Mark Olsen

Baumbach and Clooney have crafted a character who comes to realize his mistakes, many of which simply can’t be undone. Jay Kelly, the movie star, may be in the process of figuring himself out, but “Jay Kelly” the movie arrives as a fully-formed knockout.

Told with an unassuming, gentle simplicity that grows into an accumulating emotional power, the film manages to feel very small and specific while also vast and expansive.

Figgis gets moments of real tension and genuine behind-the-scenes drama, but is also too respectful and admiring of Coppola, understandably so, to push his own inquiry to its limits.

The entire movie has a disappointing air of smug self-regard about it, with an expectation the audience will adore everything about the characters as much as they do. What at moments feels like a nascent interrogation of contemporary masculinity ultimately suffers from the very impulses it seems to want to parody.

Ruizpalacios creates a visual style that continues to reinvent itself right up to the end, crafting an unpredictable feeling that matches the volatile plotting.

With Tuesday, Pusić shows great promise as a visual storyteller and director of performers. Yet it is in her work as a screenwriter where the film falters. Without the power and nuance that Louis-Dreyfus brings to the role, the drama would not have nearly as much spine or impact as it does.

Hit Man makes for an undeniable good time. Sometimes all you really need is a couple of impossibly attractive people enjoying each other’s company, captured by a filmmaker who knows when to stay out of their way. And if that’s not a movie, well, then, I don’t know what is.

There is a journeyman’s proficiency to “Chapter 1” but little in the way of real spark.

The film is pleasantly reminiscent of ’90s neo-noirs in both style and storytelling, but with a narrative fearlessness and visual imagination that makes it totally fresh.

A comedy about learning to live with grief, Between the Temples has a lot going on in its head and heart.

Bayona mixes a sense of survivalist adventure with an otherworldly spirituality — the idea that they were somehow touched by something bigger, but also that the answers to what they needed were there with them all along.

Boutella often has an otherworldly screen presence that makes her perfectly suited for this kind of material, but the fussiness of all that is happening around Kora means that the character and performance never get a chance to breathe and blossom, or to fully come to life.

More discursive than comprehensive, the film does seem to capture Thomas’ fierce, swashbuckling spirit.

Though the film is largely driven by Cera’s knowing, unsparing performance, both Gross and Lillis are also given plenty of room to develop nuance.

If the first film seemed indicative of much of what is wrong with movies in the streaming era, feeling inessential and disposable, a cog in a machine rather than something unique, “Extraction 2” is a snapshot of a sequel in this moment, bigger, expanded and even less necessary.

The film is made with a level of craft and simple competence that has become shockingly rare. A genuine movie star is allowed to radiate charisma and charm, and all the performances have character nuance and emotional depth.

Part horror film, part coming-of-age tale, part romance, the adaptation of Camille DeAngelis’ young adult novel Bones and All is a small marvel, unsettling and heartbreaking in equal measure.

The film is a compelling concept that doesn’t thread the needle of its competing impulses quite as gracefully as it might have, but driven by the imminently watchable Newton and Pine, it makes for the kind of adult-oriented storytelling one wishes there was more of these days.

Despite a few scattered moments, the team-up action of The 355 never fully comes together.

The film’s politics are not exactly sophisticated, motivated more by the convenience of the moment than any cohesive worldview.

In part because of the depth of Seydoux’s performance, the film becomes less an allegory of a nation and more a gripping character study, a portrait of a mask of personal and professional regard slowly slipping away.

Though Logelin’s story of loss and perseverance is touching, there isn’t really anything deep or convincing about grief or parenting in Fatherhood, making this promising tale something more middling and a touch disappointing.

The misadventures of the eccentrically wealthy may not exactly fit the mood right now, but the new French Exit is so genuine in its mix of arch and earnest, idiosyncrasy and earthiness that it creates a space all for itself.

The highlight of the movie by far is the relaxed, easy chemistry between McCarthy and Cannavale.

