Kong: Skull Island (2017)

The nations of Wakanda and Talokan enter war over their opposing viewpoints on dealing with the destructive hearts of humankind on the surface world.

Netflix’s new mystery thriller, The Marked Woman (released originally as La Desconocida), is confusing. More critically, though, it commits the worst mistake a movie can make: it’s boring. From Spanish director Gabe Ibáñez, the film squanders its premise at every turn, fills the story with unlikeable characters, and lacks emotional payoff.

In Paul Feig’s newest comedy, Last Christmas, Katarina (Emilia Clarke) didn’t give a heart, she got a heart, you see.

Adapted from a 2014 novel by Atticus Lish, Preparation for the Next Life is the feature film debut of documentary filmmaker Bing Liu. With the help of screenwriter Martyna Majok, he paints a realistic and somber portrayal of Aishe, a Uyghur immigrant, as she struggles to make a living while undocumented in the United States.

There’s been a longstanding criticism of sci-fi films about its lack of Black characters. For the past few years, Anthony Mackie has been successfully representing Black masculinity in the otherwise homogenous genre and I am here for it.

Its predictability shouldn’t distract from the enjoyment that the pure cinematic imagination behind the camera elicits. It is a movie of crises both moral and mortal, oozing with CGI, and thoroughly enjoyable.