Joe Neumaier

The emotions veer from bawdy to sweet and then to obvious, though the film is stylish, and Dolan's artfulness helps when the movie loses focus.

Director Jaak Kilmi's remembrance of growing up under Soviet rule never tries to be anything more than a curiosity.

Dour animated adventure that aspires to holiday joy, but is as enjoyable as a sock full of coal.

May feel especially like a statue covered in drapery. Unfortunately, the movie's attempts to steam things up feel about as exciting as an after-dinner mint.

Of the supporting performances, Gugino, Leguizamo and Wahlberg offer solid turns, but are let down by dialogue.

Movie references abound, but there's not enough humor to fuel even 90 minutes.

Most of the movie unfolds in such a dull manner.

The meta-satire hits you over the head until not just your Spidey sense is tingling.

As an exercise in atmosphere, this claustrophobic creeper does a lot with a little, even if the movie winds up providing just superficial shivers.

Another nicely understated performance from Jesse Eisenberg anchors this shambling drama.

“Um” winds up as empty as its mean streets are phony.

Cusack and Jane look like they’re improvising much of the time, and while that doesn’t lead to a better movie, the off-the-cuff approach is the best thing in the film.

Though the film’s untested cast struggles with the drama, and the sketched-out story is often banal (there are several amateurish calls-to-mom scenes), the presentation of a specific city subculture is etched from the heart.

Ferrera's shaggy tone, which fits the iconic building, gets irritating. Still, if you come for the stories, you'll stay for the company.

There's less to Beastly than meets the eye - and what meets the eye is no great shakes, either.

Narratively static and morally banal. That may be par for the course, however, when half the movie is spent watching shallow kids try on other people’s clothes.

A frosty-eyed, imperturbable actress in “Atonement,” “Hanna” and “The Host,” Ronan is at least able to sell Daisy’s new focus while the movie loses its own.

Has TOO much happening, which befits a comedy with a lot of targets but ultimately makes the whole operation scattershot.

Cathy Moriarty and other Scorsese alums pop up, but these mean streets feel too derivative to thrill.

Director Larysa Kondracki's fictionalized account of a true story is underserved by a melodramatic script; the result is like a film of a "60 Minutes" segment. Still, Weisz is strong and smart. And David Strathairn shows up in is-he-good-or-evil? mode.

Dignity dies a million deaths despite the best intentions.

The self-conscious poetry and Cruz's diagnosis of bipolar disorder threaten to add too many notes to this quiet drama.

Though Rust and Bone aims for a blasé attitude toward disabled drama - in a far more artificial way than another French film, "The Intouchables," did earlier this year - it's underwritten characters and hoary approach plunk it into mediocrity. As wheelchair-bound Stephanie practices her whale-training motions to Katy Perry's "Firework," it's eye-rollingly obvious.

A movie needs to announce if it's playing games. Pulling the rug out from under a viewer is fine for whodunnits and psychological thrillers and the usual suspects. But a supposedly grown-up drama like The Other Man ought to have scruples about where it plans to take you.

A work of words as lovely as “The Prophet” deserves a better artistic interpretation than this animated venture, which consists mostly of pedestrian, ’70s-quality visuals.

You’ll never buy an inexpensive T-shirt without feeling guilty again. At least not after seeing Nathaniel Thomas McGill and Vincent Vittorio’s thorough documentary, which explains something you already know — American manufacturing is dying.

The movie gets too claustrophobic, while its noble attempt to take on suffering remains laudable.

William H. Macy has pitch-perfect instincts as an actor. As a movie director, he’s bound to do better than his first feature, this big-hearted, nicely paced but ho-hum character study.

All of that ends up making this movie — originally titled “Jeff,” in a telling bit of overpersonalization — feel like a late-night cable-news hack job.

The “Millers” script — it took four writers to cobble together something that seems so slight — hits too many obvious notes between the moments when Aniston can strut her stuff.

What Getaway needed most is enough juice to get to the finish line, narratively speaking. Because while jumping into the car is great, the fun dies fast if there’s nowhere to go.

Some of the talk gets a little bombastic, but it's hard to deny the thrill involved.

The fact that it stars the extremely funny Melissa McCarthy is both its saving grace and incredibly frustrating.

The result was remarkable, but the story of it, while true to the moment, needed — ironically — much more dynamism.

The long shadow of David Fincher's "Seven" falls on Anamorph, a moody, ultimately unexciting thriller.

