Peter Debruge

In the annals of Mediterranean island love stories, Respiro reflects the effortless charm of a film like "Il Postino," rather than the untidy manufactured romance of another "Captain Corelli's Mandolin."

In the end, it's not the answer to the kitchen mystery that matters but the revelation that there's ultimately no difference between this bachelor scientist and his bachelor subject.

A brilliant little exercise. As a horror movie, it packs one genuine scare after another, right up to the moment of its inconceivably ghastly end. As a mystery, it unfolds with an almost supernatural elegance. And as a metaphor for the movies themselves, it's truly exceptional.

Think of how M. Night Shyamalan redefined the ghost story (The Sixth Sense), the superhero creation myth (Unbreakable), and the alien-invasion epic (Signs)--and you may get a sense of the genius behind this fascinating new horror film.

With The History of Concrete, John Wilson takes the least interesting subject imaginable — the dull gray composite used for sidewalks, overpasses and that great big church in “The Brutalist” — and crafts what’s likely to be the most entertaining documentary of the 2026 Sundance Film Festival.

The film is a snarl of contradictions, starting with the discrepancy between Mann’s obsessive demand for realism and the consistently implausible screenplay.

If you can get past the idea that the two-ton lion threatening Idris Elba and his family in the movie is a singularly frightening combination of ones and zeros, not killer instinct and claws, then Beast is a blast.

With the aid of Johnsen’s doc to overcome the obstacles China has put in his path, Ai’s voice carries louder than ever before.

Taken literally, The Successor is a chilling thing to watch. Step back and imagine what it’s saying on a metaphorical level, and it’s clear that writer-director Xavier Legrand has crafted one of the most damning depictions of patriarchal power imaginable.

The Fall Guy is funny, it’s sexy, and it features the boy toy version of “Barbie” MVP Ryan Gosling — which is to say, this time around, he embodies the ultimate action figure.

Precisely the sort of intelligent, human-scale adult drama audiences insist no one makes anymore.

Summertime celebrates the unique couple’s chemistry, allowing their smiles to convey the transformative effect they have on one another.

Disguised as a drunken cartwheel through expat paradise, Mark Jarrett’s striking feature juggles questions of mortality along its rowdy cross-country path.

Audiences want to see Diana Nyad succeed, but the pleasure of the experience comes from watching actors become these characters. No matter how tricky such feats must have been to re-create, you get the impression that everyone involved was having a blast.

[Pálmason's] a cinematic original whose voice grows stronger and more certain with each film.

Nina’s confessional set takes the already-raw portrait to a whole other level. All About Nina is very funny, but with that scene, it breaks our hearts, forcing us to reevaluate Nina’s recklessness while reiterating the lesson of the last year: that we never know what someone has been through until that person chooses to share it, and that going public takes courage, as there’s no going back.

Air reveals how an exceptional Black athlete leveraged his talent and the power of being pursued by a bunch of white men in suits, to change the game. Not just basketball, but the whole field of celebrity endorsements.

Life has a way of getting complicated when you introduce temptation, and though Union County can be frustratingly simple at times, the stakes are life and death.

By forcing Puss to contemplate his priorities, the sequel more than justifies its own existence, while paving the way for how his path meets the big green guy’s.

The movie’s not only appropriate for teen audiences, but also constructive in the way it invites viewers to consider and discuss issues of intolerance and hypocrisy, even as it encourages those who don’t fit the straight, marriage-oriented paradigm to embrace their own identities.

The satire is firmly seated in character, and no one understands how well a good homicide can elucidate character better than Wheatley.

As always, Eastwood respects our intelligence. And yet, Juror No. 2 registers as something of an anomaly in his oeuvre: It ranks among his quietest films, forgoing spectacle in favor of self-reflection.

The formula may be familiar, but the personalities are completely fresh, yielding a menagerie of loveable — if downright ugly — cartoon critters banding together to help these two incompatible roommates from ending up on the streets.

The pic owes its believability to Asser, who served as a therapist similar to Oliver’s character, drawing from his experience to shape the world. Asser brings more than just realism, however, crafting the central father-son relationship on the foundation of classical Greek tragedy.

Soft & Quiet is deeply unpleasant to watch, but that’s the point.

