The cast is top-notch and I predict there will be plenty of female audience members drooling over Michael Idemoto as Michael.

Budabin has created a compelling, entertaining, and informative work in Great White Summer that is a master class on what a documentary can be.

Messaging aside, there is such great nuance in both performances of Carice van Houten and Marwan Zenzari. You’re continually guessing their state of mind in a true psychological thriller manner.

Skate or Die is a great documentary with a positive message that will undoubtedly inspire and empower those who watch it.

Son of Monarchs is a type of philosophical journey but one of beauty and mystical discovery.

This film is done in a seemingly comedic way that does not make it just another boring educational documentary. It is effortless to watch and enjoyable.

Kai paints her subject lovingly, hitting the classics like the world’s greatest visual jukebox. Like a Rolling Stone: The Life and Times of Ben Fong-Torres is a fun-filled look at a member of the old school who wasn’t a class clown.

Clint Eastwood is the ultimate thinking man’s cinematic killing machine. High Plains Drifter is his spooky, dark, and vicious version of the Sergio Leone Man With No Name Spaghetti Westerns he once starred in, and a moody existential meditation on gunplay, revenge and karma. Payback! 

Johansson is a stunningly charismatic actress. She gives Travolta a serious run for his money.

School of Magical Animals 2 is light fantasy viewing for kids to enjoy and adults to grumble about, and it hits those marks with style and polished panache. Set your expectations accordingly.

Bolstered by two formidable leads, the film is bound to resonate with anyone who has tried to make a fresh start, rediscover themselves, but also maintain a grasp on the past that keeps slipping away.

This is absolutely Eli Roth’s best film. It’s scary, poignant, thrilling, and just a ton of fun.

The motorcycle film genre is one that has all but been forgotten, but if any film could start the resurrection of this cinema genre's corpse, it's Larry Bishop's Hell Ride.

Hero is not a CTHD clone; it’s a wonderful movie in its own right, staking its own territory as a dreamlike meditation on motivation and love.

To me, the story is the reason to see The Matrix Resurrections. Lana Wachowski brings unexpected freshness to this new evolution of Matrix stories.

I don't want to say any more about the plot, it's just too much sick fun.

Adam Sobel’s 2017 documentary, The Workers Cup is a maddening heart-wrenching inside look into a group of construction workers in Qatar, building facilities in preparation for the 2022 FIFA World Cup.

Exciting, but not completely original.

Probably the best comment I could give it is that after sitting through the first two and 1/2 hours, I would have happily sat through another five. How long am I going to have to wait for that DVD Box Set?

There is no shortage of remarkable moments.

Brosnan's best mission as Bond yet, and the most satisfying installment of the franchise in recent memory.

For the UFO believers, Ariel Phenomenon is precisely the film you’re looking for as proof of alien existence. But for the unbeliever, Nickerson’s film is a mandatory watch to either chip away at your beliefs or make them stronger.

Writer-Director Paul Etheredge-Ouzts has a clear understanding of the beauty of a slasher film. A formulaic genre, it’s not the blueprint that’s important, it’s what you do inside it that matters.

Serious actors will find a whole new respect for these women and their individual contributions to film and theater, who fought through way through a system made for men and blazed a path for those who followed. And fans of one or all the dames will see the object of their fandom be real, open, and honest.

The filmmaker’s careful modulation of tone and rhythm, how gradually he reveals mysteries, and the mere fact that this is a dialogue/character-driven horror tale make it hard to believe that this is O’Brien’s feature-length debut.

It's a love story without all the verbal hooey and it hits harder than most.

No Future is unassuming, truthful, and absorbing by virtue of the deeply sensitive performances from Charlie Heaton, who exercises rigid body language and a weary demeanor, and Catherine Keener, whose sadness and shock are softly expressed.

Let the Corpses Tan is a fiendishly clever, meticulously stylish, lean, comedic thriller. Its sole purpose is to grab you by the lapels and entertain the living hell out of you, boy does it.

In Making Montgomery Clift, you see how brilliant an actor Clift was. You see his love of the art of storytelling, developing characters with depth and dimension, and his willingness to put the final product over his own ego. He loved living life just as much as portraying it on screen.

The quiet pace of The Road Dance, along with the ebbs and flows of the events around the characters, give it an authenticity and space to feel the impact. You may be captivated just as the filmmaker and I were.

Rude, crude, gaudy and often hilarious.

While PP does contain the lesbian-toilet-poo-poo-homo-butt kind of humor you would expect, (Ba Ba Booey) underneath that, there is a real movie there with fully developed characters and engaging conflict. It's an absolute must-see.

Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings is an origin story, and director Destin Daniel Cretton, working from script he wrote alongside Dave Callaham and, Andrew Lanham did a masterful job telling a story that’s not only Asian-American but a Marvel movie at the same time.

