Overall, The Last Voyage of the Demeter is a middling entry in the Dracula canon.

Director Ben Wheatley gives the summer blockbuster the finger, and it’s the funniest damn thing I’ve seen this year. Meg 2: The Trench is flawed to perfection; a satirical pummeling of commercial cinema and the first out of gate with a Barbie send-up.

In contrast to the complex psychodrama of Nolan’s opus, A Compassionate Spy is a gentle and intimate film, largely narrated by Hall’s wife, Joan, who was 90 at the time of filming. She tells a love story.

Wryly funny, and just a little more complicated than its familiar indie film tropes suggest, the dramedy Shortcomings marks the directorial debut of comic actor Randall Park (Fresh of the Boat, Blockbuster, The Interview).

Credit goes to the Philippou brothers for their originality and perfectly queasily executed bits of ghoulish anarchy.

A thoroughly endearing movie that’s difficult to dislike, Teen-Age Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem tackles the basic themes of the characters Eastman and Laird originally instilled in their stories, like acceptance, growing up, or just simply wanting to do the right thing.

Kokomo City is a vibrant, original work, shot in black and white, in a kaleidoscopic blend of monologues, conversations, and re-enactments. At a moment when the American right are obsessed with criminalizing health care for transgender people and erasing Black history, it’s also timely.

A wildly funny film for all fans with a refined sense of nerd-humour, this is a must-see.

At a little more than two hours (about the length of the line to get into the actual ride), The Haunted Mansion sometimes strains to keep up its frenetic pace. But the fun tone is on point, and younger family members in the audience are in little actual danger of being traumatized by fear.

Let’s cut to the chase: Barbie is the greatest advertisement of all time. As a thrilling, escapist summertime movie? Yeah, no.

While so many movies lack a decent wrap-up, Theatre Camp goes out on a high note. You might not walk out humming show tunes, but you will leave smiling. After all, no one does curtain calls better than theatre people.

Oppenheimer is three hours of testimony played out as drama. There are no action scenes as such, besides pyro played on the quantum and city-destroying level. It is the opposite of escapism, but it’s real history worth telling.

What emerges is a portrait of a thinker forever questing, contemplative, and opinionated and engaging and funny. A writer and most importantly, a reader, and one who will likely make you want to cancel your next movie date in favour of something more literary.

Picturesque and genuinely heartfelt if a smidge corny, the Irish-set dramedy The Miracle Club serves mainly as a showcase for its trio of talents, Laura Linney, Kathy Bates, and Maggie Smith, billed in that order.

On an obvious level, it’s a character study of the artist as an insufferable young prig, a type that, as Petzold no doubt knows, is familiar to the point of cliché. But as the film unfolds, and boldly shifts tone, the character suggests the larger theme of struggling to stay humane in a broken world.

The stunts are simply breathtaking, and the car chase sequences could put the works of Steve McQueen and Gene Hackman to shame.

There are enough dream sequences infiltrating the action to confuse even devoted fans, while Insidious newbies and part-time dabblers are left to wonder when Freddy Krueger might arrive on scene. Wilson’s first stab at direction is not entirely a failure, but neither does he push the franchise to any new heights.

It’s still not bad, and its pacing works surprisingly well given its paucity of plot. Fans of the actors, or of low-key, high-concept sci-fi, should be pleasantly surprised. For others, mere surprise may be all that awaits.

Director Chris Smith resists unnecessary embellishments to tell the story of the friendship and partnership of Andrew Ridgeley and the late George Michael two school friends who became international music superstars. The result is a satisfying documentary that resists hagiography and instead focuses on the human beings.

It’s a clever bit of noir that keeps a viewer slightly off-balance at all times as the tension builds.

In this feature debut, De Filippis paints an utterly believable picture of the kind of immigrant/children-of-immigrants family where emotions fly and can turn from rage to love on a dime.

Maggie Moore(s) sun-baked backdrop — it was shot in and around Albuquerque — imbues the crime drama with a contrarian vibe that might be called Coen-esque though with much less umph than No Country for Old Men. It’s an enjoyable watch to be sure, but not destined to be memorable.

This is a tremendous underdog story, and it works because Holmes shows a viewer exactly who LeMond is and why he was so popular — then as now.

The two biggest questions I had going into Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny were: will it be fun and will the film stay true to the character of Indiana Jones. The answer, I'm pleased to say, is yes on both counts. It's a ton of fun. I had a blast.

