In almost any other filmmaker’s oeuvre, this film would be considered a highlight. But for the director who made “Hannah and Her Sisters,” “Match Point” and “Blue Jasmine”? It’s right up there with “Melinda and Melinda” and “Scoop.” Good, not great.

What sticks with us in the end is something beyond the black humor and even Khaled’s sorrows — it’s the touching relationship between the two principals, and the Finnish man’s quiet commitment to doing what’s right.

Across the veil of years, we have seen tall Churchills, obese Churchills, sloppy Churchills, gross Churchills and scowling bull dog Churchills, and yet not one movie or TV Churchill has come close to giving us the man in full, both in look and spirit, until Gary Oldman in Darkest Hour.

The Shape of Water is brilliant, but sick — or maybe it’s sick, but brilliant. In any case, it’s something to see.

This is a movie that has lots of magic, in more ways than one.

On the Beach at Night Alone is really Kim’s film. Her performance won her the best actress award at this year’s Berlin Film Festival, and she is in every scene, warts and all.

This movie is seriously funny, surprisingly funny, not funny in a way that you ever decide to laugh, but funny like you couldn’t keep quiet even if you wanted to. The laughs, as they say, keep coming.

Though it would be inaccurate to reduce Thelma to an extended metaphor, it’s fair to say that Trier uses the supernatural element to illustrate, in a forceful way, the power of lust, the selfishness of love, and the world-obliterating intensity of a first romance.

The film is honest enough not to exaggerate the beneficial results of Parvana’s courageous act.

Short on complexity and depth, The Divine Order gives us a parade of heroines and villains. Instead of raising questions, it seems to want to induce in viewers a sense of smugness.

Rarely has a movie ever captured the importance of a writer’s having unbroken concentration in order to work.

Roman is bad at doing good, so when he starts showing promise in the other moral direction, it hardly seems like a tragedy. It seems like a smart career move. Plus, he gets to wear decent suits and finally starts looking like Denzel Washington.

Coco is the best-looking Pixar movie since the tonally uneven “The Good Dinosaur.” The colorful afterlife is the centerpiece, but excellence is found in unexpected places.

Nye’s focus on work has had a deleterious effect on his social life. Some of Nye’s issues are no doubt the result of lifelong fears that he may be struck by a neurological condition called Ataxia that runs in his family, but which so far has not affected him.

The worst action movies, and this is one of them, are all about stretching out the action.

For the vast majority of its 113-minute running time, Wonder stays genuine and true.

The movie represents a leap forward for writer-director Martin McDonagh. Three Billboards is as clever and imaginative as McDonagh’s “In Bruges,” in terms of how it makes characters collide in delightful and unexpected ways.

Here is more ambiguity, in a film that needs less of it.

The story’s eventual move into brutality is all the more devastating because of well-observed intimacy that preceded it.

The complexity, richness and fullness of what Leo does here is acting at its most illuminating and useful.

Daddy’s Home 2 is an excessively negative, strained and predictable comedy.

If The Square has a point — and it probably has several — it’s that the visceral aspect of life cannot be fully suppressed and shouldn’t be denied.

Linklater never finds a way to sustain a drama from these characters and their situation.

A stirring romance between an emotionally stifled sheep farmer and an irrepressible Romanian migrant worker, isn’t shy about paying homage to the classic “Brokeback Mountain,” but in many ways, this British film turns out better.

This is warm and intuitive work, striking that elusive balance between inspiration and control.

One doesn’t expect that kind of intensity in a sedate British murder mystery, but Pfeiffer brings it. On her own, she helps Branagh make the case for his remake over the original.

The Departure is an excellent example of a filmmaker finding a perfect wavelength with her main character.

There is something of a Halloween costume about Woody Harrelson’s appearance in the film. He looks as if frozen midway into some morphing process between himself and Lyndon Johnson, a process that, by pure chance, happened to stop at the precise moment he began to look comical.

At 2 hours, 21 minutes, feels like a slow death by a thousand cuts.

The film was clearly a labor of love, for good or ill. At one point, Galinsky jokingly refers to the production as “semi-unprofessional.” This is unusual and welcome frankness from a moviemaker.

This time it’s not too big. Thor: Ragnarok has a lot of human appeal and a spirit of silliness that it never loses and yet always carefully manages, so that the silliness remains an ongoing source of delight without ever undercutting the impact of the action.

If there’s a casualty in the sequel it’s Bell, who may be the funniest of the young actresses, but has the most limiting character, forced to repeatedly work a single my-mom-is-a-stalker joke.

The tone of The Killing of a Sacred Deer is the best thing about it and the hardest to describe. You might call it skewed, except that what often is called skewed is extreme and outlandish, while this movie is quiet and precise.

BPM has vitality and directness, a sense of witnessing life in the moment.

The pleasures of Suburbicon are in the moment, and the moments fade before the next moment. There’s no build, just flashes of virtuosity — flashes ultimately in the service of nothing.