As with even the worst of Allen’s films, there is just enough to satiate fans and make the whole thing seem maybe, possibly worth the effort.

While the performances ensure that the movie is always watchable, the hesitant storytelling makes it far from compelling, a bad trip about a bummer vacation.

The most important thing is that it is genuinely great, a singular and moving glimpse of loneliness, community and finding the strength to face another day.

The Outpost is a visceral battle picture but little more.

The movie would like to see itself as a feminist allegory of abuse and systemic oppression, but it comes off as something far more scattered and unfocused.

The camera stays close to Dafoe for nearly every moment of the movie and he brings a compelling vibrancy to the screen. He somehow conveys both the tranquility of Tommaso’s current life and all that simmers just under the surface.

Though it is only now receiving a U.S. release, it says something about the ever-prolific filmmaker’s consistency and extremely high level of proficiency that the film still seems fresh and enchanting, by turns delicate, romantic, mysterious, witty and crushing.

Rae and Nanjiani have a quicksilver chemistry, flashing from playful banter to genuine, hurtful arguing in an instant.

The Wrong Missy is a lightweight throwaway, the kind of movie it is difficult to suggest one actually choose to watch, but if your algorithm somehow lands on it provides a certain harmless diversion.

The original film was not a time capsule; it was a snapshot, capturing a unique time and place. The new film simply doesn’t have the same spark and energy.

Amiably paced with comfortable, lived-in performances, Arkansas isn’t so much a crime drama or dark comedy as a depiction of a world in which illegal activities and their aftermath are simply part of a way of life.

With The Infiltrators there is an audacity, an unrestrained boldness, to both the events depicted onscreen and the way in which they are portrayed in the movie itself.

Extraction would be better if it just doubled down on being dumb. Instead, although the movie does indeed have some dazzling action sequences, they are interspersed with dramatic scenes that feel increasingly belabored, giving the movie a peculiar stop-start rhythm as it makes its way to a lumbering, extended gun battle final set piece.

An ambitious combination of suspense thriller and brooding treatise on existential themes, The Quarry feels like a throwback to the era of late-night cable movies, when art, ambition and genre pulp would often collide.

Endings, Beginnings has some genuinely engaging moments somewhere in between its beginning and its ending, but too much gets lost in a saggy, shaggy middle.

The movie feels disjointed and made up of parts that Dolan couldn’t bring together as it shuffles between three story strands.

After a strong start the movie steadily declines, one set piece after another, and there are many moments where the mind wanders and then asks: “Is this still going on?”

Always Be My Maybe is pleasant without being particularly powerful, appealing if not exactly transformative.

And so while Gilliam has undoubtedly made better films and certainly greater films than The Man Who Killed Don Quixote, there is something about the ridiculous effort and mixed results that make this arguably the most Gilliam-esque. For anyone struggling with whether to give up, concerned that the result will not match the effort, Gilliam seems to be planting a flag — or more accurately charging a windmill — to say the effort is the reward.

The movie is all over the place and there is no attempt to weave it into a coherent whole — which is regrettable as scene for scene it often works.

Von Trier has managed to cobble together just enough of interest — odd moments, pieces of performance, stray ideas and the simple audacity of putting this mess out into the world, that it feels like there may be something there worth considering, a maddening possibility. And that may be his cruelest prank of all.

It’s not difficult to decipher where McMurray and DeMonaco’s true allegiances are, but by delivering the story within the framework of genre cinema at its most trashy and garish, the filmmakers convey any message as a bit of rough pleasure amid the kicks and thrills of a movie.

With his latest work, Bong has created a heroine for our times, an indelible movie creature, a story that balances heart and head and a movie that engages with the boundaries of technology both on-screen and off.

Free Fire is a savagely funny and viciously precise distillation of one of the pair’s favorite themes: Men are idiots.

The film's maximalist storytelling, both expansive and precise, snatching specific emotions from its torrid swirl, is best exemplified by the fact that the title card doesn't appear until an hour in.

