This is a strange film all around, distractible and full of Olympic-level tonal gambits. Viewers’ mileage will vary. Wildly.

There's not much wrong with this film on paper—there's just something wrong with the execution.

Alice Diop understands how silence, when allowed to exist, vibrates with echoes, and it is these echoes that are trying to speak to us. They have a lot to say. "Saint Omer" shows us how to listen.

Plane rushes through its emotional and explosive beats so that it can get to the next crisis without having to fill out the previous one, and it wildly skims on the good stuff in the process.

While this remix of "House Party" may leave some nostalgic for the original, it smartly doesn't try to copy the first film. However, it does stay true to the first version's celebration of friendship.

Director and co-writer Sarah Adina Smith offers some inspired moments and laughs here and there, but too often, running bits simply don’t pay off.

It spends too much time in some of its beats—there’s a stronger, tighter version that’s more disquieting by not wearing out its welcome at 100 minutes—and a couple of loud jump scares are misplaced in a film that generally avoids that crutch, but this is a major debut from a filmmaker who is willing to tell horror stories in a way that's both different for the genre and yet also like something we’ve all experienced before.

It takes a moment for the action to start—about 38 minutes—but once it does, this otherwise generic thriller’s flimsy relevance and unusual pacing not only seem more forgivable but maybe even sneakily clever.

In his bleak film, Guðmundsson combines the kitchen sink drama of growing up in a cycle of violence and/or poverty and the magical realism of teenage fever dreams, with mixed results.

As aww-inspiring as the human and dog moments in the movie are, it is the human encounters along the search that are the heart of the film.

Ultimately, my problem with so many religious horror films like “The Offering” is that they’re insulated in a way that makes them more often boring than terrifying, willing to let a languid pace try to set the mood instead of actual plotting.

The Devil Conspiracy is nuttier than the proverbial fruitcake and twice as difficult to swallow, regardless of where you reside on the theological spectrum.

The sole redeeming quality in this 85-minute swill resides in the makeup and practical effects, which rely on viscous blood and gnarly props that make the kills hard to stomach.

Higuchi and Anno not only deliver the genre movie goods but also deftly preserve their title character’s sugary purity. Rather than gigantify what was always juvenile material, Shin Ultraman allows the iconic character to retain his original shape and proportions. You and your dad are gonna love the new Ultraman movie.

The plot does have a few weak points and dangling threads, and the PG-13 rating ensures that the violence is tamped down before it can reach its full bloody potential...But the tongue-in-cheek tone is so consistent that M3gan is a hoot anyway.

Amid tableaus of sundrenched landscapes, Simón’s instinct for eliciting naturalistic performances—displayed in her feature debut “Summer 1993"—marries a remarkably stealth narrative structure that lets us into the lives of these people, collectively and individually.

The Western may not be entirely dead yet, but The Old Way is not exactly doing it any favors.

Gottlieb (the director) uses a very light touch throughout. This is a family affair.

A Man Called Otto isn’t exactly as philosophical as “About Schmidt” or as socially conscious as “I, Daniel Blake,” two films that occasionally hit similar notes. But it’s nevertheless a wholesome crowd-pleaser for your next family gathering.

Bill Nighy is a fun, uninhibited actor, but there's an abashed, melancholy quality to him that hasn't been fully explored until Living, a drama about a senior citizen reckoning with his life.

Sarah Polley's trust in the material—and her actors—allows for the performances to flourish, and the performances drive the story along with the barrage of words.

This is a moving drama about people pushed together by fate who end up not merely helping each other survive but elevate through an increasingly harsh world.

The sumptuous settings, elegiac tone, and Krieps' layered performance bring us into the world of this woman caught between the expectations of her culture and her own desires.

It’s only after the supposedly central mystery is solved that The Pale Blue Eye fully commits to its actual business, serving up in full a tale of loss and wrong-headed resolution. Bale’s characterization, subtle and slightly enigmatic throughout, here blooms. And eventually sears.

It may not come together as smoothly as the best feel-good movies of its kind, but there's an unwieldy charm to Joyride that makes the trip memorable.

No Bears is a picture that’s in keeping with his recent work—circumstances deemed that it just had to be—but one that breaks away from it in ways that yield a work of, yes, astonishment.

The indelible, unmatched voice of Houston may live on, but I Wanna Dance with Somebody lacks the ingredients of what made Houston a force that permanently altered every person who truly heard her.

Puss in Boots: The Last Wish is as spry and light on its feet as its titular feline.