Meticulously acted, gorgeously shot and hilariously insightful about the strange, inarticulable ways people can get on one another’s nerves, this psychological thriller takes its premise to surprising, darkly comic extremes.

The characters can be so grating, watching The Divide feels like sticking your head in the garbage disposal. But as unwieldy as the multi-tentacled narrative can be — just think of the logistics required to stage it! — the experience adds up to something unshakeable.

Inspired by prize-winning French author Ernest Pérochon’s 1924 novel, director Xavier Beauvois’ emotionally devastating adaptation — which some may find as arduous as the wartime chapter it depicts — dispenses with a fair amount of the suffering to be found in the book, forgoing the contemporary tendency toward gritty, handheld realism in favor of a more timeless, almost painterly aesthetic.

In Williams’ hands, the laughs never come at Saúl’s expense, ridiculous as this arena might seem to audiences. Luchadores are entertainers, first and foremost, and “Cassandro” celebrates that while taking Armendáriz’s achievements seriously.

What makes suggestion-driven Antlers so disturbing isn’t the movie’s tension- and dread-building mechanics so much as the way the filmmaker burrows into the minds of his two main characters.

There’s a quality to the violence here that elevates it above the literal (and reprehensible) nihilism of movies like last year’s “Hardcore Henry,” and instead achieves something more akin to dance.

Falling is unpretentious and perfectly accessible to mainstream audiences. Mortensen’s patience, his way with actors and his trust in our intelligence are not unlike late-career Eastwood, which isn’t a bad place to be so early in one’s directing career.

Yonebayashi’s open-hearted tale, more than any other Ghibli offering, could conceivably have worked just as well in live-action, and yet the tender story gains so much from the studio’s delicate, hand-crafted approach.

Though the sheer scope of the material overwhelms “Pariah” director Dee Rees at times, she finds shoots of optimism among the mire that couldn’t be more welcome at a moment when the country seems more divided than ever.

Though Fanon’s words serve to justify the seemingly unconscionable — violence — the film ends with a very different call to action, one that stresses the need for “new concepts,” as if trying to calm the blood the film has brought to a boil over the dense and daunting 80-odd minutes that have come before.

In places, The Sense of an Ending seems almost frustratingly uninterested in establishing, much less solving, the riddles at its core, when in fact, it’s merely uninterested in pandering to those who lack the patience to appreciate its nuances.

With Crossing, writer-director Levan Akin wants to open our eyes to the easily overlooked.

Though the fate of his journey isn’t terribly well communicated, it’s a privilege to have observed Menashe’s world from the inside.

Everything about the three principal teens registers as deserving of “human interest” to Rich Hill’s two helmers, whose generous attitude draws us into this deeply empathetic film.

Lanthimos trades in discomfort, trusting his audience enough to take his brand of provocation as they please.

I watching The Son play out, this family’s tragedy becomes our own, and Zeller’s warning becomes impossible to ignore.

The Children Act is that rarest of things: an adult drama, written and interpreted with a sensitivity to mature human concerns.

Audiences needn’t be intimidated: Manifesto may not adhere to any conventional narrative structure, but it’s compulsively watchable all the same

Helmer Lenny Abrahamson (“Garage,” “Adam & Paul”) puts the pic’s eccentricity to good use, luring in skeptics with jokey surrealism and delivering them to a profoundly moving place.

The helmer constructs scenes with a bustling documentary energy, studiously avoiding melodramic tropes, even when they might serve to make the narrative more engaging, less unwieldy or simply easier to digest overall.

Even before Vladimir Putin’s unprovoked invasion, Olga was an incredibly strong film, but now, the Kino Lorber release should be considered essential viewing for art-house audiences.

It can sound like a cliché to say that any given movie is what the world needs now, but “Will & Harper” earns that distinction.

You don’t have to be a “dog person” to find these two irresistible, although those with a soft spot for animals may be surprised by how deeply attached they get over the course of the film.

This fleet-footed, kaleidoscopic showcase is all about finding your voice so that the world can start to appreciate what it doesn’t know about those it hears from far too seldom.

Big Fish & Begonia commands awe on the strength of its imagery alone...while weaving an epic tale that’s uniquely informed by local myths and motifs. If only it made the slightest bit of sense.

A silky, soulful black-and-white tapestry of single millennials seeking connection.

