While the cabin seemingly offers a rural respite, the endless snow and the situational horror of it all adds agoraphobic washes to any space. Couple that with captivating uses of grey and silver — seriously, the gradient factor in those two colors here is awe-inspiring by itself — and the dread becomes suffocating.

There’s such humanity and spirit to what del Toro has done that despite the narrative differences, it genuinely feels like the definitive take on Shelley’s classic tale. He’s said what he wants to say about his beloved Creature, and we are better for it.

The Lure somehow manages to seamlessly assemble a film equal parts hilarious, affecting, and grisly while trading and warping aesthetics and tones by the scene.

Decker succeeds in transporting viewers inside the mind of a tortured genius. With its mesmerizing cinematography, a deliciously waspy script, and fantastic performances, Shirley is a smart and intricately woven look at a woman’s struggle to create in a world telling her to be something else.

City of Ghosts is far less about the region’s troubled history than about the now, the daily abuses that continue to grow in severity as politics are talked elsewhere.

It’s a gripping, fascinating watch, an elegantly assembled portrait of the end result of influencer culture and late-stage capitalism – the blind leading the blind into an empty, insubstantial image of success and luxury that turns out to be nothing but smoke.

The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar is a choreographed dance of an experience — one that could have easily felt like a run-on sentence. However, Anderson is skilled enough as a filmmaker to make sure to pace things out with a deliberate and sure hand, utilizing both long takes and clever edits to make 37 minutes fly by like 15.

Ultimately, what takes Bruce Springsteen’s Letter to You from bonus-material curio to required viewing is the opportunity it gives Springsteen to make a capstone argument for his continued artistic drive.

The film possesses a quiet, considered tension that draws the viewer in.

As a writer and director, Hill demonstrates an endearing and encouraging empathy for his characters, crafting a portrait of adolescence that allows every emotion and every decision — from the most relatable at any age to the most boneheaded — to exist without irony, judgement, or condescension.

This is despairing filmmaking, but also the kind that arrests the eye from its first moments. Lee has made something rare here: a portrait of poverty that treats its subjects not as victims or as aggressors, but simply as pawns of a far grander social scheme than any of them can possibly comprehend.

It’s a very human film, oozing with heart and believable stakes, a brilliant marriage that mirrors the enduring ethos of the Spider-Man comic book.

There’s not an ounce of wasted motion to be found throughout Cold War. Pawlikowski moves at a fleet pace, trusting in his audience to fill in the gaps that the film’s understated storytelling leaves along the way.

Badlands doesn’t compromise anything we’ve previously understood about one of cinema’s most terrifying villains. It simply opens up a whole new way of thinking about them, and what they represent. Never thought I’d use the word “beautiful” in reference to a Predator movie. But that’s what makes it such a wonderful surprise.

In a time when so much of what we consume can feel plastic and cheap and mass-produced, it’s the human touch we come to crave — especially when it leads to something as fun as this.

Right to the final exhilarating moments, Challengers plays a bold game — sports action so visceral you can feel the sweat dripping off the screen, along with the emotional rallying that occurs off the court.

The Golden Glove definitely isn’t for everyone, and even when divorced from its more transgressive scenes, it’s not exactly a pleasant viewing experience. But for those not repulsed to the point of leaving the theater, there’s a lonely, human heart at its center.

Long Shot is a major win for Levine, Rogen, and Theron, who defied the odds to deliver an instantly re-watchable hit. It’s sexy, it’s funny, it’s smart, it’s topical, and, above all, it’s exactly what some people need right now.

One of the director’s finest to date, the film derives its unique power from the repetition of daily life, elevating the mundane to a kind of divinity.

It’s a visceral piece of horror that’s as bleak as it is beautiful.

Director John Crowley has fashioned a film that feels like a natural evolution from the Victorian novel, one in which the circumstances are deceptively modern even if everything else feels somewhat old-fashioned.

Mangrove elevates the oft-creaky genre of the courtroom drama with striking, evocative compositions, stunning performances, and a real sense of place.

Barely seen or even heard of since it was made, this “lost” Romero film doesn’t disappoint, and even though it’s not technically a horror film, it will scare you into spending any and all free time tending to anyone over 70 for fear of karmic retribution.

Your Name is the kind of film that’s all the more striking for how easily it could have gone awry, but Shinkai has accomplished something unique and genuinely special here.

Here’s a cocktail so potent that it may just snap even the most tired and cynical viewers out of apathy.

