“Downhill” is a remake of Ruben Ostlund’s 2014 picture, “Force Majeure,” which took a darkly comedic look at the state of a troubled marriage attacked by a life-changing challenge of trust during a seemingly idyllic ski vacation. Ostlund had his laughs, but he was more interested in the fracture facing a seemingly settled couple, exploring the bonds and stasis of marriage, and the true nature of self-preservation. “Downhill” is more direct with its offerings of funny business, even bringing in stars Will Ferrell and Julia Louis-Dreyfus to butter up potentially rough characters with familiar mannerisms and delivery. There was no need to rework “Force Majeure,” but you already know that. The real surprise of the do-over is how much it misses the raw anxiety of the original, with co-writers/directors Nat Faxon and Jim Rash unsure what exactly they want out of the feature, veering wildly between silliness and stillness. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

As the Harvey Weinstein scandal continues to unfold through lawsuits and revelations, the situation has exposed a terrible reality about life in the entertainment business. It’s a professional descent that has the potential to provide untold wealth and power, but there’s a price paid for such submission, with “The Assistant” joining a handful of movies about the making of movies that endeavors to showcase the soul-flattening nature of the job. Writer/director Kitty Green captures the Weinstein Experience from a careful distance, avoiding direct immersion into predatory behavior to explore what it’s like on the outside, where moral choices have no place with specialized employment. “The Assistant” isn’t urgent, far from it at times, but it does generate an appreciation for the emotional toll of the titular position, especially when it’s in service of corrupt individuals and a protective industry. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

In 2017, Alexi Pappas teamed with Jeremy Teicher for “Tracktown,” which utilized her natural athletic abilities and experience in track to create an authentic understanding of sporting focus and emotional pains, with Pappas making a fine first impression with a lived-in performance and co-directing credit to preserve the long distance running mood. Pappas and Teicher reteam for “Olympic Dreams,” which offers a similar appreciation for the concerns of those who devote their lives to the pursuit of a sporting goal, but dials up the romantic near-miss confusion and some feel-goods while following two characters trying to get to know each other in a short amount of time, bonding during the 2018 PyeongChang Winter Olympics. Again aiming to execute a small movie with a big heart, Pappas and Teicher achieve most of their creative goals, crafting a gentle ride of new relationship excitement and heartache in the middle of a unique location for new love messiness. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Asta Philpot is a physically disabled man who, in 2006, decided to visit a legal brothel catering to men in wheelchairs, sharing his experience in a 2007 BBC documentary. His story was transformed into a 2011 Belgian film, which has now been remade for American audiences, with “Come As You Are” looking to provide a similar balance of comedy and drama, adding sensitivity when it comes to the topics of sexuality and the physically disabled. Director Richard Wong and screenwriter Erik Linthorst have the opportunity to go broad with the material, which invites a level of wackiness to help it compete in the crowded marketplace. Thankfully, they mostly avoid primary colors, endeavoring to remain respectful to the situation and attentive to the emotional nuances of the characters, creating a satisfying sit. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Co-writer/director Jeff Baena likes to make very strange movies. He’s the helmer of “Life After Beth” and “Joshy,” and made a particularly strong impression with 2017’s “The Little Hours,” a Middle Ages farce that managed to score with particularly tricky material and tone. Never one to turn down a challenge, Baena returns with “Horse Girl,” a picture that begins with quirk and comedy before getting deadly serious about the depths of mental illness. Naturally drawn to dark humor, Baena hopes to offer some type of entry point to the story, and he works well with star Allison Brie (who also scripts), giving her the space she needs to form a character living in the growing shadow of encroaching madness. It’s the second half of “Horse Girl” that loses rhythm and tension, finding the writing irritatingly light on detail when it comes time to submerge the lead character in complete insanity. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

It’s Valentine’s Day weekend, and writer/director Stella Meghie has been tasked with providing some romantic warmth for moviegoers seeking a little tenderness. The helmer of "Everything, Everything," Meghie goes very soft with “The Photograph,” a new-love viewing experience that’s buttressed by melodrama and staring contests from lead actors Issa Rae and LaKeith Stanfield. The picture pushes a fairly safe sense of PG-13 sensuality and conflict, and while the actors are game to follow Meghie’s slow dance style of filmmaking, they can’t bring the feature any sense of urgency. The jazzy mood and delayed response tends to make “The Photograph” sleepy, which does little to pull viewers in tightly with the story’s blend of relationship worry, sexual response, and generational influence. Read the rest at Bu-ray.com

While it wasn’t a fan favorite, 2016’s “Suicide Squad” managed to make a lot of money and introduce the villainous character Harley Quinn to the D.C. Extended Universe, giving the faithful a ray of psychotic light in the midst of a dreary, confused mess. Sensing a breakout character, the powers that be have awarded Quinn her own movie, put in charge of assembling a different type of vigilante squad in “Birds of Prey,” which transforms a once dangerous character into an antihero for maximum box office potential. Edges have been sanded down to give Quinn her close-up, and there’s potential in the material’s vision for teamwork, but “Birds of Prey” isn’t really all that different from “Suicide Squad,” offering a slightly more appealing heap of half-realized characters, hand-holding narration, and repetitive action. It’s certainly colorful with a passable female POV, but whatever the picture was during its scripting phase has not made it to the final cut. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

In 2015, writer/directors Veronika Franz and Severin Fiala made a wonderfully unsettling debut with their first feature-length effort, “Goodnight Mommy.” It was spare work, but unnerving, creating an enjoyable nightmare that suffered some pacing issues, but managed to sink its talons into the audience. “The Lodge” is their long-overdue follow-up, which returns the duo to the realm of slow-burn horror, which is all the rage these days, embarking on a mission of psychological distortion with their endeavor, which examines the stains of trauma as a family spends the Christmas holiday in a remote dwelling. Much like “Goodnight Mommy,” “The Lodge” is in no hurry to get anywhere, and while such persistent delay ultimately does damage to the movie’s overall effectiveness as a chiller, it remains clear that Franz and Fiala are gifted genre craftspeople, looking to make ticket-buyers feel the pressure of doomsday without fully explaining what’s coming for them. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Elijah Wood has been working very hard in recent years to become an interesting actor. He’s selected projects for himself that’ve managed to showcase different sides to his personality and capability, and his interest in the dark stuff (extending to producing duties on “Color Out of Space” and “Daniel Isn’t Real”) has largely paid off. “Come to Daddy” continues Wood’s fondness for unexpected cinema, starring in a dark comedy that opens as a family reunion tale and climaxes at a motel swinger meet-up, and somewhere in the middle there’s a lock-picking scene with a fecal matter-covered pen. Director Ant Timpson works extra hard to make a simple idea expand into dozens of odd scenes, and while the picture runs out of steam long before it ends, there’s a special weirdness to “Come to Daddy” that keeps it gripping and intermittently amusing. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com