Odie Henderson

If you asked an AI program to create a Wes Anderson movie, you’d get Asteroid City, the latest — and worst — film from the writer-director of “The French Dispatch” (2021) and “Isle of Dogs” (2018).

Nouvelle Vague succeeds in giving you a feel for the films it’s documenting and paying homage to, without the pretentiousness and snobbery those films are accused of conveying. It’s a welcoming gateway drug for newcomers curious about its subject.

The Truth doesn’t have very much of a plot. What little there is serves as a clothesline for its two excellent leads to hang their performances out to dry.

The climax of The Amateur is one of the least satisfying meetings of hero and villain I’ve seen in a while.

What makes “The Fire Inside” so powerful is the uncomfortable questions it poses: How responsible is a person for their family’s well-being?

A documentary that inspires long, gauzy gazes back to the carefree, youthful past of viewers of a certain age.

Hemsworth’s character has more action movie clichés than Carter’s got liver pills.

As it adds extraneous characters, “Oh, Hi!” becomes so frustrating and unbelievable that I wanted to yell advice at the screen.

This film succeeds because it knows how to strike the right balance between laugh-out-loud comedy and quiet, effective drama. The clichés are there, but its heart beats loud enough for us to embrace and forgive them.

If the subject interests you, don’t let my mildly negative review dissuade you from going to see it. I would like to see it again myself, but this time in the version I can share with several of my relatives whose vision is no longer present.

Overall, the film is superbly acted and a lot of fun to watch, which I suppose is not enough hardcore critical substance to hang three and a half stars on, but there you go.

The rage expressed onscreen is understandable, and even cathartic. We can live vicariously through the vengeance of others.

Like all great movies, Blindspotting is a force to be reckoned with and wrestled with. No matter where you land in your assessment, your expectations are guaranteed to be shattered.

While this is a true story, Ozon goes the fictional movie route, taking a bit of dramatic license while keeping most of the actual details intact. The director impressively juggles the large scope of his script while maintaining the sense of intimacy for his male actors that he normally reserves for his female characters.

It’s a slog at over two hours, much of it spent with Marinelli screaming or acting coarse.

Polite Society is a tale of smashing the patriarchy through martial arts and a bit of science fiction, featuring gorgeously shot scenes of action, comedy, and outright terror.

This is an inspiring film, a funny and informative feature whose subjects were creative kindred spirits I’d never seen onscreen before. I realized that I was being represented here, and my unreconciled shame morphed into a sense of liberation.

It’s not a fun time at the movies, but it’s an informative and worthy one.

By the time we get to Ashe’s AIDS-related activism, and the horrible way USA Today twisted his arm into revealing his diagnosis, Citizen Ashe has taken us on a complex, sometimes infuriating tour of its subject’s life. It begins with the birth of an athlete, then morphs into the creation of an activist. The transition is so subtle that you only realize it after the film ends.

This down-to-earth approach works surprisingly well because Southside with You never loses sight of the primary tenet of a great romantic comedy: All you need is two people whom the audience wants to see get together—then you put them together.

Bottoms has a devil-may-care approach to its satire that might have made Jonathan Swift proud. Director Emma Seligman, who co-wrote the script with this film’s star, Rachel Sennott, are unconcerned about offending audiences. If you’ve seen their last film, the 2021 cringe comedy, “Shiva Baby,” you know what you’re in for here.

Gagarine plays like a mournful lament for a community that banded together during hard times before being separated and scattered to the winds, leaving no trace of its communal existence behind.

Though it plays fast and loose with several details, The Burial remains true to its focus on race, class, and how capitalism exploits both regardless of a person’s color or financial means. The message is not subtly delivered, but it’s still effective.

While uncertainty remains about Tenório’s horrible fate, it’s never in doubt how much he was beloved. “They Shot the Piano Player” is a tribute to the musician and to those who knew him best. See it more than once, and hope the theater plays it loud.

The “Cowabunga” dudes have become “Cowa-boring.”

This is one of the year's best films.

This is the generically structured and tamer “approved” version of a much richer story.

Most coming-of-age tales chart a course from childhood to maturity. Scrapper flips the premise, allowing a kid who grew up too fast the luxury of slowing down to savor childhood.

