Aesthetic flourishes abound, which make it an entertaining viewing experience, but one does wish that the narrative was a touch more complex. Lelio embeds some compelling meta-textual moments — ones that mostly address that fact that he’s a man tackling this subject — but the actual story of Julia can feel secondary to the melodic pageantry.

Beautifully shot and tenderly acted, placing all its faith in pure emotion rather than in overly convoluted twists and turns, this is the sort of gem that feels all the more special for appearing, at first, so ordinary.

The movie’s captivating sweetness is hard to resist, showering its love on a pint-sized human character so out of step with her kid contemporaries she has difficulty making friends. Turning around the lonely life of 8-year-old Bonnie (voiced by Scarlett Spears) becomes an urgent mission for the toys.

It’s all very atmospheric, including the frequent bloodlettings that Sister Brigid applies to Robin’s arm (the camera lingers lovingly on every spilled drop). But the dour, humorless proceedings never achieve the profundity they’re aiming for, and the revisionist take on Robin doesn’t prove very interesting or revelatory.

There are allegories that can be read about fear of the unknown breeding cruelty and exploitation, but Disclosure Day is first and foremost a propulsive yarn with thematic roots in hope, truth, empathy and perhaps even spirituality.

An overly mannered affect undermines the rawness of the emotions, keeping them from landing with the impact they ought.

Using a well-edited combination of vintage and recent interviews and copious amounts of archival footage, the documentary recounts the band’s story in compelling fashion, with Questlove providing enough imaginative stylistic flourishes to prevent it from feeling like an extended Behind the Music episode.

The film tells a story that will probably be familiar to anyone who grew up in Japan. It then takes that classic narrative and adds a few new twists, as well as a decidedly anti-war message that seems to be speaking to our time as well.

This is a Valeska Grisebach movie, so even if the stakes initially seem high, the director does everything she can not to deliver a predictable action-packed suspenser, but rather an intermittently fascinating and frustrating portrait of a place that’s been left to the dogs.

While not every grown-up romance needs to be sexually explicit, this stiff restraint sits at odds with a script that often seems to be reaching for Apatovian raunch.

The actors are reduced to joke machines trapped in a nonsensical nonplot, and while some of those gags yield laughs, a far greater number fall flat.

Masters of the Universe touches all the fan-serving bases, with a fun cameo by a certain star of a previous film incarnation and enough post-credit sequences to guarantee several sequels. But it all comes off as terribly forced, as if everyone involved was already trying to figure out exactly how much they’ll earn signing autographs at future Comic-Cons.

The heart of this action-comedy that’s really a high-concept girlfriend movie is Ginger Minj and Jujubee, their characterizations in perfect sync, their rapport endearing and their triumph-of-the-underdog arc something worth rooting for.

And like Bargatze, The Breadwinner is relatable, inoffensive and also thoroughly bland.

If the film captures something of the concept’s intriguing unease — with 20-year-old director Kane Parsons drawing from his own Backrooms-set short films, created when he was just a teenager — its underbaked storytelling made me wonder if some spooky ideas might be better left as whispers in the dark.

Featuring an award-worthy performance by Andrew Scott in the lead role and solid supporting turns by Brendan Fraser, Kerry Condon and Chris Messina, Pressure lives up to its title with its expert ratcheting up of sustained tension.

Ben’Imana contains whole worlds in one very specific here-and-now.

This is the sort of generic “things that go bump in the night” chiller that seems more suited for late-night cable than theatrical release, especially in an era when superior efforts have lifted the horror genre to a higher level.

At times, the movie veers almost into spoof territory, but it never commits to the bit enough to be anything more than a mismatched genre hybrid, despite its atmospheric visuals and strong design elements.

Barnard has always coaxed layered, thoughtful performances from her cast and knows this kind of battered but unbowed community like the back of her hand. But the drama here feels too diagrammatic, foretelling a tragic fate from the first scene onward as everyone parties down like their lives depend on it.

A pileup of movie-ish improbabilities in the climactic act notwithsanding, the new film is a taut nail-biter with a strong cast.

Featuring an impressive cast of unknowns and a fluid style that captures them with both lyricism and verisimilitude, this deserved winner of the Cannes Critics’ Week Grand Prize announces the arrival of a formidable new talent.

So subtle that it’s hard, at times, to discern much of a plot, this delicately made tale of grieving and recovery doesn’t resonate until it ultimately does so in a big way. But when that happens, it can feel like too much, too late.

Jim Queen is a crass, profane, giddily stupid romp through a heap of stereotypes about gay life in Paris. It’s teeming with jokes about prostate orgasms, about tops and bottoms, about fetishes and bodily fluids and G’d out party bois. It comes as a welcome shock to the system here at this august, black-tie film festival. I just wish the movie was funnier and fresher than it is.

