Sheridan drops us in and we know this place immediately; his storytelling is meaty but efficient, and his pacing moves along at a steadily engrossing clip before ultimately exploding in a startling blast of violence.

As an arraignment of the systems that ultimately rule human interaction regardless of the superficial societal differences between Europe, the Americas, and the East, A Hero is a chilling demonstration of how, as the song says, money changes everything.

Even if you lack a wealth of rap knowledge, Sample This is still worth seeing. Like "20 Feet from Stardom" and "Standing in the Shadows of Motown," it focuses on the studio musicians whose contributions are well-known but whose identities are not.

The film’s images entangle us with the characters, which makes its indeterminate ending a little more disappointing than it might have been. But this post-cataclysm habitat is worth paying a visit anyway.

Wingwomen, based on the graphic novel The Grand Odalisque by Jérôme Mulot, Florent Ruppert, and Bastien Vivès, is an action-packed heist film, but it leaves enormous room for the most important thing: Carole and Alex's friendship.

The absurdist sectarian comedy gives way, as it inevitably does in this conflict, to tragedy, and death both human and animal. While Shomali resists easy cynicism while seeming to have almost every excuse to indulge it, he doesn’t try to craft a hopeful parable out of his material either.

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.

If the film is a potluck stew of half-cooked notions, it's at least a tasty one.

Directed by Ángel Manuel Soto (“Charm City Kings”), this heartwarming, crowd-pleasing comic book flick is less serious and more colorful than the tonally dour mood of many contemporary superhero films.

Indeed, compared to many Sokurov films, this one has an enlivening paradoxicality: it's morbid but upbeat, grim yet rapturous.

For its near-miss moments, the inside-out approach of The Mission results in a richer film than one might have expected from reading the summary on a streaming menu.

A visually impressive mix of hand-drawn and CGI animation with basic action-adventure elements that are always viscerally satisfying thanks to Hosoda's apparent warts-and-all love for humanity.

Kevin Macdonald’s use of archival footage of the good and bad past memories, his current interview with Galliano and the exclusive interviews with A-listers are brilliant. He doesn’t leave a crumb, and you have to taste it, to see how enticing the truth of the story is.

This sequel makes up for some of the problems with the 2019 "Addams Family" animated family film, which suffered from an uneven tone and a meandering storyline.

Ultimately, the spirit of “Love, Brooklyn” is tenderness. It is both a love letter and a sympathy card: an acknowledgement that growing up sometimes means letting go, embracing the changes that come with time, and that loving someone does not always mean holding on to them.

Falling Inn Love may look and sound like a lot of other movies, but you could never confuse it for being dishonest.

It was and still is a pleasure to see a film that gives actresses characters and storylines that do not reflect or depend on the men in their lives.

The result is a work in which style and story unite to create a singularly mesmerizing look at a culture within a culture.

A movie steeped in the traditions of film noir, and its narrative will become complicated very quickly. Winterbottom, who also wrote and co-produced the movie, creates a story about gorgeous people committing crimes and double-crossing each other, where no one is innocent.

The quiet soulfulness of Buckley, Ahmed, and White makes for a banquet of slow cinema, one that haunts more than shocks in its parsing of love, lust, and longing.

The first feature from the longtime music video director has a ton of style, and signals from the beginning her confident use of framing, texture and color.

It may not meet the high watermark of the brothers’ first outing, but “Bring Her Back” is still quite the wild ride and shows the pair still have plenty of spooky tricks up their bloody sleeves.

The movie, then, is not just a niche film but a film for a niche of a niche. Rather than being ideal for people who know a bit about French cinema and want to know more, it’s best suited to people who know a considerable amount about French cinema (and culture) of the early sound era and want to delve deeper.

It’s in this unique setting, a place that inherently feels like purgatory for those stuck there, that Cogitore crafts a tense tale of faith and mystery.

White House Down is still too gun-happy, and too long, but however you feel about the Oval Office, our country, or some of the movie's jingoism, young Emily is worth rescuing.

More detailed critical or historical context might have enhanced director Amanda Kim’s already informative and loving portrait of Korean video artist Nam June Paik. But there’s so much in Kim’s movie—especially in actor Steven Yeun’s voiceover narration and talking head interviews with Paik’s colleagues and contemporaries—that this account of Paik’s working life still resonates.

It has such a strong aesthetic about it, it's almost as if The Wolverine functions as its own stand-alone film, rather than as a piece of the "X-Men" mythology.

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).