Stands out for its earnest effort to entertain without commenting on itself or the modern world.

In the end, “Sonic” is quippy without being mean, and sweet without being sappy, making this a trip that’s well worth taking.

It isn’t great. It’s a watered-down version of the original, but it’s still pretty good: neither wise nor profound, yet sometimes smart and with sharp elbows — especially if you have nothing with which to compare it.

What She Said pays fitting homage, not just to a great writer but to a vanished age.

True to its title, Portrait of a Lady on Fire generates more than its share of heat, even if it never truly becomes an engulfing flame.

The first story “Giraffes” tells is one of endangered animals. The second — and equally powerful one — is a narrative of not just one woman’s struggle to be taken seriously, but the struggle of all women to do so.

Set over the course of a single, very long day, The Assistant derives almost all its quiet power from Garner, on whose face we see confusion congealing into concern.

If The Traitor proves anything, it’s that an 80-year-old filmmaker can still pounce.

The Rhythm Section was directed by Reed Morano, who did a nice job with the first few episodes of “The Handmaid’s Tale,” but who seems a bit self-indulgent here.

"Created Equal” doesn’t offer many insights, at least not in a deeply satisfying way, as to how and why he has changed.

As untidy and un-profound as “Color” may be, Stanley swings for the fences, when almost any other director-in-exile would have tried to get back in Hollywood’s good graces with an act of penance. Score one for the eccentrics of the world.

Heroism, however real, doesn’t, by definition, make The Last Full Measure a great movie. Juicing up a fine story, and then hammering away at its point makes it one that doesn’t appear to trust either its source material or its audience.

A funny, violent, rambunctious shaggy-dog story of a crime caper featuring an ensemble cast studded with colorful characters played by name actors. In other words, it’s more “Snatch” than “Aladdin,” which was only the latest of Ritchie’s misbegotten attempts to achieve mainstream respect by retelling someone else’s stories.

The good-natured tension and ribbing between the two old “boys” is still there — and still a bit old hat — but there is a new dynamic that juices the entertainment factor.

Ultimately Dolittle is not just a weak story, badly told, but a puzzling waste of talent.

With Les Misérables, Ly delivers a passionate protest on behalf of an entire generation, whose future has largely been foreclosed. His, on the other hand, is astonishingly bright.

At 46, Shinkai still has plenty of time to convince us of his gifts. Weathering With You may not reach the heights of “Your Name,” but it still achieves something impressive: It tells a story that, without sugarcoating the environmental challenges that lie ahead, manages to end on a hopeful note.

Like a Boss is the perfect airplane movie: something that won’t distract you terribly much while you work the New York Times crossword puzzle during a long flight, periodically looking up at the screen when the 2-year-old in the seat behind you kicks the back of your chair. Oh well. At least that way you won’t fall asleep.

Clemency, which won the Grand Jury Prize at Sundance, isn’t really a death row drama in the same way that “Just Mercy” is. Rather, it’s a character study of a witness who, vicariously, is a stand-in for each of us.

In the judicious hands of director and co-writer Destin Daniel Cretton, it feels not new exactly, but fresh and urgent and more timely than ever.

The progression of the story is steadily downward, and at times the style flirts with melodrama, the mood with moroseness. But in the film’s third act, masterfully staged by filmmaker Karim Aïnouz (who co-wrote the screen adaptation with Inez Bortagaray and Murilo Hauser), it takes a giant leap, both temporally and emotionally.

When it comes to exploring the man behind the art, the film’s execution feels out of step with its ambition.

In the end this “Song” — whose payoff may leave you thinking, “Are you kidding me?” — doesn’t so much crescendo as collapse in on itself, an orchestral work that peters out in a trickle of silly, sour notes.

A Hidden Life is indisputably the finest work Malick has produced in eight years, as an examination of faith, conviction and sacrifice, but also as proof of concept for his own idiosyncratic style. It marks an exhilarating return to form but also, more crucially, content.

Sandler is so good, so committed and so watchable that, despite everything — Howard’s irrationality, a rogue’s gallery of unpleasant characters, the foreboding of a bad, bad end — you can’t take your eyes off the screen, which Sandler seldom vacates.

None of this is by way of saying that Cats is bad, per se. In fact, some of the songs are pretty toe-tapping at times.

