Moira Macdonald

It’s an unfinished story, which leaves Dancer slightly unsatisfying, as if we’re abandoning a book mid-chapter. But what a pleasure to wallow in the talent of a ballet rock star — and to watch a troubled young man find peace in a split-second of perfection.

It’s a bunch of plastic blocks that have an adventure, and it’s basically insane; not quite as pleasantly so as the first movie (the element of astonished surprise isn’t there), but hey, that’s a high bar. Everything is … oh, damn it, there I go again.

What shines through is the beauty of Guy Godfree’s cinematography — the light has a lovely, soft stillness to it, like a painting — and a remarkable performance by Hawkins, whose impossibly wide smile seems to bring the sun.

As a summer disaster movie, Twisters works well enough, though other than Powell it lacks the enjoyable goofiness of its predecessor.

Mann, as he showed two years ago in "The Insider," is a wonderfully idiosyncratic storyteller, sketching out a plot line with quick scenes, jumping into the middle of a story and letting us figure out who's who.

Drop gets the job done, and even throws in an excellent cocktail-piano rendition of “Baby Shark.” Go see it on a first date, if you’re brave.

Filmed in harsh grays and cruel light, interspersed with warm home movies of the family in a happier time, it’s a terribly sad and often mesmerizing story.

Great acting is a con game, of the highest order, and it’s a pleasure to be Moore’s mark.

In other words: yes, it’s fun.

The film is over quickly, before I’d seen quite enough of Westwood’s fanciful clothing, or heard quite enough of her voice.

Ultimately, the film’s unwillingness to go deeper makes it fall flat.

You don’t really watch Suspiria, you endure it.

Every dog in this sweetly earnest movie seems to have a strong sense of responsibility.

Perhaps Downsizing needed to be downsized a bit; as it is, it’s an intriguing concept that slips away.

It’s a feel-good film about dreams, about obsession, about believing in yourself when nobody else seems to be doing it for you, and Hawkins carries it with effortless ease.

Florid but warmhearted — much like the man at its center — The Happy Prince is a haunting portrait of the aftermath of betrayal; of how the master of comedy became a tragedy.

Byrne, a recent Oscar nominee for “If I Had Legs I’d Kick You,” holds it together.

This isn’t really a movie, but a delicious wallow, and regular movie rules don’t apply.

Gere, who somehow seems to make himself physically smaller here, creates a character both infuriating and endearing.

This film celebrates Halston’s work but shows more interest in the man — and the unexpected corporate drama — behind it.

There seem to be entire worlds behind every sentence in this film, floating somewhere just past our line of vision, calling to us as they slip away.

Does “Anna” deliver on its billing? Well, it does for a while. For its first half, the movie’s blend of earnest teen crooning and dismembered blood-geyser heads is pretty entertaining.

It’s a good story, well told, though you have to forgive Hood for indulging in a little journalistic cliché.

This movie, while perhaps not quite as charming as the 2000 original “Chicken Run” (lightning rarely strikes twice, even on chicken farms), is a hoot.

It’s pretty, it’s melodramatic-verging-on-silly, and if you like this sort of thing it’s great fun.

Nobody in this movie would be out of place in a glamorous old-Hollywood drama, which is kind of what On Swift Horses is trying to be — and, most of the time, coming pretty close.

Ultimately, The Electrical Life of Louis Wain is made enjoyable by its human and feline actors, despite the sadness of the material, and it left me wanting to know more about its subject, which I suppose is the point.

Ultimately Denial works, thanks to its strong cast — particularly Spall, who gives Irving a slightly mad gleefulness, and Weisz, whose smart, tough Deborah chafes against the quiet acquiescence expected of her.

While it’s still an enjoyable novelty to spend time during an action movie wondering where I could buy the hero’s boots, it’s no substitute for a good story.

Condon doesn’t shy away from the violence and tragedy at the heart of this story, but he lets us see the tender, hard-forged connection between Molina and Valentín, and also lets us disappear into a world of tinselly Hollywood beauty, just as they do.

Unsane has an uncanny way of reflecting the world through Sawyer’s eyes, sometimes amplified by the medication she’s forced to take. It’s not a pretty place.

Field, carrying the movie on her shoulders and handing it to us for our approval, makes us root for wistful Doris. Single-handedly, she makes the movie work. I didn’t always believe Doris’ behavior, but I knew I wanted to see her smile again.

You can see why McAvoy was drawn to the role — it’s as if he’s playing every character in a very populated if not particularly well-scripted play — and he demonstrates a shellacked creepiness that’s effective. But Shyamalan can’t find much else that’s new or appealing in this overlong girls-in-peril exercise.

Key and Peele’s fast-talking chemistry, as they shift their language instantly from suburbanite to street (a theme in many of their sketches), make Clarence and Rell’s transformation into bellowing, gun-wielding tough guys and back again feel fresh and often very funny.

