Love is the great human adventure but it is also the great human conundrum, which is why it drives us crazy. And also by there are so many stories, songs, paintings, novels, and theories about it. We all want it. And we are all terrified about being vulnerable enough to accept it, knowing we might come to depend on it and then lose it. And that presents itself in the core conflict. We want to be loved, which means being known. But if we allow ourselves to be known, we understand that we might scare off the very person we most want to love us. That is the precipice of intimacy that is very seldom . And that is the subject of “The Drama,” which has the courage to take on this conflict. It just doesn’t do a very good job. It’s non-stop cringe.

It’s also the kind of movie actors like to be in because it presents them with some very intriguing acting challenges, and if you can handle the cringe, you will appreciate the performances. They are as excellent as we would expect from four of the best young actors working today.

The movie begins with a close-up of a very pretty ear. It belongs to Emma (Zendaya), who is reading a novel in a coffee shop. She has an earbud in the other ear. Charlie (Robert Pattinson) wants to find a way to talk to her, so he quickly looks up her book on GoodReads so he can pretend he read it. She does not respond. He thinks he’s blown it. But she did not hear him. She is deaf in that other ear. She encourages him to try again. And she forgives him on their first date when he has to confess that he never read the book.

That’s a flashback. In the movie’s present time, it is just a couple of days before their wedding and they are working on the speeches they will make after the ceremony, explaining what they love most about each other. Charlie is getting some help from his best man, Mike (Mamoudou Athie). Everything seems all set for happily ever after.

But then, at a tasting dinner with Mike and his wife, Rachel (Alaina Haim), who is Emma’s maid of honor, they all get a little tipsy (“This isn’t a bar,” the caterer mutters), and everyone makes the first of a series of excruciatingly painful mistakes. They decide they should each tell the story of the worst thing they ever did. And Emma’s is so shocking to the other three that it shatters their understanding of their relationship. Charlie starts to panic. He pesters Emma with questions, not trying so much to understand as he is to find a way to feel better about making a lifetime commitment. There’s a certain amount of projectile vomiting. And some more mistakes that just make things worse.

Some viewers may think Charlie should be concerned about another of Emma’s actions, one happening in the present, more concerning than the one from her mid-teens she picked as her worst. She makes a decision based on questionable evidence and without regard for the consequences. But the script makes this seem more like a distraction than a central counterpoint to the theme.

As noted, the performances are outstanding. In one scene, just after the big reveal, the couple are posing for the wedding photographer and it is an acting class to watch the hesitations and performative re-enactments of their pre-reveal comfort with each other. Their scenes together have an electricity beyond what the script intends. Athie understands the subtlety of Mike’s internal struggle to make everyone to get along, Hailey Benton Gates gives a vivid but layered performance as Charlie’s colleague, who tries to find a way to respond to Charlie’s inappropriate hypothetical as a subordinate who socializes with him (she and her plus one are wedding guests).

There are some sharp moments in the script but it is not up to the level of the settings, the score by Daniel Pemberton, or the performances. There’s not enough substance and way too much cringe.

Parents should know that this movie includes very disturbing content and references to school shootings. Characters use strong and crude language, drink, and use drugs, there are sexual references and explicit situations,

Family discussion: What would you have done if you were Emma? If you were Charlie? What will happen next?

If you like this, try: “Bad Sabbath” and “The Trouble with Jessica”

Fair warning. I have never played Super Mario and have only the slightest acquaintance with his world and characters. For me, the best part of the film was hearing the appreciative laughs and gasps of the fans in the theater who were very happy to recognize their favorite elements and anticipate how they would fit into the story.

The story, of course is the issue when a game becomes a film. Instead of the interaction a player has with a game, we need a narrative that puts the story where the game-y parts go. And on that basis, at least to a newbie, like the first one, “The Super Mario Galaxy Movie” does pretty well.

Rosalina (Brie Larson) is the devoted adoptive mother of the sweet, star-like Lumas, and watcher of the cosmos. They love her bedtime stories about the plumbers Mario (Chris Pratt) and Luigi (Charlie Day), who rescue Princess Peach (Anya Taylor-Joy).

