says more about self-assurance, romantic wilds, and personal comforts than most human-on-human counterparts.

Gudegast's film feels almost artificially programmed in its adherence to criminal caper tropes, unable to steal our hearts with the bromantic charms of cops and robbers with boundary issues.

Warren Beatty's Howard Hughes retrospective, Rules Don't Apply, is equally tone-deaf in humor and drama, cobbled together in ways that never seem to fit.

Gifted may be bogged down by some generic dramatic beats, but young Mckenna Grace is the beam of sunshine that keeps us from losing faith.

What Backcountry did for campfire creature attacks Killing Ground does for murderous bushmen in the same setting.

See for Me positions itself as an unfair tale of “easy target versus evil men,” but highlights its strongest material when valuing people beyond their disabilities.

Bravo’s abundance of inexplicable details makes for an interesting conundrum at first, but mystery soon fades.

Little Monsters is a must-see horror comedy that proves Lupita Nyong'o should be starring in far more horror movies than she's been offered at this point.

The corroded mineral walls, dehydrated trees, and all of nature’s other décor are wonderfully shot, and the performances aren’t to blame, but The Seeding just doesn’t have the storytelling mindset to protect its characters from looking like fools instead of victims of horrific circumstances.

Terrifier 2 rips, tears, hacks, shreds, butchers, disembowels, decapitates, devours, pulverizes, tenderizes, slices, dices, skewers — I'm missing plenty — and knock-em-out-dead eviscerates the current competition when it comes to low-budget slasher effects.

Doctor Sleep is a conflicted and unwieldy sequel attempting to unite worlds (King and Kubrick) while telling an original story from yet another filmmaker's viewpoint (Flanagan) that never blends together.

Grant packs plenty into Torn Hearts’ double-barrel approach, and assures herself as a director who knows her way around a joyfully dark midnighter romp. It’s a sinister and fork-tongued tune that holds a nutty tempo, sure to delight audiences who are into hootin’ and hollerin’ at some honky-tonk horrors.

Sing runs on some serious super-piggy performance power, even if the emotional notes are expected.

Beyond The Games plays to the nostalgia crowd instead of adopting 21st century scares, but still finds a way to explore untapped VHS potential.

The Gutter demands that you’re on its wavelength, but once you’re there, it’s like continual machine gun fire the way jokes and sight gags fly off the screen.

There’s nothing exceptionally freaky outside one or two practical effects of bodily implications, and yet Good Madam still finds nationally significant ways to summon societal fears.

There are glimpses of comparably daydreamy thrillers like Come True or The Feast that give themselves to the fantasy of mania, but A Banquet fails to grab attention like these more ambitious companions. It all builds up to a cinematic Irish exit.

Here Alone is a sometimes-striking, sometimes-repetitive glimpse into apocalyptic drama that struggles to offer anything new.

V/H/S/99 understands the ‘90s assignment and crafts low-budget chaos that delivers a unified anthology slathered in guts, heavy on nostalgia, and with a punk-as-hell attitude.

Jumanji: Welcome To The Jungle is both a fulfilling reinvention and adventurous video game quest that’s far funnier, and unexpectedly exciting, than you could hope for from an evolved reboot with explosive fantasy character.

Wildling may swerve last-minute into a less dense finale, but Bel Powley's performance is worth this fierce and untamed coming-of-self arc that's so exquisitely female-centered.

Blood for Dust is a satisfactory interpretation of American hardships and making ends meet, one that’s been done plenty better and worse elsewhere.

Get Away is a deceptive blast that properly exploits vacationer stereotypes to conceal vastly more wicked intentions.

Curse Of Chucky is a vicious return to form for one of horror's most legendary icons, terrorizing victims in the purest, darkest form of criminal insanity.

Before I Fall makes a simple plot into this convoluted, aggravating mess of emotional turmoil that lacks a shocking amount of direction.