Schroeder tracks the end of innocence in much the same way that the strip captured it each time out. Unlike "Salinger," he hardly makes a spectacle out of Watterson's secluded tendencies. The pileup of interview subjects speak eloquently on his behalf.

Ducournau tears down the walls of a genre so often identified with male filmmakers. (Like the father of body horror, David Cronenberg.) Shrewdly using the art-horror format to upend the traditional teen Bildungsroman, “Raw” makes it impossible to look away — as much as you might want to.

Maintains a funny and sad focus on its single petulant subject.

It renders a global crisis in strikingly intimate terms.

"Dick Long,” which stems from Billy Chew’s script, lacks the same abstract weirdness that made “Swiss Army Man” such an indelible cinematic delight. It has more intimate aims — humanizing a couple of brutish morons by mining substance from the silliness, and arriving at the conclusion that crass white-trash stereotypes have feelings, too.

It's been so long since Lee made such a thoroughly amusing work that fans should have no problem excusing its messiness. But make no mistake... Oldboy is all over the place, sometimes playing like a subdued melodrama and elsewhere erupting into flamboyance and gore.

This nutty blend of hyper-violence and one-liners is a dark comedic delicacy.

For all of the film’s janky pacing, thoroughly mediocre action setpieces, and the clumsiness with which it’s forced to double as backdoor pilot for Disney Plus’ “Ironheart” series, Coogler’s subthread of the MCU continues to operate at a significantly higher strata of thought, artistry, and feeling than the rest of Marvel’s assembly line.

Political only by implication, Zero Bridge works in a larger sense as a story of universal longing.

The scarring power of Nyoni’s film ignites from Shula’s eventual realization that she would rather torch her family to the ground than let them forget what happened.

Universal Language is first and foremost a testament to the shared artifice of all filmic storytelling, and to the singular realities it’s able to bring alive in turn.

It’s not a hard movie to watch, but it’s a thought-provoking test about one’s capacity to push through distractions and discover what’s important.

Pina is a beautiful, heartfelt ode and a delicious feast for the eyes, but not an essential work of art on its own terms.

Before its spell unravels with overdone theatricality and on-the-nose flashbacks, Caterpillar succeeds as a kind of representational horror movie.

The understated performances and coolly detached, shivery hypnotic vibes of this film won’t be for anyone looking for a story, but The Ice Tower casts a creepy spell that lingers and even deepens in the mind long after it’s over. As only the best spells do.

Inside is a small and constrained prison drama, even by the inflexible standards of its genre, and yet Williams’ debut is so replete with such moments of raw compassion that it almost invisibly accumulates a deep well of emotion — one that allows the film to feel much bigger than it looks by the time it arrives at its absolute knockout of a final scene.

The most intense look at a social media-obsessed loner since “Eighth Grade,” Swedish director Von Horn’s Polish-language feature finds its character wrestling with the nature of her popularity, until she’s forced to confront the disconnect between her public and personal existence in vivid detail.

Fiery, fiendish, and flawed, “Drive-Away Dolls” could do more and less, but delivers definitive prove that these atypical authors of lesbian film have something and want to use it.

Mascaro’s wry and witty new film will remind savvy audiences of bleak apocalyptic films about humanity’s potential loss of feeling against technologies that crush them.

Kill makes very, very good on its goofy title by the time all is said and done, but perhaps the most surprising thing about Bhat’s action extravaganza is that it inverts expectations without ever getting off-track.

The filmmaker is ultimately better at constructing nuanced environments and troubled figures than making every piece of the equation gel as a whole. But that's a minor issue in the overall tapestry of Chandor's carefully designed world.

Edited in a frenzied mashup of concert fragments and off-stage exchanges, The Punk Singer generally overcomes its rough production values by realizing the energy of Hanna's achievements in terms of her passion and physical prowess.

Erlingsson has created a winsome knickknack of a movie that manages to reframe the 21st century’s signature crisis in a way that makes room for real heroism.

A broadly safe film like “Finch” might roll into its destination with an ease that belies the risks of getting there, but sometimes the real treasure is the friends we build along the way.

