Robert Daniels

Antoine Fuqua might’ve had some cameras and microphones on hand to produce moving images and sound for this estate-approved King of Pop biopic. But make no mistake about it: “Michael” isn’t a movie. It’s a filmed playlist in search of a story.

There isn’t a single moment of this film that borders on belief as it winds toward a cheap, bloody final freakout that is tepidly filmed in a way that makes you wonder if Tipping believes the horror he’s selling.

An empty muddle of social commentary with little intensity.

Featuring a trio of supposed movie stars who lack the panache or charisma of true marquee headliners, Red Notice is another visually ghastly bid at building a franchise on the back of breathtakingly boring action sequences.

Trigger Warning is a self-serious, brooding film without the wherewithal to know how righteously dumb it could be if it committed to the bit. Or, at least, the expertise to elevate it to the suspenseful level it so desperately aims to reach.

Laboriously paced, the indulgent jolts and bloodless scares, neither deeply rooted nor artfully raised, float as lifelessly as a lily pad on a bog.

Naked Singularity isn’t a typical courtroom drama. It’s a heist flick, a sci-fi romp, and a message film all rolled into one. And it’s a pretty terrible example of all three genres.

It’s a shame. Argylle had the potential to be a whissmart parody. It unfortunately just seems to get tired of being the butt of the joke before it can deliver the punchline. But in attempting to avoid becoming a gag—laboring to connect this film with the Kingsman franchise—Vaughn imbues his film with anonymity, making it merely forgettable.

While Hedlund and Macdonald exhibit incredible chemistry, the outlandishness of the twists “Dirt Music” takes makes their performances nearly impossible to appreciate due to their cartoon buggery. Working with “Notebook”-level cheese, here the story’s stale.

Daniel Espinosa’s Morbius, a misbegotten, artistically bankrupt bid by writers Matt Sazama and Burk Sharpless to fuse a gothic horror edge to the MCU, is the nadir of comic book cinema.

If the action in Kraven the Hunter was as well conceived as its villains, it’d be a riot. Unfortunately, the brawls are physically detached from the environment. The choreography lacks punch and design; the compositions are spatially unaware.

Director Patrick Hughes’ film should be avoided at all cost.

Despite Quan’s best efforts, there isn’t one square foot of this tepid film worth buying.

It’s unsettling how every minute of this 94-minute flick delivers a new level of boredom. You have to feel for the actors.

There are, to be sure, moments of shock. But they offer very little awe.

Rather than crafting a high-concept science-fiction marvel, Fuqua’s Infinite relies on shoddy VFX and ropey world-building for the worst film of his career.

In its quest for entertainment value, this documentary loses sight of the actual grief and hurt a devastated son would feel.

Through its images of peaceful protests and demonstrations from the era, McDonough's narrow but inspiring film finds deeper relevance in the face of the current protests surrounding George Floyd’s murder.

Featuring a breakout performance from an enrapturing Wong-Loi-Sing, and a beguiling turn from Siriboe, Really Love is a timeless black romance. Kristi Williams is an assured new voice already nestling herself inside audiences’ hearts.

In the illuminating This Is the Life, DuVernay not only fills in an important formative gap in California’s hip-hop history, she displays the inventive eye that would later lead to her future cinematic successes.

Lewis’ In Our Mothers' Gardens requires time to find its footing, but the documentary ultimately offers a salute to the generationally important women who fought to give their families a more fruitful future.

This is a uniquely Chinese-American documentary. And an immersive film concerning the immigrant experience. It’s also a work that shows the humanism needed for great journalism to happen.

The Boys in Red Hats is a necessary watch that elicits frustration by exposing our insular ideology with a raw aplomb.

O’Shay doesn’t deify these two women; she presents them as human, and uncovers how comfortable they are in their own skin.

