James Whale’s 1935 film The Bride of Frankenstein has long been revered as one of the best Frankenstein films ever made, even better than its predecessor. But, as Maggie Gyllenhaal points out in an interview with Entertainment Weekly, “The movie’s called The Bride of Frankenstein, but she’s not really in it. It’s just a Frankenstein sequel, and she literally doesn’t speak.” With her new film, The Bride!, Gyllenhaal sets out to give the woman the voice, autonomy, and spotlight she deserves. What ensues is a ferocious, bold swing from the filmmaker and a movie unlike any Frankenstein-adjacent film we’ve seen before.

Pixar is certainly no stranger to films about human beings turning into animals. In fact, between Brave (2012), Soul (2020), and Turning Red (2022), it seems to be a pretty prevalent theme. And after introducing technology in Up (2009) that allowed humans to understand what a dog was thinking, a movie where someone can literally experience life as an animal feels like a logical next step. As much as Hoppers fits perfectly within Pixar’s wheelhouse, it might also be their most absurd film yet. Thankfully, that absurdity works entirely in its favor.

Spoiler-free video review of Tony Benna’s Sundance award-winning documentary André Is An Idiot, starring André Ricciardi.

As “eat the rich” movies have surged in popularity in recent years, it was only a matter of time before Robert Hamer’s 1949 black comedy Kind Hearts and Coronets was reimagined for a new generation. It’s fitting that the remake, How to Make a Killing, was directed by John Patton Ford, since his previous film, Emily the Criminal (2022), also follows a protagonist who turns to crime out of financial desperation. However, the nature of the crimes differs significantly. Between How to Make a Killing and last year’s The Running Man, Glen Powell proves he’s the perfect star to put at the helm of these anti-capitalist vehicles, because much like in that film, his charm does a lot of the heavy lifting here. How to Make a Killing is a scrappy, modernized retelling of Kind Hearts and Coronets that coasts on Powell’s charisma.

Spoiler-free video review of Sweetness directed by Emma Higgins, starring Kate Hallett, Herman Tømmeraas, Aya Furukawa, Justin Chatwin, Steven Ogg, Amanda Brugel.

There’s been a lot of controversy surrounding Emerald Fennell’s adaptation of Emily Brontë’s classic 1847 novel Wuthering Heights, largely centered around the decision to whitewash the character of Heathcliff by casting Jacob Elordi in the role. However, almost every adaptation of the novel thus far has cast a white actor in the role, with Andrea Arnold’s 2011 adaptation being one of the rare exceptions. Between the casting, anachronistic costume designs, and original songs by Charli xcx, it’s clear even before audiences step into the theater that this version of Wuthering Heights isn’t concerned with being faithful to the novel or the time period in which it takes place. Anyone who walks into Emerald Fennell’s Wuthering Heights expecting an accurate adaptation of Emily Brontë’s novel is setting themselves up for major disappointment.

Perhaps February is too early to crown something “the funniest film of the year,” but I feel strangely confident in declaring Nirvanna the Band the Show the Movie exactly that. In fact, I first saw it back in October 2025. So as far as I’m concerned, it has already held that title for two consecutive years. And yet, it’s so much more than merely an excellent comedy. This is the rare project fueled by an almost reckless passion for filmmaking itself. It’s wildly inventive, absurdly imaginative, and unafraid to push creative, cinematic, and even legal boundaries. It feels as though films like this only come along once in a generation. It’s the type of movie that makes audiences wonder, “How did this get made? How did they get away with it? How much of this is real? Was any of it even legal?”

Winner of the Directing Award: US Dramatic at the 2026 Sundance Film Festival, Josef Kubota Wladyka’s Ha-chan, Shake Your Booty! is an effervescent crowdpleaser. It’s a thoughtful portrait of grief that’s simultaneously a heartwarming, whimsical delight. It’s a highly-stylized film, bursting with quirky characters, vibrant colors, and lively music.

NB Mager’s Run Amok is an undeniably unique and admirably ambitious film. However, it’s also an absolute tonal disaster. It’s not every day one sees a film about a high school staging a musical about school shootings, especially one that’s meant to be a comedy. The problem is, the film never seems to know exactly which genre it wants to adhere to.

Being a teenage girl is brutal, especially when you feel like you don’t fit in with any particular friend group, and that’s something that the best coming-of-age films convey all too well. Paloma Schneideman’s feature debut, Big Girls Don’t Cry, joins the ranks of recent Sundance coming-of-age gems such as Sean Wang’s Dìdi (2024) for its mid-2000s nostalgia, and Megan Park’s My Old Ass (2024) for its depiction of sapphic self-discovery. Big Girls Don’t Cry offers that same sense of nostalgia—complete with cameos from Nokia phones and MSN Messenger—and queer representation, through its sensitive snapshot of awkward adolescence. While it does suffer from some clichés and treads familiar territory, it’s still a worthwhile viewing experience.

