The acting could not be better in this new film landmark spiked with laughs that can suddenly—or maybe not for hours or even days later—leave you choking with tears.

Timothee Chalamet ping pongs to greatness in Josh Safdie’s whooshing wonder of a film about winning at all costs. And in case you’re wondering: This is the wildest damn thing Chalamet has ever put on screen.

You don’t need to know a thing about Jean Luc Godard’s 'Breathless' and the New Wave to accept Richard Linklater’s invitation to participate in the sweet agony and ecstasy of their creation. No true movie lover would dream of missing it.

The best high-wire director of his generation wakes up the sleeping giant of American cinema by turning this radical blast of action, fun and fervor into the movie of the year.

In Jafar Panahi’s latest masterpiece, one of the very best movies of the year, five Iranian dissidents debate killing their former torturer.

Quentin Tarantino puts his two “Kill Bill” epics together to make one uncut, unrated radically untamed film with extras and Uma unleashed that great godalmighty feels free at last.

Take a look at leading man Wagner Moura. That’s a movie star, right there. An Oscar nomination for this political thriller that truly thrills is his next step. Just watch, it’ll happen.

In a mere 76 minutes, director Ira Sachs and his virtuoso actors, Ben Whishaw and Rebecca Hall, have captured a specific world in universal terms and made a film for the ages.

In the most purely pleasurable movie so far this year, Ryan Gosling has a blast as a science guy who rockets into space to save all our asses with jolts, jokes and smarts that won’t quit.

It’s murder behind stained-glass windows as “Knives Out” detective Daniel Craig and a cast of all-star sinners find the fiendish fun in a crime story about the wages of wickedness. Don’t worry, it’s not a musical

As ever with Park Chan-wook, there are tasty bits of bright and bleak to noodle on in this stinging satire of AI and capitalism, but with a rigorous fix on the growing dehumanization infecting our world. One of the year’s best.

You can wait around and hope, but it’s difficult to believe that this rediscovered Sondheim classic with Grof, Mendez and Radcliffe will ever have a more feeling and vital performance than this one. And hey Harry Potter, you can really sing.

Joel Edgerton and Felicity Jones bring flesh-and-blood immediacy to this classic in the making. about the beauty and terror of pioneering railroad days. A tough sell? Maybe. But not when a movie dares to reach for the stars like this one.

A terrifying first film in which a tween water polo team becomes a "Lord of the Flies" metaphor for the hell of modern bullying. The scares are killer, but it’s the violence of the adolescent mind that hits hardest and haunts you longest.

Nothing about the pulsating ‘Sirāt’ is appropriate or expected or traditional or fully comprehensible. It just is. And it is utterly transfixing.

Sam Rockwell excels as a wild man from the future in this deceptively profound satire that holds up a dark mirror to the dangerous game we’re playing with AI. A true film for its time.

Exclusively culled from police-cam footage, this outstandingly crafted, Oscar-buzzed documentary examines a white Florida woman who murders her Black neighbor on the basis of a stand-your-ground law that indicts an entire society

An electrifying Ian McKellen hits a new career peak and takes an early shot at Oscar in Steven Soderbergh’s unmissable tale of an artist and his forger, played by the brilliant Michaela Coel.

Bigelow’s triumphant return, after seven years, is essential cinema, without closure but not without hope. The house she has built for our attention is scary as hell, but in whatever remains of it, humanity still has a future.

Forget the biopic imitations, the found concert footage in this music doc soars with 100 essential minutes of The King back on his throne and thrillingly alive on stage and off. I’d call that a must-see.

Love that Gus Van Sant has crafted his true-crime hostage drama in the grand 1970s tradition of Sidney Lumet’s “Dog Day Afternoon.” Bill Skarsgard drops his Pennywise psycho clown persona to make his unmasked mark as an actor. And does he ever.

Kristen Stewart’s directing debut is not an easy sit, but with actress Imogen Poots, she creates an indelible, impressionistic film about a competitive swimmer that doesn’t follow tidy biopic rules or, let’s face it, any rules at all.

Ethan Hawke gives one of his greatest performances as a Broadway musical legend who ends up breaking his own heart in Ricard Linklater’s enthralling, encapsulated biopic

The lovely animation is next level in this touching tale of a Belgian girl living in Japan who finds understanding in a clash of cultures.

