Mike Scott

It's one heck of a fun ride, a pure popcorn spectacle that doesn't require a knowledge of the Star Trek mythology to make it enjoyable.

This isn’t your run-of-the-mill character study. It is a smartly conceived and beautifully executed meditation on the co-existing pain and pleasure, complexity and fragility of human existence.

An unflinchingly ugly -- but downright mesmerizing -- tale that plumbs the depths of human immorality and, along the way, offers a dash of subtle commentary on just how far we, as a 312 million-member nuclear family, might have lost our way.

This is a movie that confuses teary with sweet. Mopey with sad. Discomfort with humor. And, worst of all, it confuses weird with odd.

It’s early yet, but “Challengers” is already among the best films of the year so far.

Boyle, Sorkin and company might not have invented the iPhone or changed the way people viewed technology, but it does something the real Steve Jobs had trouble doing: It offers a genuine peek at the man behind the turtleneck, and in the process finds a way to connect with its viewers.

While Isle of Dogs can be enjoyed simply for its surface pleasures -- its unique story, its singular voice and its gorgeous animation -- there are elements there that will appeal to those who want to dig deeper. That includes an argument in favor of an aggressive and adversarial press, as well as a fairly glaring distrust of government.

Love is Strange doesn't really have any sort of sense of urgency about it. To the contrary, it feels rather mundane, as their problems -- while both unfortunate and unfair -- feel relatively small when put in perspective.

The surprise is that Captain Phillips is a surprise in the first place, pitching and rolling tirelessly like the sea on which it is set and, in the process, becoming one of the most enjoyable and well-made movies to hit theaters this year.

This is the sort of movie that Charles Bronson would have made back in the day, and indeed a shot of Johnson standing in a sporting goods store, contemplating a wall of shotguns as he gets ready to get busy, could have come from any "Death Wish."

Berger's film is still far more magical than it is macabre. And so although a black-and-white, foreign-film adaptation of a very familiar tale might, indeed, be a hard sell, audiences who buy into it are in for an undeniably rewarding movie-going experience. In a word: ¡Ole!

Many scenes, like Another Year itself, don't actually go anywhere.

It is beautiful, and it is difficult to watch. It is heartwarming, and it is heart-wrenching. It is absorbing, and it's unsettling.

Don't expect there to be a run on Secret of Kells action figures any time soon.

Bridge of Spies, with its stop-and-go momentum, is also more merely interesting than it is full-on riveting. It's still quite good stuff, but despite its impressive pedigree... it doesn't feel as if it's quite the sum of all of its parts.

Foxcatcher isn't a film many viewers will clamor to rewatch. It's too chilly a film for that. At the same time, it's one that will suck them in -- and it will hold them while they're there.

Larrain's film offers something human, something insightful, and something altogether unforgettable.

This is what makes Anderson's film so infuriating. It's so damned irresistible -- until it becomes so damned insufferable, getting lost in a marijuana fog of poorly explained plot developments and indecipherable twists. Still, it's hard to look away for fear of missing some other equally inspired flourish.

You'd think that a movie about such a dynamic moment and such a vibrant ad campaign would be more dynamic and vibrant.

Rarely have New Orleanians looked so ugly, but given current events, rarely has a film felt so essential.

It's that zippy dialog more than anything that moves "Django" along and that coaxes such fantastic performances from its actors.

Few of the characters feel fully fleshed out. McKay's Big Short also lacks a certain nuance in its third act, when McKay's agenda becomes abundantly, ham-handedly clear. Still, it's hard not to be outraged by what is learned.

The sky is far from falling on the Bond franchise. In fact, it is as good as it has ever been. What's more, Craig is reportedly on board for at least two more outings, so Q had better get to work on those bifocals because 007 is no where near ready for retirement.

While those flaws might conspire to keep A Fantastic Woman from being unassailably fantastic as a whole, there's no denying that it is fantastically timely, and touching to boot.

This is not a feel-good movie. This is the frigid, hard-to-embrace cinematic opposite of a feel-good movie, in fact -- all wrapped in one long, dark metaphor for depression.

Starred Up isn't just violence for violence's sake. Rather, it is a surprisingly layered, hard-hitting human drama, one that cuts to the bone -- albeit with a homemade prison knife.

A lovely jaunt that ends up becoming one of Allen's most enjoyable films, start-to-finish, in years.

Also helping to sell it all is the fact that these films, goofy though they may be, feature a consistently high level of acting. In addition to Pegg, we get Martin Freeman ("The Hobbit"), Paddy Considine ("Red Riding"), Eddie Marsan ("Sherlock Holmes") and Bill Nighy ("Love Actually"), all of whom have appeared previously in the trilogy.