Lovia Gyarkye

With many strong elements, it’s frustrating when The Astronaut fumbles in the final stretch.

The film boasts a strong comic cast with Murphy, Davidson and Palmer at the lead. Their chemistry is naturally compelling, which helps us buy into their increasingly ridiculous situation.

Despite the care with which DeMonaco and his collaborators build dread, The Home only partially delivers on its frightening promises. The film suffers from uneven pacing, as it waits a touch too long to capitalize on the suspense it musters.

Vigalondo’s film has a compelling premise, but the story (he also wrote the screenplay) gets away from him, resulting in a film that never quite hits its stride.

How to Train Your Dragon honors the charm of the original. I’s not an essential remake, but at least it’s not an offensive one.

Honey Don’t! is a better movie than Drive-Away Dolls thanks to an engaging whodunit plot, but it ultimately suffers from the same issues as its predecessor: The film feels like a series of gags with nowhere to go.

The film lurches between comic set pieces and more dramatic beats, and while Johansson proves a competent helmer, it’s not enough to overcome some dizzying tonal imbalances.

Ironically, Sirat gets muddled near the end. Although the last act is in many ways the liveliest — viewers will be jolted by a series of bleak twists — it’s also where Laxe relinquishes narrative coherence in the service of making his metaphors more literal.

The film is competently made and absorbing at times, but there’s a workaday quality that slows its momentum. It’s a handsomely made project, but a story about such a complicated set of characters should make us feel more strongly, and Rust struggles to accomplish that.

Once the principal heroes and villains have been established and the perfunctory narrative throat-clearing is out of the way, G20 finds its groove as a solid popcorn action flick.

The problems with The Rivals of Amziah King emerge in the stitching, when Patterson (working with editor Patrick J. Smith) must turn a series of fine vignettes and memorable musical interludes into a coherent narrative.

The film, which bows on Max on March 13, is low on genuine scares, but it does boast an appealing cast, whose comic chops elevate the flick slightly above the standard streamer slush.

The Actor can be fun to think about, but hard to stay connected to. Johnson’s film works on an intellectual level — batting around questions about how identity is constructed — but the director struggles to translate the stakes of those questions.

Holland boasts striking advancements in the director’s style and committed performances from Kidman, Macfadyen and Bernal, but these qualities can’t quite save a narrative fundamentally confused about its purpose.

With its ambitious gonzo premise, Death of a Unicorn starts off on strong footing, but it’s quickly apparent that the story doesn’t have that many places to go.

For the most part though, O’Connor’s direction is disciplined. He wrings humor from nearly every moment by staging action scenes as blunt as Christian’s commentary and employing transitions as precise as the accountant’s aim.

In reviving one of the more toxic friendships in recent movie history, Feig reunites two stars whose chemistry makes this twisty, often very ridiculous and sometimes trying movie more compelling.

Derrickson offers a handful of memorable shots and genuine jump scares, but the director’s attempts to build dread in these moments come too late to have their intended impact. With so much of the film dedicated to establishing Levi and Drasa’s backstory and their romance, The Gorge is slow to get going on the action.

This gonzo premise doesn’t have anywhere else to go, and to compensate, Twohy pads the screenplay with quirky antics that tax viewer patience and expose a narrative thinness that’s hard to ignore.

Kinda Pregnant doesn’t deliver on charming main characters nor sustainable humor. It’s a staid affair, coasting on its zany premise and a handful of amusing moments.

Ricky struggles with underbaked narrative threads and breathless direction that can verge on unfocused.

The strengths of Love, Brooklyn make the weaknesses harder to shake. For every scene bursting with energy and texture, there are oddly vague moments that destabilize its hold on us.

Bunnylovr‘s strengths are in its engaging character study of a languid young woman who came of age online. It’s not a novel portrait, but Zhu makes it wholly her own.

Gates offers an incredibly compelling premise, shedding light on the scale of military propaganda in the United States, but in taking on so much, her film ends up not saying enough.

Despite solid performances from Edebiri and Malkovich, Opus never takes off. It mostly meanders, relying on leaden expository monologues to move the plot, and rarely delivers on the promised horror of its atmosphere.

There are instances where you can see the director experimenting and attempting to disturb Disney’s imposing order, deploying close-ups, almost ground-level pans and strategically sweeping views to find warmth and tactility within a cold technique.

While the highly anticipated follow-up features stunning animation, it lacks the cohesive narrative and emotional intimacy that made its predecessor special.

The film flaunts vivid animation and some pretty striking moments, captured with close-ups and unexpected angles — but similar to Skydance Animation’s debut venture Luck, Spellbound inspires a sense of déjà vu.