The Perfect Candidate doesn’t burn the veil, but it does lift it briefly, allowing us a glimpse of Saudi womanhood that is idiosyncratic and individual — in short, as we very rarely see it.

This is the final game: Do you recommend this to your friends out of brand loyalty, knowing that they’re Saw completists and hey, you endured this, so why shouldn’t they? Or should you take mercy on them and let them know that Spiral should be avoided at all costs, regardless of its slasher-flick pedigree.

Army of the Dead is neither the best of Snyder nor the worst. In whipping a bit of both extremes into a dependably watchable piece of pop froth that hits the appropriate marks, the movie strives for the expected relevance, offers the right amount of nonsurprise surprises, and distinguishes itself from the given rules of the genre just so that it, more or less, breaks even.

Statham is always worth watching. But it’s in its closing scenes that this particular vehicle, Wrath of Man, earns its keep.

The movie certainly has heart; its purpose is unmistakable. But the spark — for which it has all the necessary ingredients — is somehow missing.

Take away the serrated satirical edges of this showdown between suburbanites and self-aware smart devices, and you’re still left with a surprisingly delightful, moving story about a dysfunctional family learning how to connect again.

Its sincerity and solidity are never in doubt — the actor’s directorial career is certainly off to a clean-lined, competent start. But it’s hard to shake the feeling that this is the sort of film that fond parents wish their children would love, as opposed to a film their children actually will love.

Even though it retains the basic theatrical conceit of a lone character having a one-sided conversation, it is pure cinema, because how could Almodóvar and Swinton do anything but turn this into pure cinema?

You applaud Seyfried for doing so much of the heavy lifting, and for once again proving that a close-up of someone looking unnerved is worth a thousand wonky exchanges. Still, not even she can keep the wheels from falling off when the second half tries to trade in gaslighting for ghosts and never finds the tone it needs to make the transition.

While it is gratifying to hear each woman speak on her art in her own terms, the documentary’s most illuminating moments are those that demonstrate how each musician’s work has been received by others over the years.

His singing voice and records remain the definition of acquired taste, and King for a Day won’t necessarily send you back to his songs the way other first-rate music docs can. But watching it, you feel glad that such a genuine oddball lived his particular dream and never revealed any public bitterness over the arc of his life. His legacy, it turns out, was the last thing from tiny.

The movie’s not quite a fight-scene masterclass, though compared to much else on offer from studio action of the moment, it sometimes feels like one. It’s solid entertainment — refreshing, even, for finding ways to navigate the familiar pivots on its own terms.

If it’s an ASMR video for pandemic-raddled emotions you’re after, you could do so much worse.

The movie is a film-length argument against our usual, overly personified, cutesy depictions of animals. It is also, not incidentally, a plea to stop eating them.

The natural world gives us the resources to live. It also gives us viruses. And while some characters seek to chart aspects of nature and others wish to pay loving tribute (and offer sacrifices) to it, the most resonant notion from Earth‘s characters is that nature is a living, breathing, and undeniably aggressive entity. How Wheatley translates this notion into a bounty of Pagan paranoia is what makes the film undeniably his.

Thunder Force is another of McCarthy’s collaborations with her partner, Ben Falcone (who has a small role), and bears all the effortless likability of a well-oiled machine, which cannot help but feel like a real limit on what McCarthy et. al. are capable of while also making a great case for how watchable these actors are when they lean in to being a little washed, a little lo-fi.

This is a pulpy B movie that is dying to be a prestige project, and there’s a big part of you that wishes everyone had just leaned into the teensploitation aspects more.

As an at-risk teen drama, the film is passable. As a portrait of a community, it’s eye-opening.

The film falls prey to its own smoke and mirrors. It is less subversive than it aspires to be, and more emotionally real than than the filmmakers seem to realize.

The sheer hilariousness of a number of individual bits here are enough to get you past slow spots and a few D.O.A. duds, and you come out of Bad Trip with a serious appreciation for this trio’s chops and ability to go with the flow.

The plot of Godzilla vs. Kong matters far less than the basic fact that it’d be a much better movie if it stuck, firmly, to its title.

There is so much dead space between the death-defying set pieces that you can feel things grinding to a halt long before the next adrenaline spike hits.

The creative workaround does drop you into the middle of the shady-as-hell action in a way that, say, recordings playing over a close-up of a grainy photo does not. But it also starts to become more than a little distracting, and you find yourself tuning into the performances instead of the particulars of the case.

The movie is so overbearingly high on its own fizzy, clever stylishness that it strands the heart of its own story.

This is a film steeped in myth and ritual, besotted with secrets, history, and imagination — with a clear eye on the Ivory Coast’s politics.

The World to Come is full of inversions, deviations from the usual themes, complicated as it is by interlocking contrasts, unexpected emphases. This is a movie in which love springs in winter, whereas spring beckons devastation.

Chaos Walking doesn’t even get to the level of high camp, where pleasure is found in the sheer badness of it all.

As a traditional, accessible, familiarly-structured crowdpleaser, Boogie, in its modest, far-from-flawless way, challenges them to enjoy one as well.