Dennis Harvey

In the end, both documentary and the jump itself feel like ambitious vanity projects that are admirably accomplished, yet feel a little hollow in the raison d’être department.

The result here may not be fully revealing of his process, but it’s as close as we’re going to get.

An engaging and sympathetic documentary.

Pearlstein’s very deft assembly manages to raise all these ideas and others for viewer consideration while underlining that there are few, if any, definitive responses to them.

The Disappearance of My Mother is a successful piece of documentary filmmaking inasmuch as it’s entertaining and dextrously crafted. But its precise intent is unclear.

Potent docudocu by Katy Chevigny and Kirsten Johnson makes a strong case against capital punishment by pointing up the fallibility of the justice system, while offering an inspiring portrait of one politico who actually seems guided foremost by conscience.

This finely crafted docu may well long stand as the most balanced among such treatments, as it respectfully examines Sands’ folk-heroic legacy rather than simply amplifying it.

Though not in their class, Ms. Purple aims for something of the bruised romance of alienation and ennui that Antonioni made his name on (most notably “La Notte” and “L’Eclisse”). The fact that it even lands in the same ballpark without growing too pretentious or mannered — though it’s admittedly a little of both — is admirable, not least for simply being so out-of-step with any current cinematic vogue.

A grim diagnosis of a fast-spreading cancer, Against All Enemies may provide much less reassurance than cause for alarm, but its wakeup call is certainly worth heeding.

Despite its ostensibly depressing subject and a few tough-to-watch sequences, Blood Brother is never less than engrossing, and it’s often delightful.

The script’s more grotesque aspects integrate well enough into a portrait of everyday life among the least-reputable citizens of a grime-flavored community...while the film’s grungy aesthetic likewise keeps the bizarre story feeling at least somewhat grounded.

A muscular exercise in brutal, relentless peril that should please genre fans.

There’s a relaxed yet energetic comic rapport between players that suggests a good time was had by all.

Though not without its flaws, the movie has authenticity and resonance; there have been plenty of good surfing documentaries, but very few good dramas about the sport — a short list on which Breath instantly earns a prominent spot.

Emphasis on its combustible emotions, suspense and surprising humor should help draw sophisticated audiences who, once lured, will quickly find themselves hooked for the duration.

Wilkerson's indictment is unapologetically agitprop. He sees Butte history as a testimony to "capitalist class" exploitation, corruption and environmental disaster.

Reflective of its subject, the movie is content to exist on the stimulating surface, teasing us with the promise of something deeper while skirting around its delivery.

It’s good of its type — just not quite good enough to linger once the lights have come up.

Austere but fascinating.

An unusually low-key Filipino drama whose neo-realist air generally triumphs over the script's violent, tearful contrivances.

This slacker prince (Hawke) comprises a sinkhole at the center of adaptor-helmer Michael Almereyda's otherwise compelling contempo update.

A luxuriously old-fashioned star vehicle custom-fit to its topliner's strengths, which come across to sensational effect.

If terror is not particularly sought after, there is still sufficient tension, and downplaying the story’s fantastical aspect in favor of psychological conflicts lends the whole a persuasive pathos.

The Harbinger disappoints only in that it’s good enough to make you wish it were better — that it left an indelible impression rather than a slightly vague one.

Hall and Gandersman compel enough interest to pull viewers through, even if they may find the fadeout less than satisfying.

Inside has a suspense hook to drive it forward and a climactic violent set piece, if not quite the one we were expecting. But the question of who’s going to kill or get killed ultimately proves less important than how their pasts have shaped these men — or rather trapped them, like quicksand.

No doubt inspired to some degree by "Super Size Me," this equally engaging, slightly better-crafted documentary deftly balances humor and insight.

The endearing, guileless personalities of the two principals constitute much of the film’s appeal.

For all its tastefully exasperating gaps in character and storytelling specifics, “To Live & Die and Live” still has a persuasive overall vision, one that holds out the possibility of salvation for its hero — and its city — albeit only if history and the toll it still exacts are faced head-on.

That this mashup of too many familiar action-thriller elements doesn’t emerge a generic mess is a credit to all involved. That it’s passably entertaining but also instantly forgettable comes as less of a surprise.

Daniel Hanna (“Miss Virginia”) and a strong cast, making for a satisfying scenic ride that picked up several festival audience awards last year.

Chilling, often moving docudrama focuses not so much on the mayhem or murderer, but on the bewildered, occasionally courageous reactions of ordinary citizens caught in the inexplicable violence.

There’s an air of authenticity as well as a pleasingly laid-back yet substantive narrative engagement to this polished effort.

Colossal takes diminishing advantage of an amusing premise, one that seems made for satirical treatment yet is executed with an increasingly awkward semi-seriousness the characters aren’t depthed (or likable) enough to ballast.

