By putting the garrulous, sometimes cranky Hersh on film, “Cover-Up” reveals, in the behavioral sense, the obsessiveness that makes an investigative journalist.

It ends up being little more than a rambling, undisciplined clip show that misfires as both history and entertainment.

This movie is a classic of silliness—no ifs, ands, or butts.

It’s not an unenjoyable ride, but there’s a lingering sense that it could have been made a bit more fun and campy along the way.

The structure dispels the idea that there is a “right way” to navigate the Kafkaesque complexities of an oppressive regime, as is made plain by the ultimate fate of Hind and the two ambulance first responders, Youssef Zeino and Ahmed Madhoun.

Great sequels don’t just repeat, they build. This one treads beautifully-rendered water.

It’s a smart, mostly light movie that will teach viewers a lot about processes they might not otherwise think about. You come away from the movie seeing the world in finer shades than when you went in.

It is a movie of moments. But some of those moments are so good, its optimism is so refreshing, its dialogue so bright, and its characters and performances so endearing, it well rewards a watch.

This isn’t a classic, but it’s good enough to make you think Fuller has a classic in him.

Resurrection is ravishing in its command of shadow and light, but it studiously hollows out any sense of soul beneath the surface.

Filmmaker Waller is here trying to have things both ways: to pay a sincere tribute to the classic Japanese samurai movies in the widescreen frames and spurting blood it borrows, and also to make a genuine thing, a samurai qua samurai picture. He eventually gets there, or almost does.

So much of “Influencers” works as well as it does because of Harder’s cleverly unpredictable and often remarkably funny script.

At the end of the day, “Atropia” feels like Gates gesturing vaguely at a few really interesting notions about the military-entertainment complex, and how it can bleed through into the people waging the actual war.

Inspired but overwrought, “Scarlet,” an anime adaptation of Shakespeare’s Hamlet, begins with stunning style before falling off a major cliff.

This new holiday chiller mostly idles when it should charge at its most unsound ideas.

The whole film feels like a production of calling in favors, as the relatively hotshot cast it drew seems incongruent with its content: a clichéd story of a disordered family over the holidays.

Not Without Hope is a respectful and impactful dramatic interpretation that feels true to the real-life events.

At its heart, it’s an assured tale of queer resistance, blended with the supernatural rhythms of the folktale, and it feels suitably transgressive for its gender-nonconforming characters. It’s sweet, and affirming, and hopefully opens a few people’s eyes (and hearts).

Merv is heartwarming, in the abstract, but the heat generated is strictly lukewarm.

Whatever your feelings about Tarantino and his work, this is a tremendous visceral experience, with radiant colors, slate-somber black-and-white, and geysers of crimson blood. To quote the end of another Tarantino film, it just might be his masterpiece.

This is a hypnotic, invigorating film, and a step up for the duo—much like the diamonds that shimmer so seductively through their frames, it has a cold, bright, gem-like brilliance.

Julia Jackman‘s beguiling feminist fairytale “100 Nights of Hero” is an enchanting tribute to the power of storytelling.

It’s not just another ghost story; it’s a story of malevolence that happens to be told through home recordings, YouTube clips, and CCTV footage. Hall and Gandersman play a little fast and loose with their genre—as so many of these movies do—but it’s forgivable given the pace they maintain in their blissfully short film (under 90 minutes with credits).

Even with all the sexual trauma, The Chronology of Water manages the impossible, making a lot of the sex Lidia has as an adult look not just fun and playful, but mind-blowing and revelatory. Reclaiming your sexuality after having it stolen from you as a child is a huge, huge deal.

The film does not offer excuses for violence, and neither should we; instead, it prompts reflection on where compassion and control are needed and where the pursuit of them falters.

Sorrentino and cinematographer Daria D’Antonio color coordinate each and every frame to a fare-thee-well. Even scenes set in an Italian prison have real visual flair.

Come Closer is a unique take on grief, containing insight into projection and transference, as well as the way obsession is almost a relief from having to face the unfaceable. Nesher’s script belabors the point at times, but as a director, she captures the rhythms of Tel Aviv’s social swirl, the alcohol-spiked bell jar of clubs and dancing and music, all the things that make up the manic nightlife of a lost twentysomething who has no idea the party is already over.

This is filmed theater in the purest sense.