Rachel Lambert’s Carousel is the kind of gentle, slice-of-life independent film that feels right at home at the Sundance Film Festival. It showcases several strong, understated performances that feel authentic and lived-in, even as the story traces familiar narrative ground. In fact, Carousel almost feels too lived-in to the extent that the characters’ lives lack urgency, and the story unfolds at an almost glacial pace.

Zi feels like a return to form for Kogonada after last year’s A Big Bold Beautiful Journey, but it doesn’t quite have the charm of his debut Columbus (2017) or even the similarly sci-fi After Yang (2021). It feels more like an experiment than a film. Seven people flew to Hong Kong for a few weeks to shoot this project on a whim, and it very much feels like a film that was made on the fly. What’s admirable about this experiment is that Kogonada gave all seven of them equal equity in the film, so they’ll be splitting the profits equally. It will almost certainly be a polarizing film; I only wish it felt more like a story driven by passion and thoughtfulness than spontaneity and impulsivity.

Winner of the Sundance Audience Award in the World Cinema Dramatic category, Myrsini Aristidou’s Hold Onto Me (Κράτα Με) plays out like a modern-day, slower-paced version of Peter Bogdanovich’s Paper Moon (1973) set in Cyprus. It’s a poignant story about a little girl reconnecting with her estranged father as the duo slowly bond and con people.

Addiction is a common theme in cinema, but it’s a topic that’s often sensationalized and depicted in ways that veer toward melodrama with big, over-the-top meltdowns. Addiction dramas often lean more toward being overdramatic than truthful for the sake of entertainment value. Adam Meeks’ Union County deviates from this trope—for better and for worse. It’s a portrait of addiction that’s achingly honest, but that doesn’t always make for the most compelling viewing experience.

With her feature debut, Rock Springs, Vera Miao demonstrates a perceptive understanding that human history is a lot scarier than any monster. The ghosts that really haunt us are the atrocious acts of racial violence committed throughout human history. Rock Springs presents a bold, admirable vision, but the idea is far stronger than the execution.

The opening frame of Olive Nwosu’s feature debut, Lady, is upside down—a visual choice that makes sense from both a literal and metaphorical standpoint. The next frame reveals two young girls, their heads hanging back over a jetty, so they are quite literally seeing the world upside down in that moment. Metaphorically speaking, it’s fitting to introduce Lagos to the audience with an upside-down image. It’s almost reminiscent of the iconic shot of the Statue of Liberty in The Brutalist (2024) that inverted the symbol of the American Dream. The more one seeks out international cinema, the more one recognizes the struggles that other countries face, and America is far from the only country where the dream of financial freedom and stability feels precarious and unattainable.

Imagine Hamlet 2 (2008) in the style of an I Think You Should Leave sketch, and that’s essentially Giselle Bonilla’s new film, The Musical. Much like Hamlet 2, The Musical follows a failed artist-turned-teacher as he stages a politically incorrect musical. However,  in Bonilla’s film, the protagonist is a playwright instead of an actor, he teaches middle school instead of high school, and most important of all, the musical he’s staging isn’t a sequel to a Shakespeare play. There are hints scattered throughout the film as to what the musical is about, so it doesn’t come as a complete shock. But as the characters proclaim, “The super power of the theatre is the element of surprise,” so it’s better to walk into the film without knowing that aspect of the plot ahead of time.

What if your child witnessed a horrible act of violence at a young age? How would you answer their questions, help them process it, help them cope? Those questions lie at the heart of Beth de Araújo’s Josephine, one of the most celebrated films out of this year’s Sundance Film Festival. It’s a difficult watch, which is fitting because it’s also difficult for the parents to have those conversations with their child.

Josephine Decker’s Chasing Summer is steeped in indie coming-of-age movie clichés and millennial nostalgia, from its throwback soundtrack to its familiar arc of reluctant homecoming. For a filmmaker once celebrated for her emotional and visual risk-taking, the film’s conventionality comes as a bit of a surprise. It’s both a romantic comedy and a coming-of-age story, yet it fails to generate much romance or laughs, and it hits all the familiar beats with far too much predictability.

Gore Verbinski's Good Luck, Have Fun, Don't Die is so ambitious, audacious, and unconcerned with being accessible or appealing to mainstream audiences that I can't help but admire it, even if it ultimately collapses under the weight of its own ambitions. Matthew Robinson's screenplay attempts to do so much in a single film that the final product is more than a mixed bag, it's a piñata—but instead of just candy inside, occasionally you'll find random objects like a rubber duck, a paper clip, maybe some money scattered in there, and every once in a while you'll stumble upon a dead rat or two. It’s a chaotic, kooky, madcap adventure full of relevant social commentary.