Marries an unengaging love triangle to a flat visual style, nearly squashing the one good thing in it -- a scruffy, slouching performance from Peter Sarsgaard.

Becomes too melodramatic and bleakly obvious. Weaving, though, as always, is never less than magnetic.

Shares a spiritual link to the Japanese works of Hayao Miyazaki but lacks his films' narrative drive and magical overlay.

Goes about its game so bloodlessly, the result is some of the most unexciting action and seduction sequences in recent memory.

The story here, like a lot of bar bands, goes loud to cover up mediocrity. When Streep sings, though, so does the film.

Director Sergei Bodrov’s movie is based on a kids’ book in which Tom was a 12-year-old, and the actors wisely pitch their performances to a young crowd.

Weitz – who did a great job adapting Nick Hornby's "About a Boy" into an affecting 2002 movie – can't bring the pieces together here.

The great David Strathairn can make any film watchable, but even he can’t save this dry dramatic thriller.

As a film, the result is static, like Ang Lee’s similarly muddled “Taking Woodstock.”

Empathy for the all-too-real plight of the working poor drives this heavy but bold indie. Sadly, though, it falters under the weight of too much drama.

Feiffer sometimes gets snagged on the look-at-me nature of her meta-performance, veering from pathological to pathetic, and not always in the best way.

Sometimes, less is more. Case in point: Thanks for Sharing, a film that’s a little too eager to be ID’d as a “sex addiction dramedy.” As a result, solidly grounded performances from almost all the cast members wind up playing second fiddle to navel-gazing.

It's the same movie town we've seen many times before, with dingy mechanic's shops, barren parking lots and a greasy-spoon diner where all the clichés come together.

The movie lumbers, and Loach and screenwriter Rona Munro's affectless approach winds up tamping down the movie's good intentions.

Yes, there are good moments from a team of veteran British actors, but overall, this return visit to the 2012 gray-set rom-com is deadly dull.

Gandolfini scoops up another chance to show off the gentleness he left at home during six seasons of “The Sopranos.”

This earnest, at times touching, reach-for-your-dreams doc about musical hopefuls in middle age gets sidetracked quickly. When it should focus on a reunited R&B group, it wallows in the self-aggrandizement of an L.A. producer and, most awkwardly, a New York cabaret singer.

In either a stunningly brave or misguided act of meta-absurdity, Real Steel, which is about a boy, his dad and the robot that changes their lives, actually feels as if it were made inside the mind of a kid obsessed with robots.

Writer-director David M. Rosenthal fills this dewy road-trip movie with too many cliches. From the glimpses we get of Shue's character, that may have been a more rockin' story.

Velvety storytelling still feels more thawed-out than heated.

Boasting perhaps the most bored-sounding voice-over ever, this unexceptional drama imagines itself - much as its young heroine does - to be far more noteworthy than it actually is.

All those cliched literary trappings come together in Stuck in Love, but the final product feels more like a footnote than a finished work.

Unlike last year's superior "Judy Moody and the Not Bummer Summer" - which put its grade-school heroine through similarly seasonal woes - "Dog Days" squanders several chances to find something magical in the mundane.

"Field of Dreams" this ain't, and Crowe, whose "Jerry Maguire" and "Almost Famous" are justly held in high esteem, can't build the right frame here. It's neither fish nor fowl; a "guy-gets-his-life-right" rom-com runs smack into a "kids-with-animals" lark.

This sometimes-taut little thriller is sullied by its unnecessary masquerade as a documentary presented by HBO’s gonzo news show “Vice.”

The film doesn't play games; it's basically just Lucas going through a short story-like period of reflection and redemption almost entirely without dialogue. It's not enough, but it is what this underappreciated actor does best.

If you're going to have a ghost in your movie, it might be a good thing to present a viable alternative to that ghost. Mama, however, presents a battle between two not very good options before crumbling like a sheet on a string.

It may not be one of his finest roles or one of his more memorable films. But in its own way, Boulevard may be one that says the most about him.

Despite the incongruous romance and abrupt action beats, Crowe gives a likable, sympathetic performance. But it all starts to dry up before our eyes. Emotions feel false or melodramatic, flashbacks are drawn out and coincidences and connections are forced.

Just another loud, boy-centric comedy aimed at ’tweens. The movie turns a slight children’s book — in this case, Judith Viorst’s 1972 fave, from which it takes mainly the title — into a charmless mishmash.