Wonderstruck should not be confused for a brilliant but challenging film. Rather, it’s narratively deprived and with entire sections that are completely charmless.

“Thank You” is flawed, with a structure and pacing that dull the viewing experience, even as the message drives through. It’s a great discussion starter, but not a great finished product.

For a documentary about one of the most prestigious opera institutions in the world, The Paris Opera has, maddeningly, very little opera.

The best thing about All I See Is You is that it’s not afraid to experiment. But it’s an experiment that went wrong, a film in which ambiguity trumps complexity.

Because of age and illness, Varda is losing her sight, and Faces Places, which she co-directed, could be her last film. If so, she’s going out on a high note.

Jane is lopsided, thoroughly exploring her early career but encapsulating later decades too neatly.

The Snowman is ugly and nasty, but that’s not the worst of it. The worst is that it’s boring and makes no sense.

Miles Teller as Brendan McDonough is a standout, beginning as a dead-eyed drug user, then gradually turning into a responsible adult.

It touches, in a way movies rarely do, on some essential current of life.

Sex is a persistent theme in the movie, and it’s handled forthrightly.

Human Flow is often like seeing a travelogue of the world, juxtaposed with a desperate sea of humanity in search of a better — and safer — life.

A good, strong movie, but never threatens to be great. One salivates at the adventurous directions the film could have explored.

It’s a rousing, feel-good story about overcoming barriers, even when the challenges — poverty, lack of medical access — are inherently bleak.

Never dull and never loses its audience, but there is, inevitably, a certain sameness to the scenes, with Garfield spending a lot of time just sitting there with a goofy smile on his face.

This brand of eccentricity does not suit Cusack. He lacks Cage’s manic gleam and irrepressible sense of play. Cusack comes off as glum and a bit lost, negating Miller’s effectiveness as bogeyman.

Despite its sometimes bloody content, the mood of Happy Death Day is remarkably sappy, aimed at the broadest possible audience for a film of its genre. Think of it as “slasher lite” and an acceptable date movie for unadventurous types, and you have the gist of it.

The movie also allows Chan to demonstrate that he can act. In between setting traps, blowing things up and rendering people unconscious, Chan plays grief in The Foreigner, and his face contains all the sadness of the world.

In the face of this relentless nihilism, it’s quite an achievement that the new documentary Wasted! The Story of Food Waste is so darned entertaining and hopeful, as well as informative.

The results in an experience that is smooth sailing for the first 45 minutes, but then hits a slog that goes on for another 40, before the movie revives again in its last half hour. Obviously, a film can’t be great if you spend 40 minutes wishing the thing would end already. A 95 minutes, The Florida Project could have been a masterpiece.

As played by Boseman and Gad, Marshall and Friedman are a complementary pair, like something you’d see in a buddy movie — one fit and one fat, one black and one white, one tall and one short, one calm and one stressed, but both Americans working together in a just cause.

Take Every Wave remains entertaining because of Hamilton’s awe-inducing skill on the ocean, and his determination to ride the waves as long as his body will allow.

A story of courage and sacrifice, as well as a moving love story that’s really three love stories in one.

You also cannot help but think about what Baumbach has that Allen lacks: Empathy for his characters. Not insight into them, but empathy for them.

The film does have enough visual interest and occasional revelation to allow it to limp with dignity to its conclusion.

Some people clearly had a good time making this film. Whether you have a good time watching it depends almost entirely on your Pony love walking in.

A horror “comedy” about a deranged 12-year-old boy with a script that feels like it was written by a deranged 12-year-old boy.

A couple of other odd moments to savor: Lucky, seeking a crossword answer, reads a dictionary definition of “realism” that’s perfectly to the point. And listen as he plays “Red River Valley” on the harmonica. Either one is a great way to remember Harry Dean Stanton.

Watched today, in light of special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation of the Trump administration, it has an extra intensity, as a possible preview of coming attractions.

Ultimately, The Mountain Between Us tries to pull the audience’s interest in a relationship direction. It’s a difficult task, despite two charismatic leads.

Blade Runner 2049 is long and slow. It’s never boring, but it’s a little too mired in one sustained note of sadness to break out as a great experience or to stand out as a great movie. Still, there are some remarkable scenes.

The filmmakers offer very few clues, just more aqua filters and low-contrast visuals. And with each new jarring edit, the viewer cares less and less, until the 100 minutes seem to stretch on forever.

Haakon VII is a hero in Norway, and The King’s Choice tells us why.

The story told in Victoria and Abdul is so far-fetched that it really helps to know that it is, in its broad outlines, true.

Like many first-person medical documentaries — such as the recent “Gleason” — Unrest can be really hard to watch. Brea’s film, though, might be the beginning of hope for millions of sufferers who might see the film, and could be a conversation starter for additional funding into research.

Even while we’re watching it, a funny feeling sets in. Lots of things happen in American Made, but it’s as if the frenetic pace is to keep us from thinking about what we’re watching.