Sure, Blindspotting can feel a bit rough around the edges. Diggs and Casal have so many ideas they want to explore, and they aren’t always able to articulate them in a concise, economical way. But even if they haven’t quite honed their craft as screenwriters yet, theirs is a story that desperately needs to be told and they continue to find compelling ways by which to convey its urgency.

Documentaries exist for many reasons. In the case of Ink & Linda, it’s to take us to a world that we may not be familiar with and show us something new, something interesting. Not only do we meet two unique artists, but we get to see them collaborate and create.

Infinitely impractical, consistently unique and vastly imaginative.

Billie Piper’s first feature-length movie as screenwriter and director may have bitten off more than it could chew, but it is a daring debut that marches to the beat of its own drum. I respect it for that and enjoyed it more often than not.

The art direction and attention to detail in The Boys in the Boat are beautiful and well done, especially capturing the feathering of the rowing, the splashing and pools of water, and the creek of the rigging as the team of eight turns the oars with muscle and unison.

The film explores dark territory but treats the subjects with emotional intelligence and sensitivity.

This is a good film; strong, honest, strikingly photographed (by Dean Semler) and appropriately devastating.

A kaleidoscopic look at a marginalized community, Queer Japan is required viewing for anyone in the community as well as their allies.

Affleck carries a great deal of weight in the movie, but its Pniowsky who shines as the young pre-teen learning quickly what it means to be an adult.

It’s a Christmas movie that makes you laugh. There are a couple of cheesy scenes, though, so don’t worry if that’s what you’re looking for in your holiday viewing.

The film is filled with extraordinary characters and equally extraordinary circumstances that Hollywood could craft no better in any feature script.

Raymond Lewis: L.A. Legend needs to be seen by basketball fans everywhere because the man’s name deserves to be in the history books for his talent/determination, as well as for being a cautionary tale.

This well-crafted documentary shows us that getting old isn't all that terrible.

It will make you laugh, it will make you cry, and it will make you think. That doesn’t happen all that often in the same movie.

Lindsey Shapiro has captured an intriguing piece of hidden history, showcasing women’s strengths and the overlooked roles they played during the world’s most turbulent times of war.

It's difficult at first to tell whether this is a documentary or a fictional work and this makes Assisted Living all the more involving.

Silence of the Prey is lovingly filmed, with Varjabedian’s cinematography giving us lush greens in the deep, dark forests.

The film's quick pace and near-constant action carries you along quite nicely, and by the time Voldemort (Ralph Fiennes) makes his climactic appearance, one can't help but look forward to the remaining films.

Nicolas Cage is a joy to watch, and Werner Herzog is a brilliant storyteller.

Cash’s film is reflective and accomplished, showing the world through the eyes of a young woman challenged by a painful childhood and by the culture of her times, finding her own way through the chaos around her to a functional adult life.

Jack Hawkins is convincing in the lead role, while Joan Collins does what she does best, playing a ruthless, self-obsessed queen with no redeeming qualities – but we can’t help but love her.

With A Taste of Hunger, it is clear that Boe loves food. The film celebrates the culinary arts, as the cinematography lovingly displays exquisite dishes that please the eye as much as the taste buds. He studies how light and sound may affect taste. His approach to gastronomy is as meticulous as the dishes his protagonist prepares.

D.J. Caruso masterfully orchestrates this symphony of suspense, albeit a twenty-piece symphony, but a symphony nonetheless.

An entertaining and chilling film that will make you question what you believe about myths and the supernatural.

Through it all, Fast Food Nation never really preaches to viewers, it just lays ideas out there. In that respect, it's every bit a talky, philosophical Richard Linklater movie.

Takes a look at the man’s entire life and grants us an eye-opening look inside his brain. And now that the supposed be-all-end-all documentary has been made, let’s let the guy get some f----- rest, okay?

The whole film is an elegant inquiry into what happens when memory fails or when it just hurts so much it’s easier to try and forget. This portrait of broken people doing their best is an oblique and beautiful thing.

Hardy and Nachman’s film is the uncommon near-perfect documentary: the filmic elements fade, done so well the viewer focuses on the dogs and their journey. All of this leads up to the tremendous joy of freedom and partnership for those whose lives are transformed by their new guide dogs.

The Garden Left Behind is an amazing drama filled to the brim with realistic and heavy performances that will absolutely leave a lasting impression and subject matter that should more commonly be explored and celebrated. This film is special, and it deserves mass audience attention.

Each scene is enticing, draws you in, and tackles the verbal foreplay from the book nicely.

Nichols carefully avoids either demonizing or overly romanticizing his protagonists’ lifestyles. He portrays events just the way he imagines they would unfold.

Powerful, infuriating, and ultimately sobering. Make an effort to see it.

The scenes feel real and both Duplass and Aselton do a great job duking it out. The Puffy Chair combines great original comedy and solid acting to make a fun movie.

