Mike Scott

Almodovar lets his movie become boring, and insufferably so.

Doesn't boast enough universal meaning to make it truly sing.

Beneath all that genre eye candy, though, resides a smart and moving story that, after a somewhat slow-moving first hour, builds nicely to become an emotionally engaging drama.

It continuously feels less like straight-up reportage and more like a fan film, one built on equal parts idol worship and wishful thinking.

It's called Chico & Rita, but their film could just as easily have been titled "Chico & Cuba." In both cases, it's a film are about a long-lost love, and in both cases it is steeped in such a pitch-perfect sense of place -- and affection -- that you can almost smell the cigar smoke as it unfolds.

It is fast, it is fun.

World War II dramas might be common enough, but, amid them all, Lore stands as an uncommon entry in the genre.

Complemented by striking, well-conceived visuals, in Fukunaga's hands Bronte's tale of love and woe becomes one well worth repeating.

Seeing Brannaman work in the warm, sun-dappled documentary Buck makes it clear why he was such a perfect fit for Redford's film: Few people can handle horses the way Brannaman does.

The wholesomeness and embraceable spirit of Their Finest will likely strike a chord with the sort of moviegoer who is drawn to such a film. But that doesn't mean it's as good a film as it could have been.

Still, none of that holds back Bahrani's film from becoming a thought-provoking treatise on the self-perpetuating and dehumanizing nature of greed, which more often than not spawns desperation in others, which in turn spawns greed, which spawns more desperation, which spawns greed ...

Khan in particularly is wonderful in Batra's film, which takes the time to indulge in quiet moments that Khan expertly fills with his expressive face and sense ease in front of a camera.

Admirably, though, Gibney resists the temptation to climb on his soapbox to deliver some pointed political message. He gives his audience more credit than that.

[Pierre] owns the role so fully that it’s hard to imagine anyone else in it.

It is edifying, it is emotionally engaging, it is embraceable.

You know how people say that they don't make romantic comedies like they used to? Turns out they do. At least, director Marc Webb does -- and has -- with his clever and sweet debut, 500 Days of Summer.

The Revenant is every bit as technically proficient as Inarritu's "Birdman," a film that made critics swoon with its masterful handling of the filmmaker's daring "one-take" conceit. It manages, however, to do it without the same gimmicky feel.

Even when it is at its most esoteric, The Dance of Reality is always brimming with passion and a daring originality. That helps smooth over the flaws, such as its general staginess and his self-indulgent tendencies.

Not all of the stand-up scenes in Obvious Child are quite as funny. At least one is meant to be bad. Another is meant to be poignant but just ends up coming off as a touch weird and emotionally false.

An entertaining and interesting film, and one that speaks with a reasonable degree of credibility. And while that might not make it high art, it's good enough for me.

A Dangerous Method still feels as if it's based on a rather pedestrian narrative --and so, in the final analysis, Cronenberg's film bores.

Watching Mud unfold, one suspects that the Arkansas-reared Nichols remembers exactly what it was like to be a boy of the Southern wilds.

There are other movies out this year that are more technically ambitious than Wild (I'm thinking "Birdman.") There are others that are wider-reaching in scope and sheer audacity (the 12-years-in-the-making "Boyhood"). But there aren't any others that offer the power and profundity of Wild. This movie is a gift. It's also a journey.

An undeniable charm emerges in writer-director Azazel Jacobs' film. And so, rather than being anywhere near as smothering as it sounds, it all springs appealingly to life.

There's humor there, but this is a "smart" comedy, which is to say it's not intended to make you guffaw.

It's one of the most engaging foreign films to come along since 'Tell No One' in 2008.

Thanks to Gere -- and occasional flashes of gaudy but well-deployed visual style from Cedar -- those contrivances never threaten to overtake the rest of the film.

As ridiculous as it is, Man on a Ledge isn't a movie that requires suspension of disbelief. It requires the absolute absence of it.