While there are no profound life lessons to be found in these subplots, Jennings and his cast manage to deliver a steady supply of laughs, while respecting one of Illumination’s core principles: It’s OK to be silly.

A chaotic symphony of nearly two dozen characters, this black-and-white indie confection (garnished with sparing touches of color) mixes biting social critique with stylistic bravura.

Edwards seems to have miscalculated our investment in his cast...simultaneously underestimating how satisfying some good old-fashioned monster-on-MUTO action can be.

Though the story was written almost two decades ago, it’s a microcosm for the kind of wall-building mentality that has taken hold of the mainstream today, and the Malloy brothers achieve a kind of tragic poetry that sticks with those who make it a point to seek this one out.

A gripping, stranger-than-fiction account of a real-world medical conspiracy, the film begins as a human-interest story and builds to an impressive work of investigative journalism into how and why they were placed with the families who raised them.

Incendies vaults Denis Villeneuve to the status of serious director.

Schemes like this have a way of spiraling out of the characters’ control, but Moland and Aakeson maintain a firm grasp on the pacing, progressively building both carnage and suspense as the situation escalates toward a Mexican standoff of which even Sam Peckinpah would be proud.

Dual is in fact a fairly astute comedy. The laughs come not from jokes so much as sharp jabs of truth — wince-inducing insights into the subjects most movies won’t touch, like our fear of death, intimacy and being forgotten.

If Sorry, Baby works, it’s because Victor strikes such a tricky tone: Her debut is warm and compassionate, advancing a conversation for which we’re still trying to find the words.

It’s both funny and familiar to see these two incredibly different personalities thrust together for what’s meant to be a short ride. [SXSW work-in-progress review]

The emotions are real; everything else is movie magic, representing where we now stand — at the apex of artificiality — for better or worse.

Hoping to do for flesh-eaters what "The Twilight Saga" did for vampires, albeit on a smaller scale, writer-director Jonathan Levine spins Isaac Marion's novel into a broadly appealing date movie about a zombified Romeo and his lively Juliet.

Tantalizingly rich in atmosphere and altogether unhurried in revealing its secrets, the evocatively shot, ultra-widescreen Apostle will eventually veer into dark, mercilessly supernatural territory.

Every aspect of Daddio is designed to spark conversation. But it’s sweeter and more satisfying than you might expect, especially as Hall pays off ideas introduced early in her script.

Returning director Jon Watts — whose bright, slightly dorky touch lends a kind of continuity to this latest trilogy — wrangles this unwieldy premise into a consistently entertaining superhero entry, tying up two decades’ of loose ends in the process.

It’s an irreverent take on a form where earlier iterations were obliged to take themselves seriously. And somehow that liberates what felt like a slick but ironic riff on a tired genre to do something sincere.

MacLachlan’s writing style is at once honest and slightly elevated, the kind we’re used to hearing onstage, where the structure of the entire script matters, and subtext is every bit as important as what’s spoken.

The film, at least, feels fresh, making geek history more entertaining than it has any right to be.

Yes, Sundown is a mystery, but it’s also a Rorschach test. No two people will see the film the same way.

The bargain Benson and Moorhead make with audiences goes something like this: If we buy in, then we can participate in what often feels more like an elevated form of play than some attempt to compete with slick, studio product.

It’s genuinely exciting megaplex entertainment, informed by extensive research, featuring bona fide movie stars, and staged with equal degrees of professionalism and respect.

Directed by George C. Wolfe with the same passion and conviction that defined its subject, Rustin reminds that the pursuit for equality has never been and should never be satisfied with the advancement of a single group.

Leaf recognizes that whatever happens to Gia, the problem remains. Her portrait is intended to illuminate, and Nomore makes for a wonderful collaborator in this.

Shyamalan’s goal is to keep us guessing, and in that respect, Split is a resounding success — even if in others, it could have you rolling your eyes.

The documentary broadens well beyond a portrait of this particular facility to address the underlying causes of these crimes and to question how society might more constructively deal with the issues, where offering counseling to abuse victims becomes as important as, if not more so than, persecuting their abusers.

Lovely, elegant, and curiously opaque ... The film’s many ballet scenes are stunning, to say the least.

