Michael Rechtshaffen

The end result comes across less as a bona fide, issue-oriented documentary than a package of company profiles.

Based on the dubious, and occasionally eye-rolling responses from the majority of those being pitched, the plan would appear to be as ill-conceived as Surviving Peace itself.

The skillfully assembled documentary Wasted! The Story of Food Waste proves as eye-opening as it is mouth-watering.

While Harnett’s a real trooper and stuntman-turned-filmmaker Scott Waugh (“Act of Valor”) establishes an effectively bone-chilling milieu heightened by an immersive sound design that keeps those whipping winds and howling wolves in uncomfortably close proximity, the embellishments fail to create crucial suspense.

While the main characters appear to have been given a bit of Powerpuff Girl sass by screenwriters Meghan McCarthy, Rita Hsiao and Michael Vogel, it ultimately does little to goose the limited hand-drawn 2D animation.

One doesn’t need to be into pugilism or well-versed in Gaelic to appreciate Rocky Ros Muc, a documentary that is as much about roots and identity as it is a portrait of Irish American boxer Sean Mannion.

The overstuffed production feels as tediously incessant as its endless winter.

While the storytelling, by Abbess and co-writer Brian Cachia, might lack novelty and, occasionally, coherence, visually the film consistently impresses with creative art direction and costume choices.

Refreshingly devoid of talking animals and anthropomorphic vehicles, Ann Marie Fleming’s Window Horses is a lovely surprise of a stirringly original animated feature.

Although Chris Perkel’s two-hour documentary can feel like an extended episode of “Behind the Music”...it’s admittedly tough to condense half a century of such remarkable musical diversity.

While Little has a assembled a sharp ensemble, including Bruce Davison as the sheriff who hunts down the felons and the late John Heard as the prison warden, it’s ultimately the hardened intensity of Patrick’s commanding portrayal that gives Last Rampage its take-no-prisoners tautness.

There has been no shortage of films tracking the immigrant pursuit of the American dream, but few have been as laugh-out-loud delightful as The Tiger Hunter, a sparkling first feature by Lena Khan.

Any hope of prestige is dashed by the heavy-handed, cliché-ridden direction of former stuntman Johnny Martin and his star’s detached portrayal of a guy whose mind is permanently elsewhere.

Infinity Chamber (renamed from the original “Somnio”) may accurately convey the oppressive perpetuity of its title, but all that repetition in the absence of more inspired plotting results in a payoff that feels inescapably contrived.

Richard Gabai’s film is too preoccupied corralling all the genre clichés to come up with anything original or compelling.

Although chances are good that something called This Is Your Death is not going to be admirably restrained in the subtlety department, there was at least the hope that this grotesque thriller wouldn’t have kept pivoting uneasily between audacious social satire and mawkish moralizing.

A creeping naturalism inhabits virtually every frame of Dayveon.

Embargo plays like a freshman college paper that’s long on reference material but comes up short in establishing an overriding premise.

The fact-based story, which is allowed to quietly unfold in a series of extended takes, has been stripped of all artifice, especially in regard to the pared-back performances of Harewood, a British actor with regular roles on “Homeland” and “Supergirl,” and Findley, who starred in Ava DuVernay’s 2012 breakthrough feature, “Middle of Nowhere.”

A perfectly watchable if overtly theatrical whodunit.

A straight-ahead political thriller that fails to ratchet up the requisite tension despite its timely subject matter and (largely) effective cast.

A raunchy, ploddingly unfunny comedy sequel to 2012’s equally crass but disarmingly endearing “Goon.”

It may have been a long road to glory, but seeing Perkins (then 97) and Smith (75) enthusiastically accept a 2011 Grammy for their album “Joined at the Hip,” it’s readily apparent that it was worth the trip.

While the dramatic underpinnings could have used more work, the labyrinth that’s the focus of Dave Made a Maze is truly an amazingly inventive sight to behold.

6 Days can’t help but feel like a missed opportunity.

While that let’s-band-together-and-save-the-park setup clearly isn’t the freshest acorn on the tree, director and co-writer Cal Brunker (2013’s Escape From Planet Earth) at least manages to keep all the ensuing chaos at a reasonably brisk clip. Drawing similarly energetic performances from his voice cast is another matter.

Grafting the buddy picture onto the framework of the classic political thriller, director Jang Hoon also manages to find time for lighter moments of human comedy, and those seemingly disparate elements are deftly navigated by Song and his fellow fully dimensional characters.

Serving as something of an overstuffed sampler platter, the documentary The Pulitzer at 100, marking the centenary of newspaper publisher Joseph Pulitzer’s effort to place journalism on equal footing with arts and letters, is big on variety but comes up frustratingly short on substance.