In Beginning, the borders of the frame aren’t just the iron bars of a jail cell, they’re also the garden walls of Eden, the tempting hiss of the snake, and the angel of the lord who interrupted Abraham from killing his son.

No stranger to crafting excessive anticipation, Reichardt has funneled that skill into thriller clothing. However, like all of her output, nothing is as simple as it looks.

Throughout the very funny film directed by Lawrence Lamont and written by Syreeta Singleton, you are treated time and time again to the brilliance of Palmer — how she can transform any bit of dialogue into a laugh line, or make her eyes glimmer with gags.

A film that’s dark and delightful and ripe for rediscovery.

Beyond its surface pleasures, Crimson Peak also confronts the demons of modern entertainment. The movie frightens and surprises us in familiar ways, but at the same time issues a plea for restraint.

The central appeal of The Trip is that it's only a comedy in bits and pieces. Overall, however, Winterbottom constructs a thoughtful and generally sad portrait of Coogan's persona as a man unsure of his next move.

There’s a candor and a rawness here that’s inherently compelling.

The Divide manages to transcend its numerous flaws while indulging them: No matter where it falters, the underlying purpose stays put.

To the Wonder renders the familiar terrain of romantic dysfunction on a grand scale. Malick haters may not change their tune, but at least they can admit that To the Wonder maintains a consistent thematic focus.

Harpoons have never been more terrifying than they are here, and Robinson and Lansky expand Williamson’s once quaint universe so dramatically that it can be shockingly hard to see the Fisherman coming.

Unlike recent activist documentaries about animal cruelty like "The Cove," Leeman's narrative doesn't feature any real villains. Balding's bond with Flora leaves him in a perpetual state of uncertainty about which possible new home for his elephant would provide the safest habitat.

Entrancing from the start but slow to reveal the full scope of Wilson’s vision, Look Into My Eyes locks into that furtively cinematic essence by framing its psychic readings with a stiff naturalism that recalls the interview scenes in Hirokazu Kore-eda’s “After Life.”

A lucid crystallization of both Arulpragasam’s private life and her public mission, Matangi/Maya/M.I.A. offers an intimate profile of a righteously modern renegade without ever feeling like propaganda or a plea to stream her latest album on Spotify.

As Swift observes in the movie, powerful women are given the almost impossible task of being “strategic” but not “calculating,” and Wilson is so good at splitting the difference that some of her documentary’s most humanizing moments are beautiful for how they contradict Swift’s intention.

Though the original novels were written in the ’70s and ’80s, at times Confess, Fletch feels like a ’50s farce, with good old-fashioned misdirection and mistaken identities doing the leg work. Unlike James Bond, Fletch doesn’t need gadgets or fast cars to untangle this mystery, just a few Negronis and heaps of charisma. The formula works.

The sturdiest ingredient in 13TH is the testimony from people who clearly know what they’re talking about.

The appeal of El Planeta lies with a pair of women who prefer to live in the moment rather than considering its consequences.

The Coens get their cake and eat it, too: The lavish period details, paired with marvelous song-and-dance routines, work on their own terms while a firm self-awareness looms over every scene. It's a tricky balance indicative of directors who know exactly what they're going for: An old-fashioned homage to classic Hollywood and a send-up of the very same thing.

Director Michael Winterbottom hasn’t just delivered the funniest movie of the year, but also a comedy that casts its characters in a harsh new light.

Post Mortem portrays the specter of dictatorship through the lens of one man's private hell.

The real triumph of Obvious Child involves its ability to make familiar ingredients work just fine on their own terms. In doing so, it makes up for a lot of lost time in the pantheon of female-centric comedies, and studios would be wise to take note.

A nuanced portrait of a city in flux (or decline) that uses the impressionableness of adolescence to shake our own understanding of gentrification and its residual effects, Little Men is that rarest of beasts: a truly hopeful heartbreaker.

Anchored by a funny and especially credible performance by newcomer Miles Teller, Ponsoldt's follow up to his alcoholism portrait "Smashed" has all the hallmarks of a bittersweet teen drama with flashes of realistic comedy on par with "Say Anything" and "The Breakfast Club."

Love & Mercy is an engrossing portrait of Wilson's specific artistic inclinations, which draw from no real precedent.

