Escalante struggles to illuminate how sex and violence are connected and what this, in turn, means for more specialized types of aggressiveness and oppression, such as misogyny and homophobia.

Though Asante is no stylist or and no very deep psychologist, she is adept at reaching an audience through direct storytelling.

While the strong ensemble cast is Their Finest's most valuable asset, the movie also looks quite handsome on what appears to be a modest budget, and includes some delightful glimpses of how screen effects were achieved way back in those handcrafted days.

Rooney Mara and Theo James deliver their most richly nuanced screen work to date in the drama, a memory piece whose true subject is Ireland’s tangled, bloody history and the Church’s toxic paternalism toward women.

Even with director Mira Nair’s typically vivid sense of place and the charismatic central performances by David Oyelowo, Lupita Nyong’o and a striking newcomer, the film hits every note of plucky positivity so squarely on the head that it leaves little room for audience involvement.

The event-stuffed screenplay seems frightened of the running time associated with historical romances, though, excising any occasion for reflection or distraction; as a result, the picture moves with a mechanical predictability that would be considerably more annoying with a less watchable cast in front of us.

The movie is all tease and no follow-through, letting its story leak out in dribs and drabs that fail to gather any momentum or meaning, let alone mystery.

A very loose and extremely limp adaptation of Don DeLillo's 2001 novella The Body Artist, it palpably aspires to be a classily highbrow kind of romantic ghost story with psychological thriller undertones, but falls laughably short of its goals.

A sweetly subversive dig at the constricting codes of teen hierarchies, the sheep-like mentality of youth and the failures of the education system.

The gentle tone and disjointed sketch-show structure here will appeal to long-standing fans, but Mascots wins no prizes for innovation or progression. The jokes are uneven, the caricatures often overly broad and the plot almost nonexistent.

Lady Macbeth mostly operates within established period conventions, but draws fresh blood from antique material thanks to a sparky cast, subtle nods to contemporary race and gender issues, and a hefty shot of gothic melodrama.

Whereas there are still long takes aplenty, most of them startlingly exquisite, the film feels, for once, very urgent in relaying the faultlines of real Filipino history.

Spread over hours of poetic ramblings, the message loses most of its urgency.

The Woman Who Left is an immensely immersive and engaging tale about a wronged individual's grueling struggle between reconciliation and revenge.

Fast, full-hearted and graced with a beautifully modulated lead turn by Hailee Steinfeld, the movie takes the risk of playing it straight and sincere — and the risk pays off.

An intriguing exposé of a gripping story.

Cooper weaves a few well-placed observations about gun culture and male condescension into the heavy-handed mess.

The way in which Ozon again uses mirror images, which reveal the similarities between the French and the Germans just after the war, or the way Fanny and Anna come to possibly mirror each other again suggest that a master storyteller is at work.

Rachel Weisz’s arresting, combative Lipstadt, a shining woman warrior, is a role she will be remembered for, while as her antagonist Timothy Spall (Mr. Turner) makes a spookily stubborn, thoroughly despicable, but still human Irving.

The cast's likability keeps us on board, watching the sometimes baffling behavior onscreen just like those on the streets of Seoul, who gape up at a monster in horror but can't make themselves flee to the suburbs.

While the broad political commentary is beyond obvious, the satire of ugly entitlement draws blood, thanks to balls-to-the-wall performances from the adversarial leading ladies.

At its worst, the film oozes the sickly smugness of a self-help pamphlet, but when it relaxes its didactic grip and lets the actors take control it can be quite charming.

A sober and yet profoundly stirring contemplation of family, roots, identity and home, which engrosses throughout the course of its two-hour running time.

Extraordinary in its piercing intimacy and lacerating in its sorrow, Jackie is a remarkably raw portrait of an iconic American first lady, reeling in the wake of tragedy while at the same time summoning the defiant fortitude needed to make her husband's death meaningful, and to ensure her own survival as something more than a fashionably dressed footnote.

The film has a different though no less riveting intensity, thanks to Rooney Mara's emotionally naked performance in the title role, and unflinching support from Ben Mendelsohn.

Cedar impressively creates a complex and intricately detailed portrait of the web of political, financial, social and religious affiliations that has everything to do with how the world works.

Crucially, Litz misses almost every opportunity to build atmosphere and create suspense, or even a hint of heightened drama, rendering the tone of the film virtually somnambulistic throughout.

If it leaves something to be desired at the start of the tale, the procedural details of seeking release and exoneration are well represented.