Sara Stewart

Some of the acting feels cardboard; the plot points are never shocking. Eastwood’s love interest is about four decades his junior. And yet, the director casts a Zen cowboy spell that makes it all sort of irresistible.

Prisoners of the Ghostland is equal parts visual delight and narrative head-scratcher. Most of all, it’s a hefty dose of Nicolas Cage set to full-tilt gonzo.

Washington and Zendaya, freed from lockdown, dig into the dialogue with zest, and they’ve got a palpable chemistry even in the midst of some horribly hurtful exchanges.

With one slight wobble toward the conclusion, Ashe’s screenplay is terrific at letting its characters speak and act honestly: His dialogue is heartfelt and realistic. “Sylvie’s” is a love letter to the delights of a well-told love story.

Tonally, Happiest Season is a bit uneven; it can move from broad hijinks to high emotion a little too quickly. But it also delivers wonderfully heartfelt moments.

This is a Disney adaptation, beautiful but frequently treacly.

Being a lesbian period piece, the film’s earned inevitable comparisons to last year’s “Portrait of a Lady on Fire.” Sure, it’s similar, minus the chemistry, humor and joy. There are definitely corsets in both.

I’d have been curious to see more about Reddy’s interactions with the women’s movement, but the film mostly has room for this one woman. Thanks to Cobham-Hervey’s performance, it’s an engaging, if fairly familiar, story.

Garbus’ film is at its best when giving voice to the female relatives of these victims, who come together to pressure the cops — who’ve been instructed to downplay the possible connection between the killings — to do more.

Davidson expertly plays the role like he’s playing . . . well, Pete Davidson, which is how I imagine his career will go.

Bennett, who’s been largely off the radar for a while, is heartbreaking and, eventually, fierce as her character begins to crave change.

De Wilde has a good grasp of Austen’s sense of humor, and she plays it up with some amusing bits

Keough is riveting as the vulnerable Grace.

Never seen, but often heard bellowing profanities from the other end of Jane’s desktop landline, the boss and his eyebrow-raising closed door meetings dubbed “personals” provide the menacing undertone of this day-in-the-life drama.

Color Out of Space is full-bore, glorious B-movie Cage: Cranked up to 11, spattered with gore and bellowing about alpacas.

Though most foreign films are best seen subtitled, the nonstop overexcitement of these anime performances can be exhausting. I’d have welcomed the dulcet tones of Pace, who voices Mr. Suga.

Thankfully, director Miguel Arteta (“Beatriz at Dinner”) gets a solid half-hour of funny out of this thing before clunkiness sets in.

Clemency is remarkable for the understanding it affords to all involved with its wrenching subject matter.

Profoundly moving and, at times, almost unbearably sad.

Like most of Eastwood’s work (with the exception of last year’s disastrous “The 15:17 to Paris”), it’s a tightly paced feature, with strong performances all around. It’s also one of the season’s most politically polarized films.

The addition of Glover and Danny DeVito keeps Jumanji: The Next Level afloat, even with barely the whisper of a plot.

The audio design of Little Joe is meant to be unsettling, but it may be for naught if audiences can hardly bear to sit through it.

This Little Women is two-odd hours of good cheer and lovely ensemble performances. It’s a warm fireplace hearth of a film, albeit one with a tendency to spit out fiery embers.

If nothing else, the mere sight of two popes drinking brews and watching a soccer game together is one of the more surreal things you’ll see at the movies this year.

It’s the rare biopic that doesn’t wander into predictability.

If only director James Mangold had taken the route the Wachowskis did with “Speed Racer,” which had psychedelic colors to spice things up.

Don’t let its sweet title fool you: Director Noah Baumbach’s latest may just be the best war movie of the year.

Though deeply well-intentioned, director Kasi Lemmons’ film never really breaks free of conventional biopic mode.

Norton does a humanizing job of explaining Lionel’s unusual brain (he’s got a near-perfect memory) and defusing his outbursts with self-deprecation and humor.

Gore and supernatural comeuppances ensue in a haunted-house flick that mostly eschews jump scares for more satisfying psychological and erotic twists.

The reason Waititi’s films (yes, even “Thor: Ragnarok”) are so resonant is that they’ve always placed love and humanism at the heart of their humor. “Jojo,” despite going to some very dark places for its laughs, is no exception.

By turns funny, sinister, haunting, historically fascinating and mythical, The Lighthouse is one of the best films of the year.

This comic biopic is a blast from start to finish.

Joker starts grim and gets grimmer, as Arthur embraces his inner demons and finds they resonate with the huddled masses of Gotham.

It’s not without its quirks (and occasional pacing issues), but Sister Aimee is a true original — apparently, just like its namesake.

It’s never too early to introduce your kids to the magic and emotion of the monster movie.

No matter how well you know “Over the Rainbow,” you may never hear it as heartbreakingly performed as Zellweger sings it here.

This is a raunch-com that goes for — and gets — stunned laughs.

Disney, take note: This is how to do a winning live-action update of a cartoon.