The movie is handsomely mounted with upscale production values, but it feels sluggish and disjointed.

The film is not quite smart enough to overcome the clichés and stereotypes it acknowledges but can’t entirely dismantle. At the same time, it often isn’t quite outrageous enough, as if it should be more willing to be outright offensive.

Like husbands who think that carrying in the groceries is really pitching in, Lucas and Moore have their hearts in the right place, but their efforts have little real insight or impact.

For a project that is a showcase for his talents as both actor and director, Bateman never gets too showy on either front, keeping the emotions of the film at something of a restrained simmer.

"The Next Cut" manages to be entertaining and thoughtful, harmless fun but just serious enough not to seem frivolous.

The movie isn't fantastical enough to sustain itself outside the bounds of reality, yet every time something real creeps in, the movie stumbles and cowers.

The ostensible college comedy Everybody Wants Some!! is like a stream that looks shallow but once you're in the middle of it reveals an unforeseen depth.

It is designed to be fun, efficient and accessible and delivers precisely and exactly on that and nothing more.

In its best moments, it's a sly exposé of the frailties of the contemporary male self-image and in its lesser moments a simplistic slapstick. This being a Will Ferrell comedy, sometimes those moments are one and the same.

There is so much about its package – the stars, the premise, the talented supporting cast – that would make for a film of warmth, humor and insight on the struggles of leaving the past behind and getting out of your own way on the path to fulfilment. Instead, the movie settles for being a party comedy and little else.

The film works better as social satire than straight horror, as the murder plot that drives it along always feels unconvincing.

As told by Helgeland this Legend simply isn't memorable, because a tremendous effort by Hardy is let down by unfocused storytelling.

The movie is pleasant and charming, but when making a big-screen adaptation of a beloved classic and genuine touchstone for generations, adequate doesn't feel like quite enough.

Combining Hou's patient, observant style with a historical martial arts tale, the film is a fascinating hybrid of craft, genre and story. Beautiful to look at and with deeply felt emotions, the film has a meditative aura punctured by sharp bouts of fighting.

Truth is a movie curiously in conflict with itself. There is a constant shift between granular detail and big-picture sweep that the movie never fully resolves.

With The Intern, Meyers has made another bright, contemporary American comedy with a lot on its mind — and works hard to make it look effortless.

By turns thrilling, disorienting and draining, Sicario exists in a border zone seemingly of its own devising between the art film and the action movie.

Despite Redford's enthusiasm and best efforts, A Walk in the Woods is a tedious journey to nowhere special.

The movie is visually inventive and with enough good moments and smart moves to never be entirely dismissible, while not strong enough to overcome its essential thinness.

A pleasant if somewhat by-the-numbers family film that lacks any real crack-of-the-bat energy.

The action set-pieces and the comedic character scenes in the film seem to be taking turns and are rarely brought together in a meaningful way.

Being a mildly pleasant, passingly amusing light entertainment isn't exactly saving the world, yet the film crosses its wires to blow up even that modest assignment.

Some movies are so interminable that it seems they might never end, while others are assembled with such indifference that you are essentially left waiting for them to start. Pixels somehow manages both.

Irrational Man never does make sense of the inscrutable Abe, just as most people, Allen included, remain mysteries to themselves and others. This finally reveals the film to be neither comedy nor drama, but an all too human horror story where the monster is within.

Terminator Genisys could be Exhibit A in why the current line of thinking in Hollywood regarding sequels/reboots/remakes often leads to terrible decisions and worse films.

Spy may not be a great movie, but it is great fun. And at times it will have you wondering if there's that much of a difference.

That the bonds of friendship between Vince and his pals are predicated so strongly on excluding others feels regressive and drags the movie away from harmless high jinks into something needlessly more spiteful and ugly.

Even with its off-balance, overstuffed storytelling, the film maintains a charm and energy that never flags, with brisk pacing and generally engaging performances from its deep-bench cast.

