Monica Castillo

Then there’s a third act that’s so wildly out of left field, it shifts the tone completely. It’s an almost comical departure, but it’s certainly a disappointing one.

The result is sometimes dizzying, enchanting or confounding, but it is certainly never boring.

“The Kill Team” is both a tense moral thriller and a disheartening account of our country’s actions abroad.

While the documentary’s heart is in the right place, and loaded with many historical goodies for silent movie fans and those interested in championing women directors, the way “Be Natural” presents its findings feels unorganized — like walking through a busy museum exhibit with too many objects, not all of them especially necessary.

Although the characters tend to lean heavily on caricature, Rodriguez, Wise, and Snow seem to have plenty of chemistry with each other.

When all the puzzle-like pieces come together, the movie’s characters, story, score and emotions soar. The pace of that progress may feel slow, but things never get too quiet. It’s a movie with a racing pulse, and you can feel its heart in every frame.

Despite its hard message, Dogman comes across as sympathetic for any gentle soul trying to make a deal with the devil. May you heed this movie’s warning and not end up like poor Marcello.

Screen adaptations of well-known books are a tricky art. Stray too far from the source material, and purists will be upset. Stick too close to the text, and you risk alienating others. Native Son sits somewhere in-between paint-by-number loyalty and artistic interpretation.

Ditching many of the high school movie tropes for idiosyncratic raunchy comedy, Lorain’s film deliberately calls out the double standard that still exists while letting her flawed young characters still have fun.

The debate around sexual harassment is one many are having around the world, far beyond hashtags and press releases. Working Woman is a part of that global and cultural conversation, yet it never loses that personal focus of one woman’s experience.

Ramen Shop believes that the healing power of food can satisfy our hunger for comfort in difficult times, and that should be filling enough for now.

It’s frustratingly simple, the dialogue over-explains everything and while there are a few solid moments of suspense, there’s too much dead air in-between.

Its terrifying story about death still leaves audiences with much to think about long after the credits roll, and the twists that lead to a new ending are fun to follow. Thirty years after the original movie frightened audiences, its source material has given new life to one of the best Stephen King adaptations in the past decade.

The Day Shall Come is greatest when skewering power and shining a light on grave legal overreach. That we can laugh about it is great, but it’s a sign of our own security, of how unlikely we feel that we would be targeted in the same way. For others, laughing at this movie may not be so easy.

Good Boys is a snappy comedy that pokes fun at those painful pubescent years and, by the credits, grows up into a somewhat mature comedy about friendship.

Like “The Shining,” there are a number of different ways to interpret Jordan Peele’s excellent new horror movie, Us. Every image seems to be a clue for what’s about to happen or a stand-in for something outside the main story of a family in danger. Peele’s film, which he directed, wrote and produced, will likely reward audiences on multiple viewings, each visit revealing a new secret, showing you something you missed before in a new light.

It would have been interesting to see a better version of a working class “Eat Pray Love” or “How Stella Got Her Groove Back” that swaps thrilling destinations outside the U.S. for a bus ticket somewhere in the States to reconnect with who you are. Juanita feels like an approximation of this experience.

A movie steeped in the traditions of film noir, and its narrative will become complicated very quickly. Winterbottom, who also wrote and co-produced the movie, creates a story about gorgeous people committing crimes and double-crossing each other, where no one is innocent.

It’s a letdown for a movie that has its heart in the right place to resort to so many clichés.

Birds of Passage weaves a tale that is both familiar yet unique, yet it is so culturally tied to the Wayúu, it would be impossible to move it outside the Guajira. The film fits very comfortably in the genres of a gangster movie and an epic, with supernatural forces forewarning what’s to happen in the earthly realm.

The visual bonanza cooked up by Rodriguez, cinematographer Bill Pope and editors Stephen E. Rivkin and Ian Silverstein is enough to power through any narrative bumps with quickly paced action and bleak, yet colorful, imagery.

Midnight Family is both a compassionate portrait of a working-class family and a frightening ride through a broken healthcare system that risks the lives of both patients and providers like the Ochoa family.

The Mexican film now has a Hollywood remake, one that adds new elements to the story but is less coherent in its message.

Romano’s performance in Paddleton is an incredible work of humor. He creates a character capable of annoying anyone who’s just met him. Many of the movie’s funniest moments allow Romano to play this awkward being to his full, cringe-inducing potential.

