Frank Scheck

Besides the raucous, de rigueur action sequences, Transformers One provides numerous witty jokes of both the verbal and visual variety and — surprise, surprise — genuine emotion. Consider this a franchise revitalized.

Unfortunately, the proceedings become increasingly tiresome the more the characters are killed off, with the result that despite an impressive cast, the film comes to feel like a Coen brothers rip-off.

The Union proves as entertaining as its Netflix algorithms would have predicted, balancing its impressive star wattage with lavish production values to remind viewers of the value of their monthly subscriptions.

It’s all tremendously silly but somehow it works, thanks to combat choreography that would make Jackie Chan proud and the introduction of America’s premiere new comedy team, Awkwafina and John Cena.

However stilted War Game may feel cinematically, it registers with full force as a realistic depiction of a nightmarish scenario that could easily occur just a few months from now.

It’s hard not to wish that in the future, Harold will stick to the cartoon world where he belongs.

The Convert is uneven and doesn’t fully live up to its thematic ambitions. But it’s handsomely made and thankfully avoids falling victim to white savior syndrome.

The fight scenes are extremely well choreographed, filmed and edited, but they’re so relentless in their non-stop pacing that the viewing experience becomes numbing.

Ultimately, for all its wildly entertaining elements, Kalki 2898 AD feels like too much of a good thing, resembling the sort of lavish buffet meal that leaves you feeling overstuffed and exhausted. But fans of this particular style of cinema are not likely to mind.

Veteran television director Greg Berlanti (Riverdale, Everwood), who demonstrated real cinematic talent with Love, Simon, is unable to make any of this remotely convincing or, more problematically, entertaining. The wild tonal shifts leave the viewer in the dust, and not even the two stars are able to make any of it work.

Unfortunately, despite everyone’s best efforts to deliver a femme-driven actioner revolving around a central character who comes across like a female Rambo, Trigger Warning, premiering on Netflix, proves distressingly familiar.

Instead of being drawn in by Daniel’s spiral, we observe it from a distance. The result is that Longing, presumably intended as a cathartic meditation on grief, simply feels absurd.

This is a documentary about psychics that make you think Ouija boards might be a better investment.

Watching Will Smith’s Mike and Martin Lawrence’s Marcus go through their familiar comedic bickering routines has become like spending an evening with a long-married couple whose constant sniping has grown wearisome.

It all plays as routinely as you’d expect, making the film directed by Mark Dindal (The Emperor’s New Groove, Chicken Little) feel much longer than it is, at least for anyone over the age of 10.

For most of its running time, it’s a small-scale delight that balances quirky humor and heartfelt emotion to excellent effect.

This is one film that’s definitely worth catching on the big screen.

There’s much here to appreciate, not least of which is the admirable attempt to simultaneously provide belly laughs for children and emotional resonance for adults. IF may be guilty of trying too hard, but it’s a refreshing change from so many family movies that barely seem to be trying at all.

Snyder provides an ample display of the visual flair and skill for action that have endeared him to legions of fans who exhibit so much dedication that they’re willing to sit through numerous versions of his films.

Breathlessly paced and filled with the sort of black humor that makes it as much a comedy as a horror film, Abigail is wildly entertaining for most of its running time, although it becomes overly burdened with baroque narrative flourishes.

That the film proves as affecting as it does is largely due to Knoxville’s understated, terrific performance that makes his character fully sympathetic despite his many flaws.

Indeed, the film’s main strength is not its overly familiar if convoluted plotting but rather the strong performances all around.

Fine performances and powerful visuals only partially compensate for the inevitable air of familiarity that accompanies Marco Perego’s debut feature.

After its darkly comic set-up, the mild proceedings seem generally undercooked, lacking the subversiveness that could have given the remake a reason for being. It coasts along mainly on the charms of Jones, who displays considerable comic chops as the beleaguered Tanya.

While the events in the first Omen seemed to be taking place in a real world that just happened to include demonic figures, this film seems more like a fever dream, its outlandish storyline taking a back seat to a nightmarish vision that’s more about mood than narrative coherence.

Crowe himself, as usual, is the best thing in the film, once again upgrading less than optimal material with his indelible screen presence.

Director Adam Wingard (reuniting with Stevens after the terrific 2014 thriller The Guest) orchestrates the monster madness with impressive visual flair even if he relies on an excessive number of ‘80s-era pop song needle drops to make things seem more exciting than they actually are.

