Movies Like Hacksaw Ridge (2016)

Made on a clearly lower budget but with enthusiasm and love for the craft overflowing from every frame, Junta Yamaguchi’s River gets clean and wholesome comedy—that’s still plenty memorable—out of a terrific ensemble of actors, all of whom get to display a full range of expression for their increasingly exasperated characters. It’s smart, economical filmmaking […]

At times of great societal turmoil, sometimes stars are born, not just to entertain the masses but to challenge the way things are done. Amar Singh Chamkila is one such star, and his music captivated all of Punjab in part due to his brash lyrics. His assassination remains unsolved, but director and co-writer Imtiaz Ali […]

Just based off its title, Mutt is already a film that tackles a state of in-between, and perhaps what makes it already precious is how honest and personal it can get, while remaining a good fictional story. This striking debut took Chilean-Serbian filmmaker Vuk Lungulov-Klotz more than six years to make, at least from the […]

When it comes to ghosts, plenty of films are centered around personal, unresolved business in the living world, but rarely do films examine how the spirit world would be, unless it’s for fantastical fights or horrific terror. The Parades instead focuses on a world of lost, but ordinary, and thankfully kind, souls. And as the […]

Abel Ferrara’s protagonists have always searched for higher meaning in a flawed, messed-up world of pain and violence. If 1992’s Bad Lieutenant took Harvey Keitel to church for one of American indie cinema’s most spectacular endings, Padre Pio doesn’t offer such solace. Ferrara (who’s been living and working in Rome for years now) teamed up […]

You don’t need to know a lot about baseball to appreciate The Saint of Second Chances. It has enough going on to keep you hooked from start to end, beginning with Jeff Daniels’ inimitable voice as the narrator and Charlie Day’s inspired casting as the younger Veeck, all the way down to the Veecks’ fascinating […]

At times looking and sounding like a real Filipino action film from 50 years ago, while painstakingly edited to juggle storylines across several realities, Leonor Will Never Die is worth seeing for its originality and ambition alone. Among so many other films that function as sanitized “love letters to cinema,” this one bears the distinction […]

To Kill a Tiger should not be an easy watch. It’s about the gang rape of 13-year-old Kiran, a girl whose small village has shunned and blamed her for “not knowing better,” and who is being forced by community leaders to marry her abuser to “erase the stain” on herself. But instead of leaning on […]

It’s hard not to watch The Unknown Country and think of Nomadland: along with similarities in their Terrence Malick-inspired visuals, both films follow lone women seeking catharsis on the road as they grieve profound losses. But Morrisa Maltz’s debut feature is a decidedly lower-key, more spiritual affair — and is all the better for it. […]

Inspired by the Spiniak case, Blanquita reimagines the infamous scandal through mirrored interrogations and disorienting viewpoints. Blanquita rewrites the original witness, whose fictional variant, in turn, rewrites the abuse faced by victims as her own. She is transformed from a clueless liar, into someone still a liar, but one that did so when every other […]

The idea of representation in movies is often limited to superficial gestures of putting on screen people who look a certain way. Kokomo City is a reminder of cinema’s possibilities when one really tries to queer filmmaking itself, with genuine queer voices driving a production. This documentary is messy and incredibly playful in its style—in […]

While it might not be the most inspired story featuring the titular caped crusader—nor is it a particularly Christmas-y tale—Merry Little Batman still stands out just for how bright and warm its versions of these characters are. In this Gotham, crime is literally pushed aside for once, and that odd sense of holiday isolation takes […]

Generation-centric comedy is often of the “kids these days” variety — in which comedians make uninspired jibes about the youth of today while spectacularly lacking self-awareness of their own — but twenty-something stand-up Leo Reich thankfully upends that trend with his self-lampooning debut show. Reich takes a risk by unabashedly casting himself as a self-absorbed nepo […]

If you’re new to the story, I Don’t Expect Anyone to Believe Me feels difficult to understand. The film adaptation portrays the novel through abruptly cut sequences, meticulously framed naturalistic frames, and monologue and dialogue that mean more than what’s being said, on top of Juan Pablo’s gradual descent into a criminal network. It’s as […]

Third World Romance is what it says in the tin– it’s a love story that blooms in the rundown side of the capital of a developing country. The plot is familiar, especially for people familiar with Filipino rom coms, but writer-director Dwein Baltazar approaches this with a grounded approach. With fancy dinner dates substituted with […]

Frankly, it’s a bad idea to rush into a marriage for a financial incentive, but there’s something sweet about A Soweto Love Story with the way the plot plays out. As the brothers race to win the family home, there’s the standard romcom shenanigans where secrets are revealed and sabotage happens, but the brothers never […]

Dhuin is evidently influenced by the Iranian filmmaker whose work its characters discuss: Abbas Kiarostami. Featuring non-professional actors and full of long observational takes that center everyday conversations in the life of an aspiring actor in a small Northern Indian city, it’s guided by the same social realist impulses that shaped Kiarostami’s work. What’s more, […]

While marketed as a family drama, Long Live Love! plays out more like a romance film between parents Sati and Meta. Where Meta has dived in, and accepted her role as a wife and mother, former model Sati still clings to the immature lifestyle he’s used to, to the glimmers of fame that he used […]