Despite the film’s few imperfections, it’s still enjoyable to watch the cast of older actors refuse to age out of a young man’s genre.

Whittaker’s performance finds a balance between the tragic and comic scenarios her character experiences.

The Kid Who Would Be King is a charming story of fantasy, pop-culture references and myth-making. It’s a movie with the playful camaraderie of “Goonies” and a few elements from ’80s sagas — like “Labyrinth,” “E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial,” “The NeverEnding Story” and “Legend” — where young people go on character-building adventures.

It’s a simple, stripped-down premise that transcends cultural specificity.

Performances aside, Glass is a pretty mixed bag of exposition-filled dull moments and pedantic dialogue.

Unfortunately, Mary Poppins Returns falls quite short of being practically perfect in every way. The cast puts on a good show, but very little can be done to salvage the forgettable numbers by Marc Shaiman and Scott Wittman and dance routines that already look dated.

Days after watching the movie, I still have some reservations about how abuse is shown in the film, but it’s hauntingly effective. I haven’t been able to shake those images since.

In its modest efforts, That Way Madness Lies embraces a kind of sensitive nuance you don’t always see in depictions of mental illness in the movies.

Not all tearful screaming sessions translate well from the page to the screen, and this is an excruciating example of overkill.

Rourke, who comes to the film industry from the theater, has an eye for pageantry and staging that make even dull conversations about power struggles feel lively.

It’s one of those rare horror movies to leave you with good holiday cheer.

Jinn holds several beautiful elements, especially in its central mother-daughter story.

A movie with good intentions but is uneven in tone, leaving me with mixed feelings. It felt like the speech was preempting any criticism with sentimentality. The uneasiness continued in the film’s wild swings between tragedy and goofy comedy.

Although the film’s premise is based on a true story, Luis Ortega’s El Angel is not a faithful biopic. Somehow, the facts are darker than their fictional counterparts.

Maria by Callas offers a new side to her legend, one that was also vulnerable, smart but also lonely, a fate that sometimes befalls headstrong women.

It’s also an odd time to release a movie that embraces collaborating with the Russians and painting bad and good guys with such broad strokes. This puts Hunter Killer in murky geopolitical waters I don’t think it knows how to navigate. Neither the movie or Butler is nearly entertaining enough to distract us.

In her search for closure to this bizarre chapter in her life, Tan recreates Cardona’s steps to make sense of why he would steal the teens’ work. Her journey takes several dark turns, which she captures in a crisp digital format which contrasts nicely against the dreamy footage of the original “Shirkers,” which was its own twisted take on melodrama, surrealism and existentialism.

Chomko’s grandmother was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease, and she takes great effort to recreate a sense of that unique kind of pain, where the person’s memories are lost but they are standing in front of you.

The movie feels instructional without getting too preachy, taking time to explain various inequalities and barriers facing black Americans, typically in exchanges between father and daughter.

Far from feeling like a eulogy, the tone of 306 Hollywood is magnificently playful.

Science Fair melts your heart almost as soon as it begins, with an emotional clip that went viral of a young winner who is so overjoyed, he cries on stage while holding his award.

The documentary connects his present day work ethic to his past, and contrasts yesteryear’s heartbreaks to the large, family-filled parties he still enjoys. Jones did so much more than just unleash some of pop’s most successful records of all time.

Dan Fogelman’s Life Itself packs in enough narrative twists and turns to leave viewers with a sense of emotional whiplash. One tragedy bleeds into another so often that the events begin to blur.

Though it's a well-done family drama, White Boy Rick is a half-told story that only lightly incorporates the deeper issues of systemic injustice. The black characters feel shortchanged in comparison to their white co-stars; even Rick’s closest friend, Boo (RJ Cyler), feels unremarkable. Despite these flaws, the performances in the movie are strong.

Can You Ever Forgive Me? comes from a place of understanding and love that few other biopics truly dive into, and it makes this difficult character a joy to meet.

Rich in personal archival footage and first-hand accounts. It’s as if every other clip in the movie is a peek into a bygone era.

Minihan’s stylish film taps into our deepest fear as women, queer folks, or survivors of domestic abuse that the person we love may be the reason we end up in a body bag.

Were it not for Byrne’s endearingly optimistic performance, most of the charm of Juliet, Naked would be swept away.

Through painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable, even if most of us are not married to or dating secret millionaires. And though the film may feel overstuffed, it all works in service of its story.