Director Hiromasa Yonebayashi did a wonderful job adapting “The Borrowers” into “The Secret World of Arriety.” But this slow-moving film, also from a book, tends to plod rather than float.

This drama, as traditional as its subject was epochal, is earnest and studious to a fault. Rarely has a film about upheaval felt more like a textbook.

Noah, Darren Aronofsky’s often ludicrous, occasionally thoughtful epic, puts theology front-and-center, and doubles down on its blockbuster ingredients — like adding huge rock monsters with glowing eyes.

This National Geographic production mixes two amazing adventures, neither of them quite what you expect.

The result is that, as with Hanks' performance, what's missing - subtlety, truth, an earned sense of rebirth – is stronger than what's here. Despite all the connections in Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, it never connects to us the way we need it to.

Despite a few fiery breaths, there’s mostly hot air from a lot of serious actors slumming it.

The film's major action sequences are never exciting, and even the now-requisite destruction of New York feels lazy.

Though much of the film is overcooked and overwrought, it’s well-played, and writer-director Kieran Darcy-Smith keeps us guessing, and watching.

The cutesy energy is just too much in this Aussie comedy that’s overly bemused by its quirkiness.

Kidman is able to draw you in even as the movie's solemn, morbid obviousness wears you out.

Orphan doesn't add much to the genre except, disturbingly, a fetishistic bent that's creepy in the wrong way.

For all the trickiness and bluster, Shutter Island is dead inside.

Director Scott Teems' film is as quiet as untilled soil -- not always a good thing -- but Holbrook has a handle on where to dig.

The forced coming-of-age parable that filmmaker Joe Wright laces with fairy-tale symbolism is heavy-handed from the get-go.

The big twist to Closed Circuit is stated in the film’s TV ads, so even the element of surprise is lost. There may have been the making of a juicy, episodes-long BBC series here, but as it is, there’s barely any juice at all.

Scenes of the director as a school-age boy in a Varda film are haunting, but end up simply sparking a desire to see Varda's work.

Safe House devolves into unexciting action scenes that feel left over from the "Bourne" flicks and are peopled with cloak-and-dagger stereotypes.

It's laughably, eye-rollingly absurd.

Bloom's watchfulness and brittle seriousness anchors The Good Doctor, even as it wanders away from reality and into its own bizarre world.

Kosinski’s ultimately underwhelming film leads nowhere. As its palpable sense of dread — well-sustained in a gently cascading first hour — gives way to dead ends, this Omega Movie shoots itself in the foot.

It's a naive example of the transformative powers of a 23-year-old let loose amongst the dullards. Whoa.

The movie's lack of Michael Moore-style dynamism has a dulling effect. What saves it is the human face it puts on the crisis, and its indictment of corporate greed.

It's nice to see righteous anger in a movie. If only the education drama Detachment knew what to do with it.

Dennis Quaid lends some needed saltiness as Hamilton's supportive dad.

Aloha isn’t horrible, but it does have a pitiable odor about it, like a dog that’s sat too long on the beach. Crowe aspires to Golden Age of Hollywood repartee, but something feels off, just as it did in “Elizabethtown” (2005) and “We Bought a Zoo” (2011). Everyone just seems to be trying too hard.

Amiable but ambling.

John Cleese, Michael Palin and Chapman himself (courtesy of interviews, skits and various recordings he made before his death from cancer in 1989) chime in. It's an odd little trip, but if it weren't, one would have to ask, "Well what's all this, then?"

The deepest chord is hit by Cattrall, who almost manages to wipe away the memory of "Sex and the City 2."

Combining the dysfunctional family reunion and the home invasion thriller, You’re Next tries, somewhat valiantly, to add new twists to the usual bloody horror-flick shenanigans. But aside from a few fresh chords, it’s same-old, same-old.

Flow makes you thirsty for more information.

Like the last gift buried under singing Billy Bass fish, dancing Coke cans, joke books and mounds of wrapping paper, there's a glimmer of fun in Four Christmases that almost gets vacuumed up with the tinsel.

Informative and flavorful, though lacking in surprise.

This heavy-handed movie is simply a sermon its makers think we all should hear.

Unfortunately, "modern" additions (like the soldiers' YouTube videos and some social media moments) feel clunky, and a necessarily shortened approach trips the movie up, though leads Matt Doyle and Seth Numrich - accomplished Broadway actors - are intense, engaged and appropriately tragic.