As always, it’s a pleasure to watch Branagh’s Poirot as he watches, never missing a thing; may he return, with a more worthy corpse next time around.

Sadly, Friend Request is not even the first movie to travel that harrowing Dead Girl Who Still Maintains an Active Facebook Presence road.

It was a pleasure to become happily lost in this unique film’s world of color and line, and to see two filmmakers’ mad dream come true.

This may not be quite the movie that Ederle deserves, but it’s the one that we’ve got, and it’s definitely a story worth telling.

Should you be looking for narrative cohesion, look elsewhere. “Beetlejuice Beetlejuice” is bananas, in its high-end way — bananas wrapped in gorgeous Colleen Atwood costumes, and performed by actors who are clearly having a ball.

To paraphrase a song that pops up in the film — of course it does — during one of countless swoony moments, you can’t help falling in love with this movie.

Its honesty and power makes it feel large; you live among these characters in their weary trailer park, aching for them.

Kong: Skull Island won’t win any points for the brilliance of its writing (or for the way it reduces a terrific actor like Larson to a personality-free camera-clicker) — but oh, that ape

Ultimately, her run and Roseanne for President! meet the same fate: not quite entertaining enough to qualify as comedy, nor quite thoughtful enough to take seriously.

Those who love books, picturesque English villages and getting lost in actors’ faces should be very happy

None of these stories feel monumental, and all of them resolve themselves neatly in a quarter-hour or so. But they have a kindness to them; a way of seeing people as they are, with their flaws and their goodness.

Most important: The volume of bloodletting is undeniably impressive and frequently explosive, and the filmmakers effectively employ a lot of creepy remixes of the “Swan Lake” theme.

You leave Touched with Fire wishing there were a little more to it — the screenplay needed to flesh out Carla and Marco a bit more as people, rather than Bipolar Poets in Love — but undeniably moved.

It plants its gaze on Lee — and on Elliott, who takes The Hero in his hands and makes something quietly moving from it.

There are moments now and then that register, particularly early in the movie when we meet the regulars on the musical-impersonator circuit.

There’s a funny, offbeat movie lurking in the details here.

I can’t say I truly enjoyed watching Babylon, or that I’d ever want to see it again, but I definitely haven’t stopped thinking about it since screening it earlier this month.

Batra has assembled a strong cast, a thoughtful screenplay (by Nick Payne), a meticulous attention to detail — all of which make The Sense of an Ending a pleasure to watch. But the book ever-so-subtly slams you in the heart; the movie, just as subtly, only walks near it.

It’s a movie full of small pleasures.

The film’s light, sardonic approach is a tricky match with its subject matter: 9/11; power-crazed, empty-souled politicians; dark ambitions. It’s entertaining, sure, but a lot of us might not feel like laughing.

The Ocean’s 8 cast makes up for any deficits in its execution (Awkwafina, in particular, can make even the most mundane line funny); these women are just great fun to hang with, and I’d happily sit still for a slew of sequels.

If atmosphere is what you want in a movie, Emerald Fennell's psychological thriller Saltburn has enough to fill a multiplex all by itself.

Sometimes too many ideas collide into each other — a zippy back-and-forth structure in the screenplay gets abandoned, and the pacing in the final act feels off — but Birds of Prey is never boring and often great fun.

The first-rate cast — right down to that infant, who displays Streep-like instincts for the camera — toils mightily. But sadly, they’re trapped in what becomes a sort of A-list Nicholas Sparks melodrama Down Under.

It’s a pleasant Christmas-season offering; both mild (read: family-friendly) and sweet.

Bullock and Tatum take hold of the material and turn it into an enchanted screwball.

What’s crucial here, as in the original film, is the chemistry between the cast members. And though McKinnon’s the standout, the four women click together like Legos.

Wolfs is a great idea for a crime comedy, but it isn’t a particularly great movie.

You find yourself focusing on the details of Alexandra Byrne’s flowing costumes, or on the wince-inducing meticulousness of Robbie’s post-pox makeup, rather than caught up in the story. Except when Ronan’s face catches the light; there, Mary Queen of Scots finds its fire.

Allied runs out of steam before its overwrought ending. It’s as if the film, struggling under the weight of the classic epics it recalls, just gives up.

Motherless Brooklyn is lovely to look at — the cast, in addition to their acting talents, all look great in ’50s styles — and I enjoyed the noir-y jazz of the dialogue. (“Everybody looks like everybody to me,” a bartender tells Lionel, who’s looking for someone in the shadows of a club.) But it’s easily half an hour longer than it needs to be, and it’s full of moments that don’t go anywhere.

As sweet as honey but without the stickiness, Christopher Robin is a gentle delight — for children, and for former children.

Wonder Woman 1984 feels a bit perfunctory; just another massive superhero movie, with little fresh brought to the mix.