The new Poltergeist is a pleasant enough diversion, better as a low-simmer suspense story than a full-blown effects extravaganza.

It's an unsurprisingly ambitious movie from the notoriously, proudly headstrong Crowe, which makes it such a disappointment that it feels so blandly earnest and unexpectedly hesitant, with none of the unnerving conviction the actor often brings even to lightweight promotional appearances.

Turns out Lost River is indeed a mess, but it's the best mess possible, an evocative grab-bag of images and moods with a heartfelt sincerity and conflicting impulses of romantic melancholy and hardscrabble hopefulness.

The film has only the sheer charm of its cast to get it by, and it says a lot about the actors that they nearly pull it off.

Always looking forward, Godard remains remarkably capable of seeing the world and thinking about filmmaking with clear eyes and fresh ideas.

Wyatt, Monahan and Wahlberg never seem quite settled on what they want to say with the character or the story, so the film feels marked not by ambiguity but uncertainty.

There is just enough in Comet to keep it from fizzling out entirely – largely in the performances of Long and Rossum – but its conceits also get in the way of its characters, making it feel fussy and convoluted when it aims for something more simple and elegant.

Winter in the Blood is a difficult film to get a handle on, not least because it often feels like it should be easier to dismiss. But then it locks onto a moment that is unexpectedly arresting and little jabs of poetic meaning or hard-earned truths reel a viewer back in.

Not out-and-out terrible enough to be completely dismissed, while also not particularly memorable either, perhaps the truest summation of the film is to say simply that the new Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles is a movie that exists.

The film is then not so much a meditation but a reverie, a swirl of emotions and ideas, managing to be both calmly reflective and skittishly anxious at the same time. Calvary is a serious comedy, a funny drama, a ruminative film about life and a lively film about death.

For a film that purports to be about the process of maturity and growth, it is woefully un-evolved, lacking in understanding and insight.

McGarry has created something that feels personal, vital and revelatory, allowing the rest of us behind the curtain.

With Palo Alto Coppola transforms weakness into strength, vulnerability into armor.

Volume II builds on emotional foundations from Volume I, even recasting the first film's ironic humor with a darker pall.

It provides, perhaps like the experiences of love and sex, a shifting variety of insights, emotions, unexpected lightness and moments of visceral shock.

The Marked Ones is refreshingly uncynical and straightforward in its desire to simply be a movie that makes the audience jump and be scared. It's a fun fright film and wants to be nothing more.

Grudge Match never settles on the movie it wants to be, wavering uncertainly between a jokey old-guys comedy and something more dramatic and heartfelt.

Rinsch, making his feature debut, shows the shortcoming of someone coming from the image-based world of commercials and advertising. There are moments of genuine beauty and a few terrifically eye-popping effects, but no feel yet for storytelling.

Perry can now knock these films out in his sleep, and with “Madea Christmas” he certainly seems to be dozing at the wheel.

The movie has a fan's heart, a sense of loving every goofball moment, but as directed by Mike Mendez it also seems perpetually caught between being a spoof or playing it straight and winds up falling between the cracks rather than rising above.

All the Boys Love Mandy Lane is not a missing masterpiece; rather it is a small, tightly coiled spellbinder.

Machete Kills winds up a slightly camp, tinny parody of bad action movies, playing out with the same sense of tedium as a genuine bad action movie.

Serving mostly as a strong calling card for star Jaime Camil, the film has an appealingly loose, slightly ramshackle charm.

The effects may be cheap and unconvincing, the sets spare, the costumes from some unwanted back rack, but Argento still brings enough moments of kinky madness to his not-great "Dracula" to indicate there may yet be greatness lurking within him.

A messy brew that is a bit too slack to get all the way to actually being good.

One Direction: This Is Us is not the raw confessional that title might imply but rather both a primer and new product presentation.

Audacious and witty, The World's End is a strange brew.