Zola‘s not without its faults. The script is a little too loosy-goosy for its own good, and the last 10-15 minutes are admittedly a lackluster resolution to the high-tension hijinks on display. But until that point, it’s downright thrilling to watch a film breeze through its grimly funny energy with such exuberant confidence, especially with such a new, vibrant voice in Paige.

Three Billboards may be a film chiefly concerned with rage, and pain, but it’s also one of the best dark comedies of recent vintage, and one of the better dramas as well. While some of McDonagh’s narrative threads do time out in unexpected and even unresolved ways, the film’s highs are exemplary.

While some aspects of that history should have been examined more introspectively, the documentary should be considered the definitive recounting of one of the most influential activist groups in American history.

Arnaud Desplechin delivers a thrilling reminiscence that romanticizes and believes in youth’s ungraceful but intense splendors.

Donaldson has a tremendous command of pace and silence, laying the desperation of middle age (and how it looks to those whose lives are still ahead of them) bare with little more than a gesture or a closeup. It’s a killer debut for both her and Collias, and it will be exciting to see what both can do with the momentum a picture like this can provide.

The film is relatively sparing in how it depicts said atrocity, but the horror of it still comes through, while never distracting from the delicate bond that emerges between Jacqueline and Callie (Alia Shawkat), another ex-pat working as a tour guide through the ruins.

Kogonada matches the inquisitive eye of his two leads, finding the splendor in the everyday, the unusual in the unlikeliest places, and the need for connection that runs beneath all things.

In a narrative filled with numerous opportunities for scenes you’ve seen before, Durham ducks all the cliches to stay focused on what’s most important: a father, a daughter, and the words they shared between them.

Get Back is the history. Let It Be is a poem. [2024 Restored Version]

It makes for a deeply unconventional sort of fairy tale, but this is George Miller we’re talking about. What else did we expect?

It’s the rare Marvel sequel that manages to expand on what came before in new and rewarding ways, while also striking its own distinct tone even as some of its narrative devices skew familiar.

There’s something relatively shocking about the way One Battle After Another comments on This Moment In Time; it almost seems like production on the movie wrapped yesterday, as opposed to mid-2024. Yet while its focus on issues of political power, immigration, and the rise of white supremacy are all too relevant, Anderson never loses sight of his characters, and the different ways in which they commit to taking action.

Spinal Tap II holds onto the real sense that these men, despite everything they've been through, have loved each other almost their entire lives. Guest and McKean in particular met in college in the late 1960s, and they've been playing music together ever since; there's something beautiful about the fact that they've found their way to this moment, after so many decades — one where the only laughter they care about is each other's.

A revelatory burst of Black history suffused with the joy and struggle that made it possible.

A simple story told well can still be effective if the emotional resonance underneath it comes through. In Kubo, it absolutely does, thanks to the uniformly excellent voice performances.

As the world continues to mourn the loss of Chadwick Boseman, his last performance will serve as a magnificent reminder of the actor’s talent, and an exclamation point on a life that inspired a generation.

The Birth of a Nation is one of the most confident writing and directorial debuts in recent memory.

Berger’s take on All Quiet on the Western Front is a searing indictment of the futility of war, one that knows the way conflict erodes the human soul and the machinery that keeps that erosion moving. Its battle scenes are as impressively staged as they are visceral to watch, despite a few hinky ropes of CGI here and there.

There’s just more under the hood than your typical imitators: the antic disposition of the idle rich, the way infinite money can absolve the rich of any accountability, and the ever-predatory nature of colonial tourism. Wrap it up in a package this wild, shocking, and perverse, and it makes for a delightful bloody mess that you’ll want to go back to.

It exists less as an adaptation than a love letter to the film, its large community of fans, and crazy dreamers everywhere.

By the time we finally do get to the blood and guts, the filmmakers have laid such an artful foundation that the viscera is just another part of Suspiria‘s hypnotic modern dance.

More than a metatextual look at the struggles of indie filmmakers to gnaw at their own emotional wounds, Black Bear is an astounding showcase for its leads, and way more than it says on the wrapper.

The Souvenir‘s power is deceptive, in a way; it’s only at the film’s end, at the moment of its bracing final image, that its ideas and genre subversions come fully into focus.

It’s the strongest Benoit Blanc movie yet, thanks to the way that the best artists learn and grown from their previous works, applying those lessons to their future projects.

It’s as complex and surprising a character study as any you’ll see this year, a fact made all the more impressive when you remember that the woman in question has been turned into a collectible doll.

Hereditary‘s horror functions on multiple levels. What we see is undoubtedly terrifying, but it’s how we see it that truly distinguishes the film.