Sachs excels at investigating thorny, uncomfortable situations, and he treats all three characters fairly here, which allows audiences to decide which one they identify with.

Moya’s vision may be bleak — and “vision” is the right word to describe the Spanish-born director’s stunning capacity to create images and atmosphere — but there’s something unnervingly familiar about the world he creates in his feature debut.

Alleluia may be a remake, but its somber look couldn’t be more original — all the better for the film to spring its nasty surprises on auds, none more unexpected than the way certain shots remain seared into one’s subconscious in the days and weeks that follow.

It’s an old-fashioned literary fable, spiked with shots of grimacing men with sunburned faces blasting one another with shotguns that wouldn’t be out of place in a Sergio Leone movie.

In the end, it’s the ensemble’s collective attitude, plus the palpable chemistry between Patti and her friends, that defines the experience, not the stock desire to be discovered. Though if Patti Cake$ really did exist, this movie would certainly make her star.

Operation Avalanche demonstrates that there’s still plenty of room left within the found-footage format to craft fresh, high-concept projects, regardless of the fact that no one’s falling for their alleged authenticity any longer.

Though undeniably charming, Buñuel can be a difficult character to like here, but that’s the point: The movie dares to imagine the exact moment when Buñuel the callow prankster became Buñuel, engaged anthropologist of the human condition, whose later Mexico City masterpiece “Los Olvidados” was clearly informed by what he witnessed in Las Hurdes.

Granted, Freundlich has the benefit of Bier’s screenplay contributions to guide him, but in his particular execution, the story feels grounded for a very different strategy from Bier’s: Rather than going out of his way to include recognizable human moments, he strips away anything excessive, allowing subtext to surface in the quiet spaces between dialogue.

Though not a documentary, this gorgeous French family saga benefits enormously from Klapisch’s natural curiosity, informed by research (he participated in a harvest in order to observe its nuances) and elevated by his insistence that they film over the course of a full year, so as to capture the impact of the seasons on both viticulture and its human stewards.

Levy’s funny-sad contemporary drama acknowledges the supportive dynamic that Marc plays in Thomas and Sophie’s lives, even as it centers the gay best friend for a change — not so different from the one he played in “Happiest Season.” All three characters feel well rounded and real, especially in their imperfections.

Fox is a charismatic guy, and even though his personal story has been overshadowed by Parkinson’s disease, Guggenheim’s upbeat and ultra-polished documentary reminds what a peppy, relatable personality he was — and is — on-screen.

For Lara, dancing matters more than dating, more than anything, and as such, Dhont’s relatively modest film manages to encompass the themes of both “Billy Elliot” and “Tomboy,” and deserves the recognition of both.

Yes, this new project shares the same look, feel, and fancy corporate sheen as the rest of Marvel’s rapidly expanding Avengers portfolio, but it also boasts an underlying originality and freshness missing from the increasingly cookie-cutter comic-book realm of late.

For large segments of its running time, Good Night Oppy is more than just a documentary; it’s an animated film as well — and a hugely entertaining one at that.

For Guadagnino, it’s not the characters’ fates that matter so much as their dynamics, which Kajganich and the director manipulate with the sort of take-no-prisoners attitude typically reserved for theater, pushing the entire ensemble to their full potential.

While his American competition practices the right to remain silent, McDonagh writes his clever, coal-black heart out, delivering another firecracker script.

What’s refreshing about the debuting director’s approach is that it feels relatively egoless. His style is playful and energetic, often intercutting between multiple threads within a given song or scene, but it doesn’t feel as if Miranda is calling attention to himself so much as trying to open up the show.

American Factory is anything but a dry documentary, and will likely be a prime contender in awards season.

Not all the tricks translate, nor do they need to, since DelGaudio has shrewdly constructed the experience around the theme of identity, revealing deeply personal elements of his own history in such a way as to prime audiences to look inward as well. The result is a kind of epiphany that leaves them with a feeling of discovery rather than deception.

The connection they share isn’t the kind that would pass for conventionally romantic, and yet, theirs is a compelling love story all the same — one the filmmakers follow with open minds, focusing on the lead-up to and days immediately following their wedding.

If there was any doubt as to De Niro’s greatness, it’s laid to rest in these face-to-face confrontations. No star could’ve held his own quite so effectively against De Niro.