Life comes at you pretty fast, a wise man once said, and that’s especially true for filmgoers during the holiday season. In addition to all the seasonal hubbub, there’s an onslaught of year-end cash cows or award contenders to make headway against. This year’s buffet is a well-balanced one, with options for a range of dietary preferences, and a remarkably tasty one, with Oscar bait nestled against elevated versions of more standard fare. That said, it’s a remarkably Caucasian quartet of new films, each one a story about white people with problems. If you’re looking for differently hued protagonists, your options are blue (Avatar: Fire and Ash) or yellow (The SpongeBob Movie: Search for SquarePants).

Marty Mauser’s problem in Marty Supreme is that nobody takes him seriously. Toiling away at his uncle’s shoe store in 1953 Brooklyn, Marty (Timothée Chalamet) dreams of table tennis greatness. Why table tennis? He’s convinced it’ll be the next big sport to sweep America. Why Marty? Because somebody’s got to be the best, and it might as well be him. The only thing standing in his way is the rest of the world. Marty Supreme is a portrait of a paragon of persistence, someone who knows he can get to the top through sheer force of will, and that anyone who disagrees is a fucking idiot. Sorry, Marty’s habit of escalating a conversation into something inappropriate, a habit that allows us brief glimpses at the sociopath he is, must be contagious.

In its opening scenes, Marty sneaks into the shoe store’s back room with Rachel (Odeassa A’zion), a married neighbor, for a quick lay. Then the movie’s credits play over scenes of sperm wiggling their way along, one of them managing to penetrate a giant ovum. This is what’s known in the business as “foreshadowing.” After stealing the money his boss owes him to get across the ocean to the British Open of table tennis, he begins his rise to ping-pong prominence and meets another married woman, the American movie star Kay Stone (Gwyneth Paltrow, in her first significant big-screen role since 2015—remember Mortdecai?). Marty’s sheer chutzpah transcends the decades of age difference and they end up a clandestine item even as this galaxy-brained Horatio Alger insinuates himself into her husband’s business life. I didn’t recognize the guy, but apparently he’s played by Kevin O’Leary, the host of TV’s Shark Tank.

Marty’s meteoric ascent won’t last forever, and his Icarian downfall eventually brings him back home, where he discovers the best cure for narcissism known to humanity. His arc is novelistic, and Chalamet embodies him in a performance that’s his deepest and most complicated yet. If he had played this part a few years ago, I suspect the character would have come off as a mischievous gremlin, a testament to American (specifically Jewish-American) can-do, rather than the darker, but still sympathetic, figure he is here. Josh Safdie makes his solo feature directing debut after splitting with brother Benny (whose The Smashing Machine came out a couple months back), and it has the nervous energy and magnetic lead of their last collaboration, Uncut Gems. But it’s also a less claustrophobic, more ambivalent movie, with an amazing supporting cast (Tyler, the Creator, Abel Ferrara [!], Penn Jillette [!!]) there isn’t room to get into here. (Opens Dec. 24 at multiple locations)

Nina Winchester’s problem in The Housemaid is that it’s hard to find good help these days. Not that she seems to need it, at first glance. Nina (Amanda Seyfried) has a cartoonishly hot and perfect husband (the perfectly bland Brandon Sklenar), a giant McMansion, and an adorable if petulant young daughter, Cece (Indiana Elle). But she hires Millie Calloway (Sydeny Sweeney) to be the family’s domestic helpmeet. Millie’s stunned—we soon learn that she’s got a criminal past and has been living out of her car, so her references are not impeccable. But she takes to the gig, even after Nina’s emotional outbursts make it clear there’s something going on behind this picture-perfect familial façade. Rebecca Sonnenshine, drawing on the sense of melodrama and the absurd that she honed writing for TV’s The Vampire Diaries and The Boys, smartly adapts the best-selling 2022 book by Freida McFadden, and director Paul Feig (A Simple Favor and, once upon a time, Freaks and Geeks) gives the proceedings a tongue-in-cheek sheen that thankfully stops short of trying to be camp.

But this is fully Seyfried’s and Sweeney’s show. It’s no surprise that the former knows this terrain, since Seyfried has been moving easily between mainstream melodrama and artier fare her whole career. (For more proof, check her out in The Testament of Ann Lee, opening here in mid-January.) Sweeney’s the wild card, one who, despite being slammed as mere eye candy, has been terrible in fluffier films such as Anyone but You and impressive in offbeat stuff like Immaculate and, admittedly less so, Christy. Here she seems just in on the joke enough, playing a character who, if they possessed a modicum of wits, would bail on this whole situation. But where would be the fun in that? Things do get grim and grimy as The Housemaid hurtles through its various reversals and reveals, but it never ceases to entertain. (Opens Dec. 19 at multiple locations)

Alex Novak’s problem in Is This Thing On? is that he’s divorced. It’s not that the breakup between Alex (Will Arnett) and his now-ex Tess (Laura Dern) was especially traumatic or sudden, or that there was some sort of custody battle over their two young sons. But the state of being divorced seems to have sapped him of something, something that can’t easily be put into words. Unless, that is, he stands on a stage and says them to strangers. The hook of Bradley Cooper’s third film as director straddles the line between inspirational hokum that indulges “sad dad” tropes and genuinely moving dramedy of (potential re-) marriage. Out of nowhere, Alex signs up for an open mic night at the Comedy Cellar, Greenwich Village’s landmark stand-up club. The experience is therapeutic, and the tribe of comics he’s eventually initiated into becomes a second (or now, first?) family.

