Nina Metz

Fundamentally the film succeeds because the musicians themselves are good storytellers.

Always vivid on screen, that quality also existed in her life and self-expression offscreen.

Ultimately the film functions as an elbow to the ribs: “Remember this? Remember how fun it was?”

Players is a perfectly fine — occasionally better-than-fine — romantic comedy starring well-known TV actors who know their way around this kind of material. It’s light and bouncy. There’s plenty to like here.

If the central mystery is unsatisfying, Shalhoub remains the reason to watch. He imbues this difficult, ridiculous man with so much humanity in a performance that is both clenched and silly.

The film struggles to capture what Hudson’s personality was like in private. Nor does it talk about his drinking, which reportedly became an issue later in life. But it’s a terrific portrait of how Hollywood once functioned — and the artifice of it all.

So much of Pamela, a love story is about a woman searching for love from men who saw her as a person to be obtained — and then controlled. The best love story might just be the one she develops with herself.

More than anything, The Princess is a documentary that makes you think about its editing choices. There’s a curious lack of clarity or transparency around many of the unidentified voices (from broadcasters, presumably) that can be heard speaking over the assembled images and you’re left to wonder if this commentary originally accompanied said footage or if Perkins, the director, is mixing and matching.

The film is intimate without feeling particularly deep or complicated. Not that it needs to be.

The relationship at the film’s center remains a combustible mystery.

Though not originally produced with streaming in mind, Finch absolutely feels like it was designed by algorithm.

It’s a lot for everyone to process and I was was drawn in by the conflicting feelings colliding at all once: Mutual grief and joy, but also confusion.

The documentary is strongest when it simply lets Steve — who resembles his father, minus the poof of hair — sift through his memories. There’s a lot of regret and melancholy there. Admiration too. And legitimate anger at how the Ross name itself is no longer his own. It’s a messy and complicated story.

It’s a lovely sort of chemistry that develops in fits and starts over the course of the film, with both Helms and Harrison giving carefully modulated performances that are full of delightfully specific verbal tics and terrific comedic timing.

The film doesn’t seem particularly interested in who Turner is as an artist, or her creative inclinations and musical instincts.

There are colors that pop throughout film — as if, in a nod to the title, drawn from a TV test pattern — and visually this is what stayed with me, from the yellow of Renesha’s dress, to the aqua benches against the white antiseptic floors of the hospital waiting room

Writer-director Lee Isaac Chung is telling his own story here. The rough outlines and even some of the specific details are autobiographical and filtered through his memories of childhood. But he’s also considering these themes from his perspective now as an adult with a child of his own . . . and he straddles the two sides of this line so well, with wit and nuance, but also with such cutting precision.

Early on, the camera is outside looking in through the couple’s windows and it’s as if we’re eavesdropping. That kind of cinematic intimacy is a huge draw, even if things are about to get ugly.