Lindsey Bahr

Although it might be a stretch to categorize this as a movie, A Dog’s Way Home is harmless enough and a nice little adventure that’s fit for the whole family. But you might want to have the tissues ready.

The filmmakers haven’t gone so far as to put you in the game, too. A lot of it is watching all the characters find keys and have their own revelations, so by the time you get to the fifth room, it’s understandable if interest is starting to wane a bit even with the addition of a link between the six people.

It is simply terrific — an understated but smartly told crowd-pleaser about the legendary comedy duo in their last act, with wonderful production value, a sharp and surprisingly poignant script and brilliant performances from John C. Reilly, as Oliver Hardy, and Steve Coogan, as Stan Laurel.

Brooklyn is a story for anyone who has ever left home. It’s a story for those who’ve waffled in indecision, for those forming their identities and forging their own paths. It’s a story awash in muted pastel nostalgia about family and love and ambition and heritage and goodbyes. And it’s one of the loveliest films to grace cinemas this year.

This is a complex man and artist worthy of a complex story, not a would-be-feel-good farce.

“Moonlight” is a hard act to follow, and while Beale Street might not quite reach the heights of Jenkins’ instant classic of a best picture-winner, it is its own kind of marvel, lovely, transcendent, heartbreaking and as smooth as its jazzy soundtrack.

A slow but captivating burn that may leave you questioning your own hard-set ideas of right, wrong and family.

The film, for all its prestige and edginess, its lofty goals and contemporary messages, is not a particularly engrossing experience.

Cuaron is content to take his time with Roma, allowing the camera to linger on his subjects and the frustrating banalities of ordinary, everyday life that sneak up on you with poetic significance as the film goes on

If there is a big studio movie that’s more generally crowd-pleasing than Green Book this season, I have yet to find it.

McQueen builds tension masterfully throughout, although is so sprawling that at times you’re left wondering whether this might have been better told as a limited television series. Then again, is it worth complaining about relative brevity when done this well?

This is the first Hollywood film from South African director Donovan Marsh, and he does cook up some captivating action set pieces...which may have you laughing, rolling your eyes or even cheering (as a fair amount of people were in my screening), but it’s never boring.

Even though it might be difficult to watch at times, it’s done with such evident love and sensitivity that it’s hard to imagine a human being not connecting in some way, and perhaps even learning something along the way.

Wildlife isn’t just a great first film, it’s a great film.

A film like this, as authentic and raw as it is, should probably leave audiences in a puddle and not exiting the theater wondering why they’re not.

For as naturalistic and real as The Hate U Give is, it goes off the rails just a little bit at the climax to make its grand point about the effect of this kind of climate on innocents, but there is too much heart here to really nitpick at a little hyperbole.

A Star Is Born, is simply terrific — a big-scale cinematic delight that will have the masses singing, swooning and sobbing along with it.

The Sisters Brothers takes a bit of getting used to at the start, but the rewards are worth it.

Nothing much in Life Itself feels like life itself. It is too polished, too winking, too big and too much to be all that relatable, even with a cast as appealing as this.

You can see why Hold the Dark might have made a compelling book, but the film is one grim and pitiless journey.

Peppermint is not some model of equality, it’s just violent escapism that happens to have a woman in the lead role. And, frankly, as long as this genre continues to entertain audiences, Garner is a compelling a lead as any, and more so than quite a few of the men who get so many parts like this. But maybe, just maybe, next time consider a woman or two behind the camera (and script) as well.

All in all, it’s just a little underdeveloped. Perhaps in novel form its polite pace and subtle revelations made a certain amount of sense, but the movie is lacking.

For a movie so excited to tell a story about the CIA’s “most highly-prized and least understood unit,” it sure doesn’t do much to ensure you leave any more informed than you were when you sat down.

A sumptuous-looking but slow-moving prison drama that at times will have you dreaming about an escape of your own.

The film buzzes along with introspective conversations, all-too human moments, a terrific soundtrack with everyone from Marianne Faithfull to The Pretenders, and a few delightfully awkward scenes that really drive home the whole “don’t meet your idols” conceit.

It is an exhilarating, distressing, funny and profound film, with one of the more memorable film scores in years, from composer Terence Blanchard.

The story is not only derivative of so many other dystopias and kids with power sagas, but, and perhaps worst of all, it never even really gets going — a clear and infuriating set up for some future installment.

Perhaps the most surprising thing about this whole sequined bell-bottomed experience is you might even find yourself getting a little emotional. But not too much, this is vacation after all.