Nick Allen

The film proves to be more shallow than its edgy premise and subsequent themes promise.

The documentary vigorously investigates — and subsequently calls out — his integrity as an artist, an associate, and even as a gang member.

Shook, about an influencer being tormented by a mysterious caller, takes the bait on making a movie about such social media vanity, but its touch-and-go terror hardly offers commentary or cleverness.

It’s the kind of movie that might not be as charming if you’ve seen 100 vampire movies, but if you’re also curious about bloodsucker tropes, and the real-life world that surrounds its lead character, it has just enough of a soul.

I didn't see what was funny about the shallow wackiness of VHYes.

80 for Brady displays how Marvin’s sensibilities about friendship are primed for a mass audience. He knows the audience and, more importantly, that no one will mistake what he’s aiming for here.

Despite the sincerity that’s in every scene with Rylance’s performance, the movie's good intentions remain wistful, and thoroughly frustrating.

The World is Full of Secrets concerns text more than anything else — not the visuals within filmmaking or performance, but the stories being told. As an experiment with the sensory experience of film storytelling, it backfires. To best engage Swon's massive amounts of text, you’re better off closing your eyes.

It might be kind of tedious, kind of sloppy, and mostly silly, but you could never accuse Dangerous Lies of false advertising. The new Netflix thriller, directed by Michael M. Scott, is practically designed for rainy day viewers who initially laugh at the title, and that’s not a bad thing.

The bad news, I’m sorry to say, is that The Christmas Chronicles 2 doesn’t contribute much that's worthwhile to the first movie's blueprint, and focuses on mildly amusing indulgences — more elf-centric shenanigans, more Santa mythology, more roller coaster sleigh rides.

Interceptor is about putting on a show, and Pataky has the muscular charisma to carry it.

The story might play out like a missed opportunity in some ways, as it’s staggering that a movie in which Jamie Foxx fights vampires can be so set on killing its fun with backstory. But while the worst parts of Day Shift want to be cute with all of this, Perry’s movie is saved by the inner bad-ass that comes out when it matters most.

As a bland addition to the already low-stakes tradition of Xmas rom-coms, Let It Snow could use a whole lot more tinsel.

With Clerks III, nostalgia is its own convenience for Smith. It’s cheap and fleeting, but it is comforting.

Studio 666 is the kind of broad horror-comedy that could certainly stand to be a little scarier, a little funnier, and more clever overall. But then again, no other horror-comedy stars rock band the Foo Fighters as themselves, which is the main pull for this special Foovie event.

The biggest success for A Whale of a Tale is in how it corrects the biggest flaw of “The Cove,” which came from an inclination we all have: to cast real life people as one-dimensional heroes and villains; good and evil.

Its story is as common as sunlight, but the entertainment can be just as warm.

The romantic fantasies and the time travel plotting of “Meet Cute” are a total mismatch.

Jungle Cruise is a monument of zeros and ones, so reliant on CGI that it sacrifices jokes, fight sequences, and general wonder to the distracting notion of admiring how fake everything is, despite the truly incredible effort by hundreds of artists to make it appear as life-like as possible.

A disastrous movie, Don’t Look Up shows McKay as the most out of touch he’s ever been with what is clever, or how to get his audience to care.

Every movie, even a remake, deserves to be viewed on its own merits. But that’s easier stated than done when you have a film like Downhill, a largely inferior American knockoff that's far less dynamic than the 2014 dark comedy it's based on.

There’s a big meaning to all of this, and yet the movie can’t eloquently express it, even though the metaphor is in the title.

The cuteness of Godmothered is a winning one overall, especially in how it uses a playful sense of humor and good heart to find its own way to Happily Ever After.

There’s something to making a prequel just for the hell of it, and giving it to an actor/writer/director whose charisma has worldwide appeal, but Army of Thieves could have had much more fun with the assignment.

While this second round proves why the first movie worked, it also brings the now-franchise closer to losing its spark.

If having their own Momo is Netflix’s latest attempt to grab viewers, they’re gonna need a much more disturbing monster.

While this documentary from Alison Klayman can be insightful in taking us inside a phenomenon, its approach can be too broad, with filmmaking that relies on its own weaning sense of trendy.

This Child’s Play is nastier, more playful, and just as good if not better than the original film.