If the horror aspects are underdeveloped, so are Johnston’s other major ideas.

The considerable pleasure of Lynn Shelton’s latest “Sword of Trust” is that everyone onscreen is so good at this kind of [improv] work that one wishes more tightly scripted comedy screenplays had such savory dialogue, or inspired character conceptions.

Impresses with the originality of its observation, storytelling techniques and filmmaking style.

10 Things doesn't take much time before ditching its pitch idea in favor of a mishmash of newer formulas, never quite settling on a cogent game plan or directorial tone.

Seimetz takes advantage of the eccentric cultural/natural landscape of central Florida to vivid effect, gets impressive if seldom endearing work from her actors, and seems very much in charge of an assertive if not always explicable presentation.

First-rate assembly has a real dramatic grip as well as considerable lightheartedness, the obvious standout element being the large chunks of startling freefall and helicopter camera footage, both new and archival.

A stirring adventure by any standard.

A powerful and damning look at the long-term impact of sexual abuse.

The low-key drama is well crafted and likable as far as it goes, but there's not enough narrative impetus or depth to maintain more than passing viewer interest.

There’s nothing terribly profound or innovative about what The Quake achieves. But like “The Wave” before it, it’s just intelligent and serious enough to give you your escapist cake — deluxe popcorn perils in all their big-screen glory — without making you eat the familiar guilt of empty-calorie overload.

It’s a densely textured, quite gorgeous dive into folkloric witchiness that avoids nearly all anticipated clichés, finally arriving at something not so much terrifying as unexpectedly poignant.

Too much of “Bombshell” skims over Lamarr’s more troubling and troubled aspects to paint her in somewhat stock terms as the victim of keep-her-on-that-pedestal misogyny.

Its amusingly off-kilter humor underserved by pedestrian packaging, Dave Boyle's sophomore feature, White on Rice, is the kind of comedy that hinges on a protagonist near-imbecilic in all matters social, physical and especially romantic.

An amiable, fast-paced entry that should win over fans.

Accomplished in all its tech and design departments, Alone is easily the best of several recent hunted-woman-in-the-wilderness films, including fellow indies “Ravage” and “Range Runners” as well as the flashier French “Revenge.” It doesn’t necessarily need the structural gimmickry of onscreen “chapter” titles (“The Road,” “The Rain,” etc.), but that’s a minor quibble.

Mixing sheer spectacle with modest but pleasing human-interest threads, Viktor Jakovleski’s first directorial feature is a poetical, entrancing documentary.

Brightly packaged and steadily amusing.

While its storytelling wavers, there’s nothing unsteady about the movie’s overall packaging craftsmanship.

First-rate talent and a uniquely dyspeptic mood separate this effort from more routine, populist stabs at tasteless yukkage.

Entertaining but uneven, the result is a deliberately over-the-top sci-fi horror exercise that loses some focus as the action grows more psychedelically unhinged — its oscillating tone not necessarily helped by Nicolas Cage growing likewise, in one of his less inspired gonzo-style performances.

Thanks largely to the performers (and Crystal in particular), the end result is diverting enough if unmemorable.

It’s a fascinating moment for cultural stock-taking. Yet despite the filmmaker’s evident fondness for the people and nation, this impressionistic feature feels frustratingly obtuse, unfocused and unstructured.

Delightful documentary A Cantor's Tale casts a fond eye back at the "golden age" of chazzanut (Jewish liturgical music) and its star performers in the Brooklyn of yesteryear.

Kauffman has crafted an enjoyable armchair adventure that juggles the archival imagery, engaging present-day personalities and glimpses of the magnificent creatures themselves at a leisurely yet absorbing pace.

Thumbsucker (like "Donnie Darko") is more likely to prosper in the long haul as a home-format cult fave than in its initial arthouse tour. Both offer eccentric humor within a fairly somber overall tone, support-cast surprises, and (to a lesser degree in Thumbsucker) fable-like, hyperreal elements.

It's all efficiently nerve-jangling, with Tyler and Speedman credibly registering every hue of panic. Still, after such a long, creepy, cannily restrained buildup, it must be said the resolution is rather flat, a full-circle postscript rote.

Emir Ezwan’s directorial debut is a spare, eerie tale rooted in folk superstitions that are rendered credibly vivid by its thick yet subtle atmospherics.

Like many such movies, The Vigil leans heavily on jump scares, and is arguably more effective during its tense buildup than in the climactic events.

Within its bounds, Q Ball offers proof that rehabilitative programs like this one offer more than just a chance for prisoners to show athletic excellence; they also provide an opportunity for individual growth.

Hapless, laughless movie.

Anita Rocha da Silveira’s arresting debut feature captures the queasy mix of desire and fear among kids who are sexually inexperienced, yet can think of little else. Pop kitsch, social satire, dreamy narrative unreliability and retro giallo-thriller vibes further flavor a movie at once bold and cryptic.

