William Hale (Robert De Niro) murders Native Americans to steal their land and take their oil headrights. He convinces Ernest Burkhart (Leonardo DiCaprio), his nephew, to marry Mollie Burkhart (Lily Gladstone), an Osage woman, as part of a scheme to inherit her oil headrights. Ernest falls in love with Mollie which threatens to derail the scheme.  Meanwhile, an FBI agent (Jesse Plemons), arrives in town to investigate the murders.  

      Based on the novel by David Grann, the screenplay by writer/director Martin Scorsese and co-writer Eric Roth spends a lot of time with exposition while blending drama, romance and suspense. The suspense isn't as palpable as it could've been because the audience already knows from the get-go that William Hale is responsible for the murders of Native Americans. They also know why he's murdering them as well as why Ernest is conning Mollie by marrying her. The screenplay barely fleshed out their relationship before they get married, so their scenes as husband and wife aren't quite as heartfelt as they could've been because it's hard to understand what Mollie sees in Ernest. Moreover, William comes across as a cookie-cutter villain rather than as a complex human being. He's greedy, arrogant, domineering and sleazy with not a modicum of remorse for the consequences of his actions. The only remotely likeable character is Mollie. Whenever the film focuses on her, it becomes more engrossing. The rest of the film just seems to be going through the motions with new characters being introduced while the plot meanders. It picks up steam again when the FBI agent arrives before it wanes and then picks up again during the last hour during the gripping courtroom scenes.

      Robert De Niro gives a decent, but unremarkable performance. Leonardo DiCaprio brings charisma to his role, but not much more than that. His accent isn't very convincing, unfortunately. Jesse Plemons is terrific in his support role. If only there were more scenes with him. Brendan Fraser and John Lithgow also show up in smaller, underdeveloped roles. Lily Gladstone shines the brightest with a genuinely moving performance. She's the film's MVP and helps the film to become alive whenever she's on screen. The pace moves very slowly, sometimes sluggish with some scenes that overstay their welcome, i.e. the very lengthy scene at the jail with William and Ernest and the lengthy final shot that makes its point over and over, so it loses some of its visual poetry and emotional impact. It's beautifully shot, though, with a lot of picturesque scenery that provide the film with scope that makes it feel cinematic. At a running time of 3 hours and 26 minutes, Killers of the Flower Moon is well-shot with a fine ensemble cast and a radiant performance by Lily Gladstone, but often meandering, overlong, sporadically exhilarating and only occasionally moving. 
  

      A film crew, namely, Josh (Dylan Sprayberry), Matt (Robert Bailey Jr.), Ashley (Valentina de Angelis), and Jessica (Rebecca Forsythe), venture inside a cave in Malibu, California to investigate the disappearance of four high school students 10 years earlier.

      Writer/director Scott Slone offer anything new or surprising with Malibu Horror Story, but he does accomplish is to provide some genuinely scary scenes. To be fair, the "found footage" genre has run out of ideas since the last few Paranormal Activity movies. It all began with The Blair Witch Project which relied a lot on the audience's imagination during many scenes taking place in the dark. Malibu Horror Story also has many scenes in the dark, but it does allow the audience to see horror at times rather than just in their imagination. Slone should be commended for not keeping the film lean and focused on the meat of the story without too much filler. He doesn't bother to flesh out anyone's personality or to delve into their backstories. The suspense is Hitchcockian because it arises from the anticipation of the horrifying events that the film crew will inevitably endure. It's just a question of when and how. The "why?" remains a mystery, so this isn't the kind of film that tries to be an "elevated" horror film that has a memorable, complex supernatural entity. Whatever the film crew encounters is merely pure evil. Although Malibu Horror Story isn't as intense and nerve-racking as The Descent, it does generate enough palpable scares to be a solid B-horror movie.

      The performances are natural enough to help the film be a convincing "found footage" movie. The lighting and production design in general add to the creepy atmosphere, especially during the third act. It's fortunate that Scott Slone avoids using lots of shaky cam to generate tension because that's usually something that only makes the audience nauseous like in The Blair Witch Project. That said, there's not nearly enough levity, so while it does become somewhat monotonous, it's not too exhausting because the film doesn't overstay its welcome. At a running time of only 1 hour and 25 minutes, Malibu Horror Story is palpably scary and creepy, but low on surprises and imagination.

  

      60-year-old Diana Nyad (Annette Bening) repeatedly attempts to beat the odds by swimming non-stop for 110 miles from Cuba to Florida after failing to swim the same trek when she was 28. Bonnie Stoll (Jodie Foster), her best friend, serves as her coach while John Bartlett (Rhys Ifans) gets hired as her navigator who captains her support boat.

