Zhu Shengze’s poignant Present.Perfect. follows a dozen anchors over a period of ten months. It distills some 800 hours of live footage into a 124-minute documentary–a black-and-white collage stirring questions that far transcend the country and the zeitgeist it captures.

Like the ramshackle family it so fondly depicts, Babyteeth is not without its flaws but it does suggest a confident new voice in independent cinema.

The Wave is more interested in supplying a good time and that should be enough for some.

Troop Zero drowns in its cloying aim to please at every moment. It doesn’t bring anything new to the table, but that wouldn’t be a problem if its familiar heart and humor landed in any memorable way.

A lot of the times the jokes feel reliant on the video format and its limitations, as if the video tracking and purposefully bad production qualities can fill the gap between ideas and execution. Instead, the gap gets filled with memories of shows and movies that do a better job at the same thing.

The film admirably attempts a level of emotional resonance Bay has proven largely incapable of. Even if it can’t quite wrangle those beats into one cohesive mood, it gives its leads the most they’ve had to work across this trilogy.

Deciding to craft a film as though it were all done in a single take means that everything must balance perfectly lest the artificiality be underlined rather than smoothed over. It is a credit to every person who worked on this film, at every level of development and execution, that 1917 works as well as it does.

Bielenia delivers a fantastic performance as his character overcomes insecurities and regret to speak the words he knows from experience can help those who’ve lost their way.

By lacking a sense of vision in embracing what came before and ignoring the recently laid path for where this story could go, The Rise of Skywalker is not only a disappointing end to this saga–it’s also an ill-fated harbinger for Disney’s future in storytelling.

A horror film populated by smart characters that take on the patriarchy by refusing to play by its rules, its anger and its heart is in the right place. The problem is how it achieves these ends with plot devices that feel borrowed from cheap studio cash grabs usually dumped in theaters in January and September.

While Richard Jewell might not be top tier Eastwood, Hauser’s nervy, sweaty performance feels like a culmination for the filmmaker, a beautiful stripping away of the star power afforded by actors like Hanks and Cooper that reveals something deeper about American self-destruction.

Like its curious and intrepid hero, Dragon keeps wandering off from blockbuster responsibilities to chase the fancies of its big, beating reptilian heart. The fantasy action has never been more exciting or visually impressive, but it repeatedly takes backseat to character relationships, which develop on several new intriguing fronts.

The imagery of water fish swimming in the sky while Hina floats towards an uncharted “marine” habitat of clouds is stunning to behold and the humor earns some big laughs even if much of it centers around teenage horniness and sex-based assumptions. Beneath all that, though, is a resonant tale of empathy and romance.

The Up series feels like the last of its kind and should be treasured as such.

A thematically rich and acutely moving update for both a new generation and certainly many more to follow.

What most strikes in Feast of the Epiphany is a sense of conviction and fidelity, a willingness to document things as they are: unvarnished and imperfect.

Utilizing the style he honed as Terrence Malick’s editor and on his directorial debut The Better Angels, Edwards supplies Richie’s inner turmoil through poetic imagery.

It’s often inspiring.

Tinnell captures the warmth of kinship and tradition while displaying the truly unique immigrant experience of putting down roots and working to improve life for future generations. We should all aspire to experience that much love because nothing calls out its absence more than remembering its abundance.

Dale is a force as he runs the full spectrum of emotions to reveal why he matters and why he must also be forgotten.

While Dark Waters often suffers mightily for being so inert, it always manages to circumvent lulls by embracing Bilott’s persistence, which works as an anecdote to corporate America, whose stranglehold over the country comes through in Edward Lachman’s deathly grey visuals defined by lifeless rural vistas.

Clarke has been angling at legit leading lady status ever since she got called Khaleesi, to varying degrees of success. Last Christmas feels like the young actress is in full form. Forget the perceived genre limitations, this is a good performance. Her Kate is cutting, manipulative, charming, broken and funny. All at once! She’s fully human, a refreshing departure from some of her recent roles.

Doctor Sleep offers a shockingly nuanced and human story of social longing, spiritual rehabilitation, and existential redemption.

Despite the filmmakers investing so much time in unnecessary biopic exposition, the whole is an exciting and informative history lesson.

While often a lazy rehash of the first two installments, Terminator: Dark Fate nevertheless capitalizes on familiar territory as best it can, in order to casually examine the inner clockwork of its human and inhuman stars.

While always visually interesting, the plot fails to live up to the sheer detail of costume and set design. Waddington proves herself to be a stylish director. If only next time she can find a better script.

It deserves every accolade and opportunity received due to its unrelenting authenticity and complex themes.

For all its redundancies—the film enjoys telling us its definitions of sequel, remake, and reboot while also highlighting the myriad ways it knowingly embodies each—this authentic character growth is wholly new.