The Mortal Instruments: City of Bones is just a sloppy rag bag of ideas cobbled from other stories.

There was a time when the slack storytelling, stock characterizations and general by-the-numbers feeling of the film could be put into perspective by saying it seemed like a TV biopic. But even TV movies are done with more verve than this these days.

Kick-Ass 2 is a lesser version of what it appears to be, an uncertain jumble rather than a true exploration of outrage, violence and identity.

Anyone who longs for the old, weird films of John Waters or the psychotronic freak-outs of New York's Cinema of Transgression school should be able to get their fix from Pig Death Machine.

Blood feels perfunctory, needing something besides fussy plotting to jolt it to life.

Breaking the Girls isn't exactly a throwaway, but more an extended act of teasing foreplay, a movie that is fine for what it is but also never really shifts into something more.

Just as with the 2011 film "The Smurfs," the new The Smurfs 2 is a passable mediocrity.

Drumming is able to swing from lighter comedic moments to dramatic insights while making it seem effortless.

The entire film has an oddly underdone quality to it, as if aiming not for greatness but to simply be passable.

Solidly done if somewhat unremarkable, there is nothing particularly wrong with "Broken," nothing that needs fixing exactly, and yet it never fully comes together.

Grown Ups 2 looks like it was a lot of fun to make. And the last laugh is on us.

With continued arguments and legislation over fracking, this follow-up seems inevitable and necessary.

The movie feels like a flakey, off-the-cuff blog post that somehow transmogrified itself into a feature-length documentary.

Painfully lugubrious, any sting Copperhead might contain for its contrarian's view of history is undone by its wayward sense of storytelling.

With a fun post-credits gag to round it off, 100 Bloody Acres is great summer counterprogramming for anyone who wants to unwind with a bit of bloody fun and goofball gore.

Even if you may not be putting a Pussy Riot song on your next playlist, there is something so of-the-moment and exciting about the group that Pussy Riot: A Punk Prayer feels important, if not fully complete.

Make no mistake, "We Steal Secrets" is a sprawling, ambitious, major work — a gripping exploration of power, personality, technology and the crushing weight that can come to bear on those who find themselves in its combined path.

An infectious, warm comedy of family and communication and a promising debut as writer-director for Chism. These Peeples are people one should be happy to meet.

The film is, perhaps, intended as a deadpan burlesque of race and class and beauty ideals...but it plays more as a boorish, overextended punch line.

The Lords of Salem is like some queasy-making machine, a chamber piece of possession and madness that exerts a strange, disturbing power.

My Brother the Devil is a promising debut that marks El Hosaini as a filmmaker to watch, but one still very much in the developmental stages.

The Story of Luke is not a saga of epic proportions, but with a huge assist from Pucci's layered performance, takes a premise that could easily be movie-of-the-week sappy and finds a humanizing lightness.

It's unlikely the movie will gain the same ardent following as Raimi's debut, but it offers enough good-time gore, goofiness, scares and screams to leave an audience feeling a certain elated exhaustion.

Perry's ongoing disinterest in improving as a filmmaker is now seemingly part of his unshakable belief in himself, his insistence on doing his thing his way.

At times, Lipsky's storytelling is too cutely self-aware, trying too hard, making Molly's Theory of Relativity something of an intriguing, if not entirely successful, exoticism.

"Rubber" felt inventive and complex, but here Dupieux's absurdism is simply muddled, masking the fact he doesn't really have much to say.

Family Weekend is no worse than many of the dysfunctional family comedies that populate the Sundance Film Festival — "Little Miss Sunshine" is name-checked within the movie itself — but isn't any better either.

With good intentions and a warm heart but undone by uneven performances and shaky storytelling, Bob's New Suit never quite finds the right fit.

Though the film at times works scene by scene, Webley can't quite tie it all together. A disjointed jumble, The Kill Hole can't dig itself out.

The film has a sarcastic tone, like that of a friend who you never can tell is kidding or not, which eventually breaks through into a place of unexpected sincerity. Meeting this odd, idiosyncratic "Somebody" is a rare delight.

