Justin Lowe

Power and Marks clearly have a facility with dialogue, and even though many of their plot points may represent standard dramedy material, the two elevate scene after scene with imaginative insults and witty banter among the characters.

Lacking the flash of big-budget blockbusters or the originality of a uniquely imagined world, First Light is left trying to make the best of overly familiar sci-fi themes.

The film is attractively and professionally packaged however, with accomplished camerawork and editing supporting a narrative that eventually seems to reveal more smoke than fire.

Although it’s an inspired gamble to introduce familiar genre elements into what’s essentially a high-strung relationship drama, Nina Forever’s repeatedly shifting tone ultimately proves more of a drawback than an asset.

As a document of the American political process, Caucus offers an intriguing if limited snapshot of a specific campaign season, but lacks either breadth or depth.

Passably absorbing to start, Shaul Schwarz’s examination of the issues surrounding Mexican and immigrant musicians who glorify drug lords and their exploits gradually bogs down in repetition and narrative inertia.

While its indispensable girl-power self-affirmational instincts are sound and a committed cast assiduously focuses on delivering an uplifting message, this is regrettably uninvolving material.

Meyer...and his easy rapport with the kids and Sacks helps coax sometimes surprisingly candid comments from his subjects. What’s missing however is adequate background on how the boys became such impressive young musicians and why they gravitated toward heavy metal rather than pop or rap.

Although it’s clear that her dauntingly complex personality contributes to her abilities as a superior storyteller, Feuerzeig and Albert now ask us to believe a proven unreliable narrator’s account of her own life, which largely lacks corroboration.

Setting aside the movie’s tediously lame dialogue, self-conscious performances and frequently predicable scares, the narrative’s compulsively shifting chronology intermittently manages to engage, although it does little to obscure the distracting shortcomings of both plot and character development.

Inspiring as her journey may be, however, the film tracks an overly familiar arc, dwelling on Shields' disadvantaged background, teenage romance with another young boxer and family turmoil but providing limited focus on the sport of women's boxing or the complexities of obtaining training sponsorship or lucrative endorsements.

Such a deliberate setup is by design intended to create emotional conflict, so it’s perhaps fortuitous that the plot doesn't become even more contrived than it starts off.

Yadav’s concerns about discrimination and violence against women are evident in nearly every scene of the film, as her script positions each of the principal characters to undergo an experience of self-actualization in defiance of prevailing patriarchal norms.

Cut Throat City will doubtless grab the attention of RZA’s diverse fanbase, but looks unlikely to make a significant mark among contemporary crime dramas.

Although Landon and co-screenwriter Michael Kennedy have latched onto a winning concept, pairing the body-swap conceit with serial killer thrills, they’ve freighted the film with so many trite life-lesson moments that the fun gradually drains from the narrative, like blood from a murder victim.

For anyone who’s had to struggle to escape difficult situations, the self-reliance and perseverance these teens require to improve their lives will seem quite familiar and reassuringly realistic. Pahokee is also a worthwhile reminder for those who haven’t faced similar challenges that things rarely come easy for those from modest circumstances.

Without a strong thematic throughline, Levy relies on a highly episodic structure, letting the subject matter lead him along, rather than shaping the material into a compelling package.

Ku shows a decent grasp of plot mechanics, but never manages to adequately develop the characters or effectively modulate the film’s pacing, even in the brief action scenes, which prove too tame by typical Cage standards.

Although the pacing would have benefited from some judicious tightening, much of the film’s effectiveness is attributable to the lead actors’ well-modulated performances.

The filmmakers’ reliance on romantic situations throughout the midsection may have some older teens and adults rolling their eyes, but the final scenes over-deliver with a literal flood of action that enables Hinako to definitively prove herself and discover her true calling.

The threats faced in Runoff feel generic: predatory corporations, merciless banks, environmental contamination and encroaching industrialization just seem like overly familiar themes, lacking sustained suspense.

Favoring psychological chills over blood-soaked mayhem, Callahan’s impressively crafted debut nods to recent horror classics while displaying an eminently distinctive vision of its own.

Fight scenes are staged with brutal directness and relentless energy in an interminable series of beatings, shootings and more creatively inspired assaults.

Liberally riffing on situations and themes familiar from the high school-set movies that established the renowned writer-director’s legacy, Lee has crafted an entertaining alternative interpretation that substitutes an international cast of Asian actors for Hughes’ largely white, suburban ensembles.

The castmembers portraying Splinter and the turtles achieve a persuasive level of realism that was never possible with the elaborate puppetry required for the original film series and adequately fulfill expectations for their characters.

Writer-director Shaka King clearly knows this world, perhaps too well, but making pot use, or denial, the focus of nearly every scene becomes tedious.

Intentionally provocative, artistically uncompromising and self-consciously polemical, La Leyenda Negra attempts to inform by incitement, challenging audiences to concede to an unvarnished view of migrant life in working-class Los Angeles.

Although she seems primarily concerned with whether conflicting views of sexuality can be reconciled in a committed relationship, Cash dresses the issues up in so many layers of cuteness that the message practically gets smothered by the candy-colored cinematography and insistent indie-pop soundtrack.