Rafaela Sales Ross

If in his previous films about the regime Larraín often opted for subtlety, in El Conde elusiveness is a foreign notion. It is thrilling to watch the director repeatedly hit the nail in the head without much desire—or care—to engage with subtext.

Abbasi manages to thread the lines between tabloid fodder and veiled endorsement with great skill.

Although it is true that The Beast would greatly benefit from a gentle trimming in its first hour, it is easy to forgive the indulgence when the result is such a remarkable commentary on the looming threats of artificial intelligence and the dangers of glorified emotional numbness.

“Lost in the Night” functions as a study of absence — the absence of others, of talent, of answers, of peace, of love. By amalgamating all those lacks, Escalante reaches an unsurprising yet chillingly effective conclusion.

Corsage succeeds precisely by ditching the myth of objectivity in favor of portraying a woman eternalized by the glory and dolor of her imperfections.

In this deliberately stunted teasing of information, Mielants builds a muted drama that cleverly harnesses horror tropes to paint a picture of what happens within the convent’s walls.

As newly-elected president Gabriel Boric takes the stage to address the nation that placed upon him precious trust, it is hard not to be moved by the electric rawness of hope.

It is a disorienting, all-consuming sensorial experience and made all the much better to those willing to surrender to its mysteries.

In this years-long dance between the two, The Eight Mountains plays as a gentle epic, equally accomplished in its minimalistic approach to intimacy as in its grandiose portrayal of landscapes, an immersive visual experience that needs not sacrifice the arcs of its characters to succeed in building arresting contemplation.

The same ground that once bore the sturdy foundation of a loving home now stands eternally scarred by the searing cuts of imaginary lines, an irreparable fissure that – in Panahi’s heartfelt visual diary – cruelly severs the frail umbilical cord to the motherland.

The director is an expert in this precise kind of world-building, one intricately related to yearning – for another, for belonging, for redemption.

Sofia Coppola proves to be the perfect choice to tackle the life of Priscilla Presley through a film that deeply understands the desires and dreams of a teenage girl

The thorny nuances of multiethnic relationships are deeply understood by Celine Song’s directorial debut, Past Lives.

Those who have seen "One More Time With Feeling" will undoubtedly have a deeper appreciation for this follow-up companion piece, but — even for the ones unfamiliar with either Dominik’s or Cave’s work— This Much I Know To Be True still proves powerful even if consumed as a concert film alone.

Of all the things Phillips does better in Joker: Folie à Deux than he did in Joker, the best is by far his course correction in catering to radical misogynists. The director isn’t subtle in his nods to the controversy stirred by the original.

Despite the mid-runtime ebb and an overlong runtime that works against the film’s firm grasp on the slippery tautness of good action, Hope still proves one hell of a time.

Leaning away from blood-pumping thrills and towards family drama, Ferrari benefits from another great turn by Adam Driver and a handful of masterfully choreographed race scenes but is ultimately too risk-averse.

Society of the Snow humanizes the gruesome tale of a group of rugby players trapped in the Andes.

The horror comes from seeing seismic consequences closer to newspaper headlines than history books. Figureheads die, but words live on, with grifters always waiting in the wings, spouting the same hate.

It is an exercise in self-punishment disguised as self-aggrandisement, by a director powered by confident resignation and – for those unlucky enough to have experienced the gaping hole of yearning for home – it is entirely worth the self-indulgence.

Romería is loyal to its sense of withholding almost until the very end. It is then, finally, that Simon reaches the grand apex of her journey of self-reflection, one that holds in the stunning clarity of carefully chosen words a moving encompassing of how one can only build a sturdy foundation for the future after lovingly repairing the unrectified cracks of the past.

A tightly-paced action thriller, Plane competently delivers on the deliciously formulaic tropes of the genre.

The wretched allure of this process makes “Inside” worth the investment even when Katsoupis proves unable to resist the charming hands of cliché, bloating the script to serve the idea of an unconventional heist movie, when in his hands lie a much more interesting proposition.

Anchored by its competent trio of protagonists, The Adults would have been a lovely time if not for the overused mishmash of twee gimmicks.

David Fincher is rarely dull, and The Killer cannot take the director’s filmography in that direction, but it won’t push itself toward the top of his work, either. A competently realized crime thriller made by a technical team just as sharply attuned to details as the director at the ship’s helm, the Netflix production is entertaining but a little orthodox.

I’m not yet convinced it works, but my goodness, am I thrilled it exists.

The people in Sang-soo’s latest are given the time to exist within the frame without having to respond to the sometimes constricting expectations of fiction, the director’s observational style a perfect match to the film’s titular purpose: to observe a not-so-regular day in the lives of regular people.

Despite not being top-shelf Almodóvar, it remains the work of a director long settled into form and, as such, offers its fair share of delights.