One element of this film that works well is that the actors understand the assignment, no winking at the audience, except for British comedian/presenter and co-writer of the screenplay, Jimmy Carr, playing a vicar who cannot help running the liturgy texts together to make them sound dirty.

It’s a profoundly Catholic work, whose slippery sense of sin and living instils great confusion and consternation to those occupying the narrative’s solemn monastery setting.

It’s a predictable and straightforward accounting of events, featuring interviews with 1985 stalwarts Mike Singletary, Willie Gault, Jim McMahon, and Gary Fencik (who all look great some four decades later), and a treasure trove of archival footage in era-perfect, beautifully imperfect analog—slightly grainy, with warm color palettes and that “mildly smeared” look that screams mid-1980s.

Five Nights at Freddy’s 2 not only has a more involved story, but also features more engaged filmmaking throughout, with more camera setups and visual brio.

While “Oh. What. Fun” has an excellent director, Michael Showalter, who also co-scripted, some nice music, and top performers, including Danielle Brooks as a delivery driver Claire meets on the road, and the exquisitely lovely Havana Rose Liu, very appealing as Jeanne’s daughter, it keeps undermining our sympathy with off-kilter stakes and inert efforts at humor.

Aniskovich clearly loves her subjects, but the lack of tension is noticeable and a bit of a letdown, even if everyone else remains engaging and worth following.

Unlike its predecessor, “Troll 2” doesn’t have enough canned dramatic or comedic incidents to make it seem particularly eventful.

Safdie’s daring choices merge with the best performance of Timothee Chalamet’s career for a story of a man who thinks he’s the best in the world at something, and that thinking is as important as actually being it.

These movies are not WHOdunits as much as WHYdunits, and it’s everything that’s under the murder and its resolution that makes this sermon so entertaining and so powerful.

David Freyne’s charming afterlife comedy “Eternity” takes a simple premise of a person forced to choose between two prospective suitors and elaborates the concept with clever world-building and emotional relationship dynamics.

By fashioning a kinetic work that pulls together references and sources from Black literature, music, politics, and meme culture, “BLKNWS: Terms & Conditions” stands as a seismic intellectual awakening.

What comes across most vividly in this movie, ultimately, is the fact that what happened almost half a century ago is a trauma that still weighs heavily on the people of Vietnam. And many Americans.

An intriguing doc that juggles ’90s nostalgia with an optimism for student journalism that avoids over-sentimentality.

Southern wields the tropes in a stylistically over-determined way–jump-scares and all–which cheapens the delicate and poetic narrative.

The Tale of Silyan functions as a dialect between old-world wisdom and modern socioeconomic realities, between the natural realm and the worries of mankind; it’s both spiritual and humanist, about forgiveness and adaptability, and makes a case for holding on to what you’ve always known to fend off the illusion of progress.

Hamnet actually works best as a sensory experience, before its major plot points fall into place.

If you’re willing to bend with the story, The Secret Agent will take you places movies rarely go.

Every bit as exciting and heartwarming and imaginative as the Oscar-winning original and maybe even funnier.

“Rental Family” is unabashedly sentimental, almost Frank Capra-esque at times. It’s also a thoughtful and insightful presentation of this unique and admittedly strange business of renting humans to help other humans. And it’s a knowing character study of a gaijin in Japan who knows he could live there forever and never fully grasp and understand the culture, but will never stop trying.

It’s such a non-movie that it actually becomes difficult to review because there’s so little to hold onto that it dissipates from memory while you’re watching it. There are no laughs. The plot is inane. The action choreography is insulting. It is such a lifeless piece of product creation (not filmmaking) that even writing about it feels like a waste of time, much less watching it.

The film grants hope for the women of Iran through its thick-skinned subject, putting her resume and grit on display. But with sharper editing and a bit more eagerness for the personal, “Cutting Through Rocks” would supersede general hopefulness for a more intricate touch to the heart.

The film Shackleton wanted to make clearly wasn’t a passion project coming from his deepest soul. It’s not like he’s Orson Welles yearning for the unfairly butchered “Magnificent Ambersons.” “Zodiac Killer Project” is fairly thin in both conception and execution, but it is very much “my kind of thing,” particularly his dry, humorous tone. He makes a good and entertaining guide.

There are few gentler films you’ll find this year than Rohan Kanawade’s “Cactus Pears.” A touching queer romance whose subtle rhythms pull us into its tender embrace.