Though it eventually gets down to more serious business, this Glasgow-set apocalyptic romance-drama seems, at first, to be most concerned about whether restaurants will survive the end of the world.

Roth and Hurt glower semi-engagingly, and while Norton's scrawniness works, he seems intellectually disengaged, despite his helping to craft Zak Penn's script.

Roth's works are particularly hard to do justice to onscreen, perhaps because the celebrated author's personality is really in his words

Sam Worthington and Jim Sturgess are solid as two of the four kidnappers, but Swedish director Daniel Alfredson pushes the caper button too many times. More sly wit would have helped things come to a head.

Much of the young cast - especially a miscast Page - make the oft-repeated mistake of saying Allen's dialogue as he might say them; the result is a lot of hyperarticulation, stammering and gesturing.

Neeson's better than this. You can't watch him here without thinking, Geez, every fight-choreography session could have funded "Love, Actually." This bash-the-door-down action scene likely took as long to film as "Kinsey." That gunfight required more stunts than all of "Schindler's List."

Words and Pictures doesn’t get the dunce-cap award, but it does lose points for feeling phony and contrived — especially during the moments when it appears overly proud of what it is.

Director Sue Bourne belabors the judges' final decision to such an excruciating length, it makes the whole movie feel a bit more cloddish than it should.

The story and performances (save for Matthew McNulty’s angry Luis Buñuel) are paint-by-numbers, with social upheaval and sexual adventurism as dramatic as an after-dinner mint.

All the actresses, especially Theron, are appropriately haunted, but let's hope Arriaga's love of echoes, fate and coincidence has run its mopey course.

What remains rote is how easily the fiend’s victims fall for his tricks. It’s almost as if they’ve seen too many movies like The Barber, and shaved away all common sense.

This sequel to last year’s surprise buzz-maker takes the same appreciative approach to scare-flick tradition: Take hipsters, mix into classic genre riff, goose until ludicrous; repeat. Not every try is successful, but as with any anthology, if you don’t like one, sit back and wait for the next.

It's hard to talk about The Soloist without falling into cliches, because this well-meaning but ham-handed drama is full them.

Crisply directed but inescapably pious and, worse, narratively poky.

Faour and Muallen give solid performances, but there are a few too many by-the-numbers moments.

Unabashedly one-sided, this biography of Chávez - and several other Latin American politicians - does raise some valid concerns about what Stone calls the "manipulative power of the media." So it's too bad he's as guilty of partisanship as the right-wing outlets he reviles.

It's a big fat missed opportunity.

This contemplative drama draws strength from day-to-day ordinariness and a terrific lead performance from Paul Eenhoorn, yet sadly falls short.

The cast gives it all a good go, and pip-pip and all that for noticeable intelligence and a bit of the old British satire. Yet Salmon Fishing takes patience and rewards with no bite.

Unfortunately, the movie doesn't have enough going on to keep us engaged, but writer-director Aaron Katz has a confident style and a way with small moments.

Though coming off at times like Adam Sandler’s “Grown-ups,” only with Oscar winners, Last Vegas is a genial little comedy for the crowd it’s intended for.

Mood is more important to Not Fade Away than anything, but writer-director David Chase, who turned mood into masterpiece with every season of "The Sopranos," allows nostalgic feeling to be the sole reason for this, his first feature film.

Nowhere near as kinky or thinky as Soderbergh’s "sex, lies and videotape," Girlfriend pretends it has more on its mind than it really does.

The emotions are florid and the entanglements heated. But the film become preoccupied with, as Flaubert would say, the pettiness and mediocrity of daily life. Arterton, though, is plushly magnetic. She draws us in despite the overly lyrical atmosphere.

There's a funny movie scratching at the edges of This is 40. Unfortunately, writer-director Judd Apatow sees himself as the John Cassavetes of Comedy, so every time that funny movie starts to emerge, Apatow tramples it with scenes of domestic irritation.

The effects are so omnipresent it's like Reynolds' perfect hair is floating in CGI limbo. Yet when they need punch, as in a "Superman"-ish display-of-powers scene involving a helicopter, there's no flair.

Imagine a quietly creepy "X-Men" prequel -- in French -- and you have this odd little parable.

Any urgency the movie has comes from co-star Terrence Howard, a firebrand of an actor who can’t be contained by a paint-by-numbers script.

So now we have a full-length Machete movie, and it turns out that, as usual, less is more.

