Gary Oldman stars in David Fincher’s outstanding showbiz drama, “Mank.” Filmed in glorious black-and-white, “Mank” showcases the difficulties that infamous alcoholic screenwriter Herman J. Mankiewicz experienced while writing Orson Welles’ classic, “Citizen Kane.” It’s a shrewd, top-notch Hollywood biopic that crackles with great dialogue. “Mank” is pure Oscar bait.   “Hillbilly Elegy” is a disappointing, disjointed adaptation of J. D. Vance’s acclaimed memoir about Vance’s efforts to transcend his backwoods family roots to pursue a career in law. Fine turns from Amy Adams and Glenn Close are wasted in this wrong-headed and awkward social drama.   Riz Ahmed gives an outstanding performance as a rock drummer who goes deaf in the realistic and harrowing drama “Sound of Metal.” It’s hard to watch, but “Sound of Metal” is a well-made, empathetic and heart-wrenching cautionary tale.   “Collective” is a shocking documentary that exposes the political corruption in the Romanian healthcare system. “Collective” is a riveting indictment that demonstrates the enormous value of a free press as well as exposing its obvious limitations.   Sixty-six-year-old Jackie Chan proves he can still kick some backside in the goofy martial arts action flick, “Vanguard.” It’s ridiculous and absolutely action packed.   Guy Pierce gives…

“Freaky Friday” meets “Friday the 13th” in the bloody R-rated horror comedy, “Freaky.”  Vince Vaughn plays a deranged serial killer who supernaturally switches bodies with a mousey teenager. While “Freaky” doesn’t quite live up to its wacky promise, Vaughn milks his dual role for all its comic worth.   Mel Gibson plays Santa Claus…you heard that right…in yet another wacky, violent R-rated comedy, “Fatman.” A spoiled, wealthy kid sends a hired killer to knock off Saint Nick when he gets a lump of coal for Christmas. Intended as a pitch-black satire, “Fatman” is bleak and annoying instead of campy and amusing. It’s a lump of coal in your cinematic stocking.   Impressive, nuanced performances from Kate Winslet and Saoirse Ronan add strength to the slow-moving period romance, “Ammonite.” Winslet plays a reclusive paleontologist who begins a forbidden romance with the wife of a fellow scientist in 1840s England. “Ammonite” should have caught emotional fire, but instead merely simmers.   Eighty-six-year-old screen legend Sophia Loren returns in the sentimental Netflix drama, “The Life Ahead.” Loren plays an elderly Italian Holocaust survivor who reluctantly takes in a troubled 12-year-old Sudanese refugee. Loren is getting all the attention, but young Ibrahima Gueye carries…

Kevin Costner and Diane Lane play a retired couple who attempt to rescue their grandson from a rural North Dakota family in the harrowing drama “Let Him Go,” based on a novel by Larry Watson. Leslie Manville memorably chews the scenery as the cultish family’s domineering matriarch. Violent and a bit lurid, “Let Him Go” plays a bit like a neo-Western and is a well-acted and unsettling revenge thriller.   If a Disney Channel movie married a Hallmark holiday romcom, the offspring might look a bit like the middling flick, “Operation Christmas Drop.” Kat Graham plays a Congressional aide who tries to pull the rug out from under Air Force Captain Alexander Ludwig and his Guam-based charitable efforts. It’s meant to be inspiring, but “Operation Christmas Drop” is a bland, slow moving and formulaic romantic comedy.   “The Informer” is a brutal thriller starring Joel Kinneman as an FBI informant who infiltrates a savage Polish drug gang. Things get tricky when Joel gets sent to prison. FBI agents Rosamund Pike and Clive Owen cut him loose and he must figure out how to fend for himself. The story is overly familiar and takes some twists and turns that stretch credibility,…

