Sister Aimee is a scrappy period piece that supplants the things a bigger budget might have afforded with good choices about things that were under the filmmakers’ control.

One Cut of the Dead isn't just charming. It's an earnest and funny love letter to all the microbudget dreamers who use all their heart and ingenuity to make their movie.

That Zellweger had the audacity to decide to actually sing the standards in Garland’s act, rather than lip-synch them, and then perform them with such bravado in a voice eerily channeling Garland is the real icing on the cake here. In Judy, a star is reborn.

As played with startlingly veracity by Jonas Dassler, there's nothing romantic about him: a deformed nose, shuffling gait, slack-jawed and with a misaligned eye, he looks exactly like the man responsible for the deaths of at least four women in 1970s Hamburg.

For those who loved movies like "The Last Winter" or "Wendigo," Depraved is more of the same in the best possible way.

Yet it's really as a director of actors that he's a revelation. Abbott never lets the audience walk away because they have already spent so much time – if not liking him, at least understanding him. We're right there with his wife, Lydia (Newcomb, extraordinary in what could have been a cipher of a role), when her world starts to fall apart. Dumb and evil may be different, Dick Long says, but it doesn't make the damage hurt any less.

It's a mix of nonviolent black liberation, mysticism, 1970s psychobabble, and a dedication to Black Santa, all based on God talking to him through a duck (Moses’ delusional mental health issues are dealt with, as is Morris’ way, with both humor and sensitivity).

There’s some gorgeous animation and impeccable camerawork on display here. But as George Lucas’ 2015 fiasco "Strange Magic" demonstrated, beautifully executed visuals will get you only so far. There’s no emotional core to Abominable, which mostly proceeds at a glacial pace as the travelers’ journey across China.

It’s both too much and not enough, an unsatisfying blood-and-guts B-movie with all the goonish, grindhouse fun eviscerated out of it.

It may be a film that rubs some the wrong way – those who hate Villains will hate it with a fervent passion, I fear – but for everyone else, this is quite the lovely little oddball.

Yes, the 84-year-old Maggie Smith is back as the Crawley materfamilias, and as ever she’s the MVP.

Employing contemporary interviews with those who were there and a wealth of raw footage from the original events, Desolation Center illuminates a short-lived but absolutely momentous time when the Mojave beckoned, free of charge and front-loaded with anarchic artistic overload.

Despite earning his bread and butter with genial comedy noted for its family-friendly language and humor, Jim Gaffigan performs laudably in this decidedly dark role.

Ad Astra lacks the quiet, understated contemplation of "First Man," or the heartfelt ruminations of Steven Soderbergh's unfairly overlooked version of "Solaris." Instead, it's got about as much to say about family, attachment, and belonging as a Fast and Furious flick.

An enthralling story on the page, this adaptation fails to capture what good adaptations can: the heart and spirit of a story told in another medium.

Hustlers is an absolute joy and one of the most refreshing movies you’ll see all year.

Nelson has gifted us with a thoughtful and rich profile which, like a fading note escaping from Davis’ trumpet, leaves us wanting more.

Riot Girls doesn’t disappoint in the mayhem department, and as a meta-story about female empowerment in an increasingly threatening “men's world,” this wild and woolly take on teen-angsters past would make Furiosa herself cheer.

The content is enjoyable and informative, a loving tribute even if deeper analysis and insight rarely rear their heads. Yet I dare anyone not to snap to attention and spontaneously follow the sound of that voice.

It’s tradition versus modernity, it’s defiance in the face of oppression, but more importantly, the film speaks to how Fiddler on the Roof resonates time and time again, across generations, to the human condition.

A sublime mixture of dark social realism and magical fantasy – social magical realism, if such a subgenre exists.

Given the rags-to-riches Mafia narrative Piranhas is built upon, it’s no surprise that Giovannesi’s film has received comparisons –  both favorable and unfavorable  – to "Goodfellas."

Though the third act ends surprisingly, if not anticlimactically – truth is indeed stranger than fiction – the film can’t resist one final finger wag, this time from the esteemed barrister (a likable Fiennes) who brilliantly mounts Gun’s legal defense by barely raising that finger.

You’ve got to hand it to director Andy Muschietti. Adapting any Stephen King novel – or, for that matter, shorter material – is always a hit-or-miss gig, but It Chapter Two manages to pull out all the stops and in several areas actually tops the first film.

Before You Know It feels like it fell out of the mid-Eighties – and that's not a bad thing. In the tradition of "Mystic Pizza" or "Moscow on the Hudson," it finds its humor in the light and shade of its characters, with the odd broader gag (especially from Tullock, who is unafraid to go big with Jackie's theatrical habits).

It's the astounding score by Eicca Toppinen and his bandmates in cello-metal innovators Apocalyptica that gives the film its structure.

It’s a fascinating ticking clock, and it works because Oyelowo leads the way as the brokenhearted survivor.

There are plenty of great things to say about director Janice Engel’s portrait of the late, legendary Ivins, but maybe the best is that after watching Raise Hell: The Life and Times of Molly Ivins, you'll immediately want to go back and re-read all her books.