Bilge Ebiri

Loro itself becomes somewhat Berlusconian, though associating that pseudo-fascist slimeball with anything this visually resplendent should be some sort of crime.

The film feints at comedy with background gags and an occasional broad performance or two, but it’s primarily a dramatic story — and not a focused one at that.

Some might want to leave the theater and file a lawsuit. I stayed and laughed. It’s funny because it’s abominable.

It’s hard to care for characters when what they do and say rings so false. The result plays like the kind of sleazy exploitation movie that the first one so studiously avoided becoming.

The kids’ ambling chatter, the dogs’ routine of rest and play, lull us into a contemplative state, which allows us to better appreciate the mystery of existence.

The hoops our heroes jump through become increasingly surreal and hilarious.

Like a child unwittingly navigating a jungle full of booby traps and deadly creatures, the film walks a treacherously fine line without ever seeming to break a sweat.

There is absolutely nothing original in Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark, which just goes to show that you don’t need originality to be effective.

It’s not original, but it is enlivened by some artful touches and two excellent performances.

At its best, Hobbs & Shaw offers a refreshing antidote to the bloat. I’d rather watch another one of these than sit through one more Vin Diesel speech about family.

The director finds beauty everywhere — in a cloud of dust, a traffic jam, the raucous din of children at play. And wherever such beauty exists, we imagine, hope can never be entirely absent.

I laughed way too hard at too many points in Stuber to entirely dismiss it, even if, as a movie, it doesn’t really hold together.

While The Cat Rescuers movingly portrays the unique individuals committed to helping these cats, it doesn’t quite tackle the full complexity of this subject. Still, no animal lover should be surprised to find themselves holding back tears while watching this documentary.

General Magic is engaging, but there’s a tougher, tighter film in here struggling to get out.

It doesn’t help that the characters in some cases have been rendered with such realism that they have lost all human expression on their faces. Maybe that’s the idea — to not anthropomorphize them too much and to stay grounded in zoological authenticity. But they’re still talking, and singing, only now their faces are inexpressive; it’s a weird disconnect.

Beyond being tiresome, Intermezzo is just plain ugly, with seemingly little care given to the image — odd, perhaps, given that the film is so clearly and confrontationally about its own director’s gaze.

Anna isn’t as stylish or gripping as “Nikita,” but it does have its own demented charm, particularly in how it toys with structure, nesting competing narrative timelines within each other.

The fine cast keeps us engaged, even if the film sometimes loses the narrative thread.

The film never quite lets us know what to feel. It’s an unnerving little movie, one that at any given moment might deliver a burst of feeling, or a big laugh, or a jump scare. It whipsaws you this way and that, and this sense of disorientation is new for a company whose work usually feels so carefully calibrated, so perfectly put-together.

With facile plotting — you could fashion a pretty deadly drinking game out of all the scenes in which someone gets knocked out, or is conveniently left for dead — and humdrum action, the lack of depth or dimension becomes fatal.

Overall, the lively, unfussy Hampstead goes down easy.

It’s not that this new movie has forgotten the fleet-footed charm of the original MIB films; it’s just that it doesn’t quite know how to conjure it again, so it confuses levity with listlessness.

Too scattered narratively to cohere, and yet somehow still funny enough to justify its existence, The Secret Life of Pets 2 makes for an entertaining trifle.

It’s extremely moving and thrilling and it will both make and ruin your day.

That drifting, elegiac quality (which at times may recall his once-neglected, now-classic Jackie Brown) is the film’s great strength. There are several major set-pieces — some hilarious, some creepy, one absurdly violent — that will get people talking, but perhaps the most powerful is a lengthy, seemingly aimless one that comes smack dab in the middle.

It’s the rare actor who can make playing a character this messy look so effortless.

Pokémon obsessives will want to check it out, but the movie is mostly an uninspired slog, not committed enough to work as a demented genre picture, and not funny enough to work as a goofy, lighthearted comedy. You chuckle, you go “aww” a couple of times, and that’s it.

El Chicano is often exciting, but don’t expect to leave the theater riding an action movie high.