Hari Sama’s fourth feature as writer-director is something special, and one of the best of its particular subgenre.

Hamm’s bleary but still debonair presence, Gilroy’s cynically witty dialogue, and the not-quite-confusingly-large array of colorful characters underline how Beirut aims to be less a statement about Middle Eastern strife than a good yarn propelled by the unpredictable currents of international politics.

Excellent documentary American Hardcore chronicles the short-lived but influential musical moment when a defiantly anti-commercial underground put a distinctive U.S. stamp on the hitherto Brit-driven punk movement.

As boisterous as it is sobering.

The obstacles against effectively protecting battered women and prosecuting their abusers are vividly illustrated in Private Violence.

It offers nothing particularly new, yet it fulfills the only requirement that really matters for this kind of movie — it’s scary.

Fun if perhaps a little too tongue-in-cheek for its own good, the results will no doubt appeal most to Moore fans who’ll revel in his Byzantine plotting, noirish tropes and other signature elements.

Chomko mitigates a fairly heavy narrative agenda with a great deal of humor, sometimes threatening to make things a little too seriocomic, but never quite crossing the line into pat dramedy.

Though T-Rex leaves some questions unaddressed, and ends with little resolution to protag’s various challenges, it’s compelling throughout.

An imperfect but compelling thriller.

Loathe to mar his exquisite package with the least hint of vulgar commentary, Ancarani arrives at something that is at once luxuriously alluring and a little too like an advertisement for luxury products — dazzling, aloof, uncritical and fatuous.

It’s a dramatic portrait of institutionalized injustice, though the film is too narrowly focused to plead its case with maximum effectiveness.

The picture wobbles a bit before emerging a successful low-key satire of literary fraud and morbid personality cults.

While the competent filmmaking package lacks much of its own personality, the sheer fascinating strangeness of the people documented could earn the picture a minor cult following a la "Grey Gardens."

It’s an entertaining flashback to an always-diverting countercultural epoch, with a touching footnote of a semi-famous love story at its center.

Some fans will find the approach (which avoids Nirvana music and perf footage) too arty and indirect; but others will welcome the specialized theatrical release and the subsequent DVD.

Good music and good company make “Itzhak” a pleasure, though those seeking a methodical career overview should look elsewhere than this genial personality sketch of the world-famous violinist.

It’s not that “My Love” feels inherently dubious; it’s that its execution is just a little too smiling-through-tears slick to be swallowed whole.

Sometimes feels like an extended pilot for a smarty-pants broadcast series in the tradition of Michael Moore's "Awful Truth" and "TV Nation" skeins.

This entertaining docu by "When We Were Kings'?" Leon Gast is more eccentric personality portrait than the in-depth scrutiny of celebrity-culture madness afforded by fellow Sundance preem "Teenage Paparazzo."

Producer Charles Evans Jr.'s directorial debut finds an engrossing suspense angle in the involvement of Victor DeNoble, an idealistic scientist-turned-whistleblower whose suppressed corporate research became the bombshell catalyst in that struggle.

Fighting With My Family may not be an Oscar contender but it has enough wit, heart, energy and good cheer to make it a fun watch even for non-wrestling fans.

Intriguing as the resulting ambiance is, it alone can’t sustain the film.

Its stripped-down approach to a familiar gist has a distinctiveness that is impressive, and is sure to please fans who are always up for a new slasher film — but wish most of them weren’t so interchangeable.

What at first looks like a heartwarming portrait of a highly blended modern family turns into a no less engrossing illustration of that situation's possible pitfalls in Off and Running.

Docmeister Arthur Dong brings empathetic balance and emotional heft to the discord between fundamentalist Christian parents and their gay children.

You’re Next is fairly light on psychological and narrative complexity, but it’s still a good cut above the slasher norm, with a firm grasp on visceral action and the wisdom to place tongue slightly in cheek when things go further over the top.

Actor Philip Barantini’s first directorial feature is nothing wildly original in content or style. Still, it punches both elements across with a satisfying low-key confidence, and does not shrink from occasionally letting things get pretty rough.

Cohn handles all the performers very deftly.

Though this tale of a new widow’s apparent haunting gets progressively lost in a narrative maze that’s complicated without being particularly rewarding, director David Bruckner suffuses the action with enough dread and unpleasant goosings to make this an above-average genre exercise.

Compelling enough while you’re watching it, frustrating then forgettable once it ends, this is a work that wouldn’t command much attention if it came from any other director. Coming from this one, it mostly intrigues as an unexpected if not terribly rewarding change of pace.

A sparely plotted, low-key but ultimately rewarding slice of South Dakota reservation life.

Engrossing pic is impressively shot, edited and scored.