Unfortunately, despite the sweaty, tense atmosphere, Viva Riva becomes derivative of the duller scenes in other gangster flicks.

Only DeWitt looks at home, but Shelton allows “Touchy Feely” to be so wishy-washy that we can never get a hold of the star, or the movie.

All the low-hum, behavioral buffoonery gets a bit tedious. Still, cheers to Cross for the satirical road he covers, even with all the potholes.

Regardless of where its stars want to take it, all roads here lead to blandness and inanity.

So much of this irritating film from first-time writer-director Daniel Barnz feels like a writing exercise it's amazing Elle Fanning, in the title role, comes off as well as she does.

Sandler's shambling Yogi Bear-ness will be the big appeal to holiday-vacation audiences.

A steady thrum of anger pervades this Romanian film even in its quietest moments, but the ending and captured-lost-boys setting ultimately fail to surprise.

Filmmakers Tia Lessin and Carl Deal utilize the footage Kim and Scott Roberts had taken throughout the disaster, showing how residents suffered, survived and came together to help when official assistance let them down.

The splintered viewpoints help with the monotony, but from the taunting of new inmates to the cell-block sadist, we've gone through all this before, right down to the final twists.

Like Stallone, director Walter Hill is also far from his heyday ("The Warriors," "48 HRS.," "Streets of Fire"), but the old-guy camaraderie behind the scenes is evident. Despite the movie being based on a graphic novel, no one adds extra flash here just to appease the kids.

History can be an equalizer, so director Roland Joffe ("The Killing Fields," "The Mission") makes sure saints and sinners all get painted with the same uninteresting brush in this fact-based drama.

The story's Hitchcockian plot loses steam quickly, though Pinon's salty presence keeps things from getting totally bloodless.

The International almost seems like a Monty Python spoof on spy-game thrillers in which the phrase "secret agent" is constantly replaced by "banker," resulting in lines like, "...If I die, 100 other bankers take my place."

The sequel to one of the most visually striking movies of the last 10 years continues the graphic novel-inspired landscape of its predecessor. But the characters don’t click, and the action feels dull.

While we're meant to feel claustrophobic, we're not supposed to fight boredom, which kicks in quickly.

All In lays down some interesting hands but sometimes can't raise the stakes, though "Rounders" star Matt Damon lends a bit of celeb flash.

This well-intentioned but clumsy attempt to get into the head of one of the 20th century's most famous women remains full of hot air.

Full of unenlightening snippets and blithe but banal asides, what the movie is missing is edge.

The oldsters are feisty — a gun-totin’ granny is played by Pussy Galore herself, “Goldfinger’s” Honor Blackman — but the shtick’s as flat as old ale. It is bookended, though, by two seriously great songs.

Melancholy, often muddled documentary.

The eyewitness testimony of dozens of punk-era survivors and hotel denizens has a disorienting effect, and everyone gets sidetracked, though the colorful anecdotes are priceless.

Stories about mythic figures at the end of their days are compelling — but they still need some zing. That’s what Mr. Holmes is missing.

Despite the human drama here, we’re kept at a remove by stolid direction and by-the-numbers storytelling.

The same boring routine gets played out again.

A few really weird things happen during Paranormal Activity 3, though unfortunately, they have nothing to do with being frightened.

The sole treasure of Cowboys & Aliens is that director Jon Favreau ("Iron Man") has fashioned an actual rawhide ride from a graphic novel (that took six writers to wrangle to the screen).

For all its strengths, the film is cursed by an ADD-style structure and a flashy but inevitably ineffective casting stunt.

Wang tracks his guys like the documentarian he is, and if the movie feels a bit canned thanks to Adam Forgash's unoriginal script, classic NYC spots and a big heart make it feel like home.

Azaria channels his inner Charles Nelson Reilly, which helps, as does an evil emoting cat. Kids under 7 will likely giggle at some too-harsh pratfalls, not care about a grown man's fear of procreation, not get all the tiny innuendos and possibly miss how the movie is a fairly successful tourism ad for New York.

It feels like a high-end perfume ad.

High art swings sort of low in this watchable but thematically repetitive drama.

Aiming for lightness but landing with a thud, Frances Ha is a well-meaning blunder. Director Noah Baumbach’s ode to Brooklyn twentysomething life is a flibbertigibbet fable that, like a self-absorbed flirt you meet at a party, grates on the nerves despite being easy on the eyes.