If you took a typical Hallmark Channel Christmas romantic comedy and added in plenty foul language and crude sexual banter, you might come up with something like the off-putting Netflix offering, “Holidate.” Emma Roberts and Luke Bracey star in the story of two singles who decide to use one another as a non-intimate date on holidays only. The game cast tries hard to find something resembling reality, but mostly come up empty. Watching “Holidate” is no holiday.   “His House” is a genuinely creepy and thoughtful horror film with a timely political and sociological backdrop. Wunmi Mosaku and Sope Dirisu play a couple from South Sudan who flee the violence in their homeland and seek refuge in the British Isles. Once they arrive in England, however, they realize that an evil supernatural entity has followed them. There’s a lot more going on than meets the eye in this sharp debut feature from writer/director Remi Weeks. “His House” will provoke and disturb viewers in equal measure.   “The Craft: Legacy” is a sequel to the 1996 pop horror film about a coven of teenage witches. Cailee Spaeny plays a teen who befriends three girls seeking powers of the occult, they conjure…

“Rebecca,” a Netflix remake of Alfred Hitchcock’s classic suspense drama is a handsomely produced but uninspired adaptation of Daphne du Maurier’s novel. Armie Hammer and Lily James star in this dark gothic romance that checks all of the appropriate boxes but can’t match the 1940 Best Picture Oscar winner, which can be seen for free at any time on YouTube.   “The Witches” is yet another remake, this one based on Roald Dahl’s scary children’s story. Anne Hathaway and Octavia Spencer lead the cast in this tale of a boy who discovers that a coven of witches plans to turn kids into mice. Hathaway’s over-the-top performance is bound to creep out the kiddies in this capable if overstuffed production.   After fourteen years, Sacha Baron Cohen returns as a faux Kazakhstani TV reporter in “Borat Subsequent Moviefilm.” In this shocking mockumentary, Borat ambushes the clueless Rudy Giuliani among others. It’s shameless, irreverent and uneven, but succeeds in lampooning contemporary hypocrisy.   Anthony Mackie and Jamie Dornan star in the philosophical sci-fi entry, “Synchronic.” Mackie plays a paramedic, dying of cancer, who discovers that a street drug enables the user to travel through time. While this thoughtful film raises interesting questions,…

Oscar-winning filmmaker Aaron Sorkin offers one of the year’s finest movies, “The Trial of the Chicago 7.” This surprisingly timely drama covers the infamous case in which peace activists were tried for allegedly inciting riots at the 1968 Democratic National Convention. Sasha Baron Coen, Eddie Redmayne and Mark Rylance are part of a great cast that skillfully delivers Sorkin’s sharp, incisive dialogue. The movie’s pace is very lively and it’s unusually funny for a historical courtroom drama. The verdict on “The Trial of the Chicago 7” is ‘compelling,’ beyond a reasonable doubt.’   “Clouds” is a Disney+ drama that tells the true story of Zach Sobiech, a teenager suffering from terminal cancer who released the hit song “Clouds” a few months before his death in 2013. Actor/musician Fin Argus fits the role of Sobiech like a glove and the earnest cast helps mitigate some of the movie’s manipulative aspects. “Clouds” is a four-hankie tearjerker.  Thankfully, the pathos is somewhat balanced by the movie’s upbeat humor.   “The Secrets We Keep” is a modestly effective post WWII thriller. Noomi Rapace plays a Romanian woman living in a small American town who thinks she recognizes a German soldier who committed brutal war…

