But there are cracks in the façade, and at a certain point no amount of directorial embellishment can mask them. David and Alex Pastor’s (The Last Days, Carriers) script gets sillier and sillier as it moves along, building to bursts of outright stupidity that are almost laughable in their outlandish lunacy.

That’s not hyperbole, either. Kidman nearly elevates this film to something essential almost entirely on her own. This is a magnetic, impossibly complex star turn that comes close to being one of the Oscar-winner’s best, and truly the only reason I’m talking about [Strangerland] at all is entirely thanks to her.

Anchored by a stupendous, marvelously intricate performance from its star, [Gemma Bovery] is a sprightly, introspectively fearless wonder that goes to some pretty dark places yet does so with a somewhat surprising amount of levity. It’s an odd amalgamation of comedy, drama and tragedy all melded into one gleefully anarchic whole, and as such it’s a joy to watch opening frame to last.

But for those who do like this type of thing, who are open to all its icky, sticky, gruesomely sadistic, blood-slathered charms, Diez has done a nice job of giving Aresty’s script life. [Stung] builds well, has some superb set pieces and offers up a relatively winning climax I was perfectly satisfied with.

[Magic Mike XXL] is a blast, an animated shot of bare-chested adrenaline that’s easy to drink and even more satisfying to savor, the sequel stripping inhibitions to the point they vanish leaving only pleasure behind.

But in the pursuit of setting up a new world, as well as planting the seeds for future sequels, the filmmakers fail to construct a self-contained story worthy of an audience’s attentions let alone their emotional investment. It’s a robotic descent into Hollywood financed, corporate-driven stupidity, diluting a once powerful franchise to a place it had yet to travel to until now: irrelevance.

The film falls off a gigantic cliff during its final act, melodramatically and clumsily throwing down an obnoxious and unnecessary flashback that undercuts all of the beautiful work Winslet, Schoenaerts and Rickman had delivered up to that point.

The Australian import The Little Death is a suburban sex comedy that’s too tame to make much of an impact yet also just icky enough at times to border on repugnance…[It’s] prone to introducing a clever gag only to beat it into the ground until it’s no longer of value, oftentimes forgetting less is more especially as it pertains to eliciting laughter from the audience.

What’s interesting is that, as crazy as that destination might be, as thought-provoking as elements might become, it’s the stuff that happens long before the denouement that gives this Sundance and Seattle International Film Festival favorite its memorable staying power.