La Ola is far from perfect, often losing sight of its broader ideas for less well-executed narrative beats that don’t always cohere, but it still finds a tune where it counts.

Unidentified ranks among a rare class of movies that forces viewers to re-interpret everything they’ve just seen once the full picture locks into place. Whether that makes everything that came before worthless or worth it may be less a reaction to al-Mansour’s filmmaking and more of a reflection of the audience’s own subject position.

There’s a great evisceration of Hollywood in here that gets a bit too buried until sentimental schmaltz.

It’s easy enough to admire the evident technical merits, yes, but difficult to find any element that invites a viewer into the specific, soulful experience of the characters. As The Death of Robin Hood circles the obvious ending, the main point of reflection it invites is the missed opportunity to flesh out this world with a level of detail on par with its ambitions.

In Disclosure Day, cosmic truth does not arrive as salvation or doom, but as a question of whether humanity can still hear something beyond its own terror. The film’s answer is fragile, luminous, and deeply moving: maybe awe is what survives when we finally stop shouting.

Pressure moves along with enough of a hook to keep one invested, despite its predetermined conclusion and overly familiar structure. As far as paying respect to the unsung heroes that meteorologists were in the war effort, the film carries out its duty. In terms for bringing the winds of change to the subgenre of WWII films, the result is more static than airborne.

Backrooms could have easily been disposable internet-horror junk food—a feature-length extension of creepypasta aesthetics with nothing underneath. Instead, Parsons delivers something far more haunting: an affecting horror film about imprisonment, memory distortion, and the private hell of mistaking isolation for refuge.

From the sigh-inducing jokes to the rom-com blueprint “Ladies First” never strays from, the film keeps threatening to become stranger and more interesting than it is.

As enigmatically as “The Meltdown” unfurls, it leaves enough clues above ground for one to patiently decipher the intricate ideas Martelli is working through in her quietly commanding, narratively rich sophomore film.

Masters of the Universe asks the audience to care about its hero’s destiny while constantly reminding them how silly it all is. By the end, the power is there in theory, but conviction never dares to show its face.

This dramatic, grandiose treatment ultimately feels forced, ill-suited to a character who, despite the director and star’s joint efforts to mystify him, never ceases to come across as ordinarily mediocre.

Minotaur is searingly political yet controlled and understated, maintaining a cold grip on its narrative as the world around it descends into chaos. Urgent and restrained, personal and political, it is one of the more pointed films about the present state of the world in recent memory.

It takes what could be a lean, mean little zombie movie and jams in too much excess noise, when the most impactful bits came from keeping things simple. Even as it’s not without its merits, it’s a film that can’t keep getting out of its own way, constantly stacking more and more nonsense on top of itself until it nearly buckles under the weight.

There is a place for this, but the inherent ideas are often, for lack of a better word, basic. Overall, it’s simply not clever enough to transcend the genre.

It feels natural to expect blood-dripping gore and reckless violence from a film titled Victorian Psycho, but, with his latest, Zachary Wigon chooses instead to lure the audience with the fresh smell of ripped flesh, only to trap them under a heavy blanket of frustration.

The unassumingly magnetic Okonedo radiates the assertiveness and tranquility of someone secure in her reality.

We’re not sure Lucila is a fighter, but she’s a survivor. And over the course of the film, she learns many life lessons in a very short time. So when Diaz finally lets Lucila’s joy or pain cry out, it strikes you. And sticks with you.

Unlike other period tales of hidden queer love, including one that debuted at this same festival a year ago, Dhont isn’t interested in dripping his canvas in tragedy. He’s going to leave you with a glimmer of hope. Actually, more than a glimmer. A wry smile of anticipation that suggests all isn’t lost and love can find a way.

The Javis have a lot to say not only about Spanish history, but also about how emotions can endure and live on through something tangible. Whether it’s a painting, a recorded piece of music, or even a long-lost play, queer or not. They use the omnipresent theme of snow and the poetic spirits often present in Lorca’s work to tie these threads together. A complex puzzle where almost everything settles into place.

While Sachs’ vision is at the center of it all, this moment is also a stark reminder of Rami Malek’s considerable and we mean considerable talents. A gutsy and vulnerable version of the actor that has not graced anyone’s screens in at least a decade.

Far from defending the behavior of this abusive artist, Sorogoyen exposes him as trapped between his memories and his imagination.

The result is a film that’s both shattering in some moments and superficial in others, making it hard to write off and even harder to fully embrace.

Despite not being top-shelf Almodóvar, it remains the work of a director long settled into form and, as such, offers its fair share of delights.

In disregarding the much more interesting machinations of the Resistance in favor of shrouding his protagonist in a thin cloak of importance, Nemes’ pompous drama ultimately loses sight of both the audience and its thesis, all while patting itself on its self-aggrandizing back.

Against the austere beauty of Beanpole, Butterfly Jam can certainly seem messy as it borrows from the crime thriller, depicts a merciless act of violence, and, at times, borders on magical realism. But Balagov’s newest film also has the biggest heart.

Orphan feels like an exercise more concerned with the precision of its technical execution than the more ungovernable reins of its emotional axis.

For all its dull, forgettable, and sometimes egregious misjudgments, “The Mandalorian and Grogu” is not terrible, exactly. It is occasionally cute, occasionally funny, and sometimes harmlessly silly. But it is also completely disposable, and that may be worse.

As Another Day winds down, the weight of throwing almost everything against the wall, hoping it will stick, is a bit too much for the movie to bear. Despite her best efforts and avoiding melodramatic (if not often realistic) rock bottom moments, Herry cannot avoid treading into television movie of the week territory. All while a fiercely committed Exarchopoulos does her best to overcome the shackles of the genre.