The film leans a little too heavily on Pineda's wide-eyed disbelief at his sudden turn of fortune, leaving a feeling that it could dig deeper into the history and dynamics of the band. Yet Pineda's ebullience is infectious, and Don't Stop Believin': Everyman's Journey is a pleasant story of dreams coming true.

The Last Exorcism Part II is an effectively unnerving, slow-burn supernatural horror tale. The film is smartly different enough from the original to survive on its own, though it lacks some of the first film's sense of surprise.

Phantom is a relatively tight, gripping story told with efficiency that makes room for its fine roster of actors to explore old-fashioned ideas on honor and loyalty.

This is a movie that celebrates selfishness, stupidity and the mean-spirited insensitivity that goes along with it. We're better than this, America.

Really the biggest problem with Dark Skies is that Stewart can never quite decide just what story he is telling — a slow-burn horror parable or paranoid invasion flick — or whether to focus on this character or that, instead struggling to string together scares regardless of how they fit together overall.

Far from closing the case, The Jeffrey Dahmer Files opens up a whole new perspective, acknowledging the banal and the baffling.

The first "Ghost Rider" film, directed by Mark Steven Johnson, was sort of a fizzy goof, the kind of movie where you don't expect much and then think, "Hey, that was actually kind of fun." Spirit of Vengeance, though, is undone by increased expectations, as promising more only makes it feel they are somehow delivering less.

Though its elusive character is undoubtedly part of its strength, Dogtooth ends up feeling somehow like a dodge and a sidestep. As a film, it's pure and singular, but it's not quite fully formed enough to be what one could call truly visionary.

No disrespect to Bela Lugosi, but Klaus Kinski delivers a mesmerizing performance as the original vampire in Werner Herzog's hypnotic adaptation of the horror classic. [16 Feb 2014, p.D1]

There is much clattering and clanking plus a couple of songs; some of the gothic-inspired, neo-Victorian visuals are quite arresting; and the corpse bride herself is, dare one say, surprisingly hot. But the whole thing just isn’t much fun.

Intermittently fun, but mostly just efficiently passable.

It's so playful, wicked and unseemly, by the time you realize that the actual plot of this brilliantly sordid satire hasn't started, the party is already over.

Anchored by two fine performances, this bittersweet comedy about second chances just might signal a new beginning for the director as well.

It'll give fans exactly what they expect while passing unseen by anyone else.

It all misses the mark emotionally, hindered by one-dimensional characters and telegraphed developments.

There is something fun about a movie that so brazenly portrays excessive pot smoking.

Wilding's genuine curiosity about the monks' beliefs and daily routines, as well as her willingness to ask questions that sometimes make her look like a bit of a dip, gives the film a homespun honesty and sincerity that make it a surprisingly pleasant trip.

If, for whatever reason, you do find yourself watching it, you may begin to ponder one of life's larger dilemmas: the fact that something can be done does not necessarily mean it should be done.

It's like a musical with no big numbers, or an action film withholding the explosions.

It's Lawrence who throws Runteldat (as in "run and tell that") off key, repeating an admonition about "the trials and tribulations of life" that sounds suspiciously insincere coming, as it does, from a guy smothered in diamonds.

The plot frequently resets/realigns itself in the fashion of "Lost" or "Alias," as good guys become bad guys, friends become enemies, and combatants become lovers. To portray confusion and uncertainty is one thing; to make a film this unsure of itself, wracked by its own faulty footing and reticence, is quite another.

Just because the filmmakers have their roots in the Midwest doesn't give them a pass when it comes to their stereotypical rendition of small-town people and ways, chock-a-block with sadistic cops, shotgun-toting locals, and strippers from up in Des Moines.

A disappointing hodgepodge that fails to tie up its conflicting strands of family drama and suspense thriller.

There’s not really a bogeyman in The Orphanage and not much blood; just insane intensity and a building sense of bad vibes.