Though I could easily predict what’s coming next in Carry-On, that didn’t stop me from having a good time. The twists were executed successfully, and I liked that the heroic characters did some unlikable things in order to save themselves.

Ultimately, Joy Ride is an uneasy melding of “Girls Trip” and “Return to Seoul”; it’s two pieces that work well by themselves but clash when forced to collaborate.

By the end of “When Fall Is Coming,” we recognize the film for what it is: a character study elevated by Vincent’s superb performance.

I don’t think the third act of Dream Scenario works at all. It’s too obvious. However, its saving grace is Cage, whose petulance in these late sequences never ceases to be as funny as it is uncomfortable to watch.

Music by John Williams is a fine tribute to the magic of a legendary maestro.

There’s an optimism here that coexists with humor, joy, sadness, and more than one laugh-out-loud moment.

This is one of the year’s best films. It’s also one of Lee’s finest joints.

More than just catnip for Trekkies. It’s also an often painful examination of the rocky father/son relationship that existed between filmmaker Adam Nimoy and his famous father, Leonard.

Olympic Pride, American Prejudice tackles its subject in a straightforward manner freed from dramatic license and the fear of box office failure.

Unfortunately, Durkin’s script is so shallow that every character is reduced to a simple sketch.

Inside Out 2 is serviceable entertainment. That’s a sad thing to say about a Pixar film, especially when you consider they made classics like “Toy Story,” “The Incredibles,” and, well, the first “Inside Out.”

The Fall Guy isn’t just a throwback to the 1980s television show that inspired it; it’s an old-fashioned romp that knows how to build on its gags.

The backstory between Donny and Dame is too heavy and complex for a movie that aims to be a crowd-pleaser, but Majors and Jordan do their best to balance the material.

The biggest problem I had with this visually unappealing cinematic version of “Wicked,” is that it can’t handle the tonal shifts.

As a star-studded (and highly fictionalized) history lesson, Air is massively entertaining and one of the best films of 2023 so far. It also works as a nostalgia piece for people like me who, in their youth, lusted after the pricey footwear.

Chol Soo Lee’s complicated story deserves to be told; this film does a good job telling it.

Beyond the Lights makes unapologetically damning statements about the music industry’s treatment of women, yet it never feels preachy. It strikes a risky, though successful balancing act between being immensely entertaining as a musical feature and making dramatic, important statements about depression, self-worth and female empowerment.

Unfortunately, I didn’t laugh very much, and the story didn’t work as well as the movies that inspired it.

Raiders! is a love poem to film geeks everywhere, giving them heroes whose own geekdom is a pinnacle of aspiration.

Jay Kelly would make a good double feature with “Sentimental Value,” another film about a driven moviemaker seen from the perspective of the daughters, not the father. I think this film is the better of the two, even if it is more conventional in its storytelling.

It does what all good documentaries do: it made me want to read up and be educated more on its subject. And what a great and inspiring subject Pauli Murray is.

Driver and Cruz are perfect surnames for actors starring in a movie called “Ferrari.” That was just one of the many thoughts I had as the minutes slowly ticked by. At least the loud sound mix kept me awake.

Horror ultimately gives way to irritation as the film veers into violent shock tactics and misplaced blame. What begins as a righteous indictment devolves into an unnecessary vendetta.

I couldn’t help but see a parallel between the De’Snakes’s plight and numerous historical atrocities where minorities were slandered, brutalized, and robbed of their rightful property. That Disney somehow manages to deliver this message, Trojan-horse style and without heavy-handedness, in an entertaining feature for all ages, is the true success of “Zootopia 2.”

At almost two hours, “One of Them Days” does lag a bit. But even when it gets sluggish, there’s still a sisterly moment to enjoy or a laugh to be had.

Terrence Malick is one of the producers of Almost Holy, and while Hoover doesn’t go for a full interpretation/realization of his style, there are touches that evoke the director’s work, especially in the film’s last sequence.

Director Andrew Ahn proficiently handles the numerous plot lines, character conflicts, and the tonal shifts between raunch and sweetness.

It plays like a Marvel superhero movie had Marvel been run by Suge Knight.

Robinson’s dedicated commitment to the bit is a given, but the bit is so one-dimensional that Craig stops being believable or human.