A totally wacky head-trip with midnight movie sensibilities and a daring avant garde spirit, Glazer's movie is ultimately too aimlessly weird to make its trippy narrative fully satisfying, but owes much to Johansson's intense commitment to a strangely erotic and unnerving performance unlike anything she has done before.

What starts as a blandly divided documentary eventually finds its way to something inspiring, infuriating, and unbounded by old ideas.

This is an assured debut that sketches the relationship to state power that the marginalized contend with in London and the world beyond. Too muted in emotional effect to bring home a flirted-with theme of solidarity, the world-building still brings to life in the spirit that animates even the most besieged communities.

Russell and Karpovsky are a winning pair, and if they ever want to hit the road for more big jokes and even bigger revelations, any director would do well to let them take the wheel.

Once the menacing and mysterious Screenslaver is introduced, inciting a Spielberg-level monorail chase that reaffirms Bird’s lucid gift for kinetic and character-driven action filmmaking, the movie blasts off and never looks back.

The Ivory Game may be a harsh wakeup call to anyone concerned about the future of the largest land mammal, but it’s also a keen evaluation of the efforts being made to correct the situation.

De Wilde doesn’t strain for relevance or reinvent the wheel, she just unapologetically serves dessert for dinner until you’re left with the satisfaction of eating a three-course meal.

It’s one of the most exciting midnight movies of 2023.

That Tortorici pulls this twist off is both perverse and pleasurable, and that he keeps it all feeling funny is even better.

While it eventually devolves into exploring the terrifying prospects of something hairy lurking about in the shadows, Goldthwait uses that thrill factor to validate the commitment of Bigfoot believers. Willow Creek never feels like an attempt to proselytize, but it's a smart recognition of the dangers involved in doubt.

Wheatley’s commitment to crowdpleasing antics makes it difficult to stop and consider the lack of depth. In a universe of shootout clichés, Free Fire manages to carve out its own niche, where the proverbial last man standing matters less than the journey to get him there.

A bonafide family drama, proof that the noir has humanistic roots. It left me feeling thankful for persistent movie traditions.

Much of this quiet, slow-burn character study inhabits the dreary, remote quality of Doña’s existence, but with time, the movie pieces it together to reveal the emotional solitude lurking beneath that distant gaze.

It makes you recognize, through the force of its telling, why the story of Poitier’s life matters. And will matter forever.

Showing the uneasiness of a first-time documentarian, Rapaport has a difficult time exploring the drama. That has extended beyond the movie itself and into a long-running media dispute with Q-Tip, who has refused to plug the movie.

While nothing in your life may come as easily to you as everything in Coldplay’s lives seems to have come to them, this delightful and unexpectedly inspiring documentary has a funny way of making your dreams seem closer than they might appear.

In a world where everyone feels lonely, Amanda might be our most authentic avatar, someone willing to get super weird in the hopes it will lead somewhere great. For Cavalli and “Amanda,” the results speak for themselves: The film, and its titular heroine, are great indeed.

Chastain and Sarsgaard give a pair of haunting, expert performances as damaged people making sense of their own agony together. Franco gets out of the way of his actors without manipulating them.

Story Ave approaches the challenges faced by a talented artist in underprivileged circumstances with a clear head, always pivoting away from simplistic narratives and towards reality.

Hypnotic from start to finish and unexpectedly hopeful for a movie with so much arsenic in its blood, Islands knows that even the greatest of vacations can never compete with the rewards of fostering a reality you actually want to return to when it’s over.

Leviticus is not a perfect horror film . . . But the film’s moody atmosphere — including a soundtrack full of clanks and bangs — makes it an enjoyably disquieting ride.

While this nasty film seems headed toward a conclusion where the rich win and the status quo is maintained, that’s abruptly shattered by a violent climax that assures that no one on either side of the divide is left without a bloodstain.

As a director, he finally shows a willingness to work on the same wavelength of the material instead of adding distracting bells and whistles that overstate his characters' grievances.

And, really, it does something wild, something increasingly rare along the way: it makes you feel, as messy and strange and unexpected as that might be. Now that’s a super story.

Maintaining a feel-good tone without becoming saccharine, “Rez Ball” is a charmer with enough of an edge to keep viewers on their toes.

