There are so many striking moments, and Tiran’s performance is just so gosh darn terrific, that any hiccups that do arise are few and far between. Best of all, Wrona builds things to the type of shattering, emotionally catastrophic climax that lingers in the mind long after the curtain has closed, making Demon a paranormal descent into madness and mayhem that’s hauntingly good.

Unlike The Da Vinci Code, my opinion of Angels & Demons has actually improved over the years. The film is fluff, but it can be enjoyable fluff, and I do find lots to love about the first two-thirds. But the climax is an abomination, that hasn’t changed, and as such any goodwill that has developed in 2009 still hasn’t grown enough to make get the bad taste out of my mouth of those final 20 minutes.

My opinion of The Da Vinci Code has not improved over the last decade. If anything, watching it again I realized I was much too kind back in 2006, this movie a badly paced misfire that’s almost impossible to sit through start to finish. It just isn’t very good, and the fact it has now spawned two sequels over a ten year period is kind of astonishing if you ask me.

Blood Father really is pretty darn good. It just works, especially the second time around, Richet guiding Gibson to deliver one of his most soulful, knowingly raw performances of his entire career.

Distanced from all the whack-a-do online craziness, Ghostbusters does stand on its own, proving to be a very entertaining comedy anchored by four talented actresses each having a blast bringing this supernatural whirligig of a world to life.

Under the Shadow cannily uses a fairly standard, if also expertly staged, ghost story to obsess over a character-driven story arc involving issues of marriage, motherhood, religious fundamentalism and feminism in ways that feel raw, visceral and altogether groundbreaking.

The Birth of Nation is hitting theatres at just the right moment. While I’m not entirely certain the lessons of Turner’s rebellion are ones that should be applied now, it’s just as clear they should still be looked at and analyzed. Whether Parker, considering his own complicatedly sordid history, was the one to bring the story to the screen is an entirely different question, one that I don’t think any of us will feel comfortable answering for quite some time to come.

Moorhouse’s willingness to push the envelope and dive into the darkest aspects of the tale with such macabre relish allows the emotions swirling within this maelstrom to resonate all the deeper, The Dressmaker an haute couture Aussie barnburner that’s dressed to the dark comedy nines.

But it’s all for naught, and even with the unhinged lunacy of the climax proving to be a cringe-worthy force of unintentional, and uncomfortable, hysterics, The Girl on the Train is so leadenly paced and so blandly shot even its great moments sink underneath the surface like a lead balloon.