Love, Antosha manages to be both a deeply sad farewell and a fascinating introduction.

Action flick machismo suffers an identity crisis in Stuber.

Midsommar is no slouch on chills, but they creep up slowly, like a bad trip from one of the Swedes’ festive glasses of hallucinogenic tea, and are leavened with an occasional dash of humor.

The satire’s so meta that its whiny protagonists threaten to eclipse the joke.

The scrappy striver narrative may be an overly familiar one at this point, but director Tom Harper (the BBC’s “War & Peace”) gets a terrific performance from Buckley as Rose chases her dreams while living the kind of turbulent life that has always inspired the best of country songs.

Plus One is the latest evidence (see also: “Always Be My Maybe”) that the romantic comedy is making a long-awaited comeback, with some overdue modern tweaks.

Even with a cast this lovable, The Dead Don’t Die falls short of the killer zom-com it could have been.

Q Ball is a moving and dynamically shot portrait of the Northern California prison’s basketball team, which is sponsored by the NBA champion Golden State Warriors.

Hogg (“Exhibition”) sets The Souvenir in the 1980s but shoots her subjects with the long-armed reserve of a period piece; the ivory-complexioned Byrne bears a resemblance to 18th- and 19th-century European portraits glimpsed throughout.

In a time when climate news is near-uniformly depressing, this is a nature documentary that pays loving and hopeful tribute to the complex web of life — and it won’t scare your kids.

Poehler isn’t quite cynical enough to pull off a comedy in which, to paraphrase “Seinfeld,” there’s no hugging and learning, but Wine Country could have been improved by keeping its emotional scenes more in reserve — like a high-end cabernet.

At stark odds with the director’s earlier work is the color palette of this one — that is to say, the film is nearly devoid of it, a haunting wash of multilayered grays. This is one Shadow that deserves to be in the spotlight.

It’s blessed with an ace comic foil in Theron, who out-snarks Rogen in scene after scene. The duo makes a terrifically fun on-screen couple, with the kind of zingy banter (thanks to Dan Sterling and Liz Hannah’s screenplay) found in black-and-white movies pre-dating the term “rom-com.”

At a certain point, the pattern of Knoop’s reticence, then acquiescence to Albert’s masquerade becomes slightly repetitive, but JT LeRoy still gives a compelling inside look at the head-scratching hoax that succeeded, in part, due to musty notions of what a hot shot writer ought to look like.

Elisabeth Moss is a primal, predatory force in Her Smell, a female-centric spin on the classic debauched rock star story.

The film manages to be both hopeful and devastating — and recommended viewing for anyone who subscribes to the facile notion that abused women should “just leave.”

Us is more expansive and messier, a Rorschach blot of a movie, riffing on primal fears and a raft of ’80s references. Is it a pointed cultural take or just a gleeful scare-fest? It depends on what you choose to take from it.

It’s Schoenaerts, one of this generation’s finest actors, who makes The Mustang a moving look at human potential for redemption and rehabilitation.

Sebastián Lelio’s remake of his 2013 Chilean movie “Gloria” is, indeed, a glorious celebration of Julianne Moore at her peak.

There are two things that make the flawed Mapplethorpe worth a watch: Matt Smith’s dedicated performance, and a reverent inclusion of so much of the artist’s work.

There’s also a broader commentary here on the treatment of women, both in arranged marriage and in testosterone-heavy thrillers. Apte’s character stays largely an enigma throughout, but her palpable frustration with the men and culture around her — plus the chance to vicariously visit Goa, that jewel of an Indian seaside getaway — makes The Wedding Guest worth an RSVP.

It’s almost impossible to resist The Lego Movie 2 for its continued everything-is-awesomeness, even if it does fall back on the trope of playthings terrified of being relegated to the storage bin.

Cohen, so good in 2015’s “Brooklyn,” is chilling as the shark-eyed Varg (who has been linked to hate crimes in France in recent years), and Culkin brings just the right amount of eye-twitch to Aarseth, who seemingly enjoyed making grandiose proclamations of “evil” and donning corpse makeup rather than actual criminal activity — yet did little to stop out-of-control followers.

It’s a quiet, slow burn but one that stays with you.

Tatiana Maslany (“Orphan Black”) is nearly unrecognizable as Petra, Silas’ longtime girlfriend caught in Bell’s roundup, and Bradley Whitford shows up in the latest of his silver-haired villain roles as a sketchy lawyer.

Billed as a dramedy, the film has plenty of “WTF” funny moments, but it’s always laughter tinged with darkness.

Jenkins is a master of cinematic portraiture, but he’s so captivated by the magic of a moment — even a single image, like cigarette smoke swirling around one of Fonny’s carved-wood sculptures — that he sometimes forgets he’s got an audience expecting a plot.

Natalie Portman is captivating as a damaged electro-pop star known as Celeste in Vox Lux, a flawed, flashy drama from actor/director Brady Corbet (“The Childhood of a Leader”).