Tragically, The Truth vs. Alex Jones doesn’t deliver any closure. What it does provide is a disturbing reminder that the fight against evil will likely be never-ending.

Nonetheless, Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire tries hard, very hard, to satisfy the series’ fans with plenty of nostalgic throwbacks and mainly succeeds.

Obviously, being a dog lover goes a long way toward one’s enjoyment of Arthur the King. But even if you’re not, you won’t be able to resist this canine thespian who manages to convey a world of information merely through barks. And he doesn’t even need those.

Imaginary, which starts out as a relatively low-key suspenser with intriguing psychological depth, eventually succumbs to the inanities plaguing so many recent horror efforts (like the killer pool in the same company’s Night Swim).

Many of the gags are either derivative or homages, depending on your perspective, including the vicious killer bunnies that bring to mind Monty Python and the Holy Grail. But that doesn’t make them any less funny.

The film, which feels overlong at 145 minutes, suffers both from repetition and an over-reliance on melodramatic plot devices. But it nonetheless delivers a compelling portrait of a heroine whose story is too little-known.

It all feels quite silly, but Outlaw Posse manages to be fun anyway, thanks largely to the terrific ensemble of veteran character actors (including Neal McDonough and M. Emmet Walsh, making brief appearances) who fully embrace the film’s daffier qualities.

Swank makes it work with a canny performance that conveys her character’s inner turbulence, much of it derived from her troubled relationship with her estranged grown son.

Red Right Hand doesn’t add anything particularly new to the well-worn genre. But it features enough bloody action sequences and shootouts to satisfy fans, who will be more likely to catch it on VOD than at drive-ins.

It’s Crowe who’s the film’s MVP.

What it doesn’t provide, unfortunately, is a persuasive prescription for how we’re going to prevent our country from descending from democracy to theocracy.

Hilariously and movingly tapping into typical childhood anxieties, it’s infused with ample wit of both the visual and verbal variety for adults.

The powerhouse voice cast is another plus; besides the aforementioned, it includes Lucy Liu, Bowen Yang, comedian Jo Koy and Greta Lee (Past Lives), among others. Director Raman Hui, making his feature debut, keeps the proceedings moving at a suitably brisk pace, with the colorful CGI animation providing one diverting image after another.

It’s a shame, because Cuoco’s well-honed comic skills are very much on display and Oyelowo, working in a lighter vein than usual, seems to be enjoying himself. Which is more than you’ll be able to say about the viewers of this tired action-comedy retread.

Despite the filmmaker’s best efforts to drum up suspense via the usual jump scares, Night Swim turns out to be just as silly as it sounds.

Stretching its high concept but thin results to the breaking point, The Family Plan feels like a movie whose best moments were during the pitch meeting.

Phillip Noyce’s thriller starring Pierce Brosnan in the title role has the irreverence of an Elmore Leonard tale, leavened with generous doses of sentiment.

Geared very much to younger audiences, it’s fast-paced to the point of freneticism. But it boasts an arresting visual style, its animation heavily indebted to the satirical drawings of Ronald Searle.

The veteran action director fully delivers the goods with Silent Night.

While the group’s short SNL videos are often quite amusing, this feature-length venture doesn’t do them any favors.

It offers plenty of cheap thrills, or more accurately cheap kills, presented with the sort of attention to bloodthirsty detail that horror aficionados crave. Pity, though, that there aren’t really any more actual grindhouses.

The novel presumably filled in the blanks to build an engrossing tale, one that here comes across as a rote suspenser, complete with jump scares and a violent climax. The actors nearly elevate the proceedings to something greater.

While Ryan’s bountiful charm is as evident as ever, her character unfortunately comes across like an older version of the manic pixie dream girl. And the movie’s heavy-handed magical realist elements counter the slightness of the material to deadly effect.

That so many have to struggle not just with the disease but also the cost of staying alive is a national disgrace that documentaries such as this, however well-intentioned, can only begin to address.

If you find Burr’s stand-up routines funny (and since he routinely sells out arenas, it’s obvious that plenty of people do), you’ll enjoy Old Dads, which also benefits from Cannavale’s hilariously beleaguered reactions, Woodbine’s solid underplaying and some very funny turns by a variety of comedians in small roles.