Some jokes are a little on the cringeworthy side, but overall, they work. It’s a film that essentially hijacks the cuteness of The Little Mermaid and manages to successfully transfer it to a shy, math-loving awkward teenager who just happens to be able to transform herself into a 50-foot-tall sea-beast.

If you can get past the faintly ridiculous-slash-icky premise, underscored by the film’s double-entendre title, No Hard Feelings plays its broad comedy gamely and with some snappy dialogue to boot, albeit much given away in the trailer.

It is slap-in-the-face powerful, taking place 35 years ago (I always wonder in period pieces where the characters are today; Jean would be in her mid-60s) but full of the kind of educational turmoil and “woke” fears that stoke today’s Western culture wars. The more things change...

Asteroid City is very Wessy. Maybe the most Wessy ever. And thank goodness for that.

The film works, mostly as a comedy, never as a horror, but would work better if Story didn’t squander the film’s potential with an uneven script that fluctuates between extremes.

While the movie motors along with admirable pacing for most of its lengthy running time, it stumbles in the final act, which is marred by even more bad special effects and a maudlin reunion.

As an artistic design challenge, Elemental has triumphant moments (which may be good enough eye candy to keep kids occupied). But as a story, it doesn’t appear to aspire to much beyond a standard star-crossed romance.

Even with its decent performances and polished production values, Persian Lessons never clears the hurdle of its improbable premise, an idea that could serve as the setup for a bad-taste Mel Brooks’ sketch.

Possibly, no sane person could truly explain Dalí — who could account for the painter of Atmospheric Skull Sodomizing a Grand Piano? — but Harron’s film maintains a wry compassion for these mad love birds, who have spent their lives defying convention and perhaps reality itself.

Squaring the Circle is a gripping true story told with towering visual panache.

Maybe giant robots that turn into cars, or in this case, animals, isn’t your deal. But despite the goofy premise and the formulaic nature of the story in Transformers: Rise of the Beasts, it isn’t that bad.

Don’t get me wrong: I’m not saying that I enjoy violent films, but The Wrath of Becky is an example of a film that disappoints its audience with a failed promise. Given the extreme violence of the last film, we aren’t just shocked enough by the battle between her and the group of antagonists who have a veritable arsenal in their barn to start a small war.

Aside from a few cleverly executed jump-scares—which are to horror what tickling is to comedy—The Boogeyman drags with G-rated scares and an appropriately dreary atmosphere, but dreary nonetheless.

What it took to put together one of the most highly acclaimed exhibits ever on the art world calendar is captured in Close to Vermeer, a documentary brimming with passion, intrigue, history and beauty from director Suzanne Raes.

You don’t need to be a comic book nerd to enjoy the film though. It stands on its own merits well enough. But, go see it with one anyway. Watching them enjoy the film is almost as fun.

Director Laura Terruso overlooks several comedic opportunities in About My Father. It’s as though she’s working from a script that’s been edited by someone who got the situations but not the jokes.

Kandahar is standard entertainment that pushes for more than what they can deliver. Slight entertainment is the best it can be.

While not an instruction manual, in an economical 93 minutes, You Hurt My Feelings is a lovely little encouraging slice of life.

A warm-hearted look back at one of professional sport’s most colourful folk heroes, the late Yogi Berra, the documentary, It Ain’ Over, is also a film with a score to settle.

Penélope Cruz anchors a lightly drawn drama about a family in a quiet state of turmoil in the Italian film L’Immensitá.

Yeah, the movie does noticeably follow the formula. But still, it got to me. I rooted for the couple who didn't yet know what we knew from the beginning, and I even welled up towards the end, just when the film wanted me to. Predictable reaction. But then, it’s a rom com after all.

The Starling Girl is a film that highlights remarkable performances in a story that travels down familiar territory.

Led by Reisman’s deadpan, uningratiating performance, Retrograde is a funny, uncomfortable portrait of young millennial, struggling with her loss of status and clinging to the wreckage of her past aspirations.

At just under two-and-a-half hours and spanning three decades, The Eight Mountains feels thorough, as well as sensitively acted and moving. Its weakness is a tendency toward grandiosity, treating an anecdotal drama as though it were an epic.

Fast X dials in every living character (with some post-mortem appearances) to wrap up the decades-long franchise. If you’re not caught up on your F&F history, you are liable to find yourself reaching for a GPS to guide you through the plot.