      Based on the memoir by Diana Nyad, the screenplay by Julia Cox follows a conventional underdog sports drama formula, but it's nonetheless an inspirational and moving story even though it tries a little too hard to tug at your heartstrings. Diana remains determined from start to finish to never give up trying to complete the 110-mile swim between Cuba and Florida which no one has accomplished before. She has a tough time finding sponsors because of her age, but eventually she finds one. Her best friend, Bonnie, wants what's best for her and remains a truly good friend to her despite some rough patches along the way in their relationship. Cox does a mediocre job of incorporating exposition, though. There's too little information about how Diana and Bonnie became friends, although Diana explains to a stranger at a party that they had briefly dated years ago. Meanwhile, Diana has flashbacks to a traumatic event from her childhood which she hasn't overcome yet, but what precisely happened back then isn't revealed until much later in the film. By the end, though, it's still underexplored and sugar-coated in favor of keeping the film more light and upbeat. What makes Diana compelling as a character and more human concurrently is that she's somewhat of a narcissist with a huge ego who loves to talk about herself and has a one-track mind. However, she's not a malignant narcissist because she shows that she's introspective when she calls John to offer him a genuine apology while acknowledging her actions that hurt him. She doesn't give him an excuse for how she treated him nor does she gaslight him which is admirable.

      Screenwriter Julia Cox should be commended for also humanizing Bonnie. There's a particularly poignant scene when Bonnie bluntly tells Diana that she hasn't figured out yet what dreams she wants to fulfill for herself while making it clear that she's the only one who gets to determine what those dreams are and what she wants out of life. No one else gets to decide that for her, so for Bonnie to stand up for herself like that in front of Diana makes her brave and emotionally mature---perhaps more emotionally mature than Diana. The swimming scenes are exciting with a few thrilling and surprisingly scary moments involving sharks and jellyfish. It's also worth mentioning the effective use of comic relief at the just the right moments which prevent the film from being a dry, pedestrian biopic. The third act, which can be seen from a mile away, is somewhat schmaltzy, though, with preachy, on-the-nose messages about never giving up. If only the filmmakers could'e trusted the audience's intelligence more to allow them to interpret the film's message on their own rather than to have it spoon-fed to them.

      Annette Bening and Jodie Foster give terrific performances that help to keep the film afloat. They're wonderful together and have great chemistry. The emotional depth comes from their performances more than from the screenplay. It's refreshing to see Rhys Ifans play against type in a serious role which he brings to life with his warm and tender performance. There are pacing issues, though. During the first hour, the pace moves too quickly before slowing down a little and then picking up again. The scenes with Diana swimming are intense, but go on for too long. At a running time of 2 hours, Nyad is a heartfelt, empowering and inspirational emotional journey anchored by Annette Bening and Jodie Foster's bravura performances.
  

      Zoey (Josephine Langford) doesn't believe in romantic love. Her belief gets put to the test when Zack (Drew Starkey), a popular jock from her college, from her college, gets struck by a car, ends up with temporary amnesia, and mistakes her for his girlfriend who happens to share her name and physically resembles her.

     The screenplay by Matthew Tabak doesn't have anything surprising, profound or new to say about love, romance or relationships nor does it reinvent the genre, but it's nonetheless a diverting and pleasant romantic comedy. There's nothing wrong with being derivative as long as it borrows its ideas well which, in this case, it does. Zoey makes it clear from the very beginning that she's cynical about romantic love. She can't stand formulaic romcoms like Notting Hill and When Harry Met Sally.... Before she knows it, she's pretty much stuck inside one when she's mistaken for Zach's girlfriend. Not surprisingly, she discovers that there's more to him than meets the eye. He can make pizza from scratch and almost beats her in chess despite learning it a few hours earlier. She also lies to Zack's parents, Connie (Andie MacDowell) and Matt (Patrick Fabian), his brother, Miles (Archie Renaux) and younger sister, Avery (Olive Abercrombie). Only her best friend, Elle (Mallori Johnson), knows that she's leading them on. She even encourages Zoey to lie to them by reminding her that Zack's doctor stated that Zack shouldn't be put in a stressful situation which could worsen his amnesia. Inevitably, Zack's memory will come back to him. As the plot progresses it becomes more and more like the romantic comedies that Zoey had criticized. However, at least it's self-aware of that connection. oey's change of mind, while within the realm of possibility, feels contrived as she goes against her true feelings after her mother, Paula (Heather Graham), tells her that opposites can attract. Soon enough, she falls for Zack and also for his brother who happens to be polyamorous. There's a lot going on in The Other Zoey and there are too many characters, but it somehow feels breezy while avoiding cheesiness, gross-out humor and cringe-inducing moments.

      Josephine Langford gives a warm and charismatic performance that breathes life into Zoey. She and Drew Starkey have palpable chemistry and have many small, cute moments together, i.e. when they play chess and when she watches him making breakfast pizza with eggs and bacon which she finds to be surprisingly delicious. In terms of production values, The Other Zoey is often brightly lit which does make it seem like a sitcom occasionally, but that's forgivable and not a systemic issue. The pace moves briskly enough, and the film doesn't overstay its welcome like too many romcoms these days. At 1 hour and 26 minutes, it's a breezy, witty and charming delight. If While You Were Sleeping and Isn't it Romantic? had a baby, it would look something like The Other Zoey.
  

      Leila (Layla Mohammadi), an Iranian-American young woman, visits her large family in New York City when her father (Bijan Daneshmand) needs a heart transplant. Tensions arise between her and her mother, Shireen (Niousha Noor), who's uncomfortable with her being a lesbian. Leila thinks that it's her fault that she and her ex-wife ended up divorced.

