As a movie, It Ends With Us is an infuriating, emotionally manipulative watch and a disservice to the talents of every actor involved.

When the film quite literally runs out of plot, only the filmmaker's sheer determination and commitment to the bit manage to salvage an ending that throws logic and reason out the door several times over.

The Instigators makes exceptional use of Damon, Affleck, and the rest of its impeccable roster. It's just a shame that even this cast can't make this add up to more than a movie that's, quite simply, the sum of its parts.

There's plenty of room for silly fluff to momentarily distract us from the nightmares of the real world. But is it really so much to ask for just a little bit more? Must we continually be served flavorless gruel and pretend it's nourishing? "Deadpool & Wolverine" will probably break box office records. The Marvel Cinematic Universe will continue onward, and "Deadpool & Wolverine" just might revitalize it in the eyes of fans. But it shouldn't be unreasonable to ask for something better.

With Sullivan's phenomenal performance and Stuckmann's keen eye, Shelby Oaks allows us to witness the start of one of the most promising new voices in horror.

Oddity is one of the best horror movies of the year.

Twisters has its fair share of clunky dialogue, an endless amount of indiscernible technobabble (honestly, it's kind of impressive), and even a smidge of contrived melodrama, to be sure, but it balances out these shortcomings with a relentless sense of earnestness and heart that's difficult to resist.

This is a stripped down story — the type of moving, romantic drama aimed at adults that's become an endangered species over the past couple of decades. If the director wants to take a sudden shift in his preferred mode of filmmaking at this stage in his career, I would greatly welcome seeing him make more movies in this mold.

Tatum and Johansson are the stars of the show, oftentimes conveying with a mere look what entire monologues couldn't have accomplished. These are the two engines propelling the movie into the stratosphere, taking what could've been a disposable, forgettable effort and transforming it into an experience that'll have you floating on air out of the theater ... likely as you hum a very apt Frank Sinatra tune to yourself.c

If you're simply looking to see Murphy slip back into a familiar role and have a little fun, "Beverly Hills Cop: Axel F" might do the trick. Even though this film is lackluster, it's still fun to watch Eddie Murphy do his thing, and there are moments here where he genuinely seems to be having a good time, and that can be contagious. So maybe that's enough to satisfy. Or, when you sit down and fire up Netflix to watch this film, you can make a wiser choice and just watch "Dolemite is My Name" instead. It'll be a much better use of your time, I promise.

Even if you're not totally on its wavelength, watching Chokri's stylish fable is like panning for gold: It will present you with several nuggets worthy of closer examination.

Kill is a near-perfect action thriller that's stuck in overdrive.

Against all odds, this is the best movie in the series. How wonderful it is to be surprised.

The result is an erotic cataclysm of gnarly kills, an aesthetic to die for, and another powerhouse performance from Mia Goth.

As a self-contained and satisfying yarn, this initial attempt at original franchise-building leaves a whole lot to be desired. As the most expensive feature-length trailer ever made, "Horizon" sets the stage for a much more interesting sequel where, hopefully, something of import actually happens.

It's disturbing and uncomfortable, but it's certainly never boring. At the very least, "The Wasp" will stick with you long after the credits roll.

The film is so humourless that it becomes tiresome. That might be forgivable if the movie managed to be scary, but not even one or two jump scares are enough to get your heart rate up.

The overstuffed "Despicable Me 4" abandons any pretense of caring about characters or narrative, choosing instead to fit in as many gags, characters, and little stories with as little consequences as they can.

It may not be the best Lanthimos, but it's certainly the most Lanthimos.

Sometimes you watch a film and know the moment the credits roll that you've witnessed something special, one that will become a beloved favorite and be passed down for years to come. The Imaginary is that film for 2024, a breathtaking feat of animation with a powerful story that lends it to being a generational classic in the making.

Jazzy can be called many things — a slice-of-life rumination on the things we take for granted, a coming-of-age marvel — but, at its core, it's the simplest and most childlike of statements that echo far beyond the movie's pitch-perfect ending.

Inside Out 2 may not reach the emotional highs of the first film, but don't be surprised when it reduces you into a sobbing mess at the end.

Even a minor stumble or two does little to hold back one of the year's better horror efforts, leaving us to grapple with images that will haunt us long after the credits roll.

Sacramento is film that knows exactly how to transcend the sum of its parts.

After it's over, you won't soon forget what you've seen and heard. Even if you try, it'll come back — whether in your fantasies, your nightmares, or both.