Josh O’Connor and director Kelly Reichardt tell the story of an amateur art thief who’s not as smart or cool as he thinks he is, though the movie is both those things

Nothing happens in Eephus and it’s still one of the best damn baseball movies ever made.

Keke Palmer and SZA show how star power can turn a girl buddy comedy into a world view of the Black experience with laughs that sting with harsh truth.

I kept smiling watching this fractured family drama. A bizarre reaction for an Icelandic movie about the end of a marriage. But it’s the high spirits that stay with you in Hlynur Pálmason's charmer about the intangibles of love.

One thing is for sure about this century-spanning story about the dangers faced by young women trying to negotiate a safe space in a world of men—you’ll never forget it.

Can a brainwashed boy in Hitler Youth learn to stop worrying and love being a Nazi hater? Beautifully directed by Turkish-German filmmaker Fatih Akin, this unexpectedly tender mesmerizer has an answer you won’t see coming

Israeli filmmaker Navid Lapid is taking the risk that audiences will embrace a tragically real situation about his country’s military culture presented as an absurdist comedy. Say yes

In Morgan Neville’s intimate and insightful musical doc, Paul McCartney finds his musical wings without the Beatles but with wife Linda riding shotgun and teaching him about hard to reach places in the heart.

Anora Oscar winner Sean Baker produced, edited and cowrote Shih-Ching Tsou’s captivating tale of three generations of women building a life in Taipei. One personal note: As a leftie myself, I strenuously object to the idea that being left-handed is the mark of the devil.

George Clooney is a movie star and Adam Sandler is his manager in a deceptively lighthearted Noah Baumbach comedy that hides a world of Hollywood hurt.

Josh O’Connor adds another triumph to his growing list of exceptional performances as a Colorado father broken by divorce and a raging wildfire. Bring handkerchiefs

Hugh Jackman shepherds a tale of sheep crimesolvers that tickles the funnybone, touches the heart and just may end up as the summer’s sweetest surprise.

It’s a delicious irony that emo queen Billie Eilish and blockbuster king of the world James Cameron have teamed up to go small on the most massive screen imaginable, in 3D yet. I couldn’t have liked it more.

As Tourette’s activist John Davidson, Robert Aramayo gives an astonishing performance that hits you like a shot in the heart.

In this queer BDSM romdomcom with a core of sweetness, Alexander Sarsgård and Harry Melling bring passion and compassion to a taboo subject rare in mainstream cinema. It’s about time.

Even when her film dips into melodrama, Rose Byrne grounds her portrayal of an unhoused woman living her car in a humanity that feels detailed and true.

The sequel feels safer than the original and I’m sorry about that. But ‘Zootopia 2’ with its zippity-doo animation and surprises around every corner gets the job done.

For all the mirth and mayhem, Bob Odenkirk and his merry pranksters are exposing how violence is wired into the American character.

Jennifer Lawrence gives a performance to die for in a devastating tragicomedy about postpartum depression that drives away her husband (Robert Pattinson). Scottish hellcat director Lynne Ramsey doesn’t know from comfort zones and she may push you too far, but don’t discourage Lawrence. Risk becomes her.

Housemaid Sydney Sweeney and mistress Amanda Seyfried go bonkers to the max and I mean that in the best way.

Will Arnett and Laura Dern give their all to Bradley Cooper’s film about standup comedy as therapy for marital malfunction, but is it enough?

The tension flattens in the film’s drowsy second half, but the blazing wonder of Amanda Seyfried as Shakers leader Ann Lee makes believers of all

Even when it hops off course, this animated gem is funny and fierce in all the right places. Pixar is back, baby. Haters deserve a good squishing.

In this compassionate comedy of missed connections, Jarmusch makes us see the ordinary in fresh, pertinent and provocative ways. And the cumulative power of his vision is undeniable.

It may be tonally all over the place as cinema, but in his first film, actor turned director Harris Dickinson cuts a direct path to the heart and certifies star Frank Dillane as a major talent.

Chris Hemsworth leads a starry cast in a heist drama that fascinates even through a veil of familiarity. Near the end, a standout Halle Berry flashes a smile of sweet satisfaction. My guess is that you’ll feel the same way.

