Peter Hartlaub

As the film meanders, the powerful moments barely outnumber the ridiculous. And another excellent performance from McAdams isn't quite good enough to mask the distractions.

Feels like a streamlined improvement on the original.

An often amusing but also an aimless and forgettable animated comedy that is noteworthy mostly for its random musical numbers and surprising amounts of violence.

The reboot of the "Friday the 13th" series is a pretty big mess - not particularly scary or interesting or even gory by 21st century movie standards.

Very imaginative and can be enjoyed by audiences of all ages.

Besides the huge smiles on your faces, Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse offers mainstream moviegoers an overwhelming feeling of optimism. If this kind of risk-taking and artist-driven creativity can exist in Hollywood’s biggest money-making genre, then our superhero movie future is filled with hope.

If you're the type who doesn't go to art-house films , Murderball should be your exception. It's hard to imagine anyone could walk away from this movie disappointed.

Naysayers have been claiming for years that the "Moneyball" book wouldn't work as a movie. But ultimately, it's the cinematic touches that keep this film version from becoming something exceptional.

One of Miyazaki's most kid-accessible movies, but still an unnerving film.

Ernest & Celestine builds a delicate and charming animated world, but you wouldn't want to live there.

One of the more thoughtful and valiant feature film directorial debuts in recent memory.

A great piece of filmmaking and a legitimate science-fiction/horror classic.

Children of Men is Cuarón's run for freedom, with a riveting story, fantastic action scenes and acting so universally solid that even the dogs perform masterfully under his direction.

A return to rowdy form for Chappelle.

A meditative state of a movie. While shorter-attention-spanned moviegoers should stick to "The Fighter," this is an interesting and enjoyable entry on the opposite side of the genre.

Miyazaki is arguably at the Kubrick/Polanski level, where his lesser films still yield great rewards. Even during the moments that don't soar, The Wind Rises continues to satisfy.

Captures an artist who has decided not to burn out, but to fade away with dignity.

The movie is a wonderful surprise, cleverly written and executed brick by brick with a visual panache.

As impressive as it is geeky. Most of the principal characters look like they haven't seen daylight since "Pac-Man Fever" was on the charts.

This is an extremely violent movie, with one long gory scene that's particularly hard to stomach. The great majority of Triad Election is about political maneuvering, but when the conversations end, the blood flows mightily.

A film that is at its best onstage.

Contains so many insults to the audience's intelligence.

Anvil lives somewhere in that thoroughly entertaining gray area between self-parody and the triumph of human spirit.

A strikingly immersive movie, a slow burn filled with subtleties and nuance, with its message nestled in the details as much as the greater story. While other filmmakers have effectively captured San Francisco’s landmarks and topography, story co-writers Fails and Talbot seem to be filming San Francisco’s streets with a microscope.

It stands out as one of the best films of the genre, on the strength of the storytelling and wonderful performances.

Arrival works as mainstream entertainment, but includes hallmarks of the “2001: A Space Odyssey”/“Silent Running” era of artist-driven science fiction. It has Hollywood stars, but makes great effort to strip them of any false glamour. The film is tightly calibrated, but leaves things open to interpretation, for discussion on the ride home and beyond.

Coco is the best-looking Pixar movie since the tonally uneven “The Good Dinosaur.” The colorful afterlife is the centerpiece, but excellence is found in unexpected places.

The locally sourced documentary is always engaging — lively and well-paced with an impressive list of interviewees from Hillary Clinton to Huerta herself.

Plays like two films in one, and succeeds on both levels.

A slow start keeps Moana from reaching “Frozen” or “Beauty and the Beast” levels of excellence. But the comic self-awareness, engaging songs and a fulfilling finish are enough to merit a strong recommendation.

The result is a warm and extremely thoughtful journey, with a deliberately bare-bones narrative.

The fly-on-the-wall style is a slow build that leads to an immersive experience, and then an ultimate payoff as the change-minded department detours into another scandal. The Force is like watching a drug addict take a few meaningful steps toward recovery, only to relapse again.