Those looking for the next "The Sixth Sense" will inevitably come away disappointed (though, contrary to popular belief, that wasn't M. Night's actual debut film either). But as a bold announcement that the next evolution of the Shyamalan name is upon us, Ishana leaves plenty of reason to believe that the best is still ahead of us.

Smith, Lawrence, Adil & Bilall keep Mike and Marcus winningly human. They're adult men who suffer from heart attacks and panic attacks as much as they leap over cars and make impossible shots with their pistols. That special, magic mixture of grounded heart with over-the-top action and comedy is what makes a "Bad Boys" film, and make no mistake: "Ride or Die" is not only a great "Bad Boys" film, it's also a top-tier action comedy.

It's all just too much for any of us to live up to, and yet for Riley, it's all she's ever known. Watching her find the balance is riveting, and a testament to both D.W. Waterson's directorial eye and Devery Jacobs' immense talent.

Solo celebrates love within the queer community, and it does so beautifully. But what's even lovelier about Solo is that it's a film about finding that love within yourself first.

Hit Man is light enough to be enjoyable, and Powell and Arjona really make things pop. However, Hit Man is also kind of forgettable, and often uninspired. The story is high concept, the execution is lacking.

This is a frequently charming documentary, but it sprints through Henson's life like we're speed-reading his Wikipedia page. I wanted more.

On the positive side, Cailey Fleming makes for a compelling young lead with a touching performance.

The Strangers didn't need these horror tropes to become a sensation, so it's very odd to see them shoehorned into this new trilogy.

Not only does it stand on its own as a masterful action-adventure blockbuster, but it also exemplifies Miller's thesis as a whole: that survival "in extremis" reveals the true essence of a person. "Fury Road" is an even better movie because of "Furiosa," and George Miller has gifted the world with his magnum opus. Witness him.

The film may end on a bleak note, but there's some levity mixed into the very batter.

As a movie, Unfrosted is weak. As a delivery system for a barrage of funny, silly jokes, it's part of a nutritious breakfast.

Butterfly in the Sky is a heartfelt, beautiful celebration of one of the most influential educational children's programs to grace our television, but it also comes with a point to make.

The Coffee Table is one of the most unique experiences you can have in a movie, a torturous dark comedy with a fantastic ensemble, a great eye for visuals that maximize the emotional gut punch, and a script that ties you down to a chair as you go through the nine circles of hell, laughing like a maniac along the way.

Snyder once again displays his usual knack for crafting the occasional breathtaking visual and colorful splash page — a kiss silhouetted by the Veldt equivalent of magic hour, a spaceship foregrounded by an eclipsing star, and a stunning tableau of lasers crisscrossing in the heat of battle are memorable highlights — but his insistence on serving as his own director of photography continues to hold him back at every turn.

But when the smoke of its bombastic climax clears, what we're left with is an oddly sanitized, toned-down, and somewhat misshapen addition to Ritchie's oeuvre.

In lesser hands, Challengers would have been a chintzy soap opera. Guadagnino, however, is able to bolster an admittedly typical soap story with an energetic style and attention to detail.

I Saw the TV Glow is both a musing on the way entertainment (and screens in particular) will step in to fill the gaps left by poor emotional regulation and support from those who are supposed to help children grow and thrive to become capable, fully-realized adults and how exclusively escaping into worlds of fiction rather than fighting the very real monsters of the week in your own mind will only hold you back.

If there's any true criticism to be found with In A Violent Nature, it's that the "Friday the 13th" and "Texas Chain Saw Massacre" video games exist, diluting the inventiveness of the first-person perspective a little bit. But for those who've never played those games, In A Violent Nature will feel wholly unique. Fortunately, even if you have played these games, the film is still a hell of a lot of fun.

Traditionally, films that are this delightfully raucous, bloody (and I mean BLOODY), and silly are relegated to B-movie schlock (not a bad thing, for the record), but "Abigail" still embraces the excessive and ornate gothic aesthetics of classic horror movies. The result is an old-school vampire movie with modern frisk and flair and an absolute blast of a movie to watch with a crowd.

Cuckoo is equal parts head-scratcher and mind-blower but so ridiculously audacious that it's impossible not to obsess over.

Bleak, severe, and awesome, "The First Omen" is the best horror movie of the year so far.

Vera Drew is both the unstoppable force and the immovable object, and we should all be so lucky to bear witness to her madness. The only sensible way to live in this world is without rules, and The People's Joker refuses to follow any of them.

"Godzilla x Kong" is infectiously fun, raucous, and, in the 8-year-old sense, awesome. One will not take much away from "Godzilla x Kong," but you'll leave the theater with a big damn fool grin on your face.