Kids who get a kick out of the macabre will enjoy this exquisitely crafted but tedious film.

Director Travis Fine gives his period details flourish and lets Cumming and Dillahunt create well-rounded characters, but Any Day Now winds up treacly.

Engrossing, sad and heartbreaking.

Despite the presence of Jet Li, only the last half-hour of this chatty epic truly flies.

Plays out like a clunky, not-so-incredible "Incredibles," or a more-despicable "Despicable Me."

All banality, though it delivers some goodwill even as it pulls a muscle trying to get its premise going.

George Lucas produced this candy-coated, fictionalized drama, and while its cast is first-rate and its flying sequences sharp, the movie is as glazed and wide-eyed as a 70-year-old comic book.

This somber but unexceptional drama is luxurious to look at but never gripping.

Unfortunately, Mann’s newest film, Blackhat, fails to connect.

Riding in to save almost every scene, though, are recent Tony Awards host Harris and the wild and woolly Sedaris, who goes too far, but in a good way. Shelov could learn from them.

Writer-director Wayne Kramer adds what could be called mainstream threads to his messy script, but the result is simplistic across the board.

The film, unfortunately, hasn't the depth Malkovich brings to his performance.

There's a sense of dread in Contagion, but it never spreads to us. When Day 1 is finally shown, it makes you want to eat better, which isn't the same as saying this is a great movie.

Ultimately, this dull tour of a thieving, primal underworld is just a lot of high-talking hogwash.

No matter how the filmmakers move Heaven and Earth, this comic-book adaptation looks cool but contains very little thunder. The fault is a script by a five-headed beast which contains fateful missteps.

Good thing the Aussie star has the role down to a science, since the rest of The Wolverine is a howler.

Fans of Dario Argento and Mario Bava will appreciate the references. Even for newcomers, there are minor chords to enjoy. If only there were less screaming.

Solid performances and a literary feel help turn a standard family-rift drama into a dry but saucy narrative.

A clunky, dead-on-arrival scary drama that proves that even people with good taste need a good script or direction.

The idea of Willem Dafoe, one of our most watchable actors, playing a man stalking a thought-to-be-extinct animal in the wild is gripping in theory. In execution, however, The Hunter loses its way.

One problem with “Wish” is that Braff tries to cram so much into it, no scene ever exists for its own sake, to establish rhythm or help us know these characters outside of the ongoing family crises.

Dream House is the full magilla, with imaginary images, sanity questions, peek-a-boo startles and the usual are-they-real-or-not? characters.

If Welcome to the Rileys were a thicker-skinned movie -- if it were the movie it thinks it is -- so much of the outcome wouldn't be telegraphed the minute you read the premise.

While Montias' actors do their best, even good intentions have limits. Still, it never feels false. And remember, even Martin Scorsese (born in Queens) had to start somewhere.

There is a serious lack of action here, which might be overlooked if the script were as smart as in the previous films. What passes for parable here is merely overplotting.

The movie as a whole falls victim to a dewy kind of Tennessee Williams-itis, as Black plops too many wanna-be, colorful twists - imminent illness, botched robberies, fake pregnancies - into what is at heart a gently heartbreaking rendering.

Everyone thinks sex is easy to do, but that doesn’t mean they’re good at it. The To Do List is exactly that type of movie, one that thinks a sex-obsessed version of a John Hughes comedy by its very nature is hilarious. It’s not, but there are still some things to like here.

This comedy is empty.

Has moments of honesty, but more often the barren landscape - both outside and inside - drains the emotions out of the film.

Luna and Bernal have amiability, but not enough to earn a recommendation for this clichéd movie.

This often haunting stop-motion Claymation movie ultimately suffers from what bedevils many live-action movies culled from short stories: a herky-jerky plot.

The manic energy of Kevin Hart is, surprisingly, toned down in The Wedding Ringer. Which may account for almost the entire first half of this wannabe-raucous buddy movie being laugh-free.

This two-bit echo of "The Accidental Tourist" is a preachy pill that wastes the genial, funny Jeff Daniels and the criminally underused Lauren Graham.

Overly analytical, cutesy comedy-drama.

The biggest fault is that comparatively little attention is given to the monsters.

There’s atmosphere here, but nothing else.

The 12-year-old boys who go to see ParaNorman - and who are the only ones who might enjoy it - should double up on the sugary treats to stay awake during this gorgeous-looking but zombi-fied stop-motion animated creep show. It's as slow as a corpse, and half as interesting.

