Carla Meyer

The only clear message to emerge here is that Kruger is a world-class talent.

The body-swap movie “It’s What’s Inside” dazzles up to the moment its plot gets going.

House of Spoils suffers most from genre hybridization. The more explicit horror moments feel grafted on to what is essentially a character study with mystery elements. But as “Speak No Evil” recently demonstrated, Blumhouse no longer signifies low-budget, terrifying horror. The brand has become shorthand for movies lacking clear identities.

Before it becomes entirely too Australian, the well-crafted haunted-hand horror movie Talk to Me perfectly captures the one-upmanship of social-media-fueled youth culture.

The film rarely matches Crudup's performance, appearing confused itself about whether it's farce or drama.

As it speeds toward conclusion, “Supremes” also stops subverting its more maudlin aspects, allowing a descent into soap operatic moments.

Laura Dern is not a wizard. She cannot make the dumb and formulaic elements of her romance/travelogue movie “Lonely Planet” disappear. But Dern brings such authenticity to Katherine, her confident, matter-of-fact successful author character, that her performance often outweighs this Netflix movie’s flaws.

Buscemi is characteristically likable here, when Del, mercenary in his treatment of human and beast, should not be so likable. Such is the curse of Buscemi, the delightful killer from “Fargo.”

Teen sex comedies always have more homoerotic moments than you can shake a ... whatever ... at, but Eurotrip seems overly concerned with penises and predatory men. This brand of humor, a time-honored crutch for comedy writers, is both lazy and unseemly.

The whole cast is likable and the scenery lovely, making this only the second-worst Shields beach movie, after “The Blue Lagoon.”

Dax Shepard from MTV's "Punk'd," in his first major big-screen role, steals Without a Paddle. Not that it's too hard to do.

At its titanium core, M3GAN is a mostly on-the-mark commentary on our tech dependence.

Swayze's presence crosses the line from curious to bizarre and adds a heavy layer of cheese to Havana Nights.

It's engaging and transparent at once.

Although this story line’s turns are easy to anticipate, the seriousness with which Fellowes approaches it is refreshing in an otherwise lightweight film.

In White Chicks, the gross-out humor is minimal, no character comes off too badly and lessons are learned. Oh Wayanses, where are thy teeth?

The always fierce Bassett is a little too fierce here, reacting with unwarranted emotion to each romantic twist and turn.

A street-dance film that's lively and silly and about as "street" as a Britney Spears video.

The Color Purple now has been a movie, a Broadway show, a revived Broadway show and movie musical when it always should have been a TV miniseries.

Goes disappointingly soft despite two dynamite lead performances.

Penguin is the film’s most fleshed-out character. We know the bird’s origin story, but nobody else’s.

That story proves paper thin, and requires believing Amanda is devoid of empathy yet devoted to Lily — concepts too at odds to be plausible together.

A clever mishmash of Hitchcockian and 1980s and ’90s high school movie sensibilities, the Netflix dark comedy Do Revenge falters when it tries to grow a heart.

The relentlessly downbeat drama American Woman is a star vehicle that lets Sienna Miller (“American Sniper,” HBO’s “The Girl”) really show what she can do. But she does too much.

Something From Tiffany’s rides the line between Hallmark cheese and the Hollywood gloss of big-screen rom-coms once headlined by its producer, Reese Witherspoon. It emerges as a top entry in the former category and a middling example of the latter, with lots of nice moments along the way.

The brave men who fought and perished at the Alamo believed fervently in their cause. For The Alamo to work, the audience must believe as well. That never really happens.

There's no hiding a hokey love story that undercuts the picture's compelling tennis scenes.

But most every moment Ford is in on screen is a welcome one. Buck seems more real when in Ford’s presence.

Highly entertaining, in a schadenfreude sense, but incomplete.

There’s authenticity in the coach’s belted khaki shorts and in the anguish Hunt brings to a moment where the coach no longer can bear being at her star player’s wake. This moment is the film’s most moving until images of the real coach, and real Caroline Found, accompany the credits.

A tense, expertly acted Russian film clouded by its intentional ambiguity.

The movie is like one of those newfangled Vegas casinos, where what appears to be open sky is really painted ceiling. What's initially dazzling becomes stifling.

Light on inner conflict and heavy on cliches.

Pretty and vague, the kind of film that might play on a loop at a county fair's Americana exhibit.

To earnest for its own good. Sincere and heartfelt, it's the kind of family film that might be at home on cable.

First Daughter can be measured in degrees of Holmes' discomfort... There's never a moment when she doesn't appear as if she'd rather be in a different movie.

Confusing, mixing messages of self-empowerment with those of conformity.

The problems lie not with the actors but with a glib approach that exposes the flaws of the original story.

The Little Stranger will satisfy a very specific audience: “Downton Abbey” watchers who thought that show would be perfect if only the manor were down at the heels and haunted.

The tense, stylish thriller turns into soft-core, slapdash psychodrama.

It’s such a pure delight to see Erivo and Grande just standing around when they finally duet on “For Good” that we will take that scene over a hundred where their characters dance, preen or ride a broom on their own.

It's a prevailing sense of humor that makes this an entertaining, if silly, film adaptation of the Marvel comic.

It's a fascinating concept, gorgeously rendered. Seeing the paint actually dry, however, would probably be more fun than most of this overly expository film.

Loses momentum midway into the boys' journey.

Features bursts of humor and electrifying energy offset by speechifying and a dud of a subplot.

Clunky adventure story.

Sweaty, filthy, miserable and well acted.

Entertainment value and reasonable length still make the film a decent, low-effort option for home viewers — especially those already subscribed to Hulu.