What Sweetgrass lacks in context it makes up for in voyeuristic camera work that reveals a gritty beauty in the landscape, along with the human and livestock characters.

Devoid of thrills, and with nothing even vaguely frightening to distract moviegoers, it becomes clear that the story wasn't worth telling in the first place.

Presents an almost fawning portrait of the doctor-turned-surfer.

Mainstream audiences will probably be confounded by Drive, while lovers of gritty filmmaking will defend every exaggerated shotgun wound as art. Know which camp you're in before you enter the theater.

The cinematography and direction are particularly compelling; the complicated sequences on the tight sets must have forced camera operators to play cinematic Twister in impossibly small corners.

All the brains, heart and courage in the world can't save a movie that doesn't have a third act.

"Searching" has emotional valleys and zeniths, and gasp-inducing turns, as old friends, fans and Rodriguez's grown daughters are interviewed.

The biggest sin of 28 Weeks Later is that it's not in the same league as the near-perfect movie that came before it.

There's little illumination.

The result is an excellent film - entertaining and informative and sometimes stunning in its display of the personal demons shared by these two geniuses.

The talented fantasy filmmaker and heir to the "Lord of the Rings" throne gets the tone right throughout Hellboy 2, and the hip retro charm alone is enough to merit recommendation.

Throughout Zootopia, each bustling frame is packed with so much repeated-viewings-rewarded imagery that the screen must be sampled rather than taken in as a whole.

The sequel is filled with crowd-pleasing action, adventure and characters — sometimes too many characters. But it rises above its crowded narrative with an intense emotional core, taking a protagonist whose affliction had been played mostly for comedy, and exploring the emptiness and loneliness of her plight.

There are several excellent performances, including Wayne Hapi as Potini’s hardened brother. But Curtis is the most memorable part of The Dark Horse.

This may be Favreau’s best achievement — taking a beloved film guided by Walt Disney himself and crafting something distinct and memorable.

A film that defies lowered expectations — if not the tired adolescent mind-set and poor joke-writing — and emerges as the best in the series.

Logan takes its indestructible metal claws to comic book movie norms and destroys them, and it’s a wonderful thing.

It's a homemade protein-and-steroids smoothie of a plot, combining elements of gore, self-parody, 1990s nostalgia overload and an attempt to say something -- while actually saying absolutely nothing -- about the American dream.

It is by far the sharpest-looking DreamWorks Animation film to date.

Tribe superfan Rapaport doesn't fawn, but he juggles too much, and the ending feels pat. It's still an outstanding effort, and one of the more honest band biopics in recent years.

Peralta uses the creative liberties of fiction to focus on the one thing he couldn't convey in his historical record -- the sense of tribalism among skateboarders, who live by a code that most law-abiding citizens misunderstand for hooliganism.

While the songs are recycled, Across the Universe stands out just by existing.

Bayona remains a director whose work should be anticipated, and A Monster Calls is a solid fantasy drama.

A charming and thoughtful movie, about people making a charming and thoughtful movie.

A throwback to all those guilty pleasure action movies.

Stronger always feels right in the moment, solidified by an outstanding central performance by Gyllenhaal, and some wonderful ensemble work, especially the actors just below the top billing.

It's all very foul, and completely entertaining.

Very entertaining.

A documentary that is often told in adages, riddles and poetry.

The filmmakers investigate, but can't answer every tough question. There are so many people who could be potentially taking advantage of these players, it's hard to sort out the wrongdoers.

The movie is occasionally clever, but still inferior to last year's "Twilight" film, mostly because the story is so muddled.

The Lego Batman Movie is less awesome than its predecessor, but it’s a clever, well-paced, self-aware and completely satisfying kind of less awesome.

The studio made a great film.

It wonderfully explains elements of life with autism, offering a primer for the uninitiated, while profiling a family that was rewarded for its willingness to approach an obstacle with patience and love.

The documentary “Amy” left viewers feeling a little shame, as if the audience and society was an accessory in Winehouse’s death. Janis: Little Girl Blue is a more clinical treatment, with more complicated messages.

