It’s one of the most refreshing and satisfying Marvel movies in some time, precisely because its willing to do many things that Marvel hasn’t done before.

Narco Cultura is gripping, gruesome and arresting; a disquieting look a pop (sub)-culture phenomenon that is mushrooming all over the United States and Latin America.

There is so much beauty in Bird, both within the relationships unraveling onscreen and on the screen itself — bright reds and whites and blacks lusciously captured in the film, the edges of the image burnt and remade, almost like yet another bird, the phoenix.

Careful and deliberate character work in the script paints a striking picture of two friends who are outcasts in their little world yet still find a way to integrate into a community.

The storyline is so predictable, in fact, that despite Lafosse’s skills at crafting a scene the narrative simply leaves you wanting. The actors, on the other hand, carry most of your attention because they simply have to.

Mostly compelling but unfocused, Wild Indian dips its narrative feet in a slew of themes, all worthwhile, and doesn’t commit to any of them as its guiding star in the murky sky of its ambition. As the filmmaker tries to bind all of the moving parts, the whole turns scattered-brained and structurally disjointed.

Queen & Slim is an extraordinary Black Odyssey; a film whose tracks reverberate with echoes of the underground railroad.

Wildlike is not a traditional Hollywood feel-good buddy road movie, but a semi-slow burn experience that takes its subject matter and characters seriously while unrolling the central relationship of the story in a refreshingly deliberate pace.

By pointing their camera at the Red Mosque, Trivedi and Naqvi add surprisingly little to the conversation.

Anxious and tightly-wound like “Citizenfour,” with similarly shocking and disturbing content, (T)error is a gripping parallel investigation of illegitimate counter-terrorist stratagems that not only considers the moral consequences of informing, and the wider troubling landscape around it, but does so from a deeply intimate and remarkable perspective.

All This Panic doesn’t offer any revolutionary approaches to this type of intimate documentary, and the subject matter might be too broad for some, but it makes up for its lack of originality with heart and genuine emotion.

Vigas' grip is so tight that even if you do get to the heart of his meaning, there's a chance it will have had the life squeezed out of it.

Imperfections cannot steal away the ambitious underpinnings of Hersh’s intentions for “The Surrogate,” a down-to-earth analysis of the ever-precarious, self-serving human condition; an examination that speaks volumes despite its reserved demeanor.

Never lacking in earnestness or vigor, she nonetheless teeters over the lines separating introspection from navel-gazing and the raw from the simply underdone.

It’s far from a perfect, or even great, film, but 1945 is certainly both commendable and recommendable. It has something to say about complicity of everyday people in the crimes of society, and says so in a fairly quiet, methodical, unassuming (if a bit obvious) way.

On The Rocks is almost like a Trojan Horse of intoxicating libations and magical evenings—Murray’s sporty ‘60s candy red Alfa Romeo convertible being the vehicle of these enjoyments— a capricious trick that belies the true nature of its thoughtful and feminine perspective on the difficulties of love, life, marriage, and complex fathers.

Fearsome and fearless at the same time, Palm Trees and Power Lines practically dares viewers to watch what’s happening on screen without flinching.

If nothing else, Reybaud’s debut flaunts his knack for casting, particularly with the lead performance by Pascal Cervo.

The director’s ingenuity lies in the telling. Hitting all the beats of the police procedural, Moll, with a simple but effective sleight of hand, turns the genre inside out, and points to a much bigger offscreen enemy: Emmanuel Macron.

Ultimately, Miss Juneteenth is a reminder that dreams don’t have to die.

There is an energy to The Party, and a kind of rejuvenating bouncy glee that we haven’t seen from Potter in a long time. And after “Ginger and Rosa,” a film that felt better directed than it was written, being undermined by some very stilted dialogue, the fact the Potter also wrote the screenplay here comes as another pleasant surprise.

The movie has its issues. . . The wrestling though? The action in the ring? Durkin’s direction of those classic matches? It often looks more “real” than the WWE or professional wrestling you see on television today.

By the picture's knotty finale, in which Audiard navigates a late-stage twist with ease and emotion, you know you are in the hands of a master who is directing with the confidence and command that few possess.

A lot like many of the noisy artists on display, “Woodstock 99” has a lot to say, says it loudly but fails to connect in any meaningful way.

As awful as the events of 1944 were for her, there’s ultimately hope in her story in how it fueled a movement and continues to inspire and push people today.

While certainly imperfect, there is something to admire about the film’s attempt to present the tangled logistics of a single military operation, where it seems everyone wants success but none of the responsibility of the tough decision making involved.

As underground and DIY as the kiki scene might be, it’s still highly organized, and part of what Kiki expresses is this community organization as a strategy for survival. The struggle is real, and it’s hard to imagine how they keep pushing that boulder up the hill — being fully themselves in the face of so much hardship — but they are tough, and united.

Scott and Poo have seized on one substantive idea in their portraiture of a singular personality reduced to a caricature of himself by posterity and duly reveal the sensitive artiste who always aspired to more than “Top Gun.” If only they did so with less straightforwardness and more authorial license.