Feminism has made plenty of strides in multiple areas, but even in the era of free love, talking about sex was difficult, and certain figures were dismissed just because of it. The Disappearance of Shere Hite reexamines the titular forgotten feminist figure that simply focused on the female orgasm, giving a second look at her […]

Even with its haphazard construction and occasionally unnecessary and corny flourishes (what’s with all the mellowed-out covers of pop songs?), there’s a sense of intense, sincere pride and joy that shines through Every Body’s many testimonials. Intersex people are barely represented whether in media or in legislation, and countless people still have very little understanding […]

Renowned choreographer Benjamin Millepied brings an 1875 opera leaping into the 21st century with this modern retelling — through dance and drama — of Carmen. The plot is reimagined along the US border and recenters the titular character (Melissa Barrera), a newly orphaned refugee from Mexico making her way to her godmother (a fabulous Rossy […]

The particulars of the scandal are enough to shock, enrage, and move anyone, but the directors of BS High also put Johnson in the hot seat and skewer the guy until they wring all ego and delusion out of him. The result is a compelling and terrifying look into a con man’s mind. Johnson alternates […]

As a sluggishly paced, three-hour spiritual drama with little dialogue and even less plot, Inside the Yellow Cocoon Shell certainly won’t convert anybody who isn’t already interested in slow cinema. Even those who don’t mind these types of films in which “nothing happens” might feel that it doesn’t weave its themes of faith and suffering […]

This groundbreaking documentary follows the USA Olympics sexual abuse case that made headlines in 2015. Through interviews with Olympians, their families, and investigative reporters, it’s also a documentary on the overall culture of abuse in gymnastics: sexual, physical, and emotional. In one scene from the 1996 Olympics, gold medalist Kerri Strug has to run, vault, […]

If there are parts to Rookie’s story that seem too easily resolved—for the sake of making this more of a feel-good movie—these shortcuts still serve a genuinely romantic central relationship that develops in the most organic way possible. Besides the school’s stifling conservatism, there’s nothing that really stands in the way of Ace and Jana’s […]

So much of Puppy Love is adorable. The title alone promises that, and to be fair, it actually delivers. The movie is filled with romance, pooches, and hijinks that circle back to those two core aspects. I couldn’t be giddier watching this, as a dog lover and romantic comedy aficionado myself, but it’s frustrating how […]

With its origins as a full-length rock monologue, it’s understandable if Tick, Tick… Boom! comes off as overly concerned with its protagonist’s personal anxieties and not the larger social and health crises happening right outside his door. But while it really doesn’t offer much insight into the AIDS epidemic, or even the art scene of […]

Entergalactic, a vibrant animated romcom from the mind of musician Kid Cudi, follows new neighbors Jabari (Cudi) and Meadow (Jessica Williams) as they navigate their way through the ups and downs of modern love. They’re both established artists at the height of their careers, but when it comes to romance, they’re still scraping for lessons, […]

In Love and Deep Water is torn between multiple concepts. There’s a murder, sure, and a butler trying to figure out who’s the killer, but there also happens to be a romance plot where the same butler falls in love with the passenger that informs him of their partners’ infidelity. The film also tries to […]

I’m still stuck between calling The Tour 23 a clever marketing trick or a feast for the senses. Contradictions have always nested at the heart of the brand, between beauty and its toxic standards, so it’s self-aware of them to highlight that in an audience-facing film. It’s undeniable that the VS shows have held spectacle […]

While quite testing for viewers, this is one of the craziest, most high-energy movies you’ll ever watch. In this incredible German drama, child actor Helena Zengel plays Bernadette aka Benni, a traumatized 9-year-old child who tends to lash out and has been repeatedly suspended from every school she went to. Benni is a so-called “Systemsprenger” […]

Composed of archival footage of the titular musical legend and testimonials from those who worked with him or whose lives were profoundly impacted by his courage, Little Richard: I Am Everything feels comprehensive but is also oddly lacking. The documentary makes a bold, confident claim: that all popular music today can be directly traced to […]

Poland’s nomination for Best Foreign Language Film at the 2020 Academy Awards may have lost to Parasite, but director Jan Komasa’s film is still utterly compelling. The crazy sounding premise is inspired by true events: after having had a transformative experience in jail, an ex-convict, played by the wiry, blue-eyed Bartosz Bielenia, decides he wants […]

Sayen is the kind of film that ultimately feels like it was written by a focus group: ample representation for a worthy cause funneled into the sort of escapism that should theoretically hit the widest demographic possible. But even with its solid production values and a determined performance by Rallen Montenegro, the film lacks the […]

There’s no easy way to talk about racism – it’s a nebulous set of ideas that shift and change and manifests in numerous ways that many people can’t even identify as racism because of how prevalent it is. But Dr. Ibram X. Kendi has been able to write down a fairly comprehensive narrative that outlines […]

To be fair to this visibly low-budget adaptation of H. G. Wells’ seminal science-fiction novel, it doesn’t always settle for the cheap way out. Though it still leaves much to be desired in its visual effects, awkward action scenes, and generally unimaginative direction, Fear the Invisible Man makes a valiant effort to deepen its story […]