Even with Emma Stone as his glorious muse, Yorgos Lanthimos can be self-indulgent, self-satisfied and grindingly obtuse, but damn he is also a true visionary.

Half hot romance, half gory action, this big screen take on the Japanese anime TV series is not a blockbuster for nothing.

Two people talking in a car. Hardly the stuff of white-knuckle drama, right? It is when you hitch two phenomenal actors, Rosamund Pike and Matthew Rhys, to a suspenseful script and tightly coiled direction by Babak Anvari, and then stand back and let them rip.

Amanda Peet fans rejoice! This tale of broken connections returns this acting sorceress to films, after 10 years, playing an aging star out to restart her career and her love life. She’s funny and fierce in all the right places.

Even when her movie spins and lurches, the sensational Tessa Thompson blows the dust off a classic Ibsen play to find its queer defiant heart

This shamelessly silly crowd-pleaser has an extra 'Nick' and a double comic dose of Vince Vaughn and a knack for springing surprises that you don’t see coming.

Linda is a beast of a role and Rose Byrne plays her with everything’s she’s got and then some. No list of the year’s great performances would be complete without this tour de force.

In a fresh film take on Amiri Baraka’s 1964 race play, Kate Mara’s sexed-up subway rider hits on André Holland like a white Eve out to destroy a Black Adam through assimilation, intimidation, and worse. You can’t watch it passively. It dares you to engage.

Even when the sequel loses momentum, and it does like to repeat itself, Meryl Streep, Anne Hathaway, Emily Blunt and Stanley Tucci are comic virtuosos not to be resisted. That’s all.

The stellar Adam Scott stars in an Irish horrorfest from Damien McCarthy, a visionary new talent who really knows how to scare the hell out of and into you.

After a one-year intermission, “For Good,” makes its debut as a darker, gloomier, frustratingly less dazzling take on the “Wicked” IP. Should you still see it? Damn straight. Despite its stumbles, the final half of this witchy brew soars on the musical wings of Cynthia Erivo and Ariana Grande who are twice as wonderful the second time around.

Lucy Liu deglams with a vengeance to give the performance of her life in a shocking true story of a mother-son relationship that goes tragically off the rails.

Elle Fanning does the monster mash and brings audiences back to theaters in droves by lacing the action with laughs

There’s a timely message in this animated beauty about a time-traveling 10-year-old boy who dreams of the dinosaur era but lands in 2075 instead.

Uneven in tone and pacing, Guillermo del Toro’s passion project about a monster and his creator still roars to life as a thing of beauty and terror.

Looking for fun and a chance to scream bloody murder, then send for this terrific horror comedy in which Rachel McAdams crash lands on a desert island with her bullying boss (Dylan O’Brien) and decides to painfully alter his jerk DNA. Despite a divisive ending, I smell a hit.

A sexy tennis bum (Sam Riley) and a married woman (Stacy Martin) meet at a luxury resort and stir up murderous thoughts in a too cryptic thriller from German director Jan-Ole Gerster that recalls Hitchcock and Antonioni while revealing a tormented mind of its own.

This lean, mean, R-rated action machine is way better than you might think since Momoa and Bautista take the time, between fights and jokes, to examine the bruised places in the hearts of these half brothers. You feel for them, and that makes all the difference.

John Magaro is touching and vital in a wrenching family drama that speaks to what’s broken about family in America.

You’ll be thinking about this scary, savvy fright fest long after you wake up screaming.

Stodgy? Maybe. But the sincerity of this old-fashioned crowdpleaser starring Ralph Fiennes as wartime choirmaster is a refreshing alternative to the glut of computer-generated junk that crowds our movie houses.

Alternately terrific and tepid, Bill Condon’s swirl of song, dance and Technicolor keeps the musical alive on screen with the help of Jennifer Lopez, a star who can hold the camera and bend it to her will.

Zendaya and Robert Pattinson bring a bracing charge to the premise of turning a romcom about wedding jitters into a deep-dish think piece about the limits of condoning violence, real or imagined. The ending doesn’t work, but oh the drama!

Scream queen Samara Weaving is back in this horror comedy as a bride who takes her vow of “till death do us part” way too seriously. There’s more of everything this time, except for the irreplaceable shock of the new.