Sticky racial politics aside, there are a few inspired moments in Madeline’s Madeline, and most of them belong to the fiercely talented Helena Howard.

While the plot is familiar, Katie Silberman’s witty script plays with expectations.

Through his efforts, McKay captures a genuine sense of the bittersweet reality of the American dream and the people who give up their only weekly day of rest just to keep it alive.

Mr. Warth, who wrote the screenplay with Miles Barstead, creates a flawed tale of female friendship and the artist’s everlasting struggle. Unfortunately, Dim the Fluorescents can’t keep its story together.

Alison closely resembles Jennifer Lawrence’s character in “Winter’s Bone,” another self-sufficient young woman whose family and community turn against her. This movie is not as tense, but it gets close thanks to Ms. Agron’s resolute performance and the movie’s hostile small town setting.

The women’s missteps seem to come straight out of a cautionary morality play. And the movie’s dismal outlook even extends to the dimly-lit cinematography. It doesn’t need a miracle to see the light. It needs a full pardon.

Santa & Andrés begins as a film about separation and pain, but becomes a movie about reconciliation and healing.

Some of the tougher interviews suggest that Mr. Milewski would like Dream Boat to be more substantial, but that impulse is mostly kept at bay in favor of lighter scenes.

The movie’s premise isn’t as bad as the forced, unnatural dialogue. Even the reliable Ms. Applegate and Mr. Church can’t salvage the screenwriter Jeremy Catalino’s clumsy lines.

Such a dynamic personality as Mr. Turner’s could use a more dynamic documentary to illuminate it. As it is, “Dealt” remains a pleasing — if inoffensive — portrait.

Several scenes have a warm, rosy tinge to them, even during the sisters’ meanest blowups, as if to assure the audience that, for these two, there will always be a reconciliation.

The movie can shift unevenly from effusive love letter to travel lust to sentimental moment, but that doesn’t break the fantasy.

Fortunately, Mr. Spicer’s earnest performance bolsters many of the weaker spots in Mr. Shoulberg’s script.

The movie flouts its intolerance in an attempt at provocative humor. Unless you laugh at fossils, I have no idea why you should buy a ticket to gawk at this dinosaur.

A sweet and affecting story, one that forgoes the awkward moments of teenage romance and offers the possibility of reliving a bit of our youthful amor — if just for the film’s 90-minute running time.

The jokes are thin, the computer animation is wanting and the inane plot is a series of set pieces strung together.

The film’s narrative simplicity can be charming or frustrating, depending on your feelings about awkward dialogue and overreacting actors.

While zine-style animated sequences and VHS taped interviews enliven the pace, the documentary is burdened by too much minutiae. Not every scar earned at a concert deserves to be immortalized in a documentary.

The result is a dazzlingly imaginative movie about survival.

There are almost too many references to other movies for this one to become its own monster.

Despite its gorgeous views and a pair of strong turns from veteran Cuban actors Perugorría and García, the film doesn't connect to the heart of its central character.

The camera looks lovingly at the Fifties American muscle cars while also capturing the enthusiasm and hope in these men's stories.

Gayle's good-natured fight to reconcile with a person who sees nothing wrong with her own behavior proves both a fascinating character study and an intimate portrayal of a mother's love turned hostile.

The energy never falters as the film jumps from talking-head testimonies to on-the-streets footage of rallies and riots.

The movie's flair for soap-opera-style pile-on becomes emotionally draining rather than moving.

For a movie all about passion and the need to express yourself artistically, it is the most halfhearted "you got served" to hit theaters this year.

Difret is painful but profound, skirting the pitfalls of the inspirational biopic for something more grounded and remarkable. Its authenticity extends beyond its central characters, conveying a very real sense of what is at stake.

Fontaine, also the writer and director here, aims high and crashes spectacularly, unable to keep the Jenga tower of a story together — or from being uninteresting.

Becoming Bulletproof extols that virtue of inclusivity by not only showing the diverse actors onscreen, but giving them the chance to share their behind-the-scenes stories as well. Unfortunately, the documentary never transcends its rather conventional structure, relying instead on the do-good intentions of its audience to see it through.

The film is rife with homages to the "bullied kid learns martial arts" classic, The Karate Kid, but never quite finds its own footing in the ring. The editing is choppy and the dialogue sophomoric, however hard the actors try to deliver it dramatically.