John Anderson

Mountainhead teeters on a precipice of dramatic irony and intentions.

The filmmakers may have refashioned the book to make it a vehicle for Mr. Murphy, and done so successfully. But they were right about the POV: Witnessing the turmoil of these very troubled youths through the frustrations of their teachers makes for more convincing drama than would a delinquent’s-eye view of the same situation.

The lack of oversight revealed in BS High is appalling—Ben Ferree, a former investigator for the Ohio High School Athletic Association, is one of the film’s biggest assets, a somewhat removed, detail-oriented observer who debunks Mr. Johnson’s claims at every turn.

An eager, earnest, broadly constructed pageant of ideas and characters whose greatest asset may be the service it pays to literature. [01 May 1998, p.F1]

Even as Cecil lives his life slightly adjacent to history, building a heroic film around him requires herculean effort.

The screenwriter/playwrights have processed the characters’ last words in ways that imbue them with as much humanity as possible.

The Boy Behind the Door is an underwritten movie and an underpopulated one, though missing people are less of a handicap to the narrative than missing information.

Any self-respecting period piece, historical drama or even caper movie - and The Debt is all three - balances issues of global significance with interpersonal drama. The problem here is that the personal eclipses the global. The stakes are too low.

The creative process is always an elusive thing for filmmakers to capture, but amid all the startling visuals and the splendid acting, Polina rises, gloriously, to the challenge.

American Made is one of the many children of “Goodfellas,” a true-crime story turned first-person narrative told by a charismatic ne’er-do-well surrounded by dubious characters and tantalizing subplots. None of these offspring, including American Made, have matched the chilling grandeur of Martin Scorsese’s 1990 masterpiece, with its multifaceted characters and visual fluidity.

Ms. Israel's movie proves, once again, that the best nonfiction cinema possesses the same attributes as good fiction: Strong characters, conflict, story arc, visual style.

This is a movie about longing, desire, desperation and the abandonment of principle - quite a collection of themes, all universal.

It's a purely sensory journey until the pictures start making editorial comments, in slaughterhouses and garbage dumps.

Isolated brilliance is precisely what helps The Good Nurse shine, and it could hardly be otherwise given the story.

Anyone expecting some kind of righteously indignant, stentorian rant from Ms. Meeropol will be disappointed. In fact, she does something far more surgical: She makes Cohn ridiculous. She makes him close to an object of pity. He would have hated nothing more. Call it revenge by pathos.

Still — and with the full knowledge of committing an atrocious pun — the whole thing left me cold, partly because there’s no actual villain and thus very little concrete drama.

To its credit, Unstoppable features a first-rate performance by Jharrel Jerome (“Moonlight”), who is never less than convincing as Anthony and sometimes seems to be in a different movie from his co-stars.

World War II is often called the “last good war,” which has also meant that it was the last global conflict out of which the studios could make an unabashedly heroic movie. Fury is not that movie. And because it is not, it provides a few psychic disturbances beyond its shocking gore, burning soldiers blowing their brains out, children hanged from trees by the SS and imminent rape.

The truth is, Mr. Farina would be considered Oscar material if "Joe May" were a bigger film. As it is, he'll have to settle for being great.

There is often a pulsating musical score buoying the action, such as it is; family snapshots appear, the histories of the individual kids are told, their approaches to competitive spelling are explained, and there are interviews with mothers and fathers who, someone warns, should not be stereotyped as “tiger parents.”

Naturally, Mr. Murray is a joy to watch. And he has brought so much joy to so many grumpy people he deserves whatever accolades he can accrue, even for a career-assessment comedy like St. Vincent.

Mr. Fellowes, being something of a genius at briskly established plotlines and characterizations, clearly knew that a regal visit would be an ideal way to show off the best and worst of each Downton habitué.

It’s a fast-paced whodunit, despite the answers to its central mystery being either memorable, or Google-able, but the reasons why may amount to spoilers. So reader beware.

Mr. Chase still tries to be funny here, sometimes desperately, and isn’t. Which along with a career’s worth of ill will puts the sting in I’m Chevy Chase and You’re Not.

Mr. Carnahan has till now been pigeonholed, and rightly, by comedy shoot-'em-ups like "Smokin' Aces" and "The A-Team." But here he is with The Grey - certainly an adventure film but one with a spiritual ingredient that is both surprising and fiercely resonant.

The Last of the Sea Women is, like its subjects, beautiful and charming.

As played by Keira Knightley, Katharine is sympathetic, as is the cause of an unabashedly political movie that is, essentially, a procedural, but also a very sophisticated, ornate, complex and convincing thriller.

A delicious thriller that gets under the skin à la "All About Eve," albeit with a twist: The craft here is still theater, but of the workplace rather than the stage.