Hidden somewhere in Immaculate is a stirring and topical drama about the way male-driven religious institutions claim ownership over women's bodies.

A somewhat ambitious but messy and ultimately unsatisfying sequel, despite packing some decent laughs and a couple of genuinely exhilarating sequences.

It's genuinely funny while also basking in the very believable romance of it all.

As a road trip movie, Civil War is quite good, with some segments proving more enthralling than others. Dunst is the standout among the cast, keeping us anchored through the more episodic elements, but Wagner Moura, Stephen McKinley Henderson, and Cailee Spaeny contribute strong work.

This is a major motion picture built on the hope that audiences will want to see a cast of attractive, charming, interesting actors bounce off each other on screen, trading barbs and dashing looks. There's no franchise-building here, and no ambitions beyond offering the audience primal, pure pleasures. 

It's an action movie for progressive-minded audiences who need some kind of relief in an era of instability and terror as well as an action movie for folks who just want to watch Dev Patel decimate every single person who dares cross his path.

When Mooney is in joke mode, sprinting from gag to gag without room to breathe, Y2K is a great time at the movies: a midnight movie in the truest sense of the word.

Babes would be a stressful film if it wasn't such a funny one, if its leads weren't so charming, their chemistry so lived-in.

Once you squint and look past the Gyllenhaal of it all, there's not much on offer here. The leading man tears through a thin sketch of a story, populated by characters, performances, and even action that feel like placeholders.

Damsel lives and dies by the performance of Elodie and thankfully, Millie Bobby Brown establishes herself as the new Mother of the Dragons. She expertly finds the balance between a terrified woman thrown into an unthinkable circumstance, and a fighter unwilling to give up when things get tough.

For the most part, Ricky Stanicky is an entertaining comedy with enough laughs to keep your attention, but ultimately, it tries too hard to pull at your heartstrings without enough authenticity to back it up.

Granted, the story leaves something to be desired, and it's missing one of the franchise's signature traits, but as someone who was underwhelmed by the trailers teasing Po's return, I walked away feeling adequately entertained.

Spaceman fails to grab our attention and, like Sandler's character, feels adrift. But as the journey towards the Chopra cloud — which Hanuš describes as "the beginning of everything" — continues, the conversations between spaceman and space spider grow warm, thoughtful, and even charming.

As a whole, Lovely, Dark, and Deep starts to feel like a short film (or story) stretched to feature length. I was on board with the movie's various chills, but I wanted something more. 

It's a lightweight, weirdly teen-friendly (but very R-rated) slumber party movie with an upbeat and liberating "be gay, do crime" vibe. It's a queer, hand grenade-shaped squeak toy. 

Dune: Part Two is a rare big, expensive blockbuster with a lot on its mind. Not content with just spectacle (and boy, there is a lot of that), Denis Villeneuve's sequel packs in heavy thoughts on religion, war, revenge, romance, and yes, really big worms. It's not entirely successful, but gosh, you gotta appreciate the attempt.

Madame Web does not provide a crowd-pleasing bombast. This is a pity, as this odd duck makes for a fascinating watch. This may be one of the final films of the superhero renaissance. Enjoy it before it topples over entirely. 

Molli and Max in the Future is the textbook definition of an indie darling that executes well above its obvious production restraints, as unique and boundlessly ingenious a film you'll find in today's media landscape.

It's a hilarious low-low-budget, rough-around-the-edges oddity that makes me very happy, and I hope someday it'll make you feel the same crisp beaver-beatin' joy.

It's as if Diablo Cody and Zelda Williams took Sprouse's "I'm a weirdo" speech from "Riverdale" and turned it into an entire movie to prove the point. For all of its fantastical elements of undead boyfriends and tanning bed magic, there's a genuine message about how ungodly difficult it is to be a teenage girl in all of its forms, but that gallows humor is one of the strongest coping mechanisms to employ.

At the very least, the filmmaker offers up some cool things that we haven't seen in a modern action movie like this, which can be very challenging in the wake of many "Mission: Impossible" and "John Wick" movies. For that, Argylle is worth a trip to the theater.

It's What's Inside is one of the funniest, most clever, and narratively ambitious movies I've seen in a long while.

Skywalkers: A Love Story is a dizzying and dazzling look at a hyper-niche culture that delivers some of the most jaw-dropping real-life footage you'll likely ever see.

While Ian Bonhôte and Peter Ettedgui's documentary Super/Man: The Christopher Reeve Story recounts Reeve's journey with appropriate tenderness, it isn't a hagiography. It consistently reminds audiences that this was a real human being, and not actually a savior from another star.

