Robert Daniels

While there’s plenty of large entertaining set pieces, Sheridan’s intriguing premise withers under its overabundant components.

f not for the uptempo rhythm, The Water Man’s thin plotting would make it a slog. If not for Oyelowo’s handsomely mounted camera capturing the forest in supernatural blues and reds, the audience’s attention might wander to their phones. Thankfully, the well-executed components support the fairy tale when the tale itself runs short.

Lewis’ In Our Mothers' Gardens requires time to find its footing, but the documentary ultimately offers a salute to the generationally important women who fought to give their families a more fruitful future.

Though the delightful ensemble allows this slight comedy to bob along, it’s Henry who steers this ship into gentle waters. He imbues Charles’ substantial reawakening with great tenderness.

While Sollima tries to rekindle Clancy’s 1990s magic, Without Remorse is rendered as unmemorable schlock due to his inability to map the author’s familiar espionage themes onto a new protagonist with very different story requirements.

With a colorful blend of biting absurdity and copious dad jokes to offset the commonplace narrative, Rianda and Rowe optimize their dysfunctional family road trip for high-functioning enjoyment.

By the grace of a talented cast, especially the reliable Helms and the revelatory Harrison, Together Together is a sweet, albeit incomplete search for companionship in the unlikeliest of places.

Stowaway is shrewd in its decision-making and even better in its execution.

Laboriously paced, the indulgent jolts and bloodless scares, neither deeply rooted nor artfully raised, float as lifelessly as a lily pad on a bog.

With visual precision and remarkable intimacy, Hannah Olson's documentary The Last Cruise recalls the harrowing 40-day quarantine aboard the Princess Diamond cruise ship at the outset of the pandemic.

Martin and Lindsay’s Tina all too often struggles to show Turner as a three-dimensional person — her wants, her beliefs, her passions — in lieu of her being a product of the abuse she withstood from Ike. As a tribute, it’s a disappointing slog for an always-vibrant legend.

Nobody gathers from the familiar blood-soaked stream of “John Wick,” “Death Wish” and the “Taken” franchise to fashion a savage ode featuring the same mettle of its inspirations but with far greater humor attached to the well-worn beats.

Kali and Molina’s I’m Fine (Thanks for Asking) frustratingly struggles to find its way, but when it does, this story of houselessness, grief, and motherhood blossoms like a sunflower in a rich field of pathos. And offers a very brief balm to these heady times.

These young performers are always true to themselves. Honest and bare without inhibitions. Which is fitting for a movie that’s about rebuilding oneself and one’s connections to the world by telling yourself that the pain is okay. The hurt is real. And the love we give never dies. Park’s The Fallout is a resilient character study of grief in all its forms.

In its quest for entertainment value, this documentary loses sight of the actual grief and hurt a devastated son would feel.

Michelle Ford’s Test Pattern, with patient specificity, probes the institutional injustices suffered by black women to potent, provoking effect.

Murphy’s charm, his close chemistry with Hall, Snipes’ wily performance, and the resplendent costumes uplift this nostalgia trip.

For all the enchanting elements, the kooky lovable sidekicks, and spirited voice performances from Awkwafina and Tran — the warmth shaking the ash from this well-worn story is the gift of family. The family we are born with. The family we make. The Southeast Asian-inspired “Raya and the Last Dragon” conjures some much-needed magic for a modicum of fun.

There’s a great film waiting to be made about the opioid crisis. But much like “Hillbilly Elegy,” “Cherry” can’t conjure up the cause and the toll of the devastation without relying on pastiche. Even the ending, meant to be a moment of healing, reduces Cherry’s concluding journey to a mere saccharine montage.

The entire ensemble rolls with the fast punches. And Crosby and Knapp show real comedic potential. But First Date takes too many big bites without the ability to digest any of its gummy sweets. Crosby and Knapp’s First Date, an at-times hilarious California pleasure trip, dissolves under the weight of its self-evident ambition.

With an incredible ensemble and an elegant eye, Hall’s Passing is a high-wire act of a debut that tackles its several thorny issues with nary a scratch.

King comes so close to rendering Hampton’s life and legacy anew for a younger generation. But for all of the film’s eloquent crafts and the audacious performances from a deep ensemble, which includes an under-sung Dominique Thorne as Black Panther member Judy Harmon, Judas And The Black Messiah doesn’t fully encapsulate either its Judas or its messiah.

A good movie exists in On the Count of Three. But a film with such challenging subject matter needed a more experienced director capable of shading the dark comedy and the heartfelt spirit with an assured visual hand.

Hancock, in what might be his best film, grazes with greatness by constructing an enthralling thriller that relies on the talent of its three leading men to mine regret for mystery. But the mawkish little habits, the slow start, and the timid finale just barely get Hancock caught. It’s the little things that tear The Little Things apart.

Sam Levinson’s Malcolm & Marie is a purposely self-absorbed meta-narrative about a navel-gazing director at odds with his muse—an enticing premise on paper—that too often obscures its heart in lieu of tedious diatribes.

Grainy establishing shots of the skirmish offer little visual information other than its location on an expressway. Without viewers knowing where, and at whom, the soldiers are firing, the onscreen action is rendered indecipherable. Mackie’s quirky performance — Leo ends every order to Harp with an uncomfortable smile — is likewise baffling.

With Night of the Kings Lacôte collapses the bounds between eras, and dissolves myth and reality, performance and remembrance, into one whole. It’s an assured, energetic piece of epic filmmaking, one that celebrates how storytelling, oration, and folklore teach us about our past so we might change our present.

Chemistry wise, Miller and Luna work wonders together. Miller’s intense dynamic range: from impassioned to ebullient and afraid, plays well off of Luna’s boyish charm. They imbue these characters with troves of insecurities and mountains of love.