Matt Donato

V/H/S/Halloween is an enjoyable assortment of vicious holiday horror shorts that might take a step backward after last year’s fantastic V/H/S/Beyond, but it’s hardly a throwaway sequel.

While The Scribbler isn't exactly in contention with the best that the comic book genre has to offer, Katie Cassidy utilizes the numerous voices in her head to create a unique hero for a bit of stylized freshness.

Your toleration of mother! will be determined by movie-going patience. Aronofsky is painting with some blistering broad strokes, but they’re just that – broad and undefined.

Expressive and appropriate costume design looks the part, but the experience doesn’t fully embrace what kill-or-be-cracked-open thrills are openly promised.

Us And Them might be a little slighter than expected, but Jack Roth's charismatic fire-starter has enough anarchistic anger to appreciate.

Chupa is a rascally, if not the boldest or most artfully composed, coming-of-age fable that proudly represents Mexican culture.

Office Christmas Party is a naughty Xmas comedy stuffed with enough ho-ho-hos and ha-ha-has to corrupt this holiday season.

Conversational drama (ala Linklater’s Before franchise), plates piled with last-meal dinner fantasies, unparalleled improv – third time is still the charm, but Michael Winterbottom lets the stew boil a bit too long.

The Vatican Tapes relies heavily on its third act, but if you can stomach its more generic beginnings, you'll be treated to an exorcism story with higher stakes than normal.

Where The Witch unleashes disturbed cinematography or Lizzie swings a vicious ax, The Last Thing Mary Saw is a duller distillation of the fear-based corruption that faith can spread.

Song To Song is one of the more accessible Malick films as of late, succeeding largely in part thanks to a cast who plays their dramatic beats like poetry in motion.

The film has one mode, and it's never coy about its intentions to pry tears from your ducts as often as possible. If you're in the mood for a Shakespearean J-drama about mortality, stock up on hankies and let 'er rip.

Come And Find Me is a fine-and-dandy missing persons thriller with a romantic twist, suitable for those whose Aaron Paul senses tingle upon reading the film’s synopsis. First-time features are anything but safe bets, so a cheers is in order for Whedon’s accomplishment – no matter how small.

The Invitation represents everything that makes for a middle-of-the-road vampire experience, but doesn’t deserve to be wholly written off.

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.

Scares are often on the generic side (pitch-black doorway, hand reaches out), and while some wild effects work enjoys the zanier side of Hell’s mouth opening up to spit venom across Earth’s surface, it’s missing the masterfully torturous tone that Wan’s universe otherwise aims for.

It’s never stuffy – J-Rock guitar solos wail over science research montages – just a bit overlong and too involved in the judicial process.

Aaron Taylor-Johnson deserves more credit as an actor, because he's the only reason this Iraq War thriller hobbles steadily on two legs.

Ouija: Origin Of Evil would have been better than Ouija with even a quarter of the screams evoked, which makes the tremendous jump in quality quite refreshing despite derivative storytelling.

The Little Hours is saved by Fred Armisen and Kate Miccuci, the only performers who don't suffer from the film's one-note delivery at some point.

Many have done worse with similar setups, which isn't exactly a glowing recommendation - but hey, if you love Pierce Brosnan enough, you should be fine with I.T.

Missing owes its best moments to learning from 2018’s Searching, but is a bit of a downgrade in terms of Screenlife usage.

The Devil Conspiracy is a high-concept religious action flick with horror influences that sells its ambitions short but still entertains despite itself.

Brad Peyton oversees a futuristic action thriller that frequently plays like a clone of other cautionary tales about AI – but those movies, shows, games, and books don’t have Peyton’s secret weapon: Jennifer Lopez. She’s able to command the screen, bicker with software programs, and sell a convincing heroine’s arc from behind a mech-suit’s windshield.

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.

Scott’s latest is a thrill-ride that blasts through celestial carnage, while building a bigger Alien world that might not be 100% necessary. Out of all the films in the franchise, Alien: Covenant has the least stand-alone potential – but dammit if it’s not a wild, warp-speed-killing-machine adventure.

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

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