The frenetic mayhem becomes tiresome in its repetitiveness, although kids already hopped up on candy and soda will presumably not mind at all.

None of this would work nearly as well without Bell, whose raspy voice and menacing gravitas are so riveting that he makes Jigsaw’s oft-repeated declaration “I’d like to play a game” scary as hell. He’s made the character truly iconic, much like Robert Englund did with Freddy Krueger. Accept no substitutions.

Much like the songs of Willie Nelson that populate its soundtrack, the film relies on a general uplifting atmosphere as the indefatigable Greta stops at nothing to fulfill her dream.

No One Will Save You proves a singularly intense experience.

Expend4bles — the number is in the middle of the word, get it? — represents a nadir for a series that began as an entertainingly nostalgic throwback to old-school action movies and the square-jawed muscle men who starred in them.

The Peasants is a ravishingly beautiful visual triumph.

Dear Jassi has the feel of a timeless folktale, made all the more unbearably sad because of its basis in fact.

Despite its heavy-duty subject matter, the film co-directed by Capobianco and Pierre-Luc Granjon is filled with welcome humor of both the visual and verbal varieties.

The convoluted storyline is too clever by far, and might have proved entertaining if the film had been intended as an absurdist black comedy. Unfortunately, Keaton goes in a more neo-noir direction, with the generally grim tone only accentuating the narrative absurdities.

It’s a compelling story told in largely engaging fashion, anchored by Dano’s terrific turn as the eccentric, strong-willed Gill, who becomes an unlikely folk hero.

Despite some amusing moments, it never really takes off, burdened by a tiresome romantic subplot that periodically stops the movie dead in its tracks.

The film would have benefited from director Jeff Celentano perhaps picking up the pace a little, and the deletion of some extraneous subplots. But the climactic sequence, in which Rickey bats through the pain while encountering the toughest pitchers he’s ever faced, provides the perfect stirring conclusion.

For those not motivated purely by a desire for cinematic bloodlust accompanied by an abrasive musical score that sounds like electronic fingernails on a blackboard, there’s some fun to be had.

The four lead performers display an undeniable chemistry that makes Vacation Friends 2 pleasantly engaging if not hilarious. But it’s the addition of Buscemi that provides the real comic spark, the veteran actor employing his well-honed persona of angry sarcasm to provide a much-needed edginess to the otherwise bland proceedings.

Director Nimrod Antal (Predators) stages the mostly vehicular mayhem with as much variety and visual excitement as possible, especially in a crucial scene in which Matt is cornered by the police in a tunnel. But there’s only so much he can do with the hackneyed premise.

Thanks to its well-observed, amusing depiction of teenage girl angst and a genuine sweetness at its core, it proves thoroughly winning. And if you don’t get all verklempt at the heartwarming ending, you’ve probably never had a best friend.

Even with its brief 93-minute running time, Strays feels thin and repetitive; after all, there are only so many times you can laugh at, say, a dog happily eating another’s dog vomit. But the film nonetheless delivers plenty of laughs, making up for many of its clunkers through sheer volume and the talents of its starry voice cast.

[Ovredal] handles the darkly creepy atmospherics expertly and makes fully convincing the ship’s fateful voyage through stormy and vampire-besieged seas. But he’s not able to bring much spark to Bragi Schut, Jr. and Zak Olkewicz’s slow-paced, formulaic screenplay, which lacks the dark wit necessary to keep us invested in the gory proceedings.

Adopting a decidedly younger spin toward its teenage heroes, the hugely entertaining and funny film seems destined to reinvigorate the franchise and attract plenty of nostalgic adults as well as young fans.

At a running time of over two hours, the experience eventually feels as wearisome as riding the same ride over and over again.

Corner Office succeeds all too well in conveying the deadening effects of office work, practically serving as a testimonial to the pandemic-created trend of working from home.

It proves more interesting in its chronicling of the business practices that made the Beanie Babies such a sensation, at least for a while, than in its portrait of personal dramas, the veracity of which obviously has to be called into question. Overall, the movie follows a by-now familiar trajectory, with the company’s mammoth success inevitably followed by its big fall.

Gariépy, masterful in her emotional and physical exactness, is a revelation as the enigmatic Kelly-Anne, whose stringent control over herself and her environment masks a sick compulsion whose origins we can only guess at.