The writer-director behind The Card Counter and First Reformed makes a misstep here, courtesy unlikely characters and sometimes mystifying plot changes. Luckily, stars Joel Edgerton and Sigourney Weaver are in top form, which is enough to keep a viewer happily occupied for the first hour.

The archival clips are an enjoyable reminder of Fox’s ‘80s onscreen persona, as a 5’4’’whirlwind of mental and physical energy, with dazzling comic timing.

Director Kyle Patrick Alvarez and screenwriter John Griffin’s Crater is a sweet story about friendship lasting a lifetime but set in the year 2257. Kinda like Stand by Me, but nicer… and in space.

It’s clever and backed up by enough tech-speak to give viewers a sense of the nuts and bolts of things without wandering into the weeds.

To be clear, Book Club: The Next Chapter is not a good movie by any standards except for its appeal to audiences old enough to fondly remember every cast member in their prime (I’m raising my hand here). Anyone born after Murphy Brown will see a predictable, forgettable series of non-adventures.

Unquestionably, it’s a beautiful film, shot in 16 mm, with grainy, almost tactile, images and sounds. There is an inky sky, strewn with stars; the silhouette of a horse, mane blowing in the wind, water droplets and scampering bugs, the rustling of the wind and the rumble of waves. It weaves together themes of women’s life choices, our fraught relationship to nature, the art of archiving and the power of awe.

Carmen, the debut film from French dancer-choreographer Benjamin Millepied, is an example of a work that flagrantly colours outside the recognized lines, blending melodrama, myth, dance and stagey spectacle. The result doesn’t coalesce into a neat bundle, but at moments, it’s peculiarly exciting.

There’s fun and excitement in good measure as well, but Rocket’s story brings the audience in closer and in doing so, it enables the other characters’ stories to matter to the audience as well.

The movie looks great. The casting is wonderful.

A hybrid action/war/revenge film with enough octane to blast Michael Bay out of competition.

The film adaptation of this treasured novel is absolutely delightful. Written and directed by Kelly Fremon Craig (The Edge of Seventeen), it’s honest, realistic, heartfelt and captures the emotions of Margaret and her young friends perfectly.

The humour remains, only now there is an added charm missing from previous installments. That charm is courtesy of the movie’s protagonists, a typically atypical family, and their equally quirky neighbours. Including a lovelorn teen boy and an old dude with a shotgun.

There is an overarching story and some obvious themes, including the extreme fear suggested in the film’s title. There’s also anxiety, masculinity, toxic femininity, toxic mothers, the road not taken, etc. But there’s also plenty going on beneath the surface, clues that a movie that is already surrealist enough, might be even more surreal than you can catch in one viewing.

In its eagerness to correct past wrongs and set the story straight, the film feels weirdly rigid, narratively predictable, and occasionally overstated.

Joyland is impressive, with an emotional world that feels true, and characters who feel complex and alive.

One can forgive the occasional stumble in such a powerful debut feature.

If Renfield were a serious movie, all the gory fight and slaughter scenes would seem overindulgent. But judging from the audience laugh-meter at the screening I attended, the right decisions were made for the material.

Showing Up is a movie that whispers, and yet when it ended, I wasn’t ready to say goodbye to Lizzy or to the other characters in her world, to the sunny leafy streets of Portland, to the free spirit vibe of the art school, to the relationships I just started to get to know. I wanted to see more. I still want to.

Without anything more than the heralding of a cult figure, Living with Chucky becomes a Chucky lovefest relying solely on reminiscing the good times; the kind of interviews that used to be added as a DVD extra.

As is often the case with a not-so-great film, I can report that I wanted to like it more than I did. But I just couldn’t.

Air is enjoyable, engaging, sprinkled with some of the ‘80s sprightlier hits (including Sister Christian and Money for Nothing), and good for some laughs.

Unfortunately, love and enthusiasm doesn’t automatically add up to a good movie. The ideas here are well thought through, but the execution is tonally wonky, at times feeling like a stage musical translated to the screen. At other times, it comes across like a Hallmark movie. At two hours and 17 minutes, it’s simultaneously too much and not enough.

If there was anything missing from the lives of swords ‘n’ sorcery-loving nerds, it would be a proper Dungeons & Dragons movie. Now we have one.

None of this adds up to a deep or compelling examination of the papacy. Think of it more like a wave from the motorcade on the way by.