It feels both remarkably simple and complex at the same time, a vision on which we can place our own interpretations of what it all means instead of being force-fed superficial messages.

Wicked: For Good really sings where it counts: with the emotional ache of the fractured friendship at the story’s core.

Traditions are people’s stories, connecting them to their ancestors, to this patch of ground. Knowledge is passed down literally—recipes, sewing patterns, hand-drawn truffle maps—but also symbolically; myths, fables, fairy tales. You can’t put a price on any of it, and that, ultimately, is what Trifole is all about.

Sallywood should be required viewing for anyone who thinks fame equals wealth.

Max Walker-Silverman’s “Rebuilding” is a gentle, empathetic ode to resilience—a story of a man at a crossroads he never planned to reach.

In Your Dreams is an exciting, imaginative, and sometimes funny adventure story about a sister and brother who try to use their dreams to change their reality. But it is also a wise and touching story about the challenges of family and of change.

With its emanant sense of imaginative potential, Arco encourages you, for a time, to believe.

While the premise has some undeniable potential, it has been executed by writer-director Lotfy Nathan in a manner that is neither particularly frightening nor spiritually enlightening.

The ultimate themes of forgiveness, reconciliation, and redemption shine through, and the joyous sight of Ye skipping through the corridors of the market is impossible to resist.

An unnerving character study that often borders on thriller territory, “The Things You Kill” is a psychologically intense piece of genre filmmaking.

The film is true to Gibson’s persona, which is marked by everything you expect from a poet: thoughtfulness, tenderness, and thorough self-awareness.

While Keeper is not short on visual style or atmospheric tension, ultimately, it’s a tedious genre exercise undone by an undercooked narrative and its allergy to mystery.

For a story of a guy who’s willing to get messy for the first time in years, it’s an overly clean piece of screenwriting, one that too often lets its A-list star play ideas instead of a character. But there’s enough to like here to forgive a film whose ambition exceeds its reach, both in some of those ideas and a flawless supporting cast, especially another fantastic turn from Adam Sandler.

Murphy refuses to look back in anger. The man remains optimistic, even when discussing death. With Murphy’s 2019 return to “SNL” serving as the joyous finale, “Being Eddie” presents an Eddie Murphy who seeks to entertain (on his own terms, of course) as long as he’s still got air in his lungs.

To its credit, the “Now You See Me” trilogy, about magic experts tricking powerful bad guys, understands this principle and conveys it with humor and a light touch. That understanding, plus a strong cast, is the only thing preventing the films from turning into jumbled, giant bags of arbitrary plot twists, eager to outsmart viewers into nonsense.

Luke Greenfield’s atrocious Playdate is a remarkably stupid movie that thinks you’re remarkably stupid too.

There’s no compelling evidence onscreen that the huddled masses that the script is so concerned with are truly moved and edified by watching Ben’s rebellious acts and anti-capitalist slogans on TV, or if he’s just their latest shiny object of distraction.

Altogether, it’s a solid film of kind that used to be more common: an earnest, unpretentious Oscar Movie that wants to be seen by everyone, and consequently doesn’t try to be too complex or arty.

None of this is easy, and not much of it is fun. But “Die My Love” is a wild and worthwhile ride.

All of it is done capably but without much panache; worst of all, the boxing sequences feel rudimentary, lacking both artistry and savagery.

It is like watching a flower bloom, delicately and compassionately portrayed by writer/director Tommy Dorfman and a beautiful performance by Fogelmanis.

For the most part, “Long Shadows” is short on reasons to have our attention.

Yen Tan’s “All That We Love” is a quiet drama that’s surprisingly moving yet gentle, giving a well-known comedian a complex role to prove herself. And in this case, Margaret Cho defies expectations, bucking the caustic and bombastic persona we’ve grown used to seeing her bring to the screen for an on-screen performance that’s almost soft-spoken, a woman who genuinely feels lost among life’s many changes.

Iranian filmmaker Sepideh Farsi’s “Put Your Soul on Your Hand and Walk” is not simply a documentary, but a poignant individual’s record. It is a reminder that every number we see on the news is a complex web of individuality. It’s historical sonder on screen.

