Film-Forward

American

The Invite

Director Olivia Wilde’s greatest asset is the chemistry among her quartet of performers. It is also worth remembering how committed and versatile Wilde can be as an actress.

I Love Boosters

From left, Naomi Ackie, Taylour Paige and Keke Palmer in I Love Boosters (Neon)

It is satirical absurdism cranked up to at least 15, introducing more and more genre-bending gimmicks per scene yet never winking once as the ridiculousness piles up.

Magic Hour

For a story that teases some metaphysical quandaries, it is doggedly earthbound.

Omaha

A quietly powerful debut feature, set in the American West in 2008, at the height of the financial and housing crisis.

Ella McCay

James L. Brooks’s new film feels like it was written by an extraterrestrial being who has consumed too much media from the 1990s and 2000s and attempts to re-create how the human species behaves.

Rental Family

An earnest, though innocuous, feel-good movie for the armchair traveler.

Rebuilding

People behaving nice and helpful to one another, despite chaos, seems novel these days, perhaps even groundbreaking.

Bunny

If you are a fan of gritty 1990s indie film and have a taste for screwball comedy and eccentric Coen-esque characters, then Bunny is for you.