Amanda Kim’s admiring documentary Nam June Paik: Moon is the Oldest TV, makes a case that Paik may not have merely been one of the most influential of the avant garde, he may have been one of the most influential artists of the 20th Century - period, one who invented a new visual canvas.

Tetris is dynamic combination of thriller and historical drama.

Two hours witnessing the agony of a guilt-ridden pill addict doesn’t exactly have “good times” written all over it. To make it an experience worth enduring requires something more.

While 88 has characters who have lots to say about the history of white supremacy, dark money in politics, and the delusion of fixing a corrupt system from within, this is a stiff, artless effort that barely makes the transition from explanatory journalism to fiction.

The Lost King is a wonderfully satisfying movie. It gives both Philippa her due, and shows us how she not only found, but helped redeem the reputation of King Richard the third. Take that, Shakespeare.

In the end, there’s insufficient emotional pay-off or psychological insight here to justify the credibility-defying tricks and narrative convolutions. But the kid is adorable and Exarchopoulos, as the hot and cold Joanne, is believable at every moment, in a film more attuned to mood and sensation than literal meaning.

A circus of violence, it’s a noisy, non-stop combination of dance and Loony Tunes-worthy manic cartoonishness.

You won’t find much ambiguity on these subjects in the documentary Ithaka, directed by Ben Lawrence and produced by Assange’s half-brother, Gabriel Shipton. Unsurprisingly, it’s totally Team Julian.

Ruskin gives a fresh bend to the story of the Boston Strangler, and indeed to the true-crime genre. There are plenty of true crime films to entertain, but few that reach alongside the likes of Richard Brooks’s In Cold Blood (1967), in Fincher’s Zodiac (2007), and in his abandoned television project, Mindhunter. Ruskin’s Boston Strangler belongs on this list.

An unusual blend of a travel show and those MTV staple Unplugged specials, Bono & The Edge: A Sort of Homecoming, with Dave Letterman on Disney+ isn’t exactly a deep dive as far as travelogue goes. But it does offer a glimpse into U2’s soul.

It’s an entertaining fantasy from a kid’s perspective that hearkens back to the days of reading a stack of comics on your bed for an afternoon that never seemed to end.

Technically, Supercell is not a bad movie. But it’s dragged down by the economics that insist a low-budget movie needs some minor celebrity voltage. It’s at its best when people aren’t talking.

While it may be almost impossible to hate the well-meaning, audience-pleasing charm-fest that is Champions, that doesn’t mean I have to like it. Even a heart-warming story can leave you cold if it’s poorly told.

While limited by a weak script, the film has beautiful locations, an over-qualified Australian cast, and a novel companion.

Therapy Dogs is fuelled by adolescent angst, fears of mortality, unruly energy, and frustration.

It’s very easy to forgive this film for what it lacks, such as being shot on a minimal budget at dull locations. Some of the performances seem amateurish at times but because the story is one that has a universal appeal, they are overlooked in light of how relatable the whole concept is.

Kawase’s attempt at a healing, nature-loving cathartic conclusion comes across as campy, as if a scene from The Blue Lagoon was accidentally attached to a Japanese nature documentary.

Led by a stunning performance by first-time actor Park Ji-Min and based on a real-life adoptee’s reunion with her biological parents, Return to Seoul is a slow boil, a subtle powerhouse of a movie.

Creed III has the fights, it has a story, and it has a heart. For Jordan, it’s a feature directing debut with punch.

Joyride is terrific, a storytelling and acting gem bursting with heart yet never saccharine.

This dark comedy, co-produced and directed by Elizabeth Banks, is a non-stop ride. Complete with gore, sick humour and characters (including the bear) that quickly attach themselves to the audience, this film satisfies so many low-end viewing pleasures that it’s a film you want to see again just to confirm that yes, that WAS indeed what you just saw.

With its screwy supernatural premise — buoyed by terrific cast that includes Anthony Mackie, Jennifer Coolidge, David Harbour and Tig Notaro — the movie is a charmer with heart.

Pacifiction is a movie to experience. In the end, it’s all an analogy between politics and nightclubs and the assumption (fiction?) of power and persuasion. But that’s my guess. Your guess is as good as mine. And to that effect, ours is as good a guess as even Serra is willing to offer.

In the end, it’s a story about family coming together in the last moments of a loved one’s life and facing death with not only dignity but with honesty as well. A touching story.

There’s nothing here that sparks surprise. The film remains mechanical and stilted, like some grim combination of taxidermy and ventriloquism.