More powerful than an argument or a treatise, The Last Interview is an immersive experience. It will be a reminder for some and an eye-opener for others of why John Lennon mattered to people, and why his murder was so shattering.

Some may see in the final gore-splattered climax a simply expedient way to wrap things up, but both Stewart and Harrelson’s performances — all in by this point, or at least tonally in tune with Dupieux’s antics — somehow sell it all emotionally.

Everything is connected in a movie that never ditches its razor-sharp view of class exploitation.

There’s a radical bent to the Esiris’ interpretations of and deviations from Mrs. Dalloway.

For sports fans, especially those worshipful of King Eric, this is pure cinematic cocaine, neatly chopped out, electrifying at first although too much of it could leave you feeling jaded and jangly.

There’s nothing simple or reductive about the emotional throughlines the documentary traces. It embraces the complexities of a man who turned artifice into a kind of superpower, whether he was dreaming up scenarios for fashion spreads or confronting an America as far removed from haute couture Manhattan as you could get.

Regardless of its flaws, Atonement is admirable in the way it humanizes people on the opposite side of a conflict, treating their crippling losses as a source of collective pain while observing a U.S. Marine — trained to point and shoot with no consequences — as he comes to reflect on and take responsibility for his actions.

Based on a well-regarded novel by Brenda Navarro, it’s a wafty character study so stripped down and elliptical that it lacks the connective tissue to hook us into its story or provide emotional access to its characters.

The film moves swiftly enough, with the gags coming at such a consistent pace, that inevitably some of them land. And the performers certainly know how to sell the material, with Cohen amusingly leaning into his character’s humiliations, Pike appealingly reveling in her character’s dominance, and the top-notch supporting cast going through their paces like the pros they are.

Everything about the film is fussy, from the direction to the lighting and camerawork to the chiming score. It’s all so studied and lacking in teeth that it lurches into melodrama.

Here is a fascinating woman in her own right, distilled in the public imagination to someone else’s crime.

Los Javis execute this mighty vision with thrilling technical bravado. Nearly every shot in the film is a carefully composed wonder, either an eye-popping still-life tableau or a breathtaking bit of camera movement, all done up in lush, expensive-looking period detail. It’s a dazzlingly assured film, delivering the heady satisfaction of seeing something ambitious actually land its nervy attempt

The film feels fresh and off-the-cuff, as if someone traveled back to 1940 with an iPhone and hit record, chronicling the dark years of far-right obedience and moral decadence.

Sachs has not made an AIDS movie we’ve seen a million times, largely because it’s not so much a movie about death as one about wringing every last drop out of life, whether it’s fuel for creativity, love or one last surge of passion and pleasure.

This not-quite-a-feature is basically harmless, a wallow in nostalgia so innocuous that it’s hard to begrudge its aviation-crazed creator with connections sufficient to indulge his whim.

In his latest, Fjord, the Romanian New Wave auteur brings his needling focus and unvarnished realism to a knotty drama of parenting and education, in which a suspicion of possible child abuse escalates into a full inquisition during a head-spinning rush to judgement. It’s also a nuanced reflection on otherness, and how anyone failing to conform to the values of a community invites distrust.

The director declines to get too specific about his allegorical intent, which could be sexual trauma or gender identity or just a mysterious body-snatcher nightmare. Either way, this is a spellbinding psychological puzzler led by a typically fearless performance from Léa Seydoux.

This rigorously well-made, grippy-as-a-live-squid, toska-steeped work is Zvyagintsev’s most openly critical commentary on the motherland’s current political, spiritual and moral malaise, a denunciation never said in so many words but expressed with intricate layers of irony.

Nemes struggles to maintain fluidity or momentum in his storytelling and the movie often seems a slog in its first half. But the filmmaker clearly feels the core of the drama in his bones, which goes some distance toward masking its weaknesses.

Bitter Christmas feels like a tortured analysis construct, in which Almodóvar — normally the most generous of artists — is working things out in his own head rather than coaxing his audience in to share the experience.

It’s a handsomely mounted film, full of precise period detail, but is otherwise undistinguished from many solemn, exacting biopics that have come before it.

It’s an entertaining, fast-spaced space adventure that benefits immeasurably from the charisma (mostly vocal, but still) of Pedro Pascal as the bounty hunting Mandalorian Din Djarin and the adorable cuteness of the animatronic Baby Yoda, excuse me, Grogu.

More chronicle than drama, it sticks faithfully by the side of its lovable mess of a heroine, whom Exarchopoulos plays with her usual no-bullshit funkiness, this time with too many glasses of wine down the hatch. She brings a dose of humor and a few grace notes to a movie in search of a tighter story, even if it deserves credit for its honesty.

