The Outsiders (1983)

 

The rivalry between two gangs, the poor Greasers and the rich Socs, only heats up when one gang member kills a member of the other.

From memory: Odd, not quite satisfying melodrama about troubled teenagers (with a remarkable cast of some young up-and-coming stars) does a good job conveying juvenile life and behaviour, but the artificiality of the settings are quite off-putting.

Halliwell (no star): "Oddball youth melodrama, a curious choice for a director with big successes behind him."

Maltin**1/2: "Florid, highly stylized...Ambitious film evokes GWTW and '50s melodramas..., but never quite connects, despite powerful moments." 

The Dead Don't Die (2019)

 

The peaceful town of Centerville finds itself battling a zombie horde as the dead start rising from their graves. 

Zombie (and doomsday) comedy is meant as a satire to present-day U.S.A., which works only intermittently, but it entertains with a lot of wit, Murray's and Driver's deadpan and a lot of amusing cameos.

The Book of Eli (2010)

A lone man fights his way across America in order to protect a sacred book that holds the secrets to saving humankind.

Stylish and entertaining post-apocalyptic drama plays out like a spaghetti Western with Washington as the taciturn hero and Oldman as the sophisticated villain; big let-down when it's revealed what the "sacred book" is...

Maltin**1/2: "Washington does his best Clint Eastwood in this violent but entertaining postapocalyptic tale...Taking the "end of days" genre and wrapping it in the guise of a Sergio Leone spaghetti Western, the Hughes brothers create a lurid guilty pleasure, with a "message" thrown in for good measure."

The Ballad of Buster Scruggs (2018)

An anthology film comprised of six stories, each dealing with a different aspect of life in the Old West.

The Coen Bros. actually make it work it: the often maligned anthology film; each episodes ups the ante from macabre satire to intense drama, brilliantly conceived, perfectly cast, and with wonderful cinematography.

The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus (2009)

A traveling theater company gives its audience much more than they were expecting.

A fantasy with some spectacular visuals and an adequate star cast, but the coherence of the story is often shattered into bits which makes it difficult to follow and creates tedium.

Maltin**1/2: "Visually impressive metaphoric muddle offers colorful set pieces, if not a fully satisfying  story. Ledger died during production, so Depp, Law, and Farrell play his alter egos on the other side of the mirror - a conceit that actually works to the film's benefit."