The quiet indie drama “Columbus” won’t win over many mainstream moviegoers, but cinema academic-turned-filmmaker Kogonada has crafted a visually immaculate feature debut that can be compared to little else.

Graceful and quite literally quiet, “Wonderstruck” makes for an unconventional (or at least uncommercial) family film, but one worth enduring thanks to director Todd Haynes, the cast and composer Carter Burwell. 

“Lucky” puts us squarely into the boots of a nonagenarian — the routine, the attitude and the unknown. We follow Lucky (Harry Dean Stanton) as he goes about his day in the tiny desert town where he lives and his interactions with everyone from the employees at his favorite diner to the convenience store clerk […]

We normally associate Orlando, Florida with the vibrant commercialism and magic of Walt Disney World and the Universal Studios theme parks, but in the shadow of Cinderella’s castle lie motels like the Magic Castle, where indie filmmaker Sean Baker invites us to journey in “The Florida Project.”

Taylor Sheridan makes his case for being one of the best working screenwriters today with “Wind River,” his third script to make it to the screen in three years and the first of the three that he’s directed.

Within minutes, “Lady Macbeth” sets a familiar period romance stage: a very young woman in 19th century rural England is sold into marriage to a cold fish husband and an even nastier father-in-law and in her isolation begins an affair with the stable groom on the family estate. We immediately sympathize with Katherine (Florence Pugh) […]

Films that seem to make time stop or get us to consider how the small thread that is our lives fits into the massive tapestry of the universe are rare. Their artistic ambition usually leads to divisiveness among audiences, like an abstract painting that confounds one person but strikes a nerve in the next. “A […]

Independent comedies are full of single young adults trying to navigate life or falling in and out of love, but there aren’t any depictions of modern marital discord. In comes Zoe Lister-Jones with her directorial debut, “Band Aid,” starring her and Adam Pally as a constantly bickering couple who try starting a band as their […]

Horror purists have to be careful not to get duped because of films like “It Comes at Night.” With its creepy horror title, a trailer that presents like a mysterious “cabin in the woods” zombie movie and a solid amount of critical praise, horror fans will undoubtedly give Trey Edward Shults’ sophomore feature a go. […]

Edgar Wright’s concept heist flick “Baby Driver” shows that in the right hands, a single idea can be fleshed out into a single good movie. Anyone could have thought to fuse music and action to a choreographed extreme, but Wright’s aptitude for gleeful style and good storytelling instincts give “Baby Driver” some serious wheels. Although […]

Like a madman creator trying to play God, Ridley Scott and the team behind the “Alien” prequels “Prometheus” and now “Alien: Covenant” keep running the same experiment with slight variations, never quite able to replicate the excitement of that initial moment of creation (1979’s “Alien”). There’s nothing wrong or bad about either these precursor films, […]

First they came for the TV shows of kids who grew up in the ’80s. It was only a matter of time before they came for my shows. As for how this big-screen adaptation fairs, color me indifferent.

One of Disney’s most treasured animated musicals of the ’90s and perhaps its most critically acclaimed, “Beauty and the Beast” was understandably high in the queue for in the studio’s recent spree of live-action remakes. Led by the popular and talented Emma Watson as Belle and under the veteran guidance of director Bill Condon (“Dreamgirls,” […]

King Kong holds the honor of being among Hollywood’s first movie monsters, but “monster” has never been as relevant a label for the colossal ape as it is for his latest incarnation in “Kong: Skull Island.” Whereas most people think of Kong as a misunderstood beast who falls for the beautiful Anne Darrow, in this […]

“John Wick” deservedly earned a cult following in 2014 because of the way director Chad Stahelski and writer Derek Kolstad blended revenge-driven action with martial arts and the aesthetics of both first-person shooter video games and graphic novels. They created this seedy, neon hit-man underworld and tapped perfectly into the strengths of star Keanu Reeves. […]