Justin Chang

For all its good intentions, Jojo Rabbit comes across painfully one-note as comedy, bogus and manipulative as drama and with an archly whimsical visual style that feels like imitation Wes Anderson.

Bong Joon-ho's brilliant new movie packs the kinds of stunning, multi-layered surprises that deserve to be experienced as fresh as possible. I'll tread as cautiously as I can, but suffice to say that Parasite is a darkly comic thriller about two families: the Parks, who are very rich, and the Kims, who are very poor.

Joaquin Phoenix renders the iconic villain on an intimate, human scale in Joker, a disturbing film about one man's psychological destruction and a city's descent into criminal anarchy.

Film critic Justin Chang reviews the new biopic about Judy Garland during the final years of her life.

Brad Pitt is an astronaut who saves the world by traveling millions of miles to reunite with his long-absent dad. It's an unabashedly ridiculous premise, but somehow Ad Astra manages to pull it off.

'Brittany Runs a Marathon' is the first film written and directed by playwright Paul Downs Colaizzo and it stars Jillian Bell as a hard-partying woman who signs up for the New York City Marathon. Justin Chang reviews it.

Film critic Justin Chang reviews the new film by director Richard Linklater, starring Cate Blanchette.

The title character in the coolly engrossing new movie Luce is a high school student who seems exemplary from every angle. Played in a remarkable performance by Kelvin Harrison Jr., Luce Edgar is handsome and popular, an academic and athletic star who gives inspiring speeches at school assemblies. You wouldn't guess that Luce spent his early years as a child soldier in the war-torn country of Eritrea, a trauma that he's clearly worked hard to overcome with the help of his adoptive parents, played by Naomi Watts and Tim Roth, whom he lives with in Arlington, Va.

Film critic Justin Chang reviews the new Quentin Tarantino film One Upon a Time in Hollywood.

The best scene in Disney's incredibly photo-realistic remake of The Lion King features a computer-generated beetle rolling a ball of computer-generated dung across a computer-generated African landscape. It might sound mundane, but this particular ball of dung is carrying a tuft of fur from the runaway lion Simba, and its eventual discovery will renew hope that the rightful king of the savanna is alive and well. It's a funny, touching reminder that in the circle of life, every little creature and every lump of waste has an important role to play.