Mirai is somewhat mired in outdated gender roles, with Cho’s character hopelessly clumsy as caregiver while his wife goes back to work. But the biggest pitfall I found with Mirai, which may be more of a selling point to new parents and children struggling with sibling rivalry, is that Kun spends half the film in tears, shrieking or whining.

This is a film that challenges moviegoers in a way that a Marvel movie or rom-com will not, and it is worth taking the time and concentration — and, if possible, the trip to the theater — to view a true master of the craft at work.

A gritty romp that makes the cliché-prone heist genre feel fresh again. It runs far deeper than any “Ocean’s.”

Director Luca Guadagnino pirouettes far from the easy-living, Italian-countryside romance of last year’s masterpiece “Call Me By Your Name” for an arthouse-meets-Grand Guignol reboot of one of the freakiest horror movies to come out of the 1970s. And he pulls it off in delicious, gut-punching style.

Maggie Gyllenhaal goes from caring to creepy in this Netflix release.

Jeremy Allen White (“Shameless”) and Maika Monroe (“It Follows”) shine in this dramedy.

In a perfect world, Tea With the Dames could be a series. Let us be flies on the wall for this posse’s weekly gathering for tea and convivial cackling. And I say this with the delighted surety that they would tell anyone who proposed this idea to go straight to hell.

At its best, Love, Gilda intertwines the comic’s own narration — drawn from audiotapes, interviews and journals — with reflections from her current-day admirers.

These dynamos don’t need a screenplay to hold anyone’s attention.

As an addiction memoir, it works well enough; there are a handful of deeply felt moments.

A masterful ode to one of life’s most universally awkward phases.

As a snarky, stylish Santa Fe couple, Paul Rudd and Steve Coogan deploy a wit drier than the sprawling landscape surrounding their desert mansion. If you enjoy your comedies devoid of easy sentimentality (as this reviewer does), this one’s for you.

More wobbly moments of Woman Walks Ahead seem to teeter on the edge of both white-saviorism and becoming a Harlequin romance.

Charmingly profane, with a buzzing riot-grrrl soundtrack, “Izzy” is a stylish twist on an ’80s trope: Here it’s the woman as pathetic supplicant, trying to win back someone who’s moved on.

Superfly escapes superficiality thanks largely to strong performances from Jackson; Jason Mitchell as Priest’s workmanlike partner, Eddie, and Michael Kenneth Williams as Priest’s mentor, Scatter.

This sequel to the 2004 movie is an impressive feat of animation, particularly in its action sequences.

Adrift is paced like its title, and the story’s momentum is slowed somewhat by constant toggling between past and present.

American Animals takes an appropriately wild approach to its subject, biting off a little more than it can chew, but nevertheless coming up with a truly novel entry in the overcrowded heist genre.

If you’ve got comics-movie fatigue, with frequent fourth-wall breaks to point out lazy writing, blatant foreshadowing or heavy reliance on CGI for fight scenes, Deadpool 2 is here for you. That doesn’t mean those things aren’t there (they are) — but the eagerness of Deadpool to call out its own shortcomings earns this trash-talking franchise a lot of goodwill.

Though both Tierney and Bomer’s characters also veer into stereotype — her uptight disapproval, his sassiness — writer-director Timothy McNeil still crafts a fairly moving tribute to the notion, as Lin-Manuel Miranda once put it, that “love is love is love.”

Life of the Party is undeniably at its best when Falcone is showcasing McCarthy’s aptitude for physical comedy.

Reitman directs with an empathy for mothering that never shies away from its darker side.

McAdams gives one of the best performances of her career as her character wrestles with the enormous question of whether, and how, to give up everything she’s ever known.

All the past decade’s Marvel movies have been heading toward this showdown. Turns out the payoff was worth the wait.

A supernatural “What’s Happening to My Body?” parable in company with “Carrie,” “Ginger Snaps” and last year’s “Thelma,” Wildling is low-key with an undertone of menace, skillfully directed by Fritz Böhm in his feature debut (though some of his nighttime scenes are so dark it’s genuinely hard to tell what’s going on).

It’s big, bloated, and, if you give in to the familiar charms of its jacked leading man, not unenjoyable. (Alternately, you could easily just let it induce a little nap.)

The Scottish director’s short, blunt thriller is so violently nerve-jangling that it feels like a stretch to recommend it, exactly.

My main beef is with Spielberg’s choice to leave out his own work, both as producer and director: “I didn’t corner the ’80s market,” he told Entertainment Weekly. But yeah, he kind of did.

If there’s a flaw in Unsane, it’s that the screenplay by Jonathan Bernstein and James Greer doesn’t play its hand closer to the vest. The pleasure here is in watching and wondering what’s real and what isn’t, but all too soon it’s spelled out for us. Nevertheless, it’s great fun to watch it all come together — or, more accurately, fall apart.

Ambitious and messy, Annhilation will likely leave you with more questions than answers. Mine is: “When can I see it again?”

It’s a more somber companion to Marjane Satrapi’s 2007 film “Persepolis,” which explored life under the Iranian Revolution with dark humor: Here, the laughter’s mostly a prelude to tears.