Martin Tsai

The film is certainly interesting, despite the fact that it's a glorified promotional video for Muniz's installations.

Andrew Douglas, who directed the 2005 "The Amityville Horror" remake, mishandles the standard noir as straightforward drama and gives it an unfortunate after-school-special vibe.

Whereas the original "Monsters" was a road movie about an odd couple fleeing an alien-infested zone, "Dark Continent" cribs from contemporary war movies like "The Hurt Locker" and "American Sniper," then tosses in extraterrestrials as an afterthought.

By cramming in as many tangents as imaginable, Olvidados ultimately loses sight of what the story is even about.

It's almost inconceivable that this effective, nerve-racking thriller is the first feature from former NFL defensive end Simeon Rice. It requires the usual suspension of disbelief, and pacing problems are a sign of Rice's directorial inexperience. But the tension he creates is unrelenting.

If only writer Stacey Menear and director William Brent Bell took the very real horrors of domestic abuse as seriously as they do the virtual horror of paranormal activity.

Whereas Haneke's films grapple with the blunt force of violence, novice filmmaker Markus Blunder just lets the violence snowball all the way down a slippery slope.

Despite a few contrivances like the impending romance between Nina and Tennessee, The Frontier remains for the most part refreshing and astute.

The script, the special effects and Jack Heller's direction simply don't add up in the profile of the mythical creature. It's quite obvious the filmmakers didn't put a lot of thought into it and went straight for the cheapest thrills.

Because of the faulty memory of its unreliable protagonist, Reversion prompts viewers to second-guess its narrative. Director and co-writer Jose Nestor Marquez eschews most establishing shots, exacerbating the sense of disorientation and mystery.

While the cast and crew's competence well exceed what anyone would expect from this breed of B movies, they cannot compensate for the flawed internal logic in the screenplay.

Although Beef and Conan are far from stereotypical, the quirkiness and eccentricities ascribed to them by writer-director Kenny Riches harp on their otherness all the same.

Despite the film's made-for-TV aesthetic and performances, Coley has saturated its backstory with vividly drawn details that make this convoluted saga wholly believable.

The film is measured and executed effectively to satiate horror fans' bloodlust, yet its underlying messages are just so repugnant.

Writers Christopher Borrelli and Michael C. Martin commit quite a handful of sins of contrivance that are difficult to absolve.

The film persistently misses the mark as a raunchy comedy amid all the side commentaries and Park's earnest tone. Yet it's equally clumsy at making sense of its portrayals of the indignities that Asian Americans routinely endure.

Writer-director Ken Kwek means for the proceedings to be farcical, but seldom are they actually funny. A former journalist, he's quite observant of the clashes among the classes and cultures in this diverse society.

Director Brett Harvey has gotten the documentary look and format down pat, complete with generic and gratuitous nature and cityscape shots. Where he shows an amateurish hand is in the term-paper-like voice-over narration and the inclusion of underqualified talking heads.

If "The Bible" was CliffsNotes for the Scriptures, Son of God is the cheat sheet. The two-hour film condenses about four hours of what already was hasty television, and it all winds up a little dramatically static.

Demski and director Chris Kasick wrap up the story neatly — in both senses of that word — by suggesting that we can all feel better at somebody else's expense.

Fredric Dannen's reportage, which appeared in a 1992 issue of the New Yorker and serves as the film's basis, contains lurid details that leap off the page in a cinematic way. The "Dragons" script by Michael Di Jiacomo and co-director Andrew Loo preserves many, but few register on-screen.

Novice screenwriter Craig Walendziak has followed England's template, charting the daily worsening of the symptoms. But he doesn't get that the 2013 "Contracted" was special because it was much more than a zombie flick.

Francis has a few moments of inspiration, nonchalantly deploying visual gags. If he were going for cult status, perhaps gonzo is the way to go. The rest of his stylistic flaunts, plot twists and contrivances are joyless.

To call it amateurish would be kind.

Director Simon Brand devotes so much running time to fear-mongering and grotesque stereotypes that a last-ditch effort at moral ambiguity and a critique on muckraking barely register.

Like so many filmmaking wunderkinds who could have used a course in common sense, Glanz is technically assured but emotionally hollow.

Although this film doesn't miss the whole point of found footage as the recent "Into the Storm" did, Jung does little to help suspend our disbelief.

The film hardly scratches Abu Ghraib's surface.