Bill Murray re-teams with “Lost in Translation” filmmaker Sophia Coppola for the disarming comedy, “On the Rocks.” Rashida Jones plays a woman who fears her husband, played by Marlon Wayans, may be cheating on her. Her pushy ne’er do well father, played by Murray, manipulates her into spying on her spouse. There’s a lot more going on here than meets the eye, making “On the Rocks” a sly, engaging and loving look at family dynamics.   “The Forty-Year-Old Version” may be the year’s biggest surprise. Acclaimed playwright Radha Banks plays herself in this autobiographical movie about a struggling theater artist who tries her hand at rap. Whip smart and often hilarious, it’s an eye-opening exposé of racism and ageism in the liberal New York performing arts scene. This very adult film has brazen language and content that will make it radioactive for many, but if you can get past the barrage of dirty words, “The Forty-Year-Old Version” will be a welcome introduction to a charismatic talent.   “Yellow Rose” is a charming coming-of-age movie about a Philippine-American teenager who faces possible deportation while trying to break into the Austin country music scene. Broadway star Eva Noblezada makes an impressive movie…

The life of feminist icon Gloria Steinem is given the art house treatment in Julie Taymor’s overambitious biography, “The Glorias.” Four actresses play Steinem in various stages of her life, including Oscar winners Alicia Vikander and Julianne Moore. While it’s illuminating and relevant, the film skims the surface while indulging in some unnecessary and pretentious sequences of surrealism. Still, “The Glorias” is a modestly involving experiment.   “The Boys in the Band” is a Netflix adaptation of the famous 1968 Broadway play about a birthday party amongst a group of gay men that devolves into an ugly session of self-loathing and bickering. Jim Parsons leads a strong cast in this wicked comic drama that isn’t nearly as shocking as it would have been 50 years ago, but still packs a punch.   The documentary “Herb Alpert Is” provides a sweeping overview of the life of the phenomenally successful musician, artist, philanthropist and founder of A&M Records. For those unfamiliar with his work, it’s an involving primer. For those old enough to remember the heyday of the Tijuana Brass, it’s downright nostalgic.   “A Call to Spy” is a WWII drama about England’s spy agency that sent women to Nazi occupied…

If nothing else, you’ll have to admit that the comic drama “Kajillionaire” is not the same old thing. This quirky and gentle movie stars Evan Rachel Wood as an emotionally stunted young woman who works as a petty scam artist with her parents, Richard Jenkins and Debra Winger. Things get complicated when they invite a stranger, played by Gina Rodriguez, into one of their schemes. “Kajillionaire” has a sweet and eccentric vibe that viewers will find either refreshing or annoying. In either case, “Kajillionaire” unique.   Millie Bobbi Brown of “Stranger Things” fame is terrific as Sherlock Holmes’ teenage sister in the lighthearted Netflix mystery thriller, “Enola Holmes.” When her mom disappears, Enola attempts to find her by deciphering clues her tricky mother left behind. The story is told with a wink and a nod and never really amounts to much, but Brown carries the day in “Enola Holmes,” the probable first installment of a wannabe franchise.   “Secret Society of Second Born Royals” is a Disney+ fantasy aimed at preteens. It seems that some folks with royal blood have unusual superpowers and they’re recruited to save their kingdoms from an evil villain. It’s very pat and predictable, but the…

Pop superstar and Kansas City native Janelle Monáe stars in “Antebellum,” a bizarre horror entry with significant social overtones. Monáe plays a slave on a plantation in the Civil War South…or is she a renowned author living today? This well acted but enigmatic film doesn’t make much sense until the final scenes when the film starts to look like a project that M. Night Shyamalan might have started…and rejected.   Sitting through the Netflix drama “The Devil All the Time,” based on the novel by Donald Ray Pollock, may be a certified form of torture. The beautifully acted and lensed drama stars Tom Holland and Robert Pattinson in a sweeping story spanning two generations dealing with religiously conflicted rednecks in post- WWII rural Ohio. It’s unrelentingly ugly and violent, filled with loathsome characters. “The Devil All the Time” falls well short of its lofty thematic aims.   Susan Sarandon, Kate Winslett and Sam Neill lead a potent cast in the talky family drama, “Blackbird.” Dying of ALS, Sarandon decides to get the family together for one last sendoff before she commits suicide. It’s hard to knock the cast and the filmmakers’ intent, but the dialogue goes over like fingernails on…