And then a giant robot attacks and it is Rosalina who has to be rescued. She fights back fiercely until one of her star babies is in peril, and they are both captured by Bowser Jr. (Benny Safdie), son of Bowser (Jack Black), who was defeated and shrunk down to dollhouse size in the last episode. Bowser Jr. is determines to avenge his father: “From the ashes of his defeat rises a new emperor.”

Princess Peach is having a birthday celebration, but she is sitting alone. Mario arrives to give her a gift, a pretty pink parasol, and she tells him it is not her birthday but the anniversary of the day the mushroom people found her. She wishes she could find her family of origin.

All of this will come together, along with many other Super Mario characters and settings (and in-jokes) all very colorful and more silly than scary. Mario, Luigi, and Princess Peach are joined by Yoshi (Donald Glover) and by Bowser Sr., who gets his size back, improves his anger management, and joins the good guys, at least until he is reunited with his son.

Is it essentially an informercial for the games and merch? Of course it is. But is is good-hearted and colorful, and has genuine affection for the fans.

Parents should know that this film includes extended cartoon fantasy-style peril and violence. The issues of adoption and family separation are gently handled but may be upsetting for some children.

Family discussion: Should Mario and Luigi have believed Bowser when he promised to help them? Which version of Super Mario is your favorite?

If you like this, try: the games and the first film

NOTE: Stay ALL the way to the end for an extra scene

There’s a small genre of films I call “cheerfully nasty.” This is an ultra-violent story of hard-core featuring a time-traveling criminal who, between shoot-outs, has a serious conversation with his colleagues about whether Jess, Dean, or Logan is the best boyfriend for Rory. If you don’t know and appreciate that these are casual murderers who have all watched every episode of “The Gilmore Girls,” this may not be for you. But for the right audience, it is a hoot. It has a terrific cast, some delightfully deadpan dialogue, a bunch of great needle-drop songs, some surprising twists throughout, even a post-credit scene with one more.

It opens with Billy Joel’s “Why Should I Worry?” from the 1988 animated film “Oliver & Company” perhaps a nod to another movie with an ampersand in the tile. Symon (Ben Schwartz), a nerdy-looking guy in a garage filled with tech equipment is bopping along as he is doing something techy. Then someone shows up and shoots him. We will find out what been cooking up in that lab and we will see the nerdy guy again in a flashback.

The first of a series of chapter titles tells us we are at: “The Party.” It’s a welcome home party for Jimmy Boy (Jimmy Tatro), back from service a prison term. The host is his devoted father, Sosa (Keith David), the local crime kingpin. Sosa jovially welcomes the crowd, but lets them know that the person who framed Jimmy Boy will be dealt with.

Nick (Vince Vaughn) and Mike (James Marsden) are part of Sosa’s crime family. They leave the party to drive to a house, and Nick tells Mike to use a chloroformed handkerchief to knock out the person who answers the door. But when he gets to the door, the person who opens it is — Nick. It turns out that there are two Nicks, one from the present and the one in the car, who is used a time machine invented by Symon a few months in the future to go back in time and prevent Mike from being murdered by an assassin. Sosa believes Mike is the one who framed Jimmy and has sent a very scary hit man who solves the murderer’s biggest problem — disposing of the body — by eating them. Yes, he’s a cannibal assassin.

Another complication: Mike is having an affair with Nick’s estranged wife, Alice (Eiza González).

This is a top-notch cast, and every one of them gets the delicate balance of tone right on the button, keeping the energy of each scene high while they stay matter-of-fact in the most outlandish circumstances and handling the most outlandish dialogue with hilarious understatement. These are all awful people, but some of them are less awful and being funny about all the madness helps keep us on their side.

NOTE: Stay through the credits for an extra scene.

Parents should know that this is a very violent film about criminals who kill without any hesitation. There are many fights and shoot-outs with guns, grenades, and whatever blunt objects are at hand, as well as a cannibal assassin, with graphic and disturbing images. It also includes sexual references, nudity, and non-explicit situations with strippers, prostitutes, and references to impotence. Characters use constant strong language.