The filmmakers clearly intended this to be a goofy rollercoaster ride, so M3GAN is a success.

The script, by JT Mollner, does an excellent job streamlining King’s book.

While the visuals are often stunning, and the first hour has a loose, raunchy charm, “Mickey 17″ wears out its welcome long before its overlong, nearly t2½-hour runtime ends.

Though this isn’t very gory, the intensity level is impressive in the haunting scenes, so much so that, at one point, I caught myself watching through my fingers. The sound design also deserves mention, because a haunted house is only as good as its noises, creaks, and moans.

That Guy Dick Miller is the perfect title for Elijah Drenner’s wildly entertaining documentary chronicling the 50-plus years of Miller’s career.

Luce is the worst kind of provocateur; it tosses out all manner of outrageous ideas and then, like those pathetic dudes on Twitter, it yells out “DEBATE ME!” As soon as you accept the challenge, the film folds like cheap origami. And this film has a lot to toss at you.

While I enjoyed “Elio,” and I appreciated the animation and Rob Simonsen’s lovely orchestral score, I felt that this film was more tailor-made for adult sci-fi fans rather than their young kids. To be clear, I’m not saying you should leave your kids at home — there’s nothing objectionable here. I’m just saying they might be as bored as you usually are at some of these movies.

At its heart, this is a film about sisterhood.

Dope alternates between being shockingly tone-deaf and surprisingly on-point.

Candyman caters to fans of the original without sacrificing its own vision and story.

The screenplay, by directors Jonathan Goldstein and John Francis Daley and co-writer Michael Gilio, tries to evoke the feeling that “D&D: HAT” is being written on the fly as the movie unfolds. While their attempt is valiant, it takes away from the task of creating a world that we’ll want to revisit or see again (you know there will be sequels).

As for the fights: There are plenty of well-choreographed battles in The Final Master. The award-winning choreography eschews wire work, keeping the action sequences squarely on the ground.

Dern is excellent, as usual, and her scenes with Arnett feel realistic. The screenplay by Cooper, Arnett, and Mark Chappell is really thin, however, and I didn’t find any of these people compelling.

These documentarians masterfully construct their vision to elevate and serve their subject. The result is more low-key than one might expect from a movie about rap. It is also more powerful, bypassing the expected artist braggadocio to stand on the rarely visited street corner of sociology and hip-hop music.

With this entertaining, funny, and informative movie, McKenzie can add documentary filmmaker to his CV. I doubt it will convince anyone who has bought into the legends of cryptocurrency to change their outlook, but skeptics will definitely get a kick out of this three year journey, which started during the pandemic in 2020.

Ultimately, I respected the dramatic destination at which the film arrived, but I kept asking myself if the trip was really necessary. Sometimes you admire a movie more than you like it.

So listless and dry that the only jolt of electricity I experienced was when the screener blew up seven minutes before the end. The half hour I spent fighting with the Magnolia Pictures website was more suspenseful and interesting than anything I saw in their product.

It’s a scary and fun amusement park ride that also elicits a surprisingly tender emotional response.

This is quite a good sports documentary, moving and unafraid of making you work for its pleasures.

Though the plot gets a tad thin toward the end, “Heretic” does a good job of pelting us with uncomfortable questions.

By virtue of its subject, Always in Season is going to be a very hard sit for many, but this film should be seen. It is an unflinching look at how the racial sins of the past remain flowing through the arteries of the present day.

Exit 8 is based on a best-selling video game released in 2023. I have not played it, but if it’s anything like director Genki Kawamura’s adaptation, I’d say it’s enough to drive a person crazy.

Each one of these performers uses the same adjective to describe the songwriter: “relentless.” Many more interviewees will testify that Warren earned the bracelet she wears — the one that says “relentless as [BLEEP].”

Most franchises use a cookie-cutter approach to their entries, so it’s refreshing when a sequel tells its story in a different tenor than its predecessors. On that note, “Predator: Badlands” is a rousing success.

Through Ferreira’s skillful navigation of her character’s growth, and Leguizamo’s preternatural ability to show kindness in earnest, the film worked its way around my defenses and hit me square in the tear ducts more than once.