Sara Stewart

This rural drama is the best yet from playwright and filmmaker Martin McDonagh (“In Bruges,” “Seven Psychopaths”), and one of Frances McDormand’s greatest performances.

Arrival makes a moving case that we’ve only scratched the surface of what we think is possible — and what we define as intelligence.

Like all the best comics movies, this one’s got a villain (Michael B. Jordan) so compelling he nearly steals the show from the hero (Chadwick Boseman). And sure, the futuristic African country of Wakanda may be fictional, but it’s brimming with cultural resonance.

There is so much pain in Moonlight that it’s a little hard to breathe at certain moments. But there are others, of connection and redemption, that positively glow.

It’s a tale as messy as its muddy fields, and it’s a must-watch.

Not since “American Movie” has there been such an entertainingly clumsy, warts-and-all documentary about making a movie, this time courtesy of Cincinnati filmmaker Tom Berninger.

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.

This is a compelling and comprehensive guide to one of the most Kafkaesque crime stories in American history.

I’d like to see a sequel about her freshman year at college, please. There were still a few items on that list left unchecked.

Despite a traditional-seeming quest for a suit of armor and a sword, the film’s intrinsic message is all about the transformative powers of music and love. It’s a movie the whole family can rock out to.

The result is a thoughtful, dreamlike (at times, nightmarish) tour through the day-to-day lives of several suburban California teens.

Marie’s Story will feel familiar, which is mostly a tribute to the enduring power of Helen Keller’s biography.

Fogel’s focus is female friendship, and the challenges presented by growing older and pairing up. It all makes for a rocky road, regardless of the romantic rival’s gender.

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

A funny, shambling buddy comedy that mostly serves as a vehicle for our two stars to do what they do best, which is riff on race and pop culture.

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

In one of Hugh Hefner’s least creepy moments ever, he describes how they became friends later in life; with his help, she finally obtained the legal rights to her rampantly used image.

It’s a feel-good film with a somewhat curdled legacy: You could clip just about any piece of sexist dialogue here, label it 2017 and pass it off as plausible.

This indie, female-centric riff on “Deliverance” is spare, smartly written and shot through with moments of twig-snapping tension.

Director Catherine Gund most successfully depicts the visceral impact of Streb’s work with her footage of the 2012 Olympics.

Finally, a post-“Bridesmaids” film that lets Kristen Wiig shine — and brilliantly taps into co-star Bill Hader’s vulnerable side, too.

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

As satisfying and polished as you’d expect.

It’s not quite “Once,” but Song One, featuring original music by Jenny Lewis and Johnathan Rice, captures a similar, unselfconscious beauty in the way music can make sense of big, ungainly emotions — as James puts it, “for three to five whole minutes.”

Even the most extreme punishments are softened by hilariously neurotic dialogue. Vive la Delpy!

In a move sure to infuriate “nanny state” critics, director Stephanie Soechtig names the US government and food corporations responsible for a campaign to get Americans addicted to junk food — particularly, and most dangerously, sugar — as early as possible.

Scary and sad, Trapped is for anyone who cares about the precarious future of reproductive health for American women.

Be advised: The film opens with a warning about “flashing lights and hallucinatory images,” and, while effectively unsettling, these do eventually get a little hard on the eyes.