The onstage bits are where Arnett’s sharply self-deprecating persona comes in most handy, but he’s credible in the movie’s more vulnerable moments as well. (Side note: it’s great to see the SmartLess boys indulging their darker, more serious sides the way Arnett does here and Jason Bateman has in Ozark and Black Rabbit, but can we get today’s version of Game Night or even Blades of Glory sometime soon? Sean Hayes can have a glorified cameo in it, as he does here alongside his husband Scott Icenogle.) Dern has the tougher job as the ex-wife, but she’s more than up to the task, and Cooper’s smart enough to let his actors do their thing. Far less grandiose than his previous films, A Star is Born and Maestro, it examines the interaction between creative expression and personal trauma on a smaller, still compelling scale. (Opens Jan. 9 at Living Room Theaters)

Mike Sardina’s problem in Song Sung Blue is that he might not get to spend the rest of his life with the woman he loves. Well, that and the fact that not enough people take Neil Diamond seriously. The most unexpectedly triumphant of this white Christmas quartet looks at first (and in the trailer) like a feel-good story about a scrappy couple who form a Neil Diamond tribute act in 1980s Wisconsin. It is that, but one that delivers the sort of narrative shocks and emotional impact that can only come from a fact-based tale and a pair of committed performers like Hugh Jackman and Kate Hudson. Mike (Jackman), a divorced, middle-aged dude trying to create an onstage rock ‘n’ roll identity called “Lightning,” meets Claire Stingl (Hudson), who does a Patsy Cline act, at a Wisconsin State Fair performance alongside an ersatz Buddy Holly, James Brown, and others. There’s immediate chemistry between them, and at her suggestion he takes advantage of his vague resemblance to start covering Neil Diamond tunes. Before you can say “hands…touching hands,” they’re madly in love and performing together as “Lightning & Thunder.”

A surreal high point comes when Mike receives a call out of the blue from Pearl Jam singer Eddie Vedder asking the duo to open for the band at their Milwaukee show. But [spoiler alert] tragedy strikes with astonishing suddenness, presenting challenges that can’t be overcome with music alone. Turns out it can help, though. Director Craig Brewer (Hustle & Flow) knows how to capture music performance on film, and the star’s vocal skills let him do so with authenticity and no need for creative editing. Hudson in particular delivers an award-caliber performance, and is completely believable as a cheesehead hairdresser. Song Sung Blue works because it never once indulges in irony or condescends to its characters or its audience. Whether you’re a Diamondhead (is that the term?) or not, it’s a hit. (Opens Dec. 25 at multiple locations)

Also this week

Deathstalker: Special-effects maestro Steven Kostanski directs this faithful remake of the 1983 sword-and-sorcery B-movie epic. (Hollywood; 12/21)

Also opening

Anaconda: “A group of friends (including Jack Black and Paul Rudd) are going through a mid-life crisis. They decide to remake a favorite movie from their youth but encounter unexpected events when they enter the jungle.” (opens Dec. 25, multiple locations)

Avatar: Fire and Ash: “Jake and Neytiri’s family grapples with grief after Neteyam’s death, encountering a new, aggressive Na’vi tribe, the Ash People, who are led by the fiery Varang, as the conflict on Pandora escalates and a new moral focus emerges.” (multiple locations)

Mistress Dispeller: “A Chinese woman hires someone to secretly end her husband’s extramarital relationship in an attempt to save her marriage.” (Living Room Theaters)

The SpongeBob Movie: Search for SquarePants: “SpongeBob journeys to the ocean’s depths to face the Flying Dutchman’s ghost, encountering challenges and uncovering marine mysteries.” (multiple locations)

Repertory

Friday 12/19

• The Brood [1979] (Hollywood)
• Christmas Evil [1980] (Academy; through 12/25)
• Don’t Open till Christmas [1984] (Cinemagic)
• Elf [2003] (Academy; through 12/25)
• It’s a Wonderful Life [1946] (Kiggins; through 12/24)
• Lethal Weapon [1987] (Academy; through 12/25)
• Pee-Wee’s Playhouse Christmas Special [1988] (Tomorrow)
• Santa With Muscles [1996] (Cinemagic)
• Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me [1992] (Clinton; also 12/20, Sheryl Lee and Ray Wise in attendance)
• White Christmas [1954] (Kiggins; through 12/24)

Saturday 12/20

• All the Marbles [1981] (Hollywood)
• “Christmas in Space” (Hollywood)
• It’s a Wonderful Life [1946] (Hollywood; also 12/21)
• The Mastermind [2025] (Tomorrow)
• The Muppet Christmas Carol [1992] (Salem; Tomorrow)

Sunday 12/21

• Elf [2003] (Cinemagic; through 12/23)
• Good Night, and Good Luck [2005] (Clinton, Ray Wise in attendance)
• Gremlins [1984] (Cinemagic)
• The Muppet Christmas Carol [1992] (Cinemagic, also 12/23)
• Pee-Wee’s Playhouse Christmas Special [1988] (Tomorrow)
• The Polar Express [2004] (Cinemagic; also 12/23)

Monday 12/22

• Lady Snowblood [1973] (Hollywood)
• Love, Actually [2003] (Cinemagic)
• National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation [1989] (Cinemagic, also 12/23)
• Tim and Eric’s Billion Dollar Movie [2012] (Clinton, Ray Wise in attendance)

Tuesday 12/23

• The Big Lebowski [1998] (Clinton; through 12/27)
• The Holdovers [2023] (Cinemagic)
• Silent Night, Deadly Night [1984] (Hollywood)