In Gerwig’s capable hands, though, even the most familiar contours of Little Women feel new, not because she has the temerity to redefine Alcott’s masterpiece, but because she subtly reframes it.

Everybody wants a happy ending. But that doesn’t mean that we should always get the one we want. It’s fine, if also cliche, to be reminded that good will triumph over evil. But it would make for a deeper and more powerful lesson — one that, after nine movies, might leave a lasting dent in the heart — if the hero actually had to give up something, or someone, that didn’t feel like a tiniest bit of a cop-out.

The humor includes enough slapstick and gross-out gags to keep the kids entertained, but there are clever callbacks and meta-jokes for older audiences to chuckle at as well.

For its part, Bombshell tells a crucial chapter of that larger tale with coolheaded style and heated indignation. Its aim might be narrow, but it hits the target.

1917 is impressive but oddly distancing; ultimately stirring but too often gimmicky.

This is one of the most exciting breakout films of the year, introducing Attanasio as a vibrant new voice in American cinema. More, please.

There’s fun to be had revisiting the cleverly conceived world of the 2017 “Jungle,” in which teenagers found themselves magically transported inside a video game. But even with a new mission, some upgrades and a lot of character swapping, we’re still playing the same game over again.

The Kingmaker chills the soul by presenting shantytown residents and school kids who extol the Marcos regime and even endorse its eight-year period of martial law.

Binge-watching the first eight installments before you settle into this one isn’t strictly necessary, but I wouldn’t discourage it, either. They’re that good.

Hauser, as Richard, is absolutely superb: nebbishy, so solicitous of authority that he barely bothers to defend himself and seeming, at times, slightly dimwitted. As Watson, Rockwell often steals the spotlight, playing his client’s most ardent defender and, when called for, his most dismayed life coach, as Richard naively finds himself playing into the hands of his enemies again and again.

The title of When Lambs Become Lions could refer to any of its subjects: One way or another, everyone involved is endangered and fighting for survival.

This lively, intriguing and insistently humanistic flight of fancy — imagined conversations between hard-line conservative Pope Benedict XVI and his more progressive successor, Pope Francis — brims with wit, warmth and some tantalizing what-ifs. Whether the fact that it’s mostly pure speculation will get in the way of the audience’s enjoyment will depend on each viewer’s threshold for artistic license.

If Little Joe’s message is never less than apparent, it avoids hitting you over the head with it. It’s a movie that grows on you, planting a seed that only comes to flower long after the closing credits.

The Aeronauts is the second film this year by Harper to get a U.S. release, after “Wild Rose.” That film was excellent, with strong music and an effervescent star turn from newcomer Jessie Buckley. This one is, at moments, exhilarating — but not much else.

Dark Waters is an effective outrage machine: If you like “Erin Brockovich,” you’ll probably like this too.

Most gratifying — if also gruesome — are the many examples of Battaglia’s powerful photographs of Mafia victims. Although black-and-white, they are deeply disturbing, and it is easy to imagine that Battaglia found the work difficult. Imagination is necessary, because Battaglia herself doesn’t provide the deep introspection you might expect.

Even if you’re not familiar with the source material, this Chinese production provides plenty of supernatural thrills for the modern young adult.

The fun here — and there is a lot of it — is to be had simply in allowing an ensemble of game, generous-spirited actors to give their all in service to the fine art of misdirection and mayhem.

At its best, Queen & Slim isn’t just a crime drama but a nuanced portrayal of family, legacy and self-preservation — how they’re distorted by trauma and history, and how they thrive despite the near-constant threat of annihilation.

In an era that seems fatally mired in fear, anger and mistrust, A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood arrives as something more than a movie. It feels like an answered prayer.

The sequel to the 2013 animated blockbuster is much better than, say, “Pocahontas II: Journey to a New World.” But Frozen II is still a disappointing continuation of the story of Queen Elsa and Princess Anna of Arendelle.

Waves is as exhilarating and terrifying as the roller-coaster ride of adolescence itself, plunging viewers into a world brimming with music and color and movement and hair-trigger reflexes that feels exterior and interior at the same time.

21 Bridges will win no prizes for originality or twists. (It won’t win any prizes for anything, to be honest.) But it’s made well enough. Brothers Joe and Anthony Russo (“Avengers: Endgame”) are the producers, and Irish director Brian Kirk (“Games of Thrones”) knows how to keep an old jalopy like this well-oiled to get us across the finish line.