Ultimately, Moving On is about friendship, and who better than Grace and Frankie to show us that?

Isn’t It Romantic both spoofs rom-com conventions and embraces them; it’s a tricky balance, but it doesn’t fall off the wire.

It’s a pretty picture and a sweet adventure, and sometimes that’s enough.

All of this silliness is actually great fun, particularly the bantering chemistry between Johnson and Statham, who spend much of the movie squabbling and calling each other names.

House of Gucci is no masterpiece, but it’s often crazy good fun.

Sometimes, miscasting can be very interesting, in the hands of an actor who knows what she’s doing — and Kidman is definitely that. Here, she creates a nuanced and believable version of Ball (and of “Lucy,” the character Ball played on her sitcom “I Love Lucy,” though we don’t see much of her), meticulously introducing us to a serious, thoughtful woman obsessed with the details of comedy, who understood what it meant to have power at a time when few women did.

The message of Bad Moms is that being a mother today is impossible... But it’s a hammer brought down with a light, goofy touch (maybe too light; the male characters could use some punching-up), with a gleefully charming central trio that I enjoyed hanging out with.

Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again doesn’t pretend to be anything more than what it is: sweet, silly, sun-splashed absurdity, with a thumping disco beat. The world is a mess these days; some of us might just need this movie.

It’s hard to get too excited about Sing, which takes a bit too long to travel its familiar path, but it’s also quite impossible to dislike it.

While the structure occasionally feels a bit awkward, On the Basis of Sex has the kind of crowd-pleasing story that skims over any minor shortcomings; by its end, you’re ready to cheer.

Directed by Carlos Saldanha, who co-directed "Ice Age," the film feels visually richer than its predecessor (thanks to all that plain white ice melting) but has the same brand of uncomplicated all-ages charm.

The whole endeavor is so relentlessly lovable, like Bridget herself, that I defy anyone to not enjoy themselves.

There’s much pleasure to be had in Elvis & Nixon from its two lead performances.

Like so many small-screen-to-big-screen efforts, Absolutely Fabulous: The Movie isn’t really a movie, just a stretched-out TV episode with a parade of cameos and boatloads of Champagne.

The film doesn’t have much to say about its central questions, and its ending feels inevitable but also unearned.

While Phoenix is always more than watchable (his scary-Fred-Astaire dance moves, born from Arthur’s habit of watching old movies with his mother, are both mesmerizing and disturbing), “Joker” really has nowhere to go. Its characters are one-note cartoony, but fun is the last thing on this movie’s mind; it’s all despair, from its opening scenes on downward.

Bailey gives a glowing performance of effortless starshine; her singing voice has both sweetness and power, and her smile is the sort on which dreams dance.

The fashion alone, designed by the great Jenny Beavan (an Oscar winner for “A Room with a View” and “Mad Max: Fury Road”), is worth the ticket price; if that doesn’t do it for you, there’s also slyly brilliant work from the two Emmas — Stone and Thompson — working hard to upstage the gorgeous outfits in which they’re swathed.

If you go expecting a slightly quirky romantic drama with touches of magic realism, not to mention the pleasure of seeing Ryan in one of her rare screen appearances these days, I think you might leave happy.

Because these actors are Weisz, on whose beautiful face emotions flicker like fireflies, and Shannon, whose faintly mournful expressions imply a profound story not yet told, the film is never less than interesting.

Even Deutch’s charming radiance (she never entirely sells Sam’s nasty side) can’t quite get us through the slog of this plot.

The movie gets lost in its focus on flash and speed, and forgets about the man — and the fine, quiet actor — at its center.

Thanks to Dench, Victoria & Abdul is constantly engaging and at times moving.

Unfortunately, the filmmakers — busily splashing the film in crayon-colored light, vaguely sinister pop music and jittery camerawork — forgot to give Vee and Handsome Stranger (his name’s Ian) much personality.

Political satire is one of the trickiest of genres; this one, running out of steam and nerve, ultimately becomes a too-familiar example of another genre: the 93-minute movie that feels way, way too long.

Roman J. Israel, Esq., isn’t as good as the performance at its center, but perhaps that’s inevitable.

Mostly, we watch Binoche’s face, in eloquent, mesmerizing close-up; pain and grief engulf her expression like water flooding into a still pool. She has few words. She doesn’t need them.

Lights Out is an effective, tidy little chiller; basically the same sneak-up-in-the-dark scare over and over. But hey, as we’ve learned through decades of horror movies, that stuff works.

This stranger-in-a-strange-land mood piece has an appealingly serene pace.

Hope Gap is a deeply sad film, and maybe not what a lot of us are in the mood for these days, but it’s ultimately uplifting, in its quiet way.

Wicked: For Good could have been better, but it’s still a glorious journey to Oz.