[Duhmel] brings surprising nuance to an ostensibly shallow character, a guy who's not really bad, just caught up in his own celebrity.

It's not a terrible movie, just a disappointingly pleasant one.

Despite most everything else in the movie being predictable, Bray’s mystery is hard to guess.

It's merely adequate, with one riveting element but limited chills.

The picture never comes out from under the weight of its dreariness, despite fine acting, foot chases and conspiracy theories galore.

Stewart’s impact is evident within the first hour of “Martha.” That’s a good thing, because the younger audience this film might be targeting lacks the patience for another hour of Cutler’s photo parade, no matter how extraordinary his subject.

Offers a lively but jumbled insider's view of a world of great talent and greater risk.

Fascinating context but awkwardly told.

The buddy comedy “Babes” offers keen insights into pregnancy, parenting and longtime friendships, although many get lost in the movie’s bodily function-joke jamboree.

Were “Vita” better developed and edited, one might find joy in its rejection of the patriarchy. But the female-friendly dialogue relies too heavily on exposition. Nobody asks if anyone wants a cup of tea.

Negotiating the role of a forward-thinking woman constrained by family demands and era, Elliott elevates a picture that's lovely to look at but lacking in dramatic impact.

Beautiful but hollow.

A good-hearted 'tween comedy hampered by uneven direction and a misguided plot twist.

There is simply too much going on, in these separate storylines, for too long. There is a literal “meanwhile, back at the farm” quality to the movie, because it becomes so involved with subplots that you only remember Max and Rooster at the farm when the action shifts back to it.

Has to be enjoyed in spurts. There's no cohesive story, just a series of opportunities for the title character (Jon Heder) to strut his gawky stuff.

The Little Mermaid origin story lacks room for this more feminist take. It simply is not deep enough.

Pretty standard stuff, mixing a few truly clever moments with facile drug humor and throwaway female characters.

It seems like a bizarre move for Disney, releasing a film that combines elements of "Blue's Clues" and "The Island of Dr. Moreau."

The freshest thing about Breakin' All the Rules is its dropped "g.''

Melissa is the only fully developed character in an overlong, badly paced film filled with cliched dialogue and accented by pleasant yet forgettable music.

Daniels has the talent to make a genuinely complex horror film. What was “Precious,” if not a horror movie made all the more chilling by its lack of supernatural elements? But for “The Deliverance,” Daniels simply dusts off the same crab-walking, veins-a-popping demon moves we have seen a million times.

Diego also lacks any nuance as a character. He is grim and humorless, like most everything else about this film.

McCarthy is one of our finest physical comedians. Every moment of physical comedy she performs here is cringey.

First Purge further lessens the drama by offering a hero and villains too mercenary to care about.

Margaret Cho goes over the top in the new Netflix comedy Good on Paper, mugging and delivering lines too emphatically. But as the movie progresses, you see the San Francisco native’s approach not as overacting, but heroism. She appears to be trying to single-handedly breathe life into this nearly laugh-free movie.

A dreary, distasteful exercise, "Off the Leash'' favors dogs over humans, framing canine high jinks with an ugly story of domestic abuse.

Wolf Man does not fully compel until it becomes ridiculous, employing a wolf-cam perspective that shows what a werewolf sees when he encounters people: glowing-eyed figures who look like AI-hallucinuted Teletubbies.

The game’s repetition quickly gets tiresome.

Badly cast and unevenly acted, “Regretting You” features the least healthy mother-daughter relationship since 1975’s “Grey Gardens.”

probably less painful than actual childbirth, but it's still a very long 86 minutes.

This tale of tortured love between a Mormon missionary and a West Hollywood tomcat renders its gay and religious characters so stereotypical that neither lifestyle appears attractive.

It's strung together, with cliches instead of puka shells.

Were there an award for most bizarre and dispiriting comedy-horror hybrid featuring killer dolls, the latest installment in the "Child's Play" series would have it locked up.

A rather boring horror film.

The sequel might have the formula down, but it lacks everything that made "Anaconda'' fun.

Filled with overly processed situations it tries to sell with manic energy, "Kranks" is canned, hammy and rolling as fast as it can.

An awkward and aggressively unfunny film.

This brand of eccentricity does not suit Cusack. He lacks Cage’s manic gleam and irrepressible sense of play. Cusack comes off as glum and a bit lost, negating Miller’s effectiveness as bogeyman.

See No Evil directed by James Watkins (“The Woman in Black”), is not that interesting. Nor is it much of a horror movie or psychological thriller, despite carrying the Blumhouse imprimatur. For more than half of its nearly two-hour length, it plays more like the James McAvoy variety hour — which can be highly enjoyable if you do not mind one actor being the entire show.

With The 15:17 to Paris, director Clint Eastwood overwhelms the extraordinary with the mundane, turning the true story of three Americans who helped subdue a gunman aboard a European train into a tedious film.

Lacks the clever twists and turns that made the original such fun. The sequel has exactly one twist, and it's not very clever.

Wilson and Helms favor Bradshaw in likability. But they are not two hours’ worth of likable, in a film this flawed.

Jackpot! involves a fight to the finish between the abundant charisma and likability of leads Awkwafina and John Cena and the impossible material they were given. The actors lose, because nobody could survive so many jokes based on groin kicks and bathroom humor or a movie premise as lacking in context as it is sky-high in concept.

Tries screwball and gross-out comedy and fails on both counts.

[Brody's] mannered performance helps downgrade this picture from a middling sci-fi film to a bad, borderline-camp sci-fi film.

The studio behind Wicker Park bills it as a "romantic thriller.'' But it's actually an example of an even more unusual subgenre: the dumb, suspense- free and undersexed stalker drama.