As an experiment in filmmaking trickery, All the Money in the World is an extraordinary viewing experience; without that, it’s a compulsively watchable rumination on the worst of the one percent.

At its core, A Screaming Man emphasizes the strength of family bonds. It's a sad, moving portrait that has nothing to do with its chaotic setting.

The first-time filmmaker may be attempting to fit too many ideas into one sleek package, but that doesn’t mitigate the truth of "Nanny": All of it haunts.

That it manages to end a note that’s both deeply sad and sardonic only further makes its case as one of the finest forgotten films of its time, and one of the best, period.

It’s easy to imagine how a version of this film might have descended into vaguely connected sketches (and still would have been one of the funniest pure comedies in forever despite its shapelessness), but there’s a clear and rewarding intentionality to DeYoung’s plotting, and it pays off with a finale that — better than almost any scene before it — perfectly threads the needle between all of the movie’s competing energies.

It’s Alive presents a dialectic of horror in which monstrous excess is first repudiated and rejected, then returns in the form of self-loathing and social stigmatization, and is finally painfully accepted as an essential part of ourselves.

Union County doesn’t completely bypass addiction-drama clichés. But its detailed, humanistic approach successfully creates a realistic world that supports its muted storytelling

Colaizzo’s script weaves in enough detail to explain some of Brittany’s demons, but Bell sells the tough stuff too, doing more with a cautious look in the mirror and a slow smile than other performers can do with an Oscar-ready speech.

Emerald Fennell’s raucous debut, Promising Young Woman, twists its buzzword-laden, spoiler-free synopsis — it’s a #MeToo rape revenge thriller with bite! — into something fresh and totally wild.

If you've never heard of LCD Soundsystem or cared much for the group's work, Shut Up and Play the Hits still manages to explore the prospects of fame and contemporary rock music's lasting relevance.

Best Summer Ever isn’t the best movie ever, but what it does is continue to show that disability can be fun, unique, and enticing without being dour. It’s the best at what it’s doing and you’ll want to see more.

The resulting documentary is a nuanced, humane, and more naturally uplifting portrait of three young people trying to keep pace with their dreams in a relay race that’s never offered them the inside lane.

It’s too bad that the movie isn’t as vibrant, funny, and entertaining as the community it wishes to represent — but it’s a start.

The film is an agreeable document of cultural processing that should especially appeal to the niche crowd at its center — it's more or less mandatory viewing for L.A. foodies.

Its creators are so clearly on the same insane wavelength, nimbly blending camp and social satire and actual terror, that “M3GAN” is poised to crack the murder-doll pantheon and stay there forever. Oscars!

It’s always fun to sit through a clip reel when the talent quotient is this high, but Belushi doesn’t sugarcoat the sadness at the core of the actor’s legacy.

Even as the movie lingers on the question of whether one woman has more talent than the other, Always Shine is an effective actor’s showcase for both of them.

I Love You Forever unfolds like a documentary to those who have lived a similar experience — and a stalker horror movie to others.

King Jack, while unabashedly a coming-of-age story, is even better as a portrait of masculinity in crisis, of how its passed down from one generation to the next, and how that process might best be interrupted.

This isn’t just another great Bong Joon Ho movie about how much he hates capitalism (though it definitely is that too), it’s the first Bong Joon Ho movie about how much he loves people.

The film is smartly assembled, making the most of a limited indie budget and building a compelling world to boot.

Rather than smothering the material in bad vibes, the filmmaker uses them to gradually reveal a fascinating world in which anger and resentment becomes the only weapon any of these people know how to wield.

For all of its clumsiness and rookie missteps (which continue through the film’s gut-punch of a coda), His House is an urgent and spine-tingling ghost story about what it means to begin anew in a home that may not want you to live in it.

Director Barr’s intimate filmmaking finds the space to cover a multitude of moments in Sophie’s life that add up to something profound, from the mundane sequences that see her fully engaging with her grief to brief moments of respite.

Princess Cyd is a triumphant little film — little in the detailed moments it creates, not the content of its character. Anchored by complicated, smart, funny women, Princess Cyd is a rare delight of a film and a model for others to follow.

Marrying the sensitivity of “Spirited Away” to the lushness of “The Legend of Korra” and the narrative coherence of a lucid dream, Big Fish & Begonia is the very rarest of Chinese exports: An animated film that was made for adults.

Boy From Heaven wants to offer up a character study of a young Muslim man who ends up in hell and keeps going. Sadly, a deep and meaningful portrait of Adam is forgotten as the film — like the state officials it depicts — prioritizes functionality above all else.

Our Hero, Balthazar isn’t cold by any means, but the result comes off as more ethnographic in tone than the in-your-face bravado of the approach would suggest.