A cool and collected Shula (Susan Chardy) drives into the opening scene dressed like Missy Elliott in “The Rain” music video. When she comes to a sudden stop, she sees a body lying in the street. It belongs to her Uncle Fred. When she concludes that Uncle Fred is dead, Shula isn’t overwhelmed by grief.

There’s a warning up front for viewers sensitive to flashing imagery, but Aïnouz might also have provided a cautionary note about the palpable dampness and odors of the movie’s titular sex motel, even if you can’t technically feel or smell them. Iago Xavier plays Heraldo, the handy slab of beefcake who holes up at the

David Cronenberg’s “The Shrouds” is best viewed in pure auteurist terms. With hair that unmistakably resembles the director’s, Vincent Cassel stars as Karsh, the proprietor of a high-tech burial business that allows the bereaved to keep an eye on their loved ones’ decaying corpses. The headstones have video screens, and there’s even a smartphone app

A modern update to the Greek playwright Aristophanes’ Lysistrata, “Chi-Raq” immediately found controversy using Chicago’s South Side (particularly the ensuing bloody gang wars, which by that point were already making national headlines) as the backdrop for a musical crime romance starring Nick Cannon and Wesley Snipes as opposing gang leaders, and Teyonah Parris as the