This is a special movie. It has a life force unlike any other crime thriller I’ve seen. It’s about characters who suffer a personal failure but emerge transformed. It’s a violent movie, but not a cruel one, and unexpectedly moving by the end.

Amanda Kramer’s “By Design” is an oddball, almost-love story that has more to say about human dejection and desire than a lot of more conventional tales.

Cold Storage strikes a nifty balance between the sardonic and the stressful and throws a lot of gnarly gore and gook into the scenario, as a bargain.

It’s wrapped in an original, funny piece of entertainment, but this is also undeniably a warning.

In an era of stark division, not to mention demands for simplistic storytelling one can absorb while doing household chores, “Honey Bunch” revels in the uncertain, ungraspable, the neither-nor of it all.

It’s movies like these that prove that cinema still has the capacity to surprise, even in criminally goofy comedies like this.

The coming-of-age story in “Sweetness” is less sugar than spice and very little nice.

It’s not a good sign when we find ourselves admiring the background art more than what is happening in front of it, but it is more imaginative than the characters and story.

This is an enchanting film. At every moment, one feels spellbound by its earnest aims and its heartwarming excursions.

It’s hard to feel freely when you are constantly and loudly reminded by every aspect of the movie that you are supposed to feel things.

Pillion is a quietly devastating ode to the power of that self-discovery, a reminder that perhaps one of life’s greatest tragedies is that we can’t always remain in a relationship with the people we learn the most valuable lessons from.

The President’s Cake is notable for its unvarnished, affecting performances; its digitally shot yet eerily film-like cinematography, which packs an amazing amount of crisply focused information into wide frames with rounded edges. But most of all, for the way it captures the strange disjunction between the monotony of daily life for children in a war zone and the anxiety between adults who are aware that everything could fall apart at any moment.

It’s a narratively simple film that has been interpreted differently by dozens of critics since its Cannes premiere last May, but it’s one that is impossible for this critic to shake, a reminder of what movies can do when they loosen the restraints of traditional narrative and remember that images are meant to evoke as much as they are to explain.

This might have been a better movie if its creators embraced their fitful bloodthirst. Instead, they seem to hope that you like these stock characters enough that you’ll gasp when their friends and enemies inevitably bite the dust. A machine to kill vague people, “Whistle” never delivers on its frightful promise.

Jimpa is a story that feels like it’s arrived about a decade too late for its intended audience: Queer people want more from their rep than being anthropologically observed from the sidelines, and straight people have watched enough “Drag Race” to already be familiar with the concepts this film treats as novel.

Touzani’s “Calle Málaga” is a reminder to savor the days we have in the places and communities we hold dear.

Besson doesn’t build up the romantic emotion he apparently aspires to with his efforts, but “Dracula” gets by on the power of his (and Landry’s) conviction.

It moves at a breakneck pace to get to its primary plot, but neglects the emotional backdrop required to really invest. Indulgence itself is the film’s greatest lack.

The third chapter is better than the middle one by virtue of having at least a few new ideas and one less CGI wild boar, but it’s still a shapeless mess, a movie that might have worked as the final act of one film.

A grungy, blood-soaked DIY chamber piece based on David Szymanski’s 2022 video game of the same name, it’s admirably restrained, being far more interested in creating a haunting ambience than raising your blood pressure.

As it stands, Queen of Chess gives a champion her flowers, reminding that you can always build your own chair and pull up at the gatekeeping tables. That’s worth celebrating in and of itself.

The screenplay by Damian Shannon and Mark Swift is sharp and funny, and contains knowing insights about misogyny in the workplace and the shifting dynamic between a toxic male boss and an overlooked and mistreated female employee. Mostly, though, “Send Help” is about paying your ticket for an R-rated, Sam Raimi thrill ride with projectile vomiting, flying ropes of blood, and a handful of scenes that fly so off the rails that you wonder if we’re in the middle of a dream sequence, or the mayhem is real.

Nothing in “Shelter” develops beyond the suggestion of an idea. A sleepy vehicle for action star Jason Statham, “Shelter” piles on cliches and expects viewers to supply enough goodwill to compensate for its shortcomings.

Director and producer Robert Sarkies uses interesting, sometimes surreal, scenic transitions. So crisp and entrancing, these shots are artful, aesthetically pleasing, and even contemplative, but the color grading blankets the film with a drab tone. Yet the magnetic chemistry between Lynskey and Malcom, complemented by the lived-in, authentic costuming and production design bolster the movie overall.

The Love That Remains plays out with remarkable intuition and sensitivity about its troubled characters, ones who try to love and reckon with hard feelings when those endeavors don’t work out, and you have to sift through the rubble to find meaning.

Unfortunately, “Back to the Past” doesn’t really stand on its own, and its creators don’t know how to offer viewers anything new.

While the on-the-nose title suggests each individual is an isolated entity...the character construction and how their respective desires intersect with one another, in tandem with an effectively dizzying atmosphere, render it more original than expected.

It’s very easy to dismiss a film about a hapless loser. But it’s nearly as difficult to ignore a performance like the one Rios gives.