Tamara simply doesn't cover all the bases in its drive to be both a grubby teen splatter flick and a more high-minded thriller.

Watt seems to want to say something about the role of fate and happenstance in creating connections between people, but she never quite brings the strands of her ideas together.

Going Down is woefully lacking in the comedy (or the sex for that matter), and even some of the teens look a little long in the tooth.

Pretension, in its own way, is a form of bravery. For this reason and this reason only -- the power of its own steadfast, hoity-toity convictions -- Chelsea Walls deserves a medal.

The film does, in the end, raise something of an existential dilemma: If you set out to make a new version of something you know to be bad, and you make something that is in fact bad, have you somehow succeeded?

Frankly, the story behind Manna From Heaven is a truckload more interesting than the movie itself.

Recut and reassembled at just a little over two hours, the new version of the film is a staggering and bracing object, stylistically bold and hypnotically captivating.

The film essentially grinds along in second gear. A promising debut, Dirt Boy nevertheless fails to fully deliver.

Various actors deserving of better (including Zooey Deschanel, Eddie Griffin and Lyle Lovett) suffer through the undercooked material, while love interest Eliza Dushku gamely gets through both a bikini-modeling montage and a mechanical bull ride, but none of their efforts can save this film.

Cholodenko's new film relies on easy caricature over true character such that the film fails to build emotional momentum or resonance.

When Plympton isn't indulging his manias, the film just sort of nods off, and nothing much happens -- either visually or storywise -- for what seems like ages.

What at times feels like a maniacal romp becomes just another sporadically funny, but mostly lame, piece of disposable product.

The laugh always comes first, and Myers' puppy-dog tenacity to that cast-iron tenet of low comedy, disarming and even somewhat charming in the first film, now has an air of careerist desperation about it.

Okuda creates that slightly surreal atmosphere of ghost-town emptiness that will be familiar to fans of Takeshi Miike, but he infuses it with a romantic's sense of deep yearning.

Snappy, fun and outrageously irreverent, Kiss Kiss Bang Bang is the work of someone with nothing to lose, which is only to the audience's gain.

Roaming freely between comedy (which mostly works) and drama (which mostly doesn't) before settling on trite sentimentality, the film may not be an altogether unpleasant way to pass the time, but, ultimately, the innocuous Captain Pantoja doesn't earn its stripes.

And whenever the film shifts from spunky "let's put on a show" fun to overly earnest drama, it slows to a crawl, with mawkish performances that fail to rise above the soggy material.

Chai's structure and pacing are disconcertingly slack. Missing the loose ends and ambiguities of actual conversation, the dialogue makes characters sound like they're delivering speeches rather than interacting.

Undiscovered is beaten on all counts by TV’s "Entourage" and "Unscripted" in its portrayal of the aspirational lifestyle and its end-of-the-rainbow spoils.

There is a great divide between a film about people in the throes of aimless, meandering lives and a film that is simply aimless and meandering. Smokers Only never acknowledges, let alone bridges, that gap.

Watching Americano is like hearing a long story about someone else's holiday, and while it seems everyone had a nice time, it's too bad they didn't shoot a better film while they were there.

Gores certainly seems to be enjoying himself, and diplomacy and plain old good taste prevent one from saying much of anything about his screen performance. Arnold doesn't merit such kindness, nor does producer and director Penelope Spheeris, whose work barely rates above the level of rote competence.

Mo’Nique's character here is so underwritten that the actress doesn't get a chance to really capitalize on her extra screen-time. Her sassy forte may be talking so straight-up she sounds crazy, but she seems a little advanced to be doing "yo mamma" jokes.

The inventive and unpredictable May is exactly the kind of unexpected delight one hopes for every time the lights go down.

There may be an audience out there for any movie about gospel music, regardless of how bad it is, but as filmmaking or as drama, it's hard to imagine anyone singing the praises of this one.

