The Shape of Water

Del Toro advances from Pans to buckets in this super saturated surrealist romance. His foreign perspective only enriches this alarmingly deep dive into American culture of the early 60s, and Hawkins’ emotionally loud performance patches plot-holes to ensure that ludicrous elements still hold water and Abe Piscine can swim spectacularly.

Hidden Figures

Candy-coated historical fairytale about the time we solved racism. True story is fascinating and worth telling but it struggles to reach orbit while bearing the weight of trying to be so universally likeable. Everyone gets what they want and everyone learns a math lesson: Inhumanly flawless people = adversity overcome.

Zootopia

Perfect parallel to human world with incisive social satire and powerful political points. Brilliantly bold comedy and criticism intertwine in a film that plays like the social supplement to the internal Inside Out. Cleverly avoids specificity in allegory to broadly criticize bigotry (and smallotry) rather than attacking a specific group.