Amy Nicholson

It’s a simple story made to rouse modern hearts, and the performances and cinematography are so good, the film nearly pulls off the trick.

Only Anderson’s part with all its hazy contradictions — neither comic nor tragic, neither pathetic nor heroic, neither subtle nor showy — seems, to transcend. More than the film around her, Anderson earns our respect.

[Whedon] wants to give us everything, and that he fits it all in is its own kind of feat. Age of Ultron is a middling film, yet it's so heavy with his sweat that it never feels like a lazy cash-in — which for a preordained summer megahit is an accomplishment.

Everyone involved knows exactly what movie they’re making — especially Craig Robinson as the hilarious town sheriff.

Mr. McKay’s comedy is at its best when his tone is big, ridiculous and cheerfully subversive.

The result is sniggering slapstick that’s two-parts biological fluids and one-part salute to the innate empathy of mankind, often in the same scene.

Villeneuve's proven he's got a strong punch. The trouble is, he barely aims.

As a ballad about a rock star’s soul, The Nowhere Inn is a fun riff performed on flimsy strings.

Space Jam: A New Legacy is chaotic, rainbow sprinkle-colored nonsense that, unlike the original, manages to hold together as a movie.

This recycled trash is no treasure, but I’m betting the majority of this redo’s audience will be young enough to find ’90s-style schlock adorably quaint.

By poking fun at the cliches, director Gluck thinks he can turn an inevitability into an in-joke. Eh, it'll do.

There’s a crack running through “Sentimental Value” too. A third of it wants to be a feisty industry satire, but the rest believes there’s prestige value in tugging on the heartstrings. The title seems to be as much about that as anything.

The irony at the core of the Dr. Ruth persona is that the maverick who made the bedroom public is herself incredibly private, and while she encourages women to get intimate with their bodies, she’s not in touch with her own emotions. Still, she is vocal about respecting boundaries, and White acquiesces, trusting that the facts of Westheimer’s life say plenty about her peppy workaholism.

The movie is constrained by its own conscience.

Kunis’s alpha female appears at once ferocious and like a conspicuous sham. (Imagine Sheryl Sandberg as a “Scooby-Doo” villain.) Her performance carries the film — a fortunate break for the director Mike Barker, who has the near-impossible challenge of shepherding the tone from snark to painful sincerity.

Demme's film plays out like a catnapping afternoon dream. We recognize the world, yet the logic is screwy.

Headland's film might have been more engaging if it were about its supporting characters.

Oddly — and rather fascinatingly — this is a film about a spiritual revolution.

The film does, at minimum, convince us that most people would want to transform into Keaton if given the opportunity.

Only after Emma’s circumstances get worse — the poor dear is knocked comatose — do things onscreen improve.

Despite this sequel’s thin and rote stretches, it once again closes strong with a few images that will stick in your head for at least a week or two. No spoilers, but it’s no coincidence that “Here I Come” finally gets more interesting once it tires of hide and seek. Finding a fresh plot twist is the only way it ekes out a draw.

For all its careful evasions, I believe that the Michael this movie reveals is true and worth watching. But ultimately, it’s the music that breaks down our resistance, from the opening funk beats of “Wanna Be Startin’ Somethin’” to the climax, which essentially cues a greatest hits tape right when we know the bad times are about to begin.

"Dark Web” skates by on saturated nastiness, one terrific kill, and the audience’s engagement in seeing if the filmmakers can pull off the stunt. Barely, but it’s fun to watch them try.

After a decade in development, the project that made it to the screen is a noisy, pixelated smash-and-zap that does manage to capture the spirit of play.

This is a guaranteed blockbuster that nobody needed except studio accountants and parents. I’ll accept it on those terms because it’s a good thing when any kid-pleaser gets children in the habit of going to the movie theater.

If only Shepard's movie lived up to his leading man. It's merely a frame for a character portrait, with Shepard's camera screwing our eyes to Law's performance and pasting in supporting actors and situations for no larger purpose than to see his reaction to them.

For all its empathy and equilibrium, The East has nowhere to go after the script backs itself into a corner.

The film invents a new emotion: passionate ambivalence. Schoenbrun’s argument might be that this is exactly the response they’re after. They’ve accomplished it, but at the expense of engagement, resulting in a collection of leaden scenes that might make the audience want to claw out of its own skin.