It’s a great feeling to know from a movie’s first frames that you’re in the hands of an assured genre auteur. The rare action thriller that takes place almost entirely in broad daylight, Hope pulls you in immediately with its virtuoso camerwork, pulse-pounding score, adrenalized pacing and sharply drawn characters.

Even if its elements don’t always gel, The Beloved offers another prime showcase for Sorogoyen’s art of unease, as well as for Bardem’s talent for playing men who can fly off the handle at any moment.

The Japanese director has no shortage of ideas — chief among them the potential for advanced robotics to bring closure to the bereaved. But too few of those ideas yield satisfying conclusions, resulting in a drama that becomes treacly and insubstantial, reaching for a profundity that remains elusive.

Gray and his superb cast are in blazing form and full command here in a bruising movie that reveals the heavy price of pursuing the American Dream too recklessly.

Like a photograph developing in a bath of chemicals, Kreutzer’s strategies and themes slowly become clearer, and the scene isn’t pretty.

Club Kid isn’t really a whitewashed vanity project. It’s a confident, exciting directorial debut, stylish in an unobtrusive way and agreeably paced.

All of a Sudden is an odd but audacious film in the way it favors the thematic over the dramatic. Those not attuned to Hamaguchi’s wavelength may find it overstretched and desiccated. But if you can get on board with its leisurely pace, there’s transcendant beauty in its view that all lives are of value, no matter how diminished.

The problem is that all the various strands — the parallel tales — dilute our access to the characters, limiting their dimensions.

If nothing else, Guy Ritchie’s latest effort proves that a movie can be ridiculously convoluted and simple-minded at the same time.

Sometimes eloquent and often rocky, Magic Hour is good enough to make you wish it was much less predictable.

Balagov is indisputably a filmmaker with his own distinctive vision, ideally matched with Evgueni and Sacha Galperine’s glowering score and with Fray’s nimble shooting style, which often takes its cue to get in close from the knotted bodies on the wrestling mats. Story-wise, however, Butterfly Jam is too diffuse to measure up to the brutally transfixing Beanpole.

It is immaculately performed by Zischler and especially Hüller, grounding the film throughout with an uncanny, expressive stillness.

A Woman’s Life is, in its own way, something almost as gratifying: an elegant, enjoyable sophomore outing that proves the breakout was no fluke.

It’s such a seamless, harmoniously composed work, effortlessly edited and elegantly shot, that it’s almost too easy to just drift along with it, like floating down a river on a canoe, letting its currents take control. This isn’t a grabby, attention seeker of a film, but a quiet, watchful sort of movie that whispers its secrets sotto voce.

It’s heady, strange stuff, perhaps not as emotionally resonant as TV Glow, but captivating in both its confusion and honesty.

While there’s not exactly a surfeit of character development, the screenplay co-written by Corrigan and Hope Elliott Kemp provides just enough motivation to keep us interested in more than just the caper.

The actors are all likeable enough, especially the gamine Demoustier, but they are stuck with limp material that’s more twee than captivating.

What makes Obsession so fun, and so disturbing, is how it takes typical aspects of dysfunctional romantic relationships to initially comic and then horrific extremes.

Marty, Life Is Short is, as much as anything, a documentary about not being defined by failure or tragedy.

Nobu is a straightforward and admiring portrait of its subject.

As a film about animals, Remarkably Bright Creatures is human-centric treacle. But as a film about people, its gentle sense of humor and depth of feeling are enough to sweep you away on a wave of emotion.

With its vivid footage, sometimes captured from breathlessly intimate proximity, you might be able to believe, just for a moment, that you could really reach right through the screen and touch her.

The film has its rewards, mostly of the unsophisticated kind, since the fight sequences come fast and furious and the cheesy dialogue has enough groan-worthy one-liners to inspire a thousand drinking games.

The film never gets too heavy-handed in its themes, thanks to its fast pacing, frequent doses of humor, and myriad plot twists, including one that qualifies as a doozy.

That exciting crash sequence — from initial turbulence through to catastrophic Pacific Ocean landing — is where high-stakes action specialist Harlin is most firmly in his sweet spot.

David Frankel’s sequel hits familiar beats that fans will eat up and deftly reconfigures the core trio of women into new adversarial positions, even if it ultimately lapses into cozy sentimentality. The movie is best when it sticks to fluffy, fun nostalgia rather than shooting for substance.

While it’s not without entertainment value, Motor City feels like it wants to be Don Siegel meets Michael Mann meets Walter Hill with a dash of John Woo, but ends up an ersatz version of all their work.