      The screenplay by writer/director Maryam Keshavarz blends comedy, drama, tragedy and whimsy with mixed results. Keshavarz relies too much on narration to tell the story and to get inside Leila and Shareen's heart, mind and soul which feels both lazy and clunky with too much over-explaining. She also uses flashbacks as a form of exposition to illuminate Leila and Shireen's childhood memories, some of which are traumatic and shapes who they are today. In one of the film's outrageously funny and awkward scenes, Leila gets pregnant, despite being a lesbian, when she sleeps with a guy (Tom Byrne) at a party who's playing Hedwig at a Hedwig and the Angry Inch musical. when Leila invites him over to dinner to meet her family, they call him ugly behind his back. Just when you think the film will turn into something along the lines of Meet the Parents or My Big Fat Greek Wedding, it adds subplots through flashbacks while shifting the narration from Leila to the Shireen (now played by Kamand Shafieisabet) during her childhood growing up in Iran. The screenplay's systemic issue is that it's overstuffed, undercooked and bites off more than it could chew. There are too many characters and too many different tones, but it feels convoluted and contrived. Leila's grandmother, Mamanjoon (Bella Warda), seems like she's a character straight out of a Farrely brothers' or Judd Apatow movie as she makes raunchy jokes about anal sex twice. She's more of a caricature than a fully-fleshed human being. Unfortunately, the very rushed third act does not earn its uplift and tries too hard to please the audience with a lively, upbeat song and dance number. The beats don't quite land when Leila and Shireen have major epiphanies. Their character arcs aren't very believable.

      The performances are fine with no one getting the chance to rise above the contrived, shallow and cheesy screenplay. The editing between the present day scenes and the flashbacks are awkward and distracting. At least the editing isn't as choppy as the overly-edited My Big Fat Greek Wedding 3 nor does the pace move too quickly. There's nothing exceptional about the production design or anything else that would have provided the film with some stylish visuals except for the dance number which feels like it belongs in a completely different film. At a running time of 1 hour and 47 minutes, The Persian Version is mildly engaging, sugar-coated, clunky and tonally uneven.
  

      When Wren (Nina Dobrev) begins to sense that she and her childhood friends, Laurel (Sherry Cola), Cece (Stephanie Koening), and Jill (Hayley Magnus), have been drifting apart, she lies to them that she has cancer. She befriends a young man, Leo (Brandon Mychal Smith), at a cancer support group.

      Based on the premise alone, writer/director Jennifer Cram grasps that comedy is deeply rooted in tragedy. Wren comes across as an emotionally immature, insecure and lonely hot mess. She gets drunk a lot and behaves childishly, so it comes as no surprise when she can't figure out a healthy way to get closer to her childhood friends. The synopsis for the film on Rotten Tomatoes inaccurately refers to Wren's lie as a white lie when it could be argued that it's not that at all because she does hurt other peoples' feelings by lying that she has cancer. She's too naïve to realize the consequences of her actions, especially when her friends start a fundraiser to raise money for her cancer treatment or when her parents, Fred (Dan Bakkedahl) and Carol (Wendi McLendon-Covey), express how offended they feel that she didn't tell them about having cancer when they show up to the fundraiser. It's not a small lie or white lie at all--it's not the same as lying to someone that they like their food. Moreover, Wren shows signs that she might be a compulsive liar, i.e. when she tells her doctor that she sought therapy which he correctly claims that she needs. He's the only voice of reason, but she doesn't even listen to him and has no shame in lying to him, too. Unfortunately, Sick Girl doesn't work as a psychological character study nor as a comedy. It's just as contrived and shallow as A Little White Lie that opened earlier this year. Wren's character arc doesn't feel organic enough, and the same can be said about her relationship with Leo. The wheels of the screenplay can be felt turning from start to finish which is not a sign because it means that none of the characters or their situations ring true. Moreover, the third act is preachy, corny and very rushed without earning its uplift. For a better film about an insecure young woman who's desperate for friends and lies as well, see Muriel's Wedding which humanizes its protagonist, Muriel, by showing that her insecurities and toxic behavior come from her toxic, narcissistic mother and father. Sick Girl is too busy trying to please the audience instead of exploring the origins of Wren's toxic behavior, so it essentially dehumanizes Wren as much as she dehumanizes herself.

      None of the actors or actresses manage to enliven the film with their comedic timing or charisma. Sherry Cola is much funnier in Joy Ride and Shortcomings; here, her role is wasted. Nina Dobrev gives a decent performance, but she's undermined by the witless and bland screenplay. There's little to no chemistry between her and Sherry Cola, Stephanie Koening, and Hayley Magus who portray Wren's childhood friends. The pace moves briskly, though, and too fast during the third act. At a running time of 1 hour and 39 minutes, which feels more like 2 hours, Sick Girl is a contrived, unfunny and undercooked blend of psychological character study and comedy. In a double feature with Muriel's Wedding, it would be the inferior B-movie.