The Girl in the Book is an auspicious debut for Cohn, a showcase for VanCamp’s true acting abilities, and a fascinating feminine story.

Playing like a slightly more reflective B-side to the director's greatest hits, his style in this film isn’t for the more cerebral audiences. But for the viewer who relates to family dysfunction, its maddening contradictions and its mercurial tenor, Joy can be painfully funny, engaging and full of relatable heartache.

Though it may feel threadbare for some, Iñárritu’s near exhausting movie is still unforgettably visceral and there’s so much to be dazzled and experientially shaken by.

MI-5 is no action b-movie classic, but it manages to weave a complex and compelling narrative knot, mix in some absorbing musings about the nature of doing right and following orders, and pack in some nail-biting shoot outs.

There are elements of The Boy And The Beast that undoubtedly reinforce the promise that Hosoda holds: it’s a treat to look at, is inventive in spots, and will probably be eaten up by younger viewers. But it ultimately proves both narratively unsatisfying and emotionally lacking.

Visual daring is nice, but it means little in the end when the ultimately safe and harmless story never rocks the boat.

There’s never too much at stake for the princesses or the audience, but it makes for a fine diversion from the realities of life and history.

The film's lack of terror might be more forgivable had it embraced its more humorous inclinations, but the script’s pedestrian liberals-vs.-conservatives, boors-vs.-yuppies conflicts rarely result in anything laugh-out-loud funny.

Illuminating and fiercely original, if you’re willing to go along on a silent, experimental, dance-based journey of a mother in the desert, Ma is well worth the ride.

Letting such a film slip into the melodramatic could have been very easy. But Garaño and Goenaga tactfully navigate the delicacies of death and the difficulties (and guilt) of life with a quiet poise that make for a film that is as enriching as it is disheartening.

Intimate, singular, and hallucinatory on all aesthetic levels, the film strips politics down to the bone, not always successful but never opportunistic.

While its ambition does show a director still aspiring for great heights, its patchy execution only partly restores the faith.

Berardini’s film follows a narrative trajectory impressive in any documentary, let alone one by a rookie filmmaker. The debut effort is commendable, both for its handling of a complex issue, as well as for its engagement factor.

There’s still that dissonance — Pixar is creating its own world, though the characters, and replicating our own, in the gorgeous vistas — but even when the combination doesn’t truly sing, it remains entrancing, and even surprising.

Deformed from the start, it confirms the very thing argued by its narrative – namely, the folly of unwarranted resurrections.

It promises a minute character study, but Franny, though embodied by a game Gere who in all fairness does visit places in his performance we have rarely seen him even stop by before, is less a person than a collection of quirks.

Ultimately, Ross hasn’t just successfully mounted an adaptation of a hot literary property, or even launched a film series that earns the right to be a franchise. He’s produced an engaging, thoughtful, populist piece of entertainment that transcends gender, genre or source material.

An unremarkable but solid genre exercise, one that shows off Jackie Earle Haley’s chops as a director.

It’s a promising premise fit for a thorny inquiry into personal and institutional priorities, and yet no sooner has Secret In Their Eyes laid its story’s groundwork than it goes off the rails

Rousing in spirit, surprisingly emotional and visually dynamic, filmmaker Ryan Coogler’s first studio movie, Creed, is a worthy successor to the best of the “Rocky” movies and proves the young director is the real deal.

Lawrence is never less than commanding in her last outing as the fiery dystopian heroine, but the most heartening liberation proffered by Part 2 is its star’s escape from this one-note fantasy series.

Always energetic like the wild whoop of a bachelor party, the lights burn brightest when The Night Before indulges in big goofs and kooky tangents.

Nielsson’s documentary portrait is a tragic look at the broken political process in Zimbabwe.

The Big Short ends up an energetic, absorbing version of these events, marked deeply by its director’s uniquely surreal vision.

Using its characters' memories, loyalties and resentments as vehicles, Return to Ithaca gently expands our understanding of life within a society that, in contrast to our own, did not even pretend to cultivate the idea that its citizens were free.

A lack of pace and illuminating insight are what keep Concussion from lasting resonance, its flaws threatening to dull the issue for drama in a way that the NFL could only appreciate.

Despite the predictability of storytelling, The 33 is an undeniably rousing picture.

For those who are coming to Codegirl looking for a fiery rebuke and exposé on the gender imbalance rampant in Silicon Valley, they've come to the wrong place.