Family discussion: If you found a time machine, where would you go?

If you like this, try: “Mr. Right,” “Boss Level,” and “Shoot-Em-Up”

“Fantasy Life” is the story of people in their 30s-50s who are struggling with the kinds of mental health challenges that often accompany or exacerbate mid-life concerns. They do not have money problems, but they have problems of purpose, confidence, loneliness, and feeling that they don’t know how to get what they want out of life. There are chapter titles letting us know what season we’re in. But it feels more unfinished than episodic, as though it could have used one more draft. That may be a reflection of having one person serving as writer, director, and star.

Matthew Shear stars in “Fantasy Life” as Sam, a law school dropout struggling with intrusive thoughts, possible OCD, and panic attacks. In the first minute of the film, he is fired from some kind of file clerk job. And then, he has a panic attack at a bookstore, falls, and gets a cut on his forehead.

We quickly see that he may be lost, but he is a nice guy. At the bookstore, he offers to buy the woman who offers him her thermos. With his therapist, Fred (Judd Hirsch, triggering memories of “Ordinary People”), he apologizes for his “internalized anti-Semitism,” ugly and disturbing thoughts that come to his mind.

And then Fred’s receptionist, Helen (Andrea Martin), who is also his wife, asks Sam if he can do an emergency babysitting job for her three young granddaughters, the children of her son, David (Alessandro Nivola) and his wife Dianne (Amanda Peet). Sam knows that is unorthodox, and possibly inappropriate. But Helen reassures him that it must be okay because they know his family, and, some faint praise, “you’re functional.”

Because he is a pleaser and because he has nothing else to do, he agrees. David gives him a few brisk instructions and rushes out to fill in for an ailing guitar player in a band. And Sam becomes the family’s “Manny,” but he doesn’t like that term.

Dianne is an actress, but she has not worked in many years and is worried that she is too old to get a job. She and Sam become friendly. And David is invited to go on tour with the band.

Shear makes some interesting choices as a director. The sea-green colors in the most significant interiors give us the sense that the adult characters feel like they are under water. In his first evening with the girls, and then again when he is with Dianne, they are framed sitting on a long sofa, looking at us in the audience, where the television would be. But by far his best choice was in casting. Every role is superbly performed. Amanda Peet, who seldom gets a chance to show us the depth of her talent, is breathtaking in every scene as Dianne, an actress who does not know who she is without the kinds of roles that depend on youth and beauty. Nivola shows us that David may be selfish but it is because he is scared and angry that he may not have a chance to be the musician he wants to be. Their scenes together are wrenching because we see that they seem to have forgotten how to connect, how to share their very similar mid-life fears, how not to hurt each other. Jessica Harper, Bob Balaban, and Zosia Mamet make strong impressions in small roles.

The storytelling has some gaps, not just in time but in the kind of information we want to have. At one point, it seems like commentary on the prevalence of psychopharmacology in treating anxiety and depression, and whether that prevents patients from making progress on their issues. At another point, it seems like a commentary on the existential questions of mid-life. but it limits our sympathy for the characters that they come across as spoiled and self-indulgent. What makes it worth seeing is Peet and the other performers, as well as the chance to see a first film from Shear, who deserves a second one.

Parents should know that this film has strong and crude language, characters with mental health challenges, family confrontations, and sexual references including accusations of adultery. Characters drink, including drinking to excess and drinking to numb feelings, and there is brief drug use.

Family discussion: Was Sam a good nanny? Why didn’t Dianne want to film her audition?

If you like this, try: “While We’re Young”

“Project Hail Mary” is everything we hope for in a movie, filled with intelligence, humor, heart, and hope. It also has one of the rarest of qualities in a movie: genuine joy.

If we are going to spend much of the run-time with one actor, there couldn’t be a better choice than Ryan Gosling, who is a quintessential American boy-you-wish-lived-next-door hero, with self-deprecating humor, and the superpower of the scientist trifecta: boundless curiosity, problem-solving skill, and extensive knowledge of the physical properties and the organic world. Those three qualities overlap and enhance each other. If curiosity is your foundational mode of thought, there is no room for fear. And knowledge and not panicking help a lot with problem-solving.

