John DeFore

Satisfying enough as a horror/slasher flick with a black-comedy aftertaste, it has some commercial appeal but doesn't represent a step forward artistically.

An ordinary look at four extraordinary kids, Scott Hamilton Kennedy's Fame High sticks firmly to convention but will please viewers who can't help but want the doc's sympathetic teens to escape the heartbreak most would-be artists face.

Byington's two-chuckle-a-minute script is mostly interested in Larry's constant, evasive patter, which continues whether the target of his words appears to care what he's saying or not.

Barak Goodman's straightforward Woodstock: Three Days that Defined a Generation plays to this group of nostalgic Baby Boomers, offering a rosy view of the titular event that for many is synonymous with Peace & Love

Kink is quite convincing in presenting this one workplace as a happy, sane environment where people respect each other and aren't manipulated into doing things they don't ultimately enjoy. But it leaves plenty of room to presume that Kink.com is an outlier in the industry.

The new film adds slices to our understanding of life in this war but not so much so that it feels essential.

Margaret Qualley and Christopher Abbott make an exceptionally good team here, in a film that requires a deep sexual chemistry but keeps sex itself almost entirely out of the picture. Careening from one kind of intensity to another, the encounter excites without prurience and, like the transactions it depicts, is more concerned with psychology than sex in any case.

The personalities and rhetoric are colorful and the film's presentation is lively, though some viewers will wish for a little more rigor.

Some in the area have lost some hope, seeing so many of their neighbors fall for a candidate they knew to be a snake-oil salesman. But Hillbilly is forward-looking, believing there's something special about its region-specific variety of what elsewhere would be called rednecks or bumpkins.

Fans looking for an inspirational portrait of idealism will probably respond warmly to a film whose release is timed to World Food Day (October 16), a United Nations effort to highlight the cause nearest to Chapin's heart.

If it leaves something to be desired at the start of the tale, the procedural details of seeking release and exoneration are well represented.

Given the dearth of docs about the heyday of circus arts, one wishes for more of that spotlight showmanship on the screen.

Very funny whatever you think of its more old-fashioned notions, the picture will charm many viewers who can set implausibility aside for a while.

A film that (whatever massive efforts were required to work around [Paul Walker's] absence) is as stupendously stupid and stupidly diverting as it could have hoped to be had everything gone as planned.

Though cameras weren't allowed in the courtroom, Rosenstein gets a whiff of the drama there by watching as Bonauto reviews her own performance after the fact, pausing after each exchange to dispassionately critique the way she made her case.

The feature writing/directing debut for a man whose history is in art departments, it should be no surprise that the pic looks wonderful, with distinctive design and lush settings; but Rothery also fares well with the human element, helped by a mature lead performance by Theo James, best known for the YA Divergent franchise.

Adoptees themselves almost certainly will find Somewhere Between an empowering reminder that tens of thousands of kids have walked this path before.

A must-see for fans of the cult musician and a moving, if sometimes oblique, look at gender-identity issues, it will find many admirers in niche bookings.

Beautiful settings and eccentric effects work enliven a tale that's more than meets the eye.

Moving to Charlottesville, Lough puts viewers in the action. We don't talk to journalists or politicians about what happened the weekend Heather D. Heyer was killed; we stand in crowds and watch the events unfold.

An affecting debut for anyone who has dwelled on the far outskirts of adolescent social life, Ian MacAllister McDonald's Some Freaks captures high school/college agony without transmuting it into thank-God-we-survived-it nostalgia.

Despite an appealing cast, though, neither comedy nor suspense really takes flight until very near the end, largely due to a script that isn't equal to the filmmakers' enthusiasm.

The effective documentary makes her attitudes and techniques look unarguably commonsensical, for the most part; while many distributors will shy away from such graphic material, the film may thrive in niche bookings and will benefit from enthusiastic word-of-mouth on video.

Funny, fascinating, and packing a surprisingly poignant twist, the doc will get plenty of free publicity and, for unsqueamish moviegoers, will live up to the hype.

It's much more dry than one might expect, demonstrating the truth of something interviewees suggest more than once: As intriguing a person as Berg was, it was not easy to know him.

Clearly intent on inspiring viewers, the informational film makes a fine sum-up for those who've found the last decade's geopolitics too much to keep track of, but isn't promising in commercial terms.

While general audiences may wish for a bit more technical information about how Turner keeps track of cards without being able to see them, Korem understandably seizes on the emotional arc before him, following Turner's late-middle-age crisis through to its happy resolution.

Despite dealing with a truckload of grief, isolation and heartbreak, Happy Face finds a resolution that's optimistic enough to justify its name.