What makes Synonyms so compelling is how it explores the theme of identity through a lens of searing self-reflection.

A fun, engaging story that’s more about obsessive drive than actual driving.

Stewart’s unexpected casting here, in a frothy action comedy, injects the movie with a shot of much-needed unpredictability. Of all the Angels, she works the hardest, ensuring that the movie isn’t forgettable.

Somehow Baumbach manages to find a nugget of humor at even the most painful points.

A silly breeze of a movie starring two of Britain’s finest actors, each having a blast playing cat-and-mouse with the other.

Well, surprise: Honey Boy, Shia LaBeouf’s startlingly forthright, cathartic and beautifully acted movie based on his confusing and chaotic life as a child actor, winds up demonstrating what can go right, when the right elements are in place.

All of these make for engrossing, if hardly untold, tales. But what gives the lurid, titillating — and even, at times, fun — aspects of “Scandalous” a more sober edge are the journalistic implications, best articulated by former Washington Post reporter Bernstein, who calls the Enquirer’s frontal assault on truth and integrity “as corrupt as you can be.”

The story of an insurgent Indian woman certainly seems timely in 2019. Too bad the new account of her uprising, The Warrior Queen of Jhansi, is as stodgy as a movie from 1958, if not earlier.

This may be the world’s first movie micro-targeted to several thousand of the people who live and/or work in Washington, and no one else.

It is also very much a Mike Flanagan film, for better and for worse. Part homage to Kubrick’s moody atmospherics, and part hyper-literal superhero story, Doctor Sleep is stylish, engrossing, at times frustratingly illogical and, ultimately less than profoundly unsettling.

Last Christmas labors to turn the genre on its head and say more than your typical feel-good holiday flick. Somehow, Kate and Tom’s story still finds a way to play out in painfully predictable fashion.

For Sama is a before-and-after portrait, both literally and figuratively. What begins as a brash, bold, giddily optimistic love story devolves into something far darker, as viewers begin to question why al-Khateab is willing to endanger her child in the name of doomed principles.

In ways both large and small, Midway may be the most realistic war movie you’ve ever seen, as those involved in the production of this World War II action film, including Naval historians, have touted it to be. That’s not to say it’s as real as “Saving Private Ryan.”

The Irishman is a feast for the ages, a groaning board of exquisitely photographed scenes, iconic performances and tender nods toward old age that leave viewers in a mood more wistful than keyed-up.

With horrific wildfires scorching California, the timing of this firefighter comedy also seems off. It might inspire empathy, if only it were actually funny.

Sarah Connor may have averted one dark version of the future, but another even darker destiny may be inevitable. Even so, the film suggests, hope — just like the hearts of people who buy tickets to sequels — springs eternal. In this case, it is not misplaced.

Peppered with tense action sequences and propelled by a characteristically gorgeous musical score by Terence Blanchard, Harriet is the kind of instructional, no-nonsense biopic that may not take many artistic risks or sophisticated stylistic departures but manages to benefit from that lack of pretension.

Norton, who wrote and directed Motherless Brooklyn, does his best to imitate the genre’s snappy dialogue and clever red herrings; but what starts out as a mystery as intelligent as it is intriguing winds up being over-plotted didactic.

Gift doesn’t really get into such unpleasant details as financing, and that’s okay. The idea that culture has a value beyond cash — that both sides of the equation, both the getters and the givers, are enriched by something that doesn’t have a price tag, or at least not an obvious one — is a beautiful thought.

Thanks to a superb cast and a welcome strain of comedic energy, Frankie turns out to be more than a pretty travelogue with melodrama.

The action is sufficiently gripping, even if the drama plays out along predictably violent lines.

Fayyad — who directed a team of cinematographers remotely when he was prevented from entering Ghouta himself — films The Cave with a grace and compositional sensitivity all the more impressive for being achieved under the most difficult circumstances.

In this case, director David Michôd — working from a script he co-wrote with actor Joel Edgerton — doesn’t make the material distinctive or provocative enough to merit a second, far more dramatically inert go-round.

Set to an anachronistic pop soundtrack and an eye-poppingly attractive production design that would be right at home in a Wes Anderson movie, this is a film that dares you not to enjoy its material pleasures, even as you wonder if you should be laughing quite so hard at the jokes.