The Holdovers is the easiest possible recommendation, a perfect time capsule of a kind of movie that may not be totally extinct.

Directors Adam Nee and Aaron Nee manage to find just the right balance between action, comedy, and romance to make all three work harmoniously together, while playing with a team of all-stars who make the material sing.

This is a film about sisters, yes, but also the identity we all must forge independent of our families, and the pain that comes with outgrowing the innocence that once defined our sibling bonds.

There’s so much heart throughout Theater Camp — it also doesn’t overstay its welcome, landing at a tight 94 minutes packed to the minute with visual gags and quick comments you don’t want to miss.

Director James Gunn’s first foray into big-budget movie making succeeds despite focusing on characters largely unknown to mainstream audiences and provides some of the most genuinely affecting moments of any Marvel film to date.

Though it’s not outright scary, Midsommar will no doubt unsettle even the most steeled of viewers. It will also satiate those who may have feared a sophomore slump from Aster. Hardly. This film’s the real deal, and if anything, it’s more audience-friendly than his first. Don’t miss it.

With its painterly, brutal beauty and folk-horror underpinnings, it’s tempting to dismiss Stolevski’s You Won’t Be Alone as “Terrence Malick’s The VVitch.” But it’s so much more than that, a devastating yet highly-attuned exploration of the brutality of the world, and our yearning for identity and connection to protect us from nature’s capriciousness.

There’s talent in every corner of the film, and it elevates Black Panther beyond so many of its superhero contemporaries even as it exhibits some formulaic tendencies. It’s a sterling example of formula done exceedingly well, however, particularly in the ways it uses the familiarity of that formula to tell a new kind of story.

Calibrating a horror-comedy requires intense precision, since the director has to keep the tension alive while also bringing in just the right level of over-the-top gore and mayhem to inspire laughs, not screams. I’d estimate that a good 95% of The Monkey is totally dialed in, especially when it comes to finding a level of gore that plays as hilariously disturbing.

The Iranian filmmaker wisely uses the genre to work through themes of oppression, rebellion, and femininity without ever politicizing the film. This is prestige horror, the kind with tricks and treats that arrive with purpose and linger for years.

It’s a warmly empathetic documentary, the kind that simply observes instead of attempting to sound one kind of rallying cry or another.

The Lighthouse is a stunning sophomore effort for Eggers, featuring two exceptional performances by Dafoe and Pattinson and a stunning visual and aural aesthetic.

Bolstered by the fantastic technical direction at every turn, Priscilla lands as a remarkably moving portrait not just of a pair of American icons, but also of a dissolving romance.

Perry’s kinetic style and Moss’ explosive performance transform it into something that feels more authentic than actual history.

There’s something, well, deliciously appetizing about Bones and All’s oddball romance, from Guadagnino’s sensitive approach to the material to its staggering work from both leads.

Whether we follow Han Solo through hyperspace for more adventures is up to Disney, but what we got here is enough to keep us coming back again and again...That’s the best kind of Star Wars movie.

There ends up being something really profound about the way A Real Pain lets the undercurrent of history serve as contrast to the deeply felt emotions of its core character story.

Love Me had the potential to be a little too precious in its storytelling — certainly there’s something profoundly cute about two robots falling in love, as any Wall-E fan will tell you. What keeps the narrative balanced is the raw bleakness of the setting.

Though it doesn’t end with quite the punctuation it deserves, The Eyes of My Mother is a beautiful nightmare from start to finish.

The film is filled with sensitive performances that help to upend the fantasy of the nuclear family as the cure for society’s ills. It’s a sparse but stunning mood piece, and a wonderful showcase for Dano as a uniquely family-driven auteur.

Barbie is a magic trick, a stellar example of a filmmaker taking a well-established bit of corporate IP and using it to deliver a message loudly and clearly. That Greta Gerwig’s third solo film as director also manages to be a giddy, silly, and hilarious time is essential to its power, and the challenge of this review is thus trying to explore how the magic trick works, while still preserving the flat-out awe I have at what it achieves.

Instead of simple heroes or avatars for big ideas about equality, Loving delivers complex, imperfect human beings who are struggling to find their place in a far from perfect world.

The characters in Isle of Dogs may fight. They may get vicious. They may get hurt. They may get sick. But they also get nostalgic. They also get bashful. Their eyes also well up with tears when they reconnect with their loved ones, or when they first realize that love even exists at all. Just like humans.

Fails is unsurprisingly exceptional given his relationship to the material, shaping the film’s overall tone as he goes along, portraying a kind of existential tour guide for a place that at once still stands, is being torn down every day, and never quite existed at all.