Gosling plays an unassuming middle school science teacher named Ryland Grace. In a brief classroom scene we learn two things. First, he loves teaching and inspires his students. Second, as the students ask him questions about rumors and bits of news reports they’ve heard, there may be an existential threat in some changes to the sun. He does his best to answer honestly but reassuringly. And then, as he is about to ride home on his bicycle, he is quasi-Shanghaied by some mysterious but official-looking people. They are the ones monitoring the dimming of the sun and trying to figure out what is going on and how to stop it. The leader of this initiative is Eva Stratt (Sandra Hüller), perhaps selected for this role because of her ability to move forward, eliminating every consideration except whatever it takes to keep the planet alive.

Hüller and Gosling play very well off of each other as the resolute Stratt and the amiably goofy Grace. The middle school math teacher has a degree in molecular biology and was tossed out of academia for a theory that was so far outside of conventional belief it was considered not scientifically valid.

It is his openness to think outside conventional belief that makes him immediately valuable to Stratt. And eventually we will learn how that led to his being sent on an interstellar mission to find out why just one star has not been affected or infected and what that means for saving our sun. A karaoke scene where Stratt sings Harry Styles’ “Sign of the Times” brings them together for a brief respite from the overwhelming existential threat; it is a pivot point at the heart of the story.

Information about the past is revealed to us as Grace remembers it in pieces. He has been in an induced coma as he traveled through space. The other members of the crew have died. But he is not alone for long. He meets an alien who is there for the same purpose. They find a way to communicate, and they work together to save the stars.

The alien, a sort of spider-looking creature who looks like he/she/it/they is/are made out of rocks and so nicknamed Rocky, is utterly endearing to Grace and to us. They manage to create a translation program so they can communicate but it helps a lot that for both of them their first language is science. Numbers and molecules and physics are the same in any language, even when the words for them are different. And, as Grace says, if his puny human brain does not understand what Rocky wants to say, Rocky uses his masterful construction skills to make little puppet figures to show Grace what he means.

They do have their adjustment problems. There is a scene that could be a sci-fi version of “The Odd Couple.” But the friendship that develops between them is immensely touching and the way they think through their challenges is hugely satisfying.

The production design by Charles Wood and special effects by a huge team are stunning. Directors Phil Lord and Christopher Miller are the brains and heart behind some of the funniest, smartest and most joyfully buoyant animated films of the past two decades, including “Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs,” the “Spider-Verse” films, and “The LEGO Movie.” Their visual imaginations are witty, accessible, and thrilling. The score by Daniel Pemberton is excellent. And costume designers David Crossman and Glyn Dillon deserve a special award for Grace’s sweater, t-shirts, and glasses, which achieve the near-impossible in making Ryan Gosling look even more adorable and yet relatably human than we imagined.

Gosling contributes a lot to that as well, of course. He makes Grace just a little shrubby, but heroic in a way he does not realize. When he remembers something about his past near the end, when he is faced with a dire moral dilemma, when he finds a connection to Rocky that is more meaningful than any he has ever had before and realizes that connection is as important to saving both their planets as all the science and engineering they can draw on. Gosling does not just show us what Grace is feeling; he makes us feel it, too. His comic timing is impeccable, and he is just as good at the drama, the fear, and the adventure.

I do this job because in my heart I believe that movies are the culmination of every art form imagined by humans, the greatest story-telling mechanism ever developed. “Project Hail Mary” makes use of every part of that story-telling capacity, a film that makes us feel good about the characters, about the people who devoted all of their skill to making it, and about being human.

Parents should know that this movie is about a threat that could destroy all life on Earth. Characters are in peril and some are killed. There is some mild languages and references to bodies and characters drink alcohol.

Family discussion: If you woke up in a spaceship, what is the first thing you would do? If you met Rocky what questions would you ask?

If you like this, try; the book by Andy Weir and the book and movie of “The Martian“