Love Lies Bleeding transforms into a thrillingly grimy, seedy, Americana-and-fluid-soaked body-horror noir that's unabashedly queer and winningly deranged.

When Presence delves into the more typical trappings of the genre — everything from a scene where a psychic investigates the house to moments of seance-like invocation — it still retains its unique voice, thanks not just to Soderbergh but Koepp.

As a celebration and an elegy for a creature that isn't and never was, "Sasquatch Sunset" is kind of beautiful and kind of ridiculous.

Lindy doesn't just make a fun genre mash-up of a film, blending together comedy, fantasy, romance, horror, and musical theatre, but uses the movie's genre elements to tell a subversively wicked story of suppressed emotions, and what can result when those feelings aren't kept behind a closet door.

Thelma's plight is handled with respect, and by putting us in her perspective, Margolin allows us to empathize and see the world through her eyes.

There are plenty of enjoyable moments here, and audiences who want nothing more than a Jason Statham beat-'em-up will surely be satisfied. But this movie's narrative and creative stumbles put into stark relief what we've known for 10 years now: The "John Wick" formula might seem easy to replicate, but to make an equally legendary action film is much, much harder than it looks.

The Book of Clarence is aspirational, unique, moving, funny, weird, and very shaggy. But it's better to have a picture's cup runneth over than to present us with an empty chalice.

The film is a fun and totally fetch amalgamation of both eras of Cady, Regina, Gretchen, Karen, Janis, and Damian.

Ultimately, Night Swim is a bit of a contradiction in terms, a mostly generic horror film that impressively adds a few unique elements to the proceedings. It's a shame that McGuire doesn't follow Russell's lead and allow the movie to really go bonkers; perhaps they were intimidated by 2002's "Dark Water" or the "Jack Frost" films, which do more with the idea of "evil water" than is seen here. Still, "Night Swim" delivers the goods enough to be a fun time, and like a day in a backyard pool, it may not be super memorable but that doesn't mean it's not enjoyable.

When the plot gets going and we're on a road trip through fantastical locations, the movie becomes a fun ride. It's not as good as the original, but it is still one of the better superhero films of the year.

The best that can be said about everything surrounding Powell and Sweeney in Anyone But You is that they mostly have the good sense to move the plot quickly and then let the stars sparkle.

In spite of the pedigree of White as writer (and yes, it is that Mike White, of "The White Lotus" and "School of Rock"), and Benjamin Renner as director (following up on his very sweet and tender 2014 animated film "Ernest & Celestine"), Migration rarely approaches a level of excitement or creativity that might be hoped for with a big-budget animated feature.

Blitz Bazawule and a cast of talented performers do their best, but the end result just doesn't gel.

Another lighthearted, fast-paced adventure that is both enjoyable and can't help but feel slightly like reheated leftovers.

The film tastes like the cinematic equivalent of Clooney's tequila brand Casamigos. That is to say, The Boys in the Boat goes down smoothly, if somewhat unremarkably.

Ultimately, "Rebel Moon" resembles little more than a grab-bag collection of world-building influences, mythology, and epic storytelling that we've seen done better many times before.

The Iron Claw is an emotionally eviscerating watch anchored by one of the best ensemble casts of the year.

Origin lacks both a center of gravity and a sense of scale.

Miyazaki remains one of our greatest filmmakers because he utilizes the medium of animation to tell intensely personal stories that open up our eyes to grand new worlds, strange new characters, and unforgettable images. "The Boy and the Heron" is one of the year's best films, and hopefully not his last masterpiece.

I'm not quite sure what "Leave the World Behind" is trying to say, other than the fact that as a species, we seem to be inherently doomed because we're too neurotic to help ourselves. That might leave a sour taste in the mouths of some viewers, but there's something refreshing about a film so unapologetic about its unflinching hopelessness. 

Even with a runtime twice as long as the typical "Monk" episode, "Mr. Monk's Last Case" has the same breezy pacing — mostly.

So while Timothée Chalamet doesn't have the magic to hold the movie on his back, the movie around him is still rather splendid and enjoyable. Even if Chalamet ends up leaving a displeasing taste in your mouth, he doesn't end up ruining this sweet treat. 

It all ends up being a touch forgettable by the time the end credits roll, but the journey to get there is never dull.

Though this film is well-intentioned, fleetly paced, and boasts a unique blend of animation, it's a desperate and sweaty attempt to revive the past glories of the studio.

Though Leo is perhaps not the most groundbreaking animated film of the year, its gentle tone and emotion mixed with some standard anarchic gags from the Happy Madison school of comedy work in its favor.