William Bibbiani

It’s a little happy, a little sad, a little off-putting, a lot like going home again. And it’s always interesting.

Despite one wonky misstep, it captures some real magic.

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 Sisters Brothers is almost as aimless as its title characters, but it's worth the journey. John C. Reilly and Joaquin Phoenix shine as wild west hitmen who are just smart enough to know they should be smarter, whose quest leads them in unexpected, funny, and surprisingly emotional directions.

Doesn’t have the depth of Shyamalan’s most important films or the theatricality of his most memorably weird experiments. But it’s one of his best thrillers.

What’s most impressive about Joker: Folie à Deux is the way Phillips willingly undercuts his own billion-dollar blockbuster. He’s looking inward. Arthur is looking inward. Hopefully the audience will too, and question why they care so much about Arthur Fleck in the first place.

Avery’s film is a solid piece of genre entertainment, grounded by excellent performances, and clever enough to find a new way to present the same old tropes. Like an old hunk of junk fixed and cleaned up, and made into something new again, and worth paying full price for.

It’s a diabolically odd horror comedy that keeps the giggles at a steady simmer until, eventually, they’re just right.

Gary Oldman gives an impeccable performance as Winston Churchill in a gorgeously photographed, suspenseful World War II film that suffers from too much hero worship.

Say what you will about the premise, but if you think that’s all there is to 'Goat,' you’re going to bleat those words.

Matt Shakman has done something Marvel Studios doesn’t do very well anymore. He’s made a superhero movie that embraces the 'super' part. And the 'hero' part. And the 'movie' part.

It’s still sweet, it’s still funny, it’s still freaky, and it’s still Friday. Thank God.

Although Omaha is powerful and ultimately depressing as all hell, there is a faint, faint, faint glimmer of hope. If not for the world around us, at least for the people in it.

100% pure Statham, and after many years where audiences had to settle for the diluted variety it’s a welcome return to form.

An impressive and nearly-comprehensive overview that will probably have something to teach almost everyone in the audience, regardless of how familiar they already are with the topic.

An ambitious comedy, not because it’s so big but because it’s so delicate. This film could crumble at any minute. It veers dangerously from misery to whimsy to horror to hope.

There’s no escapism here, just like there’s no escape from our final repose. But there is a sense that how we face mortality matters, and that maybe — after watching this strange and wonderful film — we’ll be better equipped for that moment.

There’s a confidence to She Rides Shotgun that many other movies can’t match, as though the filmmakers always knew exactly where to put their camera and how long to let it roll.

Allswell is one of those rare movies that feels less like a cinematic presentation and more like a personal invitation into someone’s home.

The story’s playful, subversive reinterpretation of 'The Wizard of Oz' as a work of propaganda, designed to obfuscate the true story of how political dissidents and minority groups are demonized by fascist con artists who trade in theatricality instead of competence, is fully developed and still (to our collective dismay) incredibly salient.

It’s a playground for the filmmakers and audience alike, a fantastical space where anything can happen, whether it’s silly or badass or both.

It’s a deeply personal documentary, candidly reflective and disinterested in flattery. It brings titans down to Earth.

Reminds those of us in similar situations that these painful paths are well traveled, and that the outward success we think might fill the holes in our souls usually turns out to be an excuse to push ourselves even harder. That’s why we cry sometimes when we’re lying in beds, just to get it all out, what’s in our heads.

Any movie that reminds you, simultaneously and favorably, of Francis Ford Coppola’s The Conversation and Michael Mann’s Thief is doing something very right — even if it looms a lot lower than those towering works of genius.

It’s What’s Inside understands the concept of sympathy, but with people like this, the movie advises against it.

Glorious, angry, hilarious, nail-biting fun from a director, writer and cast who all know exactly what they’re doing, and relish in the fact that they’re practically getting away with murder.

Damsel is viciously whimsical, if such a thing is possible, and it’s thrillingly subversive. But the punchline comes early, and it’s only repeated as the film progresses.

It may not provide the rush of adrenaline that many people seek from their horror movies but Mr. Harrigan’s Phone is a smart and elegant piece of creepiness.