Teo Bugbee

This is a comedy that takes a vicious, over-the-top look at family greed, and fortunately, the cast members are game to play their characters’ attempts at flattery in the most unflattering manner possible.

The writer-director Takashi Doscher forgoes apocalyptic spectacle to focus on the pandemic’s effects on Will and Eva’s romance. Too bad. Most of the scenes could have been lifted from a generic relationship drama, and it is only the couple’s conversation, not their visually desaturated world, that distinguishes them.

The stories that Ms. Adrion elicits may be infuriatingly recognizable to women who work in many fields. But if there is a missing element in her analysis, it is the effect that sexism has on these women’s artistry, not only their livelihoods.

The movie is generous about allowing Mercado to present his view of the world in his own words, but it’s a shame not to be able to see the world through his eyes.

For the most part, LaBruce tries to maintain fidelity to the idea that camp is best performed straight. If keeping up the pretense of unwinking entertainment causes the pace to drag at times, at least this movie never fails to follow through on its scandalous promise.

As our window into a world lost to violence, Suzu gives us the chance to see rabbits in rivers, though her rosy view obscures history’s shadows with a preponderance of golden light.

In the scenes that break with banality, there is a zing not only of originality, but of daring.

Dudamel is a joyfully appealing figure, and the film benefits from following such an amiable subject. But the documentary lacks the rigor it would take to turn this warm portrait into a proper cinematic symphony.

Some of these central relationships are inappropriate, even dangerous, but the subtlety of Sanga’s filmmaking allows for big twists to come as a genuine surprise. It makes for a successful manipulation of his audience’s expectations, even if the overall effect is a movie that feels slightly detached.

It’s a competent movie, but it doesn’t quite make it to the big leagues.

The softness lacks detail, the butterfly metaphors lack originality, but the movie is pleasant, a balmy introduction to adult feelings of desire and belonging.

Yomeddine makes its strongest impression through the direction and performances; at times, the story is rather flimsy.

Lears clearly feels earnest sympathy for her subjects and passion for their cause, but the film often replicates for viewers the same atmosphere of hopelessness that makes climate activism a hard sell for voters.

Like many of the young inventors she documents, Jacobs has created a project that doesn’t fall apart at first touch. But her film doesn’t meet the mark for excellence, either.

Lu sometimes feels more like a cynical plot device than a character. The problem is only amplified by the animation itself.

This movie about artistic inspiration is meandering and slight, but, in a way, it provides evidence for why it’s helpful to cast actors with movie-star charisma.

The film’s subjects are overwhelmingly earnest, but the movie suffers for its substitution of enterprise over entertainment.

These features of city life feed a sense of realism, as does the film’s warmly-lit and intimately framed cinematography. But that realism here is exhausting, even if it is well-intentioned — by the film’s end, even Feña seems ready to escape from the trial of his packed plotlines.

For all of the film’s attention to the contradictory emotional aftermath of loss, its Mongolian escape valve feels strangely obligatory — not a reason to get away from mourning, but a gimmick around which a film about bereavement was built.

The movie abounds with imagination, but is unfortunately too unnerving — even nauseating — to enjoy.

The film’s referential pleasures feel insubstantial, diminished by the direct comparison to more meaningful works of the period.

Intriguing, but ultimately slight.

The effect is a movie that resembles nothing so much as the centerpiece of the Malus menu — a hot dog made with elevated ingredients.

With its deep ensemble, the movie doesn’t want for colorful characters, and Davis keeps his cast loose, unvarnished and unleashed. But the movie lacks focus when it moves between its larger-than-life plotlines.

It’s an earnest film, one that glows with pride at Aboriginal resilience. But the impression it leaves is didactic, a saints and demons fable that meanders to foregone conclusions.

For all the linguistic gymnastics, the film is hamstrung by its directors’ lack of visual imagination.

Throughout, the writer and director Cordula Kablitz-Post asserts Andreas-Salomé’s commitment to her own independence. But Ms. Kablitz-Post’s focus on Andreas-Salomé’s suitors has the effect of chaining the early feminist’s legacy to exactly the patriarchal conventions she claims to reject.

Adam is a movie that tackles big ideas about queerness and comes out looking confused — making it an experience that frustrates even as it tries to endear.