If characters talking to dogs and dog reaction shots are some of your favorite things, add some stars to this review.

African Cats, while often adorable and at times gripping, is more of a TV-ready experience.

Kurt Cobain, TicketMaster and the tragic concert in Roskilde, Denmark, are addressed through plentiful backstage footage. If only it was about something other than rockers almost irked they got famous.

An oblique, by-design and frustrating drama, Claire Denis’ film about a man’s mysterious suicide and its repercussions is creepy, but finally too vague.

Barrymore is a delicious opportunity to watch the great Christopher Plummer perform the role that won him a second Tony Award. But it's also a lesson in the pitfalls of personality-based minimalism. While Plummer acts his heart out, the script becomes one punchline after another.

It's like torture, though Body of Lies has nothing to spill.

The result isn't deadly dull, but it does turn what should have been a most dangerous game into a basic scenery-chewing contest.

It’s all too much. Frankie & Alice has multiple problems it can’t get past.

If director Rob Reiner’s AARP-aimed comedy stumbles on several fronts, at least it provides a stage for some seasoned pros to strut their stuff.

The Giver was ahead of its time as a book. But as a movie, it’s too late.

Comes upon a few quirky solutions and movie-ripoff scares before settling into a kind of coma.

An earnest but undeniably eye-rolling documentary about the denizens of this odd pocket of show business.

While Messina and Ireland are fine company, writer-director Matt Ross' conceit tires you out.

The actors are in good form, but McFarland, USA can’t find its footing.

The movie devolves into a series of clichéd bits, none of which are that funny.

This dull thriller wastes the potential of Nicole Kidman and Colin Firth.

As an acting symposium, this is 83 minutes of Tucci exercises; never a bad thing. The wooden Eve does her best, but director/writer Neil LaBute unfortunately underwrote her character — by design, it would seem, given all that transpires.

The movie shows the city as both an intimidating and enticing place for new arrivals, but ultimately gets bogged down in the cliched split destinies and intentions of its main characters.

Words and story are still the lifeblood of a movie, and Jennifer's Body is filled like a Twinkie with half-fleshed-out ideas.

Only the extremely naive will be shocked, shocked by director Morgan Spurlock's dissection of product placement in movies.

The central metaphor of dance, though, is forced, a standard-issue cliché about dancing away problems.

This overly twee, morbidly cute romance initially digs up the ageless "Harold and Maude" as a touchstone before it slips the coils of watchability.

The result is far too high-and-mighty to truly be moving.

This sweet if limited film has an agreeable attitude.

Liberal Arts is at its most nauseating when we hear Jesse and Zibby read their oh-so-self-aware love letters.

Dominic Cooper gives a riveting dual performance in The Devil's Double, but the movie is a relentless one-note drama that loses its momentum halfway through.

Close and McTeer, an evenly matched odd-couple pairing, keep it real. They do the heavy lifting, and are utterly enchanting, whether in bonnets or boots.

Writer-director Hannah Fidell’s somber drama of an illicit romance earns credit for being a serious discussion of a tabloid-rich topic, but the movie runs out of places to go.

This doc, made by Kunstler's daughters Emily and Sarah, doesn't pretend to be unbiased, but it nonetheless has an unblinking view of its subject. They must have learned a thing or two from dad.

Strong acting all ’round helps, but unfortunately this is just a slow ride to nowhere.

There's an art to making a good spoof, but good luck finding it in Dance Flick, not only because the movie goes for easy toilet humor, but because it often relies on it to stay afloat.

Gets old fast.

This empty, immature romantic comedy ultimately feels as if it's filled with all the hot air that separates New York and San Francisco, yet still manages to be a suffocating bore.

Less the opulent retelling she (Taymor) intended and more like a high-minded midnight movie, filled with Ricky's-style costumes, black swans, sprites that flit across the screen and a cave filled with boiling beakers.

If Marmaduke achieves anything, it's that it makes this past spring's "Furry Vengeance" look like a masterpiece by comparison.

This pseudo-punkster hybrid of "Heathers" and "Thelma & Louise" loses its way almost immediately, veering from wannabe-shocking social indictment to stultifyingly obvious yawner.

Brothers tries to delve into how war can tear families apart, but only succeeds in showing how miscasting and melodrama obscure good intentions.

Such a lazy action-drama underachiever, it seems unfair to target stars Jamie Foxx and Gerard Butler for bringing their C game.

