As the tapestry of the Marvel Cinematic Universe expands further and further, it has become increasingly difficult for individual films to carve out distinctive identities and Read More

The world of the first How to Train Your Dragon movie was exactly as fleshed-out as it needed to be to tell its simple story of Read More

Nobody expected The Lego Movie to be anything more than a feature-length toy commercial, so when Phil Lord and Christopher Miller’s 2014 animated film turned out Read More

The story of the early black metal scene in Norway is as much about violence and criminal activity as it is about music, and director and Read More

An aspiring serial killer meticulously plots his first premeditated murder, making detailed notes and plans for the killing and dismemberment of a prostitute, and yet when Read More

The 2011 French inspirational drama The Intouchables, based loosely on the real-life story of wealthy quadriplegic businessman Philippe Pozzo di Borgo and his caregiver, was an Read More

As a pair of dispassionate musicologists and a government official conduct American Idol-style auditions among peasants in 1949 Poland, the vibrant and slightly devious young singer Read More

Japanese filmmaker Hirokazu Kore-eda’s films often focus on the beauty of unexpected or unconventional families, and his latest, Shoplifters (which won the Palme d’Or, the top Read More

When Ryan Coogler’s Creed debuted in 2015, it had the advantage of not coming off as just another Rocky sequel or a cynical exercise in branding. Read More

Director and co-writer Sean Anders based Instant Family on his personal experiences of fostering and later adopting a group of siblings, but that doesn’t mean that Read More

The six segments in Joel and Ethan Coen’s omnibus feature The Ballad of Buster Scruggs are each introduced as stories from a dusty old book of Read More

The story of The Nutcracker seems like the kind of thing that Disney would have adapted decades ago, making the new The Nutcracker and the Four Read More

Dario Argento’s 1977 horror classic Suspiria is a masterpiece of atmosphere and color, but it doesn’t exactly, you know, make sense. In taking on a remake Read More

It’s a little hard to believe that there have been three Johnny English movies since the character debuted on the big screen in 2003, but Rowan Read More

Having original “final girl” Laurie Strode return to the Halloween franchise after decades away is not a new idea, although given the underwhelming way it turned Read More

The song in The Song of Sway Lake is an actual song, a custom composition for the Sway family that becomes the source of an intergenerational Read More

Maggie Gyllenhaal is great at making audiences uncomfortable. Even in her more sedate, straightforward roles, there’s often a sense of something off-kilter and unstable, and she’s Read More

As brutal and unyielding as the violence is in Jeremy Saulnier’s acclaimed movies Blue Ruin and Green Room, it’s generally contained and matter-of-fact, the product of Read More

It’s a shame that the Tim Burton of 25 years ago wasn’t able to travel forward in time to direct The House With a Clock in Read More

At first glance, Paul Feig doesn’t seem like the right choice to direct a stylish mystery thriller. But the man behind crowd-pleasing comedies including Bridesmaids, Spy Read More