In the end, Predator: Badlands is a bizarrely inspirational adventure about different types of beings overcoming the limiting parts of their programming (literal or figurative) and/or proving there is more to them than others assumed. The takeaway is applicable to beings all across the universe: sometimes the things you want most are not worth having, and when you figure that out, you’ll be free.

A tender romp through time we’ve all seen long departed, and may only relive through children of our own, “Little Amélie and the Character of Rain” begs for the warmth of innocence, even when it pleads too hard.

Baahubali: The Epic may not deliver a better edit or experience, but it does highlight what was already great, especially once it settles into a groove following a ten-minute intermission break. By that point, most of the cuts have already been made, leaving the leisurely pageantry of Rajamouli’s regal milestone to speak for itself and at its own preferred volume, too.

While Powell’s film is highly bloody and invested with psychological realism, it lacks a pulse and curiosity that doesn’t befit the excitement promised in the title.

Hallow Road is an earnest attempt to make a movie no one has seen before, only to end up with one few will want to watch again.

The result feels like one of the many thoughtful films made about life under dictatorship, but with a unique twist: This one isn’t critiquing past events in Argentina, Chile, or Uganda from a safe historical distance, but events happening right now in the U.S., from behind a scrim of metaphor as thin as tissue paper.

Guillermo del Toro would love “Stitch Head.” This animated, family-friendly take on the classic “Frankenstein” tale has a soft spot for its monsters, most of whom are soft and squishy themselves.

Coexistence, My Ass! bears witness in a powerful way, offering viewers a pause from the noise while galvanizing them to continue the fight for justice and freedom.

Chainsaw Man The Movie: Reze Arc is a beautiful, bizarre, and poignant adaptation worthy of its source material.

Josh Boone’s adaptation of Colleen Hoover’s “Regretting You” is a romantic drama with big emotions and plenty of both romance and drama. But too much of a good thing can be a bad thing, and in the case of “Regretting You,” the narrative buckles under the number of overblown emotional scenes and the commercial interruptions for product placements.

Last Days is a scattered, superficial depiction of a sad tale that requires deeper analysis.

A few heavy-handed stabs at commentary aside, “Queens of the Dead” gets by with good, flirty cheer.

Mistress Dispeller” isn’t really about Wang, or her methods...It’s about the mysteries of the human heart. Its exploration of these subtle depths is sensitive, as are its conclusions.

It has the narrative bones of late director Curtis Hanson’s 1992 thriller, focused on the escalating conflict between a furtive mother and the unstable nanny she’s hired–but it’s cloaked in anxieties that make it feel achingly modern. Even if you don’t take your horror elevated, there’s plenty on the surface that makes this a story worth re-haunting you.

Reichardt—who also edited the film and has said that she based the story on details from many real-life people and incidents, including the 1972 robbery of an art museum in Worcester, Massachusetts—builds the movie with her characteristic mix of dry humor, incisive psychological details, and elegant, minimalistic visuals.

Polsky is so honest he has to add a question mark to the film’s declarative title. This slight detachment, this hesitation to believe without question, makes Polsky the best of guides.

There is a sense at times that Johnston has over-compensated for Dahl’s cynicism with his wondrous children and their magical friends, and a bit too much of “The Twits” feels like it desperately wants us to love Beesha and Bubsy, even if they’re kind of shallowly conceived and designed.

The irrepressible tone of mordant giggliness this movie hits so often is entirely its own, keeping the movie buoyant throughout its over two-hour running time.

The Astronaut isn’t terrible, I suppose—the performance by Mara is solid, and Varley’s work on the directing front shows that she knows how to take familiar genre elements and present them with style and efficiency. However, these efforts are undone by a screenplay that kind of goes off the rails for a while, leading to a conclusion that fails to inspire the overwhelming emotional impact it was clearly intended to evoke in viewers.

It’s a messy movie that produces frustration instead of fear, and its nods to commentary on gender roles and the need to become and stay beautiful feel shallow and insincere.

The voice talent and character design are second-tier, and there are too many characters. But the action scenes are exciting, and the pacing, along with its reassuring humor and some nice character arcs, makes it a mildly appealing watch.

She Walks in Darkness can be a little confusing at times, and that’s probably intentional as we learn things alongside our conflicted heroine. But the fact that everyone believes what they’re doing is right is a notion that’s clear and complicated.

Truth & Treason is a staid drama whose observations about Helmuth could easily be summed up in a quick encyclopedic blurb.