Derek Smith

This unfocused, awkwardly paced film never quite gets off the ground and, as a result, will do little to change perceptions of the Korean War as the “forgotten war.”

Song Sung Blue is content to pendulum-swing from triumph to tragedy and back again with all the self-control of a drunk driver.

In the gradual development and expansion of the Wickaverse, the filmmakers seem to have lost the thread of what makes the first and, at times, second film in the series work so well.

Pearl is ultimately an empty exercise in style masquerading as a character study, and for as fantastic as Mia Goth is, her performance mostly succeeds at making Ti West’s homages just a little bit easier to stomach.

The film takes aim at myriad targets and bluntly satirizing them in disparate styles that never mesh into a cohesive whole.

Aside from further vilifying the Nazis, the film's ideological endgame remains a bit too slippery.

Whenever its main characters are pulled apart, the movie magic, in every sense of the phrase, dissipates, leaving us with a bland, derivative action-comedy that’s never quite as funny or thrilling as it thinks it is.

The film seems far more interested in celebrating a short-lived era of artistic invention than interrogating it.

The film feels like sitting through extended acting exercises where everyone is giving it 110% every take.

The film is almost sadistically driven to turn a woman’s trip down memory lane into fodder for cringe humor.

The film is admirably frank in its depiction of lingering trauma but too often struggles to capture its more ineffable qualities.

Through this endless string of undercooked subplots, Avi Nesher’s film continually trips over itself.

The film's performances and narrative flounder to strike the right balance between comedy and drama.

The film is a perfectly entertaining retelling of an offbeat tale, but it’s also superficial and borderline exploitative.

The film is loaded with inconsequential detours and questionable and inconsistent character psychology as it stumbles awkwardly to its foregone conclusion.

A Simple Favor haphazardly vacillates between suburban satire, goofy comedy, and dark, twisted psychological thriller. Which is to say that the film doesn't evince the seamlessness of presentation of its clearest antecedent: David Fincher's "Gone Girl."

The original Brian and Charles short focused entirely on its titular characters, and it’s clear that was for the best.

Humor for the sake of humor is a worthwhile pursuit, but Missing’s final act is more unintentionally funny than intentionally funny.

Throughout, the too-brief depictions of Luciano Pavarotti’s flaws are conspicuously shrouded in a veil of hagiography.

All of the time spent on Thomas Munro’s various campaigns for reconciliation and harmony between two Māori tribes hampers the film, which would have been better served had it expounded on the grander conflicts that it only superficially acknowledges.

For all of its slavish devotion to Mary Poppins, the sequel doesn't even seem to recognize its greatest attribute: its star.

The film celebrates individuality even as it suggests that everyone needs their own A.I. tech to validate everything they like and think.

While Strange World’s examination of generational tension is tender and inspiring, as well as nicely tied to its theme of the necessity of adapting to changing times, the film’s sci-fi elements and environmental message are more half-baked in their execution.

The Bad Guys is a heist film that steals all of its moves.

The film's biggest problem is its inability to lend its clichés and tropes any dramatic thrust or satirical bite.

Like so many shoot-‘em-up video games that repeatedly break for cutscenes, the film too often diffuses its tense energy by whipping up context.

Not Okay doesn’t make any points that, now over a decade into the ubiquity of social media, aren’t painfully obvious.

The film is overstuffed with characters and subplots that ultimately have little to do with Ip Man and his legacy.