Movie after movie, hero after hero – waiting for Marvel Studios to misfire and derail its blockbuster empire is a fool’s errand, and “Captain Marvel” is just the latest to disappoint the superhero movie Nostradami of the world.

Nobody quite knows what Steven Soderbergh is doing, but his projects sure are interesting. “High Flying Bird,” shot speedily on an iPhone and released on Netflix, is a dialogue-forward fast-talking business movie set during a pro-basketball lockout. In other words, it’s in its own category of “sports movie.”

As indicated by the Oscars, 2018 was a year that celebrated popular films, and while I liked a lot of those movies and some of them make this list, I was equally if not more impressed by independent films and less-heralded filmmakers.

Typically, you’re either the person who perks up at a trailer for an English period piece or has learned to completely tune out dress-up dramas. “The Favourite” will ruin expectations for both audiences with its playful and wry demeanor yet consummate production values and performances.

It’s unfortunate that not every film or TV show involving close, interpersonal relationships has a Tamara Jenkins in its writing room. Although she’s only made two films in the last 12 years, Jenkins demonstrates an exceptional talent for creating honest drama around ordinary, conceivable hardships.

An Oscars without a host seems fitting for one of the toughest years of Oscar prognosticating in a long while. Among all the various indicators used to determine how the big night will go, which includes critics groups and pre-Oscar award shows, there is a good amount of disagreement, especially in categories not covered in […]

Films rarely capture real life, relatable moments, let alone with any kind of regularity, but Tamara Jenkins’ “The Savages” does it.

Even if this particular pet project for Drew Goddard won’t leave viewers buzzing in quite the same way as some of his previous accomplishments, he delivers another astute example of mystery-building and storytelling that immediately pulls you in.

“Widows” doesn’t feel like the film you follow up Best Picture winner “12 Years a Slave” with, but thriller genre fans will graciously accept the talents of Steve McQueen anyway. In tandem with “Gone Girl” author and screenwriter Gillian Flynn, McQueen delivers a crooked Chicago crime story with fully-formed characters, noteworthy performances and lots of powerful visual drama.

Since the 1960s, America has glorified space travel, and for better or worse, Hollywood has been implicit this glamorization. In “First Man,” director Damien Chazelle ironically tries to bring the moon mission story down to earth, making a film about the bold, pensive and unassuming man who became an American hero, whose journey to the lunar surface was anything but glamorous.

Queen, and especially its lead singer Freddie Mercury, is the stuff of rock ’n roll legend. More so than peel back the curtain on that legend, “Bohemian Rhapsody” perpetuates it, celebrating the band’s incredible, genre-defying music and most of all its flamboyant and inimitable frontman.

Whether it leaves you cold or comforted, “Roma” possesses unmistakable artistry of the highest order, cementing Cuarón as one of today’s absolute best.

Considering Sony Pictures was unable to relaunch the universally beloved character of Spider-Man without help from Marvel Studios, it was pretty audacious of them to try spinning off a “Spider-Man” villain into his own franchise.

Bing Lu’s “Minding the Gap” is more than a sleek skateboarding doc that dives into alternative culture; in fact, it might not even be that at all. What probably
began as an exercise in Lu turning the camera on himself and his friends blossomed into portrait of middle-American working-class life, specifically three young men who process hardship and deep emotional wounds best while on a
skateboard.

A lighthearted, music-driven comedy about friendship, self-love and boldly defying expectations, “Dumplin’” is the modern-day small-town Texas answer to the stage musical “Hairspray.” Somehow, however, it was conceived as a book and adapted into a film for purposes of streaming on personal devices despite its clear Broadway desires.