Justin Lowe

Rose-tinted as the film’s perspective may be, Ping Pong Summer is still a lingering, entertaining glance back at an era that Americans just can’t seem to get enough of, whether in music or movies.

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

Although a rather self-congratulatory air intermittently hangs over the film, the accomplishments of the participants and the popularity of motorcycling speak for themselves, without the need for superfluous commentary.

Good-naturedly gruff, unabashedly resourceful and proudly Australian, Occupation gets the job done with a minimum of fuss and an abundance of explosive set pieces that will likely endear it to domestic fans, even if it’s mostly forgettable otherwise.

Title deploys a fairly effective range of horror techniques, including jump scares, misdirection and some oddly unattractive VFX to ratchet up the tension, although gore is at a minimum.

In the end, it’s a rather conventional feature that satisfies expectations rather than challenging them. As a result, this adaptation looks unlikely to stir the passionate devotion that could confirm it as first-rate comedy material.

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.

Davey’s tortuous emotional distress, while generically relatable, seems more appropriate to a younger teen rather than a young woman who’s practically a college freshman. This curious disjunction impacts the performances as well, which are adequate but rarely persuasive.

Shifting the film into action mode necessitates several leaps of faith to keep pace with the plot as Powley goes crashing through the forest with near abandon.

An accomplished first feature that doesn't quite achieve its initial promise.

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.

Mustang fanatics will be thrilled by the level of access that Ford provided the filmmakers to shoot at the company’s Dearborn, Mich., headquarters and interview the Mustang design team headed by chief engineer Dave Pericak. Even so, it may be difficult to escape a sense that the film sometimes plays like an extended product promo.

The script succeeds by expanding the Paranormal Activity mythology with additional details and even a few surprising twists.

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.

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.

Although the prescription drug users that Klayman (Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry) profiles have some interesting things to say about how these products affect their performance and perceptions, the steady stream of talking-head experts doesn’t do much to raise the movie’s pulse.

Hughes and cinematographer Peter Menzies Jr. handle the assignment skillfully enough, but without much imagination, sticking to a conventional action style that is more about the quantity of explosions than nuances of execution.

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.

More reliant on atmosphere than action to build suspense, Duncan Skiles’ The Clovehitch Killer offers an intriguing perspective on the darker side of American values, but lacks the conviction to entirely expose the cultural contradictions that often enable compulsive murderers

The movie is at its strongest when it integrates family dynamics into the plot rather than indulging in extreme couples therapy.

The film is often so deterministically plotted that a sense of creative detachment hangs over far too many scenes, leaving an impression that the filmmakers may sometimes be more interested in making grand statements than in engaging interest.

Loaded with dark humor, Bates’ script faces considerable challenges developing sympathetic characters.

With predominantly improvised dialogue and performances, Felt gains scant narrative complexity from an over-reliance on a no-frills documentary style.

Anders’ well-attuned comic sensibility makes for moments of hilarity in some of the more originally conceived scenes, but bogs down in predictability with reliance on too many stock situations that absorb the bulk of the running time.

Drawing on a substantial track record of comedic performance, Guzman adopts his usual approach by coming on much too strong, a strategy that elicits its share of laughs in action-oriented scenes, but tends to overshoot the more dramatic moments.

With filmmaking roots in horror and other genre fare, Taylor invokes some interesting cinematic choices but sometimes seems to be uneasily straddling the line between serious, intense drama and outright exploitation.

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.

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.