Justin Chang

Director Marielle Heller's new film, starring Tom Hanks, casts a spell with the lightest of touches. Drop your skepticism; this film feels like an encounter with Fred Rogers himself.

The emotionally turbulent drama Waves revolves around an African American family living in South Florida, and I mean "revolves" quite literally. In an early scene, the camera swivels a full 360 degrees around the inside of a car, as a teenager named Tyler Williams and his girlfriend, Alexis, drive along the oceanfront.

No one outside a marriage can know the truth of it, but actors Adam Driver and Scarlett Johansson bring the audience awfully close in Noah Baumbach's devastating drama about splitting up.