For a movie that takes place mostly in the bowels of a sewer, Flushed Away has some surprisingly charming moments.

A tough internal struggle must take place before one can come forward and admit enjoying The Devil's Rejects, a movie so fundamentally horrible that even its creator has to admit he's basically made a 101-minute snuff film.

As challenging as it must have been to pilot Joss Whedon's space opera from the TV junk pile to the big screen, the finished product is a triumph.

Armstrong acted like a demon, but it becomes clear there were very, very few angels associated with the sport in the 1990s and early 2000s.

The ego trips and sexuality and driving are all filmed with equal intensity, to the point where the emotions and flesh and crunched metal seem to blend together. The movie's only major problem is that the tension sometimes overwhelms.

In the end, Sully is a broadly crowd-pleasing movie, at a time when we could use the straight-forward entertainment.

Bridge to Terabithia is a good movie, but it could become truly great with a director's cut that leaves the fantastic elements a little more vague.

The end result is an interesting documentary that is as unpolished and gutsy as the championship-caliber high school hoop stars at the other end of his camera.

It's clear by the end that one Ruth Gruber is worth more than 100 pundits fighting about partisan politics.

Byrne is the furthest thing from being a manipulative filmmaker. But Raising Bertie is moving nonetheless.

The end result is flawed, but also funny, heartfelt and inclusive movie making.

Half of one song is performed with a speck of saliva on the camera. More casual fans will twist in their chairs uncomfortably, wishing that a roadie would walk up and wipe it off. Neil Young die-hards will cherish the spittle.

The visual style and lethargic pace can be frustrating -- at least if you're sober -- but the animated tragedy is still a success.

This isn't just a good throwback satanic thriller - it looks as if it was made during the era of satanist paranoia.

Like George Bailey, and the Cartwright family from “Bonanza” and other fictitious families, the real-life story of the Sungs is one of loyalty and adhering to their code, even as they face losing everything.

It’s like combining the anything-can-happen excitement of playing a slot machine, with the grace of a ballet, and the prolonged and escalating violence of a good gladiator battle. Reeves has sustained his career through consistently trying 20 percent harder than most of his contemporaries.

Rocket Science has the makings of either a tragedy or a crowd-pleasing underdog story, but writer-director Jeffrey Blitz instead takes the movie on a different, and ultimately more rewarding, direction.

The story is painfully simplistic, and it becomes quickly apparent that the narrative is a crude cement to hold together the carnage.

A love story that gets the single male culture down so honestly and unapologetically that it can't help but push the boundaries of political correctness.

It’s not a sin to tell a one-sided story, Hoover seems to be arguing, when there is no other side.

Now in middle age, members of N.W.A. no longer believe all of the hype. They’re in an introspective space, to the great benefit of this film.

By the time the ride is over, director Drew Goddard and co-writers Goddard and Joss Whedon will change course three or four times, nodding and winking but never losing momentum.

More than just culinary recommendations, he provides a cultural guide to the Los Angeles that is almost never seen in movies — and then the film makes an argument that Gold’s L.A. is more relevant than the one we all know.

The movie's shockingly tasteless setup is also its secret weapon. Despite many scenes in The Ringer that could individually be viewed as politically incorrect, audiences will be laughing with the athletes most of the time.

It's funny, clever and marginally educational.

Miles Teller as Brendan McDonough is a standout, beginning as a dead-eyed drug user, then gradually turning into a responsible adult.

If you were ever wondering what "Die Hard" would have been like if Neil LaBute directed it as an art film, prepare to enjoy Lovers of Hate.

If Insidious 2 exists solely because Insidious 1 made a ton of money, then at least credit Wan for making quality control a priority.

The result is an unconventional and layered portrait of a complicated talent.

What Dunham lacks in polish, she makes up for in her ability to observe her generation, with the hardest truths coming at her own expense.

Difficult to watch, and the film is sabotaged by an impossibly naive lead character and the repetitive auditions that become gratuitously depressing.