If one were to parody Iranian cinema, packing into one film its common tropes and themes to the point of bursting, it would probably be a lot like Iraj Karimi’s Going By.

As the cop who finds himself in way over his head, kickboxer-turned-actor Conrad Pla turns in a performance of such staggering ineptitude that it almost (key word: almost) reaches a so-bad-it's-good, Plan 9 From Outer Space brilliance.

Doogal is one of those pickup-and-redub jobs, the original version having been made by European studio Pathé based on a 1960s British children’s show, "The Magic Roundabout." And lacking even the minimal pop-cultural pizzazz of "Hoodwinked," the story, dialogue and animation here really are for-kids-only.

Has moments of real interest, but they require wading through a lot of dead air.

Traub does her plucky best, coming off as part Judy Blume heroine, part post-WB hipster, and she provides the film with its few and infrequent moments of emotional truth.

The film has a hypnotic pull, drawing the viewer deeper and deeper into its enigmatic adventure by crafting a world all its own.

Director Erik Van Looy has filmmaking chops to spare, and while he has created a sharply shot and crisply paced film, he isn't able to make it all cohere.

It’s a tantalizing idea - a little rom-com sugar to help the Big Pharma exposé pill go down -but Slattery-Moschkau is simply not a writer of the caliber necessary to pull off that delicate balancing act.

The film works no matter which side of the racial divide you're on, because nothing unites an audience quite like making fun of everyone.

The makers of Lisa Picard Is Famous -- having mastered the obvious early on, set their sights on the unfunny and repetitive.

Relies almost exclusively on the gushing exuberance of Gooding Jr., and the aw-shucks factor of his digitally expressive, face-licking canine co-stars, leaving such potentially game actors as James Coburn and M. Emmet Walsh out in the cold.

With its chatty, overstuffed patter, Hoodwinked strains at the seams to look with it, like one of those dressed-alike Beverly Hills mother-daughter combos. Having said all that, the songs (yes, there are songs, too), mostly written by Todd Edwards, provide an unexpected bright spot.

Among the film's other drawbacks are how conventional it feels in its structure and strategy, often misguidedly going for the epic high-key feel of classic NFL Films on a low-key, DV budget.

Directed by Henry Hathaway and co-written by Charles Brackett, the picture, about a femme fatale who wants to kill her husband, could be seen as a "House of Gucci" predecessor -- starring Marilyn Monroe as she was coming into herself as a performer and star, and featuring Joseph Cotten with his blend of the suave and the sleazy. [25 Nov 2021, p.E1]

The sex-comedy-for-girls idea never quite takes off.

Not for the squeamish (a guy rips out his own arm, for goodness' sake), the film is nevertheless more than just a gonzo gross-out. But not by much.

While there is something to be said for a movie that aims to grapple with some of the “big questions” about the very nature of existence and reality, Down the Rabbit Hole makes teen sex comedies, action-chick sci-fi and the other usual multiplex chum seem like high-minded discourse.

The story is bound together with gaming set pieces that are strange, inventive and mesmerizing.

By the time a not terribly surprising tragedy hits and these crazy kids get theirs, the movie doesn't so much end as finally keel over.

Ultimately neither freewheeling enough to work as a diverting entertainment nor barbed enough to strike home as any sort of social commentary.

As a first-time filmmaker who juggles such duties as writing, directing, producing, even playing piano solos on the soundtrack, Rice is in over his head.

A project such as Operation Homecoming should shed light on their experiences, but Robbins' film just falls short. [06 Apr 2007, p.E17]

During the all-important underwater sequences, the three-dimensional effects are surprisingly muted.

Its overall view of 12-year-old life is essentially one of high-spirited fun.

There's something refreshing about a film set in Los Angeles that gets its L.A.-ness right -- the difference in vibe between Silver Lake and the Hollywood Hills, or the types of people at CityWalk versus Saks. It is that sense of specificity, both geographic and emotional, that gives Shopgirl its pull.