The main problem, despite committed and at times vivid performances by the three main actors — and a mostly perfunctory supporting appearance by Tom Holland as Edison’s loyal assistant Samuel Insull — is the sheer amount of information that the movie tries to convey.

Ozon has said the American drama “Spotlight” inspired his sober, methodical approach. The similarities between the two films are obvious, but there’s a crucial difference: While the 2015 Oscar-winner focused on investigative journalists, By the Grace of God is primarily concerned with the victims.

Swaggers across the landscape like a cinematic epic, but it’s basically a concert flick, with some extras. And those extras are not the best things in it.

There’s a repetitive — but not necessarily redundant — quality to Zombieland: Double Tap, a violent, funny and satisfying sequel to the 2009 cult hit zombie comedy.

What unfolds is a perverse odd-couple tale, flooded with ornate dialogue, surreal storytelling and nightmarish imagery.

Think twice about taking very young children — or even some susceptible adults — to this at-times shocking, if less than graphic, gloom-and-doom fest. But the worse sin is: It’s boring.

A timely, essential film.

With Parasite, Bong’s finest work to date, the 50-year-old director clearly articulates a throughline that has been present in all his previous work: there’s no war but the class war.

Nothing about El Camino makes a case that we are necessarily better off with it than without it, or that some great hole has now been filled. It turns out we were fine with the idea of not knowing exactly what happened to Jesse; that way, we could always hope the best. Now that we know, dare we ask for a little more? Or leave it be?

As inventive as The Laundromat is as an information vector, though, its semi-ironic tone is at odds with the content at hand: This is a movie that often feels like it’s fighting itself, asking viewers to be charmed by Oldman and Banderas’s characters one moment, and — maybe? — outraged the next.

The script screams of a thinly written, ’90s-era narrative reanimated for audiences who now expect more depth from their action movies. The final product is less a technical marvel than an ambitious experiment gone wrong.

Like “Once Upon a Time in Hollywood,” this is a movie rooted in the scruffy but golden days of the 1970s, populated by strivers and schemers and would-be stars whose breakthrough is as much a function of willpower as raw talent.

As a portrait, Pain and Glory is less a mirror than an impressionistic painting. It’s an emotional rendering of a person, not a literal one.

It is the story itself that never achieves liftoff.

This is a “just see it” movie, as in: Forget flowery language, redundant synopsis, clever paraphrasing or hyperbolic praise. Just see the dang thing.

The truth is, it’s just a movie — a fine movie, not a great movie, a movie that will please the specific subculture of fans it aims to service, while those who have survived this long without caring about comic-book movies can go on not caring.

First Love isn’t art, by any means, but it’s way more entertaining than it should be. One brief sequence, involving an airborne car, was probably too crazy — not to mention too expensive — to actually film, so Miike renders it as animation.

It’s both a success and a shortcoming of Britt-Marie Was Here that the flashbacks to her younger years, and the discovery of what happened to her more free-spirited sister, represent the film at its fullest emotional capacity.

The animated film takes a standard story and adds so much visual beauty that it exceeds expectations.

The result is a relatively straightforward slice-of-life biopic, bogged down with flashbacks and backstage histrionics, that nonetheless offers an utterly transfixing glimpse at the art of screen performance writ gloriously, glamorously large.

Newcomb is especially good and poignant, but Abbott also brings a pitiful emotional honesty to a repugnant character.

“Moonlight” is actually not about one thing, but many, and Brodsky threads her themes together nicely. The film also charts Paul Taylor’s incipient dementia, a development that “Moonlight” weaves into its other story lines by noting, poetically, that our mistakes — the metaphorical, and inevitable, false notes we play in life — can become, as Brodsky puts it, “our music.”

Through the lens of the eminence sleaze at its center, Where’s My Roy Cohn? offers as cogent a primer as any on how we got here. Meanwhile, somewhere down there, Roy Cohn is having the last, bitter laugh.

The empowerment trajectory of Ms. Purple, whose title may refer both to the color of two dresses worn by its protagonist and to the hue of hard-won bruises she sports by the end of the film, will surprise no one.

A brilliant film has been made about the spectacularly corrupt administration of Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi. It’s called “Videocracy” and it’s available on a streaming service near you. Loro, on the other hand, is a much more mixed bag.