John DeFore

Though difficult to watch, it's a film that helps outsiders confront the horrifying ways such events can cause damage for decades after the fact.

Despite some promising moments, the project never quite takes flight, partly thanks to mismatched performances that don't seem to agree on how quirky this film intends to be.

Amusing but off-key in some unhelpful ways, it's a dorky time-killer that doesn't suffer too much for its familiar vibe.

The film's timing is fortuitous, as a worldwide calamity might conceivably make governments more receptive to Piketty's proposals for redistribution and reform. But it leaves one wishing for a longer-form project.

More exciting is Hu's handling of the minutes before violence erupts: His staging and editing pinballs our attention back and forth around the small inn, as conspirators furtively communicate with each other or gauge how to respond to the suspicions of Khan and his underlings. These masterful sequences are a delight.

Rapu's film is still somewhat scattered; its Earth Day release date only serves as a reminder of the many superior eco-docs one has seen about remote paradises threatened or destroyed by encroaching forces.

This portrait of influential U.N. diplomat Sergio Vieira de Mello benefits immensely from two magnetic leads, Wagner Moura and Ana de Armas, whose onscreen chemistry is undeniable; but its deft sense of structure is of equal importance, making it an engrossing picture even for those who know next to nothing about its subject or settings.

Ibarra and Rivera maintain an effortless balance between genre-rooted entertainment and concern for real human suffering caused by governmental policies. They get viewers wrapped up enough in the narrative that it takes a while to appreciate the courage required to set it in motion.

Less outrageous or provocative than puzzling, it will appeal to a very specific sort of irony-hungry moviegoer and leave most others shrugging.

In their wonderful documentary Other Music, Puloma Basu and Rob Hatch-Miller come to both celebrate a place and lament its passing.

Sensitive performances only go so far toward generating sparks in the slow-moving film, which never becomes the crime-and-punishment nail-biter it might've been.

Taken on its own terms, it's a solid if hardly revolutionary thriller that bodes well for the filmmaker's future in genre films.

The pic's claims grow wilder by the minute, and its power to persuade is undercut by narration scripted like a YouTube conspiracy film. For this skeptical but totally willing-to-believe viewer, Fifth Kind doesn't move the needle even a smidge.

Making a film that feels two days long is not the same thing as making 48 Hrs.

The film has a solid feel for family dynamics and local color.

Though Marceau's artistic ideals are central to the film, Resistance happily avoids novelty, making its hero one credible human among many in a wartime tale that, though largely familiar in its feel, dramatizes a question that has become urgent for many in recent years: How does one best resist hatred — by fighting its proponents, or rushing to assist its targets?

Well cast with actors who help the film overcome an obviously meager budget, Phoenix is as rough at the edges as its protagonist, and will inspire a similar kind of sympathetic response — especially among viewers who've been through a few reversals and know not every rebound has to take the form of a glorious firebird to be worthwhile.

Most will learn something here, in a film that both follows the practice to its natural, dire conclusions and champions the ordinary citizens who have stepped up to fight against it.

The untrained actor is the weakest link in an already hit-and-miss cast, and few viewers will respond to Ben's unearned bravado.

It's a tour-de-force for an actor who's more than willing to be loathsome and will be welcomed by both Baker's fans and those of writer/director/provocateur Onur Tukel. But casual moviegoers may not find it as revelatory as comparisons to early Neil LaBute films suggest.

Making her debut as director with a true story from her native Australia, actor Rachel Griffiths gives the pic a workmanlike, generic feel that would play well on family-centric cable channels. Horse lovers will be the moviegoers most vulnerable to its modest charms.

A cogent, wide-ranging look at both the discovery and the nascent, soon-to-be-giant fights humans are having over it.

An involving and ambitious fictionalized look at Rob Ford's downfall that is far from satisfied with gawking at that Toronto trainwreck, Ricky Tollman's Run This Town also intends to make points about racism and sexual harassment; to lament the slow-motion death of journalism; and to give voice to a generation of young adults who've been maligned by the oldsters who, as the movie sees it, made them the way they are.

Star Daniel Radcliffe will be the biggest draw here, but the pic's focus on planning and genre mechanics over personalities may limit its appeal for his fans.

A tense debut built around a compelling lead performance by Bethany Anne Lind, it benefits from a couple of graceful storytelling flourishes and a persuasive sense of character.

A tale of long-simmering grudges and shocking violence in a small town, Paul Solet's Tread is a smartly structured doc with a finale so extravagant you could build an exploitation film around it.

Hossain's refusal to overexplain the details of his world — is the thing Jack's supposed to steal a drug? a weapon? — plays well in some instances; elsewhere, coupled with the film's low budget, it risks failing to convince us we're in the future at all.

Why somebody would get off the couch and spend money to see it is anyone's guess.