Sinners had me cheering for every thrill and spill, all while mulling the deeper concerns threaded through it.

The film is simply intent on capturing the energy of that special “us against the world” connection that can exist only in high school and unleashing it onto the screen.

Beats Per Minute is specific in topic, to be sure—this is a moving account about the gay experience at a particular point and place in history—but it’s also fascinating to consider from a wider angle, as many people continue to grapple with how to carry out different kinds of political protests.

The film is, as a result, a portrait of how Rasoulof perceives the systematic oppression within his home country, from which he is now exiled. The government’s rejection of its citizens’ efforts for change is personal to him—as devastating and painful, the film suggests, as having a father turn against his own flesh and blood.

I’m all for the studio exploring new concepts and original characters going forward, and setting aside the endless anthologizing of its biggest hits for a good long while. But if I had to get another Toy Story, this is about as strange and beguiling an entry as I could have hoped for.

It is one of the most moving and mesmerizing films of the year, a meditation on the wonders of nature and human curiosity.

For all its powerful elements, though, Hamnet rings a bit hollow at its core. Perhaps the grand tragedies are just too overwhelming for some viewers to see beyond. I cried, yes, but in the end, I felt no closer to the mysterious bard—let alone to the people he loved, all those hundreds of years ago.

The aesthetic is Twilight Zone, and the plot could be right out of The X-Files. But despite its small-screen influences and tiny budget, The Vast of Night is shockingly cinematic, overflowing with the kind of inventiveness you rarely see from a first-time filmmaker.

You Were Never Really Here feels remote and somnambulant—a bad dream viewers know will end after 90 minutes, never to disquiet them again. Its emotional stakes are inflated so overzealously that they scarcely register as stakes at all.

McQueen has made a big, pulpy crowd-pleaser, but he uses it to tell a story with real meaning. Widows is methodical in its imagery and gracefully written; it’s also a suspenseful blast, best seen with the biggest, most animated audience possible.

Boys State is both inspiring and occasionally terrifying, and that befits its gaze into America’s political present and future.

First Man is about Armstrong’s landmark achievement, but it’s just as much about a country’s grinding, maniacal fixation on getting him there.

Eephus is an elegy, but with just the barest hint of sentimentality—a shrugging send-off that simultaneously cares deeply about America’s pastime.

Does the movie, like its predecessor, rely on familiar tropes a bit more than it should? Yes, I think it does. Is it, at a solid two-and-a-half hours, considerably longer than it needed to be? Yes, that too. But it’s still a pretty damn good movie, arguably the best the franchise has offered since Empire.

With so many details pulled directly from history, along with scenes shot inside an intake prison that had housed the RTA alumni featured in Sing Sing, the film often plays like a documentary.

Overlook Turning Red at your peril. It’s the best thing Pixar’s produced in recent memory and perhaps the studio’s most emotionally nuanced and thematically clever film since Inside Out.

It’s funny, high-spirited, and giddily loopy, a descent into madness told with the energy of a sea shanty. But it has that same attention to detail that makes Eggers such an exciting filmmaker.

Jenkins uses her gift for capturing intimacy as a weapon, telling a story that’s sometimes brutal, other times acidly funny, but always honest.

This is a film loaded with broad comedy, bold speechifying, blunt depictions of racism, and astonishing visual flair; it is a Spike Lee movie, made with the kind of artistic and political verve that recalls his best work.

What impressed me most about Janet Planet is what a work of cinema it is, visually alive and inventive even with a small budget and fairly languid plotting pace.

Spielberg is in complete control of the material and even manages to tamp down his customary treacle until the movie’s almost over. It’s a fine, enjoyable ride, even if the ultimate destination is never the slightest bit in doubt.

The result is a documentary that’s fascinated with its subject without being reverent, one that’s beautifully photographed (the way that Vasarhelyi and Chin capture the scale of Honnold’s climb is stunning) without ignoring the horrifying consequences lurking if he fails.

The clever script, written by Glass herself, is designed to keep the viewer guessing until the very last minute, and it’s the foundation of the first great horror movie of the year.

In Palm Springs, the journey the central characters go on isn’t just about trying to escape the loop—it’s about understanding that no matter how tedious life might seem, there are always ways to find joy in living it.

The thrill of RRR is not the density of its storytelling, though—it’s the exuberance of it.

It’s also just a sexy, fun movie for grown-ups that believes in its story rather than empty spectacle. . . this is a rare romantic comedy to see with a roaring crowd.

Rye Lane may be the most unconventional conventional romantic comedy in years, delivering the genre’s trappings in such fizzy, gleefully inventive ways that even predictable beats feel new.

A Quiet Place is a taut piece of genre filmmaking, to be sure, though it succeeds because it leads with a believable, if heightened, portrayal of a loving family.