This version sacrifices the story’s powerful political and social themes in favor of by-the-numbers plotting.

If at times the dramatic balance feels off, or the passion exasperating in particularly Gallic ways (l’amour!), Desplechin and his superb cast convincingly bring the angsty emotions to a place of unexpected brightness and clarity.

Decidedly dark, though not necessarily bleak, Bertelli’s hybrid docu-fiction is an unflinching look at the trials and travails of contemporary sports. It’s also a visually seductive meditation on the many ways in which science — whether biological or technological — now plays a pivotal role in any serious athletic endeavor.

The taut nail-biter is well-acted, crafted with skill and briskly paced, running a tight 95 minutes. It’s the rare breed of streaming original that can safely be called a real movie.

The film leaves itself open to accusations of making Michael a saint, which will not sit well with the cancel crowd. If you are unwilling to separate the art from the artist, this will not be a movie for you. But for lifelong fans who cherish the music, the movie delivers. Simply as a celebration of Jackson’s songs and stagecraft, it’s phenomenal, shot by Dion Beebe with visual electricity in the performance sequences. The music has never sounded louder or better.

The steadily accumulated emotional weight of the film dissipates rather quickly as it reaches its abrupt ending. Still, Blue Heron is an affecting, promising debut feature.

Does Cronin’s film have the sharp narrative lines or control of those predecessors? Not even close, but it has enough style and scares, breathless energy and even fiendish humor almost to justify the grandiose inclusion of the director’s name in the title.

Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick, who have written much funnier scripts for the Zombieland and Deadpool films, are here working in uninspired mode. Balls Up loses comic steam the more it goes on, and although Wahlberg and Hauser have demonstrated solid comedic chops in the past, their laid-back underplaying fails to provide much juice.

It’s an aggressive glossing-over of a career that is worthy of both reverence and introspection/interrogation/investigation. Entertaining, funny and light on its feet to a fault, Lorne offers only the first.

Some might be willing to find depth in his stylish, stylized but gossamer-thin depiction of a woman at the height of her performative powers struggling to bear the weight of her stage persona. I found it a bore — self-consciously cool but distancing and empty.

As bloody, dumb shark thrillers go, it stays afloat, gaining some credibility from the natural disaster element.

Sadly, there’s no trace here of the authentic fondness for his characters that illuminated Hill’s directing debut, Mid90s. Just a load of solipsistic L.A. brain rot trying to pass for satire.

Through it all, Bailey’s star power shines. She holds the camera’s attention, pops off the screen and gives Anna an innocent energy that makes her ruses seem mischievous and harmless.

It’s reasonably effective, with Ferreira appealing in the lead role and Montgomery very creepy as the copycat killer who would have benefited from a more wholesome media diet.

The film playfully critiques certain Muslim customs, but never in a demeaning way, while providing a heartwarming coming-of-age narrative that’s a tad predictable.

Immortal Man certainly is a lot of misery business, but the misery is done in high style.

The subject of mentorship is not treated frequently onscreen, but Mr. Burton may be remembered as one of the definitive explorations of the theme. All the technical credits help to ground the film — cinematography by Stuart Biddlecombe is especially striking — but it is the performances that truly mesmerize.

Relentlessly fast-paced and filled with hyperkinetic visuals, the sequel hits the sweet spot in terms of what its target audience wants, even if adult non-aficionados will find little of interest other than the starry vocal cast.

The documentary is an ungainly blend of ultra-earnest hagiography and trashy true-crime sensationalism, without being completely satisfying as either.

The Drama is a handsomely made, sharply performed letdown. It is yet another example of a far too common occurrence: a kicky logline premise having no real structure behind it.

Family Movie is a project that seems to exist entirely because the Bacon-Sedgwick clan just thought it’d be fun to collaborate on something, and that’s being released for the rest of us entirely because the Bacon-Sedgwicks are the Bacon-Sedgwicks. For some fans, maybe that’ll be enough. I think I preferred the actual home movies of the actual Kevin, Kyra, Sosie and Travis that play over the ending.

The impression Pretty Lethal leaves behind is one of unfulfilled potential, an exciting premise executed as a fitfully fun but mostly forgettable distraction.

Originally teased with the droll but less marketable title Colin You Anus, Wheatley’s sporadically amusing semi-farce has a lively rhythm and some fine performances, but the baggy screenplay never delivers the emotional grace notes and knockout revelations it promises.

The Rise of the Red Hot Chili Peppers: Our Brother, Hillel is highly entertaining, full of ridiculously fun early footage of the band and its predecessors, and deeply emotional, with Flea succeeding in making me tear up on multiple occasions. As a film about Hillel Slovak, it’s a bit less successful.