In the end, it’s not Weiner with whom you’re furious, but a media climate that routinely prioritizes scandal and lewdness over the intricacies of a candidate’s platform. With the circus that is our forthcoming election rapidly approaching, this message is all the more resonant.

Johansson and Driver both give strong performances, while the use of supporting characters for comedic levity is smartly executed. While the content of the film isn’t happy per se, audiences will find much to like.

Wakanda Forever, first and foremost is a film about grief — which is extremely fitting for a movie that, in another and perhaps better timeline, would have starred the man who led the original film to both box office and awards glory.

The director of Dogtooth and The Lobster has been gradually making his way towards something this vivid and vibrant his whole career, inching toward his audience with one absurdist feature after another.

There are choices here that prove reminiscent of the iconic Looney Tunes cartoon “Duck Amuck” — if “Duck Amuck” was over two hours long, and Chuck Jones had chugged four dozen Four Lokos while directing it.

It’s a love letter to the genre without ever aping or mimicking it. With an incredible supporting cast and two engaging leads, it’s an out and out blast that finds Landon inching closer and closer to slasher masters like Craven and Carpenter.

Jordan Peele's made a thrilling, exciting blockbuster that also touches on the nature of spectacle, and the ways artists get chewed up and spat out (in some cases, literally) by their work.

Patient, meditative, and sanguine, Adopt a Highway is a rugged slice of Americana.

Born to Be Blue serves as an honest and heartfelt ode to not only Chet Baker, but those who revel in the occasional highs and neverending lows that overwhelm the pursuit of art.

Clever mythos and well-crafted chills with an expertly-paced narrative makes for a deliciously entertaining, late summer crowd pleaser.

The terrors put forth by the film are at once specific to the era of its production and timeless in their direct connection to the American experience.

The costuming and detailed sets shifting from era to era are part of what made “The Eras Tour” such an immersive experience, and the camerawork again puts the craft in the spotlight. Swift, of course, looks and sounds great, beaming at the sold-out SoFi crowd throughout the show.

What’s perhaps most remarkable about Mudbound is its emotional honesty, Rees rarely sidestepping the inner lives of her characters and never diminishing their own battles to live in an unlivable time, however wrongheaded they might be.

It’s a huge, huge swing, and Aster skeptics will likely scoff at the egotism of it all. But for those of us who’ve been at the receiving end of a classic Jewish-mother guilt trip, Beau is Afraid will serve as affirmation, cinematic therapy, and the most relatably terrifying thing they’ve ever seen.

Park comes through with his typically vibrant, inventive command of tone and camera. Virtually every composition and camera movement from DP Kim Ji-yong is gasp-inducing, aided by some truly exciting blocking from Park.

Cautionary tales about the dangers of life in the Internet age can often feel heavy-handed and trite, but M3GAN never feels like an extended Black Mirror episode. Its accessible themes don’t come off as oversaturated, thanks to the wit of the screenplay and a great performance from Williams.

It’s a simple story of children who have to figure out, at too young an age, what kind of people they’ll be. And in its pervasive sense of hope, Barras seems to suggest that they can be anybody they want. There’s always still time, as long as love remains in the world.

It’s been far too long — or it seems like it — since we got a full-throated, ridiculous comedy in theaters. Though it’s a real shame that Barb and Star Go to Vista Del Mar isn’t going to play to sold-out crowds, it deserves to live on as a cult classic.

Garland boldly asks us to take a step back, to forget about notions of who is right and who is wrong and simply focus on the horrors of what might happen if this happened at all. If you surrender to its abstractions, it proves a disquieting, terrifying watch.

At times, László Nemes’ film induces the sensation of drowning, slowly. Not the kind where you’re pulled under by the riptide, but the kind where you’ve been treading water for so long that the body starts to betray you in tiny increments, and any life preserver must be met with utter desperation.

On its own, it’s still an incredible achievement, amplifying a blood-soaked adventure epic in the haunting specters of witchcraft and folklore that will still challenge viewers without leaving them fully out in the cold. Odin willing, it can offer a window for folks to look into Eggers’ more Bergmanesque works, and inject a little more cinematic curiosity into a palate that’s often dulled by CGI sameness.

The relaunch of the classic comedy series captures exactly what made the original, and other movies from the team behind Airplane!, so essential: An almost non-stop onslaught of silly and random moments, rejecting any attempt at logic to instead go for the gut — which is to say, the belly laugh.

Robbie has been great in many films, including some pretty bad ones (what’s up, Suicide Squad), but she’s outstanding here.