Director Jake Paltrow’s stark sense of place fades as familiar genre elements are introduced. It winds up like “There Will Be Blood,” but with H2O, not oil. It’s food for thought, nothing more.

Half-assed, halfhearted attempt to copy the Farrellys' out-there style is missing both their jackassical riffs and their heart.

During all of the film’s oh-so-long 97 minutes, Year One, barely earns a snicker.

One of 2015’s dullest.

It’s too bad we can’t take a hit out on The Family. This unexciting, unfunny would-be action satire is filled with Italian-American stereotypes, decades-old TV-style Mafia cliches, bits of business that never amount to anything and actors so much better than the hoary, one-joke material.

Adds to the sad realization that this once-vibrant and witty actor (Cage) is completely controlled now by his inner teenager.

Talk about lost in space. The whacked-out outer-space melodrama Jupiter Ascending has embedded in its genes the DNA of “Barbarella” and “Flash Gordon,” some dust from “Dune” and even a bit of Michael Jackson’s Disneyland short “Captain Eo.”

Since Bullock coproduced this masochistic venture, it seems she buys into the idea that fluffer-nut ditziness is what she does best. Except it isn't.

It's nothing special. Which sort of makes it a loser all the way 'round. Expect a sad afterlife for it on cable.

Ridiculous and mannered, Loosies is light-fingered but heavy-handed.

A dumb thriller starring Dennis Quaid as a weirdo mortician taunted by high school kids into revealing what he did with his wife and her lover years before - and look at the movies it rips off...

The acting and general schlockiness make "Friday the 13th" look like "Macbeth," but it's clear D'Onofrio just wants to hang out. And actually, a lot of the music is really good. Let's hope next time, he decides to make something like "The Commitments" instead.

Johnson is convincing as a swaggering, jokey Lennon, but the photos of young John, Paul and George that end the movie ultimately have more punch than this bubblegummy montage.

I Love You Phillip Morris not only blasts gay stereotypes back decades, it could actually make people wish for a third "Ace Ventura" movie. Both of those are an accomplishment, though neither is a compliment.

If there are Nazis fighting other Nazis in a movie and it's still boring, something's gone wrong. Valkyrie has a coterie of problems, and represents a whole new front in Tom Cruise's public relations war, but first and foremost there's the tedium.

The Big Wedding lets them all down with bottom-rung sitcom shtick and an undercurrent of squareness masquerading as absurdity.

I Am Number Four, with its gangly title, seems like a dimwitted cousin to those hipper properties - a Superman-come-lately tale of puppy love, extraordinary powers and puberty that's duller than a chalkboard and less powerful than an extraneous Jonas brother.

Everything that goes around comes around, but the roundelay in 30 Beats comes off, well, a little square.

Though this family film is slick and well-intentioned, it comes off as shallow as a prom committee meeting.

Writer-director Sebastian Gutierrez seems to think his characters are oh-so-edgy, and maybe they would be -- if it were 1982.

Atrocious dreck that feels sitcomish, only without the polish or panache.

Can't overcome mythic stupidity.

Only viewers wondering if James Van Der Beek has finally outgrown "Dawson's Creek" will be at all satisfied by this dreadful police procedural that contains good history lessons and bad TV-cop-show drama.

Muddled and inert despite the best intentions, this inescapably dull thriller plays like a Middle Eastern take on Liam Neeson’s “Taken.”

It is no summer thriller. It’s an anemic actioner that fosters excitement like dead limbs as it lumbers toward a conclusion.

Dullness, as well as hoary preachiness, neuters the family-and-their-war-dog drama Max.

A documentary with too much dead time between the arduous tasks at hand, never grabs a viewer because -- sad to say -- it's too dull.

Every scene is entwined in clunkiness.

Unfortunately, its positive attributes are thrown out of balance by its abundant negatives - including chintzy effects, lumbering storytelling and an overstylized, earnest incompetence that evokes "Speed Racer."

Hardworking Oscar winner Harden and beguiling Spanish star Watling do nothing for this haphazard film, which belatedly decides it wants to be a stage satire as the women lark into a ridiculous avant-garde production of “MacBeth.” Bloody awful.

Corey Stoll is the only reason to sit through this muddled Jersey-set drama.

With the most growling and grunting of any movie this summer - and that includes those apes perched atop the box office - Conan the Barbarian seems at times to have actually been made by barbarians.