The screenplay reflects actual effort, and Jim Carrey gets to be unfettered in his performance, leading a surprisingly satisfying follow-up.

Lunana: A Yak in the Classroom is more than what Ang Lee calls a “breath of fresh air”; it’s an affirmation that all films, however humble their origin, can matter and be counted.

Even if you’ve been longing for a more grounded, gritty car-chase movie since the “Fast” franchise left physics behind ages ago, Bay’s addiction to confusion and pointlessness as operating visual/narrative principles keeps even this shoulda-been auto-pocalypse from being in any way pleasurable.

The first hour or so of Mothering Sunday can be very enjoyable because Husson (“Girls of the Sun”) does not take what little narrative there is too seriously and instead dedicates herself to making O’Connor into the most attractive possible love object for her camera.

The movie’s secret sauce is humanity through action, what Watts’ Pam in all her heart, knowledge, grit, solitude, caring, irritation, and worry shows us when she’s in her element: what losing and finding looks like in real time.

With striking scares, moody atmosphere, and impressive performances, You Are Not My Mother gradually reveals itself to be a wicked, wicked work of horror, with perhaps only a few unanswered questions holding it back from true greatness.

True to its title, Baena’s latest takes us through more than a few tonal twists and plot turns, even if they don’t always land smoothly or humorously, in its exploration of how fooling oneself into believing a fantastical fiction can provide dangerous respite from a bland, ordinary reality.

It’s a difficult world out there, so once in a while it sure is nice to just sit down with the family to watch a wholesome movie about a wholesome man, his wholesome dog, and their tireless, never-ending hunt for human corpses.

Jane by Charlotte is a sensitive, pretty, reflective and artful piece that attains intriguing levels of intimacy and emotion alongside moments of banality.

The most frightening part of Umma is not the ghostly apparition of Amanda’s mother, but Amanda herself. Under Shim’s direction, Oh’s Amanda is haunted and taut, an unpredictable force of nature.

A joyless exercise in IP mining, Cheaper by the Dozen is all the more depressing for its glimpses of unfulfilled potential.

Deep Water offers so many tawdry delights along the way that its flaws aren’t dealbreakers. Affleck and de Armas might not have lasted as a couple off-camera, but as co-stars, they’re a potent combo.

“Until the Wheels Fall Off” works better as a humanistic exploration than it does as a biography, making its Hawk focus occasionally feel like a weakness.

Part unlikely friendship tale and part potpourri of genre tropes orchestrated as a parade of red herrings, this debut feature takes on modern culture’s blatant disdain of aging and veneration of youth. ... Greatly entertaining.

Full-hearted, albeit conventional ... That long first act feels, at times, punishing. ... The drama that plays out in the film’s second half is much more engaging, the script gaining momentum alongside Leslie.

Unlike the “memberberries” school of nostalgia that can reduce itself to “I had that lunch box!” Linklater gets granular and specific (and thus universal) about his memories and his perceptions of the world at that time.

"Massive Talent” goes full fan service–y, tapping into the cult of personality shrouding its lead actor. But the actual finished product feels too inside-baseball; it takes a true Cage aficionado to be in on all the jokes.

Like the anime series, Jujutsu Kaisen 0 sometimes feels too much like a Cliffs Notes adaptation, despite also featuring more interaction between the supporting characters and the lead protagonist than the original manga.

After the quick-witted and action-packed first act, the film switches gears into full romance-novel mode. Unfortunately, The Lost City never manages to sustain or recover once Pitt’s rousing cameo is over. It’s still pleasant, though it’s unlikely to satisfy those thirsting for action and adventure.

The Daniels are unusually present ringmasters here, eschewing the flippancy that marred their splashy quirk-quake “Swiss Army Man” for a more big-feeling anarchic escapism. In their nifty code-switching, we-all-contain-multitudes metaphor, they’ve concocted something that feels genuinely attuned to our modern anxieties, but also embracing of our coping mechanisms.

Song for Cesar manifests as the scrappy but meaningful results of people coming together to document a chapter of America’s recent past still not as visible as it should be.

It’s a film as cuddly as Meimei’s panda form, but it’s also a perceptive examination of how one person’s coming-of-age has a ripple effect on those closest to them.

Concurrently, as Maitland provides pockets of warmth and humanity in the legacies of a handful of letter-writers, he relays through archival footage and interviews the fallout for Brody himself when the sheer volume of outstretched hands and scrutinizing eyes became too much for him to handle.

The story is based on real events, which should make it even more gripping, but Abu-Assad and cinematographers Ehab Assal and Peter Flinckenberg draw the rope so tightly around the leads that the suffocating atmosphere reads almost like a filmed play. Fortunately, Abu-Assad does have two excellent collaborators in Awad and Elhadi.

The conclusion of Great Freedom manages to finesse the flaws of the movie, and it winds up feeling genuinely tragic.

With Pattinson glowering beneath his cowl, Reeves creates a Batman whose psychology is at least as interesting as his crime-fighting activities, for the first time in a long time.

Whether playing off his returning company of co-stars or swapping barbs with fellow drag comic O’Carroll, Perry’s giving one of his best self-directed performances.