Glen Powell runs for his life to win a reality TV jackpot in a remake of a dystopian Stephen King thriller that comes on like gangbusters—until it loses steam.

It’s the Mattfleck starshine, plus the indisputable action bonafides of director Joe Carnahan, that sell this cop thriller when formula threatens to overtake it.

Jodie Foster speaks French with elan, but even her indisputable star power and fun bond with costar Daniel Auteuil can’t keep the lights burning in this frothy bauble.

A charming Elizabeth Olsen must choose between two men in the afterlife. The trouble with this often-beguiling romp is that it takes an eternity to wrap up. Too bad no one ever learns how to quit while they’re ahead.

There’s not a twist you can’t see coming, but thanks to Kiefer Sutherland and a cast of up-for-anything actors, this trifle goes down easy and leaves a smile on your face for the holidays that might just last all season long.

Anne Hathaway and Michaela Coel are dynamite in a pop rock opera from director David Lowery that wins points for visuals and suffers from a terminal case of grandiosity

What to do when a great actor is stuck in a not-so-great movie? You bite the bullet and watch anyway for Russell Crowe at his cunning, commanding best as Hermann Göring, a Nazi whose soft-pedaled narcissism gives him gobs of unearned confidence. Enough to fool his shrink (Rami Malek) and the tribunal judges at Nuremberg? That’s the idea.

Before it reverts to moldy zombie tropes, this low-budget, no-frills survival thriller puts a fresh spin on the familiar thanks to Daisy Ridley as a human living among the walking dead.

Cillian Murphy’s gangster icon Tommy Shelby makes his big-screen debut in a standalone film that can’t stand up against the great series that spawned it. For all its entertaining fan service, it’s an unnecessary coda to an unforgettable TV classic.

What was once riveting now feels rote. What once made us want more of the same now makes us eager for the shock of the new.

Margot Robbie and Jacob Eloridi get steamy in Emerald Fennell’s overheated but undercooked take on Emily Brontë’s classic Gothic romance in which they suck each other’s faces with a wild, porny abandon that would shock Victorians. No complaints here.

This hoop dreams animation romp from producer Steph Curry isn’t NBA quality, but it gets the job done for family fun. The inclusivity messaging abut teamwork is laid on thick, but still worthwhile for immature audiences of all ages.

Until predictability seeps in from the edges, first-time director James McEvoy offers an invitation to a rap party that’s hard to resist as two Scottish MCs fake their way to the hip-hop top as Americans.

Even when the laughs evaporate in the final stretch, Gaten Matarazzo and Sean Giambrone know how to breathe comic life into a stoner buddy comedy that’s high on its own shitfaced supply.

Channing Tatum and Kirsten Dunst find the heart but not the soul in a true-life crime drama that should have cut deeper and hurt more.

In this slow but touching biopic, Claire Foy excels as an academic who buries her grief about her father’s death by caring for a predator goshawk, so both can relearn to fly.

Brendan Fraser excels as a failed American actor adrift in Japan. Is his film a shameless soap opera or a far flintier look at human frailty? It’s more like both.

Maika Monroe brings battered heart and soul to a Colleen Hoover soap opera that renders “big” emotions with the small details that make them count.

In this sadly stunted comic thriller, a delightfully depraved Glen Powell must kill seven of his family members to inherit $28 billion. Would you? By the end, the film’s lockstep quality commits the worst crime of all by killing our interest.

See this romcom for the soft side of Kevin James as a jilted groom in Roma and Italian scenery that’s gorgeous in any language. That’s the only way to come out ahead.

This animated tale of a grumpy fish is as bland as blueberries, yet some wonder if sad Mr. Fish can inspire suicidal thoughts. Nah. Positive messaging swims will all these fishes.

It sounds pretty cheesy and sometimes it’s a whole cheese wheel, but Hugh Jackman and especially Kate Hudson sing and act their hearts out.

If you need to spot the narcissist lurking behind a friend or lover, this Maria Tomei bonbon may be just instructional romcom you’re looking for. Or maybe not.

There’s good reason to throw stones at Luca Gaudagnino’s teasing provocation about cancel culture. So have at its dawdling, blowhard, philosophical pretensions, but the film—riding on the power source that is Julia Roberts—stubbornly lingers in the memory.