NEW YORK. Though it has the relationship between a teen girl and a cuddly creature at its core, “The Legend of Ochi” (PG, A24) is not a sunny children’s movie. In fact, this fantasy tale is a sort of infernal machine of confounding dark imagery, threats of violence and a mixed moral about honoring your parents while respecting nature.

BISMARCK, North Dakota. In 2012, when Michelle Duppong, who was about to become director of adult formation for the Diocese of Bismarck, North Dakota, asked Jacqueline Matta Balzer if she could be her roommate, Balzer had no idea she was dealing with a possible future saint. Still, “You could just sense there was a holiness about her,” Balzer recalls.