William Bibbiani

It’s a film that engages with the dour without becoming bitter, and a film that allows for redemption but only through the hardest possible work. It’s a film that’s built on a lie but sees only the underlying truth. What an astounding religious drama, and what a beautifully realistic morality play.

It’s a frustratingly superficial, judgmental, surface-level thriller that undermines all its scariest moments by getting distracted at all the wrong times.

As a fantasy, Gretel & Hansel is a delectably smart concoction, thoughtfully reevaluating the original tale, adding all-new layers of the ominous, and yet also keeping the story rooted in an amorphous, fairy tale past. As a horror movie, Perkins’ movie relies more on disquietude than external threat, and demands a thoughtful audience’s mental energies instead of a rowdy audience’s popcorn-spilling flinches.

The Rhythm Section takes well-worn genre material and removes all the substance and ingenuity, leaving behind only an undeveloped plot, a blank main character, and a sense of gravitas that is entirely unearned.

It is, most importantly, amusing and creative. It may not follow its storylines to the most logical conclusions, and it may not reinvent the action movie as we know it. It’s still an enjoyable blockbuster sequel that tries to infuse the original idea with a couple new ideas, while setting the stage for more exciting adventures to come.

It’s an undeniably informative and vital documentary, which clearly illustrates a disturbing political farce that has been allowed to thrive for far too long. Which is to say, at all. Where Citizen K falls short is its depiction of Khodorkovsky, whose early indiscretions are breezed over as quickly as possible in order to get to his redemption.

"Scandalous” is a fast-paced documentary, packed with incident and information, as tantalizing as an old issue of the Enquirer itself.

Like many of Emmerich’s movies, even the better ones, Midway loses sight of the humanity inside its vast vistas of devastation. It’s a giant film with a very small impact.

It doesn’t glitter, it doesn’t explode. It’s just fluffy and sweet. Bean’s film suffers a bit from minor technical issues and, despite a few improvements, it just doesn’t have the same emotional impact as the original, but it still deserves a good home.

It’s almost a romantic melodrama, but it’s emotionally inert. It’s almost a biting statement about cultural appropriation, but it barely shows its fangs. It’s almost a murder mystery, but it abandons the plot for vast periods of time. It’s almost a good film except, no, that’s really stretching it. At its best it’s an unfocused plod.

Arctic Dogs is a functional, distracting kids flick that’s only remarkable in how unremarkable it is.

Making Waves: The Art of Cinematic Sound is a practically perfect primer for anyone interested in the history and craft of filmmaking, answering most of the pertinent, baseline questions while leaving plenty of room for supplemental research.

Countdown can never be taken seriously enough to work as a conventional horror thriller, and it’s never quite funny enough to be a great horror comedy. But it’s got just enough eccentricity and self-awareness to entertain despite those obvious deficiencies.

Whether Terminator: Dark Fate is the last chapter in this story or the first in an all-new franchise is, for now, irrelevant. The film works either way, bringing the tale of the first two films to a satisfying conclusion while reintroducing the classic storyline, in exciting new ways, to an excited new audience. It’s a breathtaking blockbuster, and a welcome return to form.

Michael Damian’s film has no nutritional value, but that’s by design: It’s a flaky dessert for the mind, and it’s irresistibly decadent.

Michael Goi, serving as both director and director of photography, does a better job placing the camera around the claustrophobic location than he does exploring the depths of his actors.

It gets through its storyline and makes its underscrutinized points about fidelity — it’s right there in a title — and then it’s over, and the only thing we have to show for it is a missed opportunity to let these characters reveal their inner selves for more than three minutes.

With its passionate contributors and lofty ideas, Memory: The Origins of Alien demonstrates that, if nothing else, the study of a film can be as exciting as the film itself.

It’s fun to watch clever people think their way out of impossible situations. What Berk and Olsen do in Villains is make it wildly entertaining to watch not-so-clever people try to do the same things.

It’s immediate and specific and painful and impressive.

It’s got at least one excellent performance, but as a whole it contributes little to the “Frankenstein” tradition, other than a reminder that this has all been done before, mostly better, with more nuance and excitement.

It’s got all the cinematic bravado of an expensive high school A/V project, and like a school project, it’s easy to root for the young people involved. They’re getting out there and they’re making a movie, dang it! Good for them! Not good for us, of course, but good for them.

A shabby low-rent thriller with a few vaguely interesting ideas and an ensemble that deserves better material.

Steve Bognar and Julia Reichert have produced in “American Factory” an invaluable snapshot of a moment where history is repeating itself, and trying to write a new, possibly dystopian ending. But it’s also a film full of beautiful human beings, trying desperately to make good for themselves and their families regardless of their nationality and culture.

The first half is a drowsy day at the office, full of complex paperwork minutiae that, too much of the time, doesn’t even pan out by the end of the movie. The second half is more horrifying to think about but less scrupulously presented and, as such, harder to believe.

If you knew Yechiun, or even if you just knew his films, it’s a sad and sweet catalog of his brief, inspirational life. If you didn’t know him, you’ll eventually feel like you did, and you’ll cry the kindest tears by the end, as you realize just how much he meant to the people who were in his orbit all along.

The contrast between the impossible events happening on-screen and the hyper-realism of the imagery doesn’t always work in the the movie’s favor.

Besson’s film feels like a relic by most modern standards: It’s a formulaic thriller from a director who invented this very specific formula, and just about all it’s good for is introducing audiences to Sasha Luss, who carries the film with elegant strength and unleashes a satisfying fury whenever she’s allowed to destroy or humiliate her oppressors.