The fly-on-the-wall style is a slow build that leads to an immersive experience, and then an ultimate payoff as the change-minded department detours into another scandal. The Force is like watching a drug addict take a few meaningful steps toward recovery, only to relapse again.

Lego Ninjago is still nowhere near bad “Alvin and the Chipmunks” sequel territory. But at this rate, we may be only one or two movies away.

All this is dramatized expertly and with a lightness of touch in Simon Beaufoy’s screenplay and in the direction of Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris, the team behind “Little Miss Sunshine.”

The designer’s own recollections paint the most vivid pictures throughout the film, as do his sketches and the extraordinary parade of shoes that go by like models pivoting on the runway.

It’s a quiet film that almost slips by without notice.

Stronger always feels right in the moment, solidified by an outstanding central performance by Gyllenhaal, and some wonderful ensemble work, especially the actors just below the top billing.

When explored by writer-director Mike White’s expert, soulful script, Brad, against all odds, becomes a sympathetic figure, and the film itself achieves a sort of poetry.

Despite all the mayhem, “The Golden Circle” often feels slow and belabored, particularly in its middle section, when inspiration is nowhere to be found, and the chaos seems to be there just for the sake of being there.

Cuesta’s direction is all blunt objects, like a doctor performing surgery with a plastic fork from Burger King. But he shines in the more testosterone-charged scenes, including the opening terrorist attack with its tracking shots above and below water.

Jolie has crafted an intimate epic about a tough war subject that probably would have gone unmade without her humanitarian influence and star power. First They Killed My Father is a much more assured film, even if a bogged-down middle section prevents it from greatness.

Polina is spare in dialogue; more is conveyed through painterly wide-screen cinematography by Georges Lechaptois.

Salinger, who died in 2010 at age 91, probably would have hated this movie. If Jones doesn’t quite pull it off, it is at least a film of many pleasures and a thought-provoking look at American literature’s most famous loner.

Aronofky gets exactly what he needs from his top-notch cast. Lawrence is appealing and never allows herself to be reduced simply to a howling victim. Bardem, Harris and Pfeiffer are menacing in their own varying ways, with Bardem capable of turning on the charm at key times that makes us wonder if we haven’t misjudged him.

The bold, masterful Beach Rats, one of the most exquisitely haunting LGBT coming-of-age stories ever told, takes place in the unhip fringes of Brooklyn, a land that time has forgotten. But nothing about this film is forgettable.

Home Again is plain vanilla, from start to finish.

The locally sourced documentary is always engaging — lively and well-paced with an impressive list of interviewees from Hillary Clinton to Huerta herself.

It’s smart and funny and makes great effort to capture not just a time and place, but the specific feelings of being on the verge of adulthood and thinking the world is against you.

The film is undeniably energetic, with a lot of good lines written by Shores, but it descends into obvious preachiness, and from this view, the unrelenting wackiness becomes overwhelming. Still, good times are had by all.

Director Byung-gil Jung, a trained stuntman, is an expert in staging action set-pieces, and for fans of dazzlingly violent shootouts on motorcycles and buses, this brutal revenge tale should be right up your alley, even if the proceedings often get sidetracked with a confusing back story.

A play-it-safe film, with its chaos a little too controlled. But Bell’s examination of the institution of marriage has it insights, and there are laughs.

Crown Heights is a challenging film with long treks between uplifting moments. And there’s no question the film earns every moment of grace.

The problem with Birth of the Dragon, George Nolfi’s largely fictionalized account of a 1964 fight between an Oakland martial arts instructor named Bruce Lee and San Francisco instructor Wong Jack Man is that Lee...is the third-most important character in the film.

Gook is at its best when detailing the interactions of the three in the shoe store, but it strikes a more urgent note when the riots break out and the store comes under threat.

It’s less about music and more about how hard it is — and how bad it feels — to be absolutely and completely on the outside. And though the movie is uncompromising on that score — and shows its heroine going through a series of humiliations that are almost as painful to watch as they would be to experience — it’s not self-pitying. It’s dead-eyed accurate, and that’s its ultimate redemption.

The Fencer, directed by Klaus Haro, is basically a “Hoosiers” remake — a true story set in a 1950s small town, in which a coach with a mysterious past arrives to shape a rag-tag bunch of kids into tournament contenders (there’s even a halfhearted romance that seems thrown in at the last minute in both films) — but that’s OK. It’s a winner here, too.

Leap! is the kind of movie where if you see someone holding a stack of dishes, they will certainly break in the name of a lazy comedic moment.

Hamm perfectly plays Walter as a sort of suave, GQ version of HAL 9000, and Davis and Robbins have their most satisfying feature film roles in years. Along with the pitch-perfect Smith, they provide the humanity to Almereyda’s vision of a species in danger of slipping into the void of selective memory and loss.

The result is an unconventional and layered portrait of a complicated talent.