This exercise in brutal nihilism ultimately proves as empty as the inane philosophy that provides the film its title.

Suffice it to say that if you enjoyed Extraction, you’ll have a fine time with this one, which, in typical franchise fashion, busts its butt attempting to outdo its predecessor. And it does.

The many, many action sequences are spectacularly conceived and executed, including a car chase on the Williamsburg Bridge that’s probably still tying up downtown traffic.

The story was already told in the 2008 documentary More Than a Game, but that won’t stop the GOAT’s fans from wanting to see this lovingly rendered adaptation that covers all the early career highlights, albeit sometimes in sanitized form.

The Boogeyman, in both its literary and cinematic forms, is undoubtedly relatively minor King. But when it’s done this well, even minor King is major scary.

The film’s genuine sweetness and affection for its characters go a long way toward compensating for its numbing overfamiliarity.

As usual, Butler brings a convincing humanity and vulnerability to his action movie heroics.

Harlow makes a surprisingly strong impression in his film acting debut, signaling that more big screen roles are in his future, while Walls provides the requisite simmering intensity and formidable physicality as the anger-prone Kamal.

Twice in the film, giant lumbering objects ricochet through crowded city streets wreaking absolute havoc in their wake. They’re perfect visual metaphors for the movies themselves, so stuffed with over-the-top mayhem and testosterone-packed macho aggressiveness that they’ve become utterly ridiculous. What saves Fast X is that it’s so aware of its own absurdity that it becomes an entertaining parody of itself.

While the disparate thematic elements don’t mesh together seamlessly in Crater, the film offers enough fun and thrills to swell the ranks of aspiring astronauts.

Big George Foreman isn’t bad exactly, merely serviceable. You keep waiting for it to deliver a knockout blow that never comes.

The film’s wildly imaginative visuals are another plus, with the proceedings feeling so bizarrely trippy at times it’s as if Gunn is aiming to create a midnight cult classic rather than a blockbuster superhero film.

In contrast to Bellucci, who underplays in dignified fashion, Collette works hard, very hard, to sell the concept and her character. That she fails is not an insult to her formidable gifts, but rather due to the flimsiness of the material, which seems better suited to the small screen.

Despite Wilson’s on-the-nose caricature and the enjoyable comic performances of such supporting players as Lusia Strus and the ever-reliable Wendi McLendon-Covey, Paint never delves beneath the surface.

Directors Aaron Horvath and Michael Jelenic, creators of the Teen Titans Go! series, deliver a reasonably faithful big screen adaptation that, while it features plenty of juvenile humor, wisely doesn’t lean toward broad satire.

The only real amusement comes from the casual asides delivered by Sandler and Aniston, the latter also providing perfectly calibrated slow-burn reactions that too often become overshadowed by the overproduced mayhem surrounding them.

Pugh delivers a superb starring performance that serves to accentuate her growing artistic stature and co-star Morgan Freeman turns in his best work in years after appearing in far too many sub-par vehicles. Their efforts lift A Good Person, which otherwise too often feels familiar in its themes and self-conscious in its melodramatic plot contrivances.

What also makes Angel Applicant different from so many other personal documentaries about serious illness is his essay-like examination of Klee’s life and career, accompanied by numerous examples of his artworks which became more abstract as his illness progressed.

Like some children who aren’t so cute anymore after they’ve grown up a little, this follow-up lacks much of the appeal of its predecessor. While the film provides the elaborate action set pieces, colorful villains and save-the-world plot mechanics expected of the comic book movie genre, some of the magic is missing.

Bigger, badder, bolder, longer, and featuring nearly more spectacular set pieces than one movie can comfortably handle, this epic action film practically redefines the stakes.

The film’s lengthy chronology and constantly shifting tones would be challenging for any director, but Longoria, making her feature debut, handles things expertly, infusing the proceedings with a loving appreciation and authentic-feeling depiction of the Latino community at its core.

The filmmaker, making his feature debut, also has more interesting things in mind, delivering a darker, more complex story that nonetheless proves utterly heartwarming by the end.

Making an atypical foray into commercial film territory (the Star Wars films being a notable exception), Driver proves a formidable action movie hero, his imposing physicality (and, perhaps, his former experience as a Marine) serving him well here.