Carlos Aguilar

Doubling as both a colorful recycling bin for tropes and ideas from a variety of preexisting children animated features and a casting session for “The Voice”‘s next batch of hosts, Kelly Asbury’s plush-inspired film UglyDolls is underscored by a well-intentioned message of self-acceptance, even if the delivery vehicle is unremarkable.

As lackluster as this scattered-brained saga is, the animation team of “The Rise of Gru” does excel at constantly reminding us that we are in the 70s via its production design.

Rifkin’s crafty determination to embellish production value constraints with campy transitions and an eerie use of colored light is commendably spirited. Ultimately, however, its aesthetic ambitions trample the substance that occasionally shines through.

It has an intriguingly radical and gung-ho core concept, but shallow implementation.

Meant to feel either lived-in or spontaneously passionate, these poorly written relationships don’t project the effervescence of living in the moment nor the fickleness of what’s to come.

Sunsets, cellphone-lit melancholic music shows, and clichéd references to stars and constellations abound.

Afineevsky’s by-the-numbers, for-hire production feels unnecessary. Even if one can’t argue with its distilled message of loving thy neighbor, Francesco just serves to remind us of all the horrors unfolding simultaneously.

A mostly hackneyed lesson on racial biases desperately stumbling to appear provocative. It does, however, occasionally raise inquiries worthy of pensive consideration.

Better Angels is a shallow analysis disconnected with the harshest realities of out time. It’s far from being malicious, but making a movie centered only on the shiny parts is too unnaturally artificial to make an impact.

Like a comedy sketch that overstays its welcome, “Society” undermines both its caustic intent and its romantic-comedy subplot.

Heavy-handed acting from the young cast and Needell’s hackneyed dialogue further unmask the movie’s lack of visual wonder and narrative cohesiveness.

Despite Smaller and Smaller Circles being visually proficient, stagy performances fueled by formulaic dialogue do little to steer the film’s narrative.

What’s most disingenuous about Trial by Fire is that it knowingly simplifies the institutionalized and ingrained biases that foster the very matter it’s trying to address.

Zemeckis’ Pinocchio prompts one to wish upon a star that Disney would stop diluting the legacy of its beloved animated features with these soulless knockoffs.

The King of Kings is a serviceable if uninspired take on a story told countless times in just as varied formats.

That Bagiński’s Knights of the Zodiac amounts to a well-intended disappointment doesn’t mean it has zero merit as a work of entertainment, but it will neither satisfy the fandom’s demands for a true-to-the-bone homage to their childhood favorite, nor will it transmit to outsiders why this tale of blind courage in the face of insurmountable odds has inspired such decades-long devotion.

Cutting through the thick curtain of recycled lovey-dovey remarks and the proficiently dull craftsmanship of the production, Richardson’s radiant charisma acts as a lifeline. One would be hard-pressed to find a moment where she is not earnestly committed to the role’s convincingly bittersweet shtick.

More effective as an aspirational exercise than as a piece of inspired cinema, Say a Little Prayer fulfills the promise of showing Latinos under a different socioeconomic light from what has existed in mainstream media in the past, but not much else.

As a movie, this new installment feels closer to a lazily assembled playlist featuring all of the Top 40 songs that hit airwaves in the years since the original was released.

Corny to its core but with enough charisma to avert total insufferableness, it’s a bubbly counteraction of a movie boasting a progressive conclusion.

The problem isn't that this concept has been reworked to death, but that Quintana and co-writer Chris Dowling (the scribe behind Christian dramas such as Run the Race and Priceless) fail to mold it into a winning catch.

Destined to fade into obscurity in the presence of the other two films about Reality Winner, Fogel’s version should at least indicate to other filmmakers that they must leave this story alone and move on to other preoccupations.

Crowded with shallow characters (particularly Jinzhen’s loved ones: his wife and adoptive family) there to forcefully inject emotion, overlong and technically pristine while devoid of cinematic personality, “Decoded” is pleasant to look at but difficult to feel much toward.

It’s better than nothing to mark the cheesy holiday, but the lack of effort shows.

Little insight is gained from what’s on screen.

Mann, an emerging Latino filmmaker, exhibits signs of vocation for the craft that could lead to a more fruitful product some day. For now, what he serves is a tortuous trick with a confusingly dark punch line for an ending.

Short on cultural specificity or distinctive attributes, “Maria” is utterly universal in the most discouraging manner.