Farran Smith Nehme

A sudden lurch into trippy abstraction at the end simply doesn’t work, but for the vast majority of the time this is a strong and original film.

Lifetime movies have their pleasures, and so does this film. Chief among them is the cast, a group of over-45 actresses who really are better than ever; in the cases of Brooke Shields and Daryl Hannah, remarkably better.

The seething passions of Flaubert’s characters are absent, except when Rhys Ifans (as a greedy merchant) or the splendidly ruthless Marshall-Green are in the room.

Trouble is, while the social milieu is nicely realized, other parts of the drama are not. Too often Burshtein cuts off a scene prematurely, darting away just as the crucial moment of emotion or confrontation appears.

The swooping shots and the way the lack of dialogue amplifies ambient sounds are stunning. Story-wise, The Tribe is yet another art-film wallow in cruelty, not nearly as unique as its looks and its world.

Agreeable this film certainly is, but the shagginess never seems to take shape.

Pretty and pleasing, but no more. A bon-bon, not a meal.

It’s a slickly plotted ticking-time-bomb thriller with a crisp look and one standout debut performance, by Hitham Omari as a ruthless leader of a terrorist cell.

Gorgeous surroundings don't make up for sulky, feuding travel companions.

Despite a remarkable performance by Suliman, who’s almost never off-camera, events become increasingly pat and implausible, with one explanatory scene played like a shadowy variation on Kevin Spacey’s monologue in “Se7en.”

Director Baran bo Odar puts all this in the service of ghastly clichés. The rape of children has long since grown nauseatingly familiar, in books, in films, in each season of “Law & Order: Special Victims Unit.”

Most of the film, while handsome to look at, doesn’t rise above this level of obviousness.

Blair has a colorless, weirdly teenage delivery that doesn’t convey Hesse’s vivid, brilliant personality. It is odd to watch a documentary where the subject becomes more interesting when she is discussed by other people.

Israeli director Nadav Lapid uses a well-worn concept — a lonely little boy is taken under a teacher’s wing — to create a slow, creepy movie.

Una Noche is intriguing enough, however, to make you hope that both Mulloy and her actors are heard from again, sooner rather than later.

The New Black often feels like a polished but uninspired op-ed.

The film keeps its focus small, but the trouble is, the characters' emotions stay that way, too.

The movie was largely improvised, which lends itself more to scenes than a feature-length film.

There’s a nice candor and sweetness about the players, especially Butterfield and Sally Hawkins as his mother.

Farahani determinedly underplays her character, and is often very touching. But while there is a satisfying final scene, The Patience Stone is essentially a monologue, and Atiq Rahimi (directing the adaptation of his own novel) doesn’t have what it takes to make the story more dynamic.

The photographs on view are dazzling; the way they are shown here is somewhat less so.

The film is impeccably shot and paced, but the radical real-world implications of Wise’s agenda are never fully explored.

As reactions to budding sexuality go, it’s a little extreme. And it’s also contrived; Isabelle’s decision never makes any emotional, let alone logical, sense.

Ultimately, this film reveals the Israeli self-image, but not much more. The people with the cameras pass by Arab neighbors, and what the Palestinians’ home movies might look like remains unexplored.

The crime and aftermath (based on a real story) are the best parts by far, but these come well after many overextended scenes of selfish, squalid people treating one another like dirt.

Tilda Swinton narrates this oddball, meandering essay film.

Directors Aron Gaudet and Gita Pullapilly overload their too-long film with subplots. Yet the actors — including a terrific Aiden Gillen (“Game of Thrones”) as Casper’s no-good father — perform as though unaware that any of this is a cliché.

The filmmaking style is practically nonexistent: interviews and static shots of the performers onstage. They are thoughtful and often funny, especially Mat Fraser, a British man whose arms were damaged by Thalidomide, and Julia Atlas Muz, the off-stage partner with whom he often performs.