It flourishes as a modest picture, an acute character study of men and women picking up the pieces of a patriotic ideal that seems to have failed them

After the story of the Tulsa Massacre entered the national consciousness because of Damon Lindelof’s “Watchmen” and Misha Green’s “Lovecraft Country,” Dreamland: The Burning of Black Wall Street this Memorial Day feels like the first time that the voices of the victims have finally been heard.

The film struggles from scene to scene, incoherently tying elongated and repetitive montages of Guy and Sullivan performing together to hagiographic perspectives explaining how giving Guy is or the brightness of Sullivan’s future.

The soft-spoken Epps is frustratingly miscast. The editing by Geofrey Hildrew and Scott Pellet limps lifelessly along, and the direction lacks the necessary pulse for a story line with more twists than a low-budget soap opera.

The kinetic, captivating tone disintegrates once the narrative remembers that it needs to tell us about these people.

The stirring pratfalls and well-placed dirty jokes make It’s a Wonderful Binge a keenly subversive Christmas movie.

The sole redeeming quality in this 85-minute swill resides in the makeup and practical effects, which rely on viscous blood and gnarly props that make the kills hard to stomach.

Despite its name and copious sex, Lonesome is surprisingly wholesome.

None of these people feel real. They’re the Montgomery Ward catalog of racists common to so many Civil Rights movies, they’ve become noxious cliches, particularly in this drab script, which feels like an AI chatbot wrote it.

Those affected by America’s terrible immigration system need a film explaining their difficult plight. Knowton’s “Split at the Root” just isn’t it.

Few threats are more pertinent to the earth's future than deep-sea mining. I can think of no documentary as ill-equipped to inform viewers of this peril than director Matthieu Rytz’s scattered and vague documentary Deep Rising.

Writer-director James N. Kienitz Wilkins’s “Still Film” is a stunning, acute critique of the regressive artistic sensibilities that plague contemporary Hollywood.

It’s Bruneau who makes you realize how great “Dusk for a Hitman” could have been if only it had some extra shine, but who also allows you to be content that St-Jean’s crime movie is merely a sturdy installment in the genre.

Stockholm Bloodbath is a half-promise. There's plenty of blood to be had, but not much of it boils.

Based on the real-life story of World War II resistance fighter Gunnar Sønsteby, Norwegian director John Andreas Andersen’s “Number 24” is a sturdy, handsomely mounted period piece depicting the emotional toll required for freedom.

Frédéric Jardin’s “Survive” doesn’t necessarily break the mold. But being original isn’t totally important for this schlocky French disaster flick.

Though Pakistan is filmed with a sense of grandeur, Ibby’s return to his cultural roots is rushed and superficial. Khan’s lack of screen presence, toothless mixed martial arts sequences and unintelligible editing further knock the film down.

It’s a film that’s as aching as it is defiant, reflecting its diverse subjects.

The film’s quiet approach doesn’t rely on overworked sentimentality or melodramatic angst. It washes over you, pulling you forward toward its heart through the natural strength of its emotional tide.

When “Revelations” isn’t investigating signs, it’s a dry, psychologically driven ghost story.

Absolute Dominion is a high-concept sci-fi flick whose many pieces move but rarely settle in satisfying positions.

Vibrant, silly, and unwaveringly vulnerable, “Pools” is an invigorating party movie whose non-stop reverie uplifts its protagonist’s downcast spirit.

Judging by this documentary’s easygoing approach, Altrogge wants to use his film as a full-spread story on Clemente. The decision pushes Clemente the man into being a mere memory.

Truth & Treason is a staid drama whose observations about Helmuth could easily be summed up in a quick encyclopedic blurb.

For the most part, “Long Shadows” is short on reasons to have our attention.

A high-strung, faith-based hood drama, Moses the Black has admirable intentions but lacks precision.

Visually evocative and uniquely conceived, Cristian Carretero and Lorraine Jones’s “Esta Isla” (“This Island”) is a lovers-on-the-run narrative unafraid to pause for emotional and thematic effect.