The stifled quietness of “Strangler” leaves us wanting more, for better or for worse.

Menkes will often admit that many examples might be the result of unconscious choices — a particularly useful and astute notation when dealing with films directed by women, plenty of which contribute to the same gendered way of shooting — but rarely engages with the possibility of a different intent by the filmmakers whose work she is unpacking.

Freaky Tales is Boden and Fleck’s attempt at applying their studio lessons learned circa “Captain Marvel” to something supposedly more personal, but this film just ends up only repeating that one’s most grating tendencies.

More blatantly an exercise in style than anything on par with the director's crowning achievements, and suffers to some degree from the predictability of its premise.

Poyser doesn't do anything we haven't seen before, but the familiar ingredients are done just right.

Blisteringly cool one moment and ridiculously silly the next (much like its high school heroine), this punchy and propulsive late summer surprise is able to capture the way we live now because it displays such a vivid understanding of the reasons why we live that way.

Eternity does what it can to leverage its heady concept into a heart-stirring tale of love and longing, but the world-building — or lack thereof — invariably gets in the way of the emotion that Freyne is hoping to generate from it.

Even as The Keeping Room plays with formulaic ingredients, it manages to combine them into an eloquent portrait of gender, race and the constant march of time without overstating any of its potent themes.

There was more to Bonnie and Clyde than 'Bonnie and Clyde,' but The Highwaymen falls short of making the case that the good guys had the better tale.

Pitched somewhere between outrageous satire and sincerity, the movie has a tough time finding its priorities, but it’s endearing to watch it try.

One of the greatest comedy sequels ever made.

Hyams delivers a remarkably satisfying action-thriller hybrid that constantly pushes ahead. It's one of the best action movies of the year simply because it keeps hitting the right beats.

A mawkish coming-of-age story that marries Sundance vibes with a soft punk spirit, Peter Livolsi’s The House of Tomorrow never manages to flesh out its skeleton of quirks, but its heart is definitely in the right place.

The movie amounts to a tame, forgettable doodle, as if designed to imitate the scruffy Duplass movies that Naima worships; for Shawcat, however, it’s a promising step in a new direction that suggests a far more confident artist than the one she plays onscreen.

Much like “Les Misérables” before it, “Les Indésirables” is a series of riveting setpieces that are strung together with a mess of exposed wires, and much like “Les Misérables” before it, “Les Indésirables” can be easy to forgive for its contrivances because Ly’s anger is so palpable, his vision so viscerally lived-in, and his widescreen cinema so capable of galvanizing suffering through spectacle (a mixed blessing).

Macdonald has crafted one of the most riveting rise-fall-redemption story arcs in documentary format in recent memory, with Galliano himself as his unreliable — but never less than compelling — guide.

While there’s nothing egregiously cynical about the film’s nature or design, its forensic tone belies the familiarity of its evidence, and its subject has already been too well-excavated for the sincerity of Monroe’s efforts to shake off that signature true-crime stink (the pungent stench of a once-proud medium that’s been left to rot on streaming).

This soulful and deeply satisfying film — a fitting swansong, if ever there was one — makes a compelling argument that change is always possible, and that the path we’re on is never as narrow as the highway makes it look.

I couldn’t help but try to read a bit deeper into how these characters rhyme with each other, especially since Egerton is so game to go nuts, and Theron — ever the reliable action star, radiating strength through a clenched vulnerability — is as human as he is cartoonish.

Despite tackling our crazy times, The Oath somehow winds up not quite crazy enough to assess them.

Even if The Spine of Night struggles to align its overarching story with the anthology-like shape that it takes, it’s still rare and rewarding to watch a film that makes so few bones about what it wants to be.

Transitioning back into a scripted dynamic after his quasi-documentary performance excursions with "Bruno" and "Borat," Baron Cohen loses none of his edge, combining slapstick inspiration and social commentary into a hilariously provocative blend.

Rather than developing Roman’s conundrum, Roman J. Israel, Esq. settles for a prosaic character study laid out in painfully obvious terms, with a tacked-on twist in the third act just so that the story can find some way to end.

While there are a few truly moving detours along the way . . . Uncle Frank fumbles through its fairy-tale finale so fast that it sours everything that came before.

Most of the movie is spent on overfamiliar ominousness that does little to advance the plot, which is all the more frustrating because Chase has clearly assembled the ingredients for a richer horror experience than the cheap gruel he ends up serving here.

While it struggles through some awkward plot twists and clunky tangents, The Midnight Sky never loses grasp of the chilly atmosphere that inspires every moment; if only it there was something fresh about that.

A clever, high-concept dark comedy that uses the moral clarity of “The Twilight Zone” to see through the veil of modern cynicism, Happily jackknifes into the murky waters between #RelationshipGoals and #BodySnatcherVibes as it skewers the assumption that something must be very wrong with anyone who’s too happy for too long.

Visually scrumptious and slickly told, Creative Control illustrates the power of groundbreaking technology while also indicting its extremes.