There’s something especially primordial, even biblical, about director Lucio Fulci’s grisly spectacle.

the film isn't always successful at justifying its heft, repeating the central father-daughter tension innumerable times before the pair finally start to make some progress. It's only thanks to the two actors' extraordinary authenticity that the film continues to work as long as it does.

Like its star, Anna and the Apocalypse merrily charges through danger. It’s a genre mash-up populated with cliches...but McPhail finds small moments to make his characters unique.

It’s the kind of film that steadily trains you in perceiving and eventually becoming lost in its sense of time, to the extent that you can almost forget the presence of the camera even when it is moving. You’re living in the frame with Thien; the timing of the camera and character naturally intertwined.

This semi-autobiographical sketch isn’t really a story at all so much as a sweetly effervescent string of Kodachrome memories from the filmmaker’s own childhood — the childhood of someone who was born in a place without any sense of yesterday, and came of age at a time that was obsessed with tomorrow.

The coolheaded patience of Burns’ approach is precisely what makes “The Report” so powerful in the end, not only as a lucid crystallization of our country’s recent political history, but also as an urgent reminder of how a world that prioritizes emotions over ethics will eat itself alive.

Creating a lucid sense of reality only so that she can defile it with a wicked pivot towards madness, Asensio’s film creates a vision of immigrant life in America (and its value) that’s all the more urgent for how it uses genre elements to exaggerate the experience.

The surprise isn’t that it deviates from the groundrules set out in the film before it, or even the scores of horror films from in and around the decade in which it’s set. It’s that when Fear Street: 1978 is given the opportunity to fulfill the promises it’s made for itself, it does so unreservedly, with a clear sense of purpose.

In a documentary landscape rife with both star-fronted documentaries and other hagiographic entries, Howard leans into honesty. The film is so much better for it, even as it can’t quite capture the full magic and scope of Henson’s life and work. What could?

Wright's extraordinary long takes draw you into the universe of Anna Karenina with a seamless approach that a straightforward literary adaptation could never accomplish.

Shelton’s work is understated, but elevates seemingly forgettable scenarios with a wise, humane approach that makes even a lesser work like Outside In a cut above the market standard.

Offers a wry snapshot of self-involved New York lesbians that’s both enjoyably smarmy and unsettling in equal doses.

As inspirational as it is entertaining, “Polite Society” is a strong debut from Manzoor and a rallying cry for a whole swath of brand-new stars to champion.

Writer-director Ari Aster’s first feature culls from a tradition of slick, elegant genre filmmaking, making up what it lacks in originality with an impressive volume of atmospheric dread.

While its main characters are tough-minded, Rust and Bone is itself pure heart.

Pummeling forward from its first diner-set fight scene to a sweeping final showdown on the beach, Haywire is a literal blast.

Piponnier dominates every frame, with a mesmerizing screen presence that pushes the drama well beyond its formulaic premise and visible microbudget constraints.

Anchored by a nuanced turn from Scanlan that can hang with some of the best Italian Neorealist performances, the film ends up a beautiful, jagged exploration of the messy nature of being human.

Few movies have ever so boldly explored how fraught the safety of unconditional love can be in such a cruel world, and even fewer — including Aster’s own “Hereditary” — have been so willing to sit with the irreconcilable horrors of trying to share that love with someone else.

Oppenheim relishes in the strange beauty of their lives with Rockwellian precision, and the bigger picture remains elusive throughout. Look closer, however, and the movie makes a sobering point, whether or not Oppenheim intended it — that the biggest threat to American identity isn’t confronting the nature of the society so much as the people who prefer to escape it altogether, ending their lives in solipsistic bliss.

With high points that are sharp and low points that are nonsensical, Leave the World Behind never ceases to be entertaining.

Cold Pursuit resolves as a riotously fun example of a director remaking their own film for the right reasons.

While not his best work, Like Someone in Love is a nimble expression of Kiarostami's appeal: He remains one of the few directors capable of pulling you into a narrative and making you question its motives at every turn.

Boonbunchachoke has made a darkly hilarious film that deserves to be remembered for much more than its shock value.

This film is as muted in its approach to character and drama as its color palette, but the result is devastating.