In preparing A Compassionate Spy, James seamed together a spellbinding collage concerning the life and times of Ted Hall and his family. It is a wonderful documentary, and I encourage everyone who wants a greater sense of the story of the Atomic Age to check it out.

An acute reflection of the current refugee crisis, minimalist and poetic in its approach, Transit, unlike its protagonists, seamlessly reaches its destination: a conclusion so heartbreaking, it will resonate for weeks after.

Paul Solet’s Tread takes a little while to grab the audience; however, once the stakes are fully understood, it becomes quite intense. Plus, the way it plays with audience sympathy is genius, making for an involving watch.

If you go in thinking it’s just a stupid teenage sex comedy, it can be pretty funny.

A Desert is a solid neo-noir with excellent visuals, good characterizations, and fantastic acting.

This deep-thoughts comedy is a must-watch for fans of Greg’s, but also for anyone who wants something beyond frat boy comedy or the typical Apatovian-adjacent improv stuff that has become de rigueur at this point. It’s a special movie that I hope people enjoy as much as I did.

Toying with the audience’s own expectations and predispositions, Schimberg has made a movie that can be confidently called original.

Cruz effortlessly holds the screen in a tricky performance: phlegmatic and ambivalent, radiating charisma and sophistication, making you feel for her despite some morally dubious acts.

While never sacrificing any of the hard-knock authenticity and specificity of his characters and their milieu, Brewer has crafted a deeply felt film.

One of the coolest and most memorable films of 2005 – I just want to see it again.

Video games have had a lot of misses as adaptations, but this isn’t one of them.

If you liked "Magnolia," you'll also like Mind the Gap.

In the end, Sisu is all about the violence and blood, and there are buckets of both. This is one of those action films where you can just sit back, unplug your brain, and hop on for one wild ride.

The Fam sensitively deals with a tough subject and serves as a striking introduction to a roster of formidable talent. It certainly feels like the cast and crew have become a true family during the shoot.

As a celebration, the documentary is an uplifting and joyous experience filled with amusing stories and engaging anecdotes.

The animation is beautifully done, with striking color and simplicity.

Craig is terrific.

Adieu Godard is generally a blast. Cinephiles will love it because it should, without fail, bring to mind our own journeys into “challenging” cinema. Casual viewers not well-versed in the New Wave catalogue will still find plenty of enjoyment in the chaos that erupts as a result of the backlash against the film.

In a parallel dimension, perhaps, most movies are this well-made. Watch Parallel, and then watch it again to untangle all of its little nuances.

If you like anything David Lynch or any of the surrealist masters, like Luis Bunuel have ever made, then you will like Giving Birth to a Butterfly. It also has a kick of Douglas Sirk/Ranier Fassbinder melodrama which I always love. If these are things you seek out in films, you will be right at home here.

Not unlike its predecessor -– might be hard to swallow, but it’s so delicious you just can’t help but want more. Not unlike one of those gobstoppers you can find in any candy store -- Hard to chew, nice to endure, if you will.

The tragic, violent true-life tale that concerns Waltz with Bashir is rendered even more powerful in animated form than it would likely have in life-action.

He and Côté write an ode to human resilience; they compose a soliloquy about lost identities; they paint a portrait of people seeking meaning, guidance, warmth. The result is a soulful cinematic treatise on the gradual, painful loss of a city’s soul.

This is a good move because while I and many others believe in civil liberties, no one likes a cop who goes by the book. Besides, Harry seems to have realized that if you kill the criminals then you never have to bother with prosecuting them. It’s only when people live that Harry gets hassled.

LX 2048 has some very funny moments of black comedy thrown in, especially in the latter half, which throws off the nihilistic tone that the movie has held up until then. However, some truly thought-provoking concepts, interesting production design, and a knockout performance from James D’Arcy make LX 2048 well worth a look.

Thematically relevant and persistently moving the form forward, Searching is an emotional roller coaster, taking a familiar premise and invigorating it along with biting commentary on viral video culture.

Emergency is a sharp, farcical comedy with a message.

Send Help is a brilliant, startlingly gory dark comedy. Sam Raimi still has that old magic.

At the least it will cause you to sit in a chair and laugh uncontrollably while twitching all over and moving your shoulders up and down in a rather creepy manner.

An exciting time at the movies, where you don’t smell something burning and realize it’s your brain cells dying off. During the summer movie season, that’s rather hard to avoid. But this movie has avoided it and it’s time well spent.

The Deeper You Dig is one of the more fascinating explorations of psychic activity and hauntings that I’ve seen in quite some time.

The Protégé is just good action-y thriller-y fun with great repeat value. It falls in that mid-range budget for an action film, maybe just a few notches below the Bourne films. So it’s the perfect popcorn and movie outing for the weekend.