Peter Travers

You can kill the vibe of Minghella’s film with nitpicking, but Fanning rides the movie home to glory. She is simply sensational.

The rousing life that Malek brings to this extraordinary recreation deserves all the cheers it gets. Screw the film’s flaws — you don’t want to miss his performance.

Thanks to the comic tornado at its center, Isn’t It Romantic is still your best bet for a Valentine’s date at the movies. You could do worse.

Flawed? You bet, but the film of the Broadway musical about teen suicide is not the crime against humanity some claim. Yes, Ben Platt, 27 is playing a high school kid, but he inhabits the role he created on stage with every fiber of his being and hits you like a shot in the heart.

What does matter, besides the collection of deranged characters who can’t escape their limitations, is the southern-fried atmosphere so resonantly captured by DP Steven Meizler (Contagion).

The British author's wickedly twisted children's book is transferred to the Deep South in the 1960s to provide a racial diversity meant to speak to a 2020 audience with a pertinent understatement that is otherwise in short supply.

But this is Washington's show, his Scarface, if you will, and his smiling, seductive monster is a thrilling creation that gives Training Day all the bite it needs.

At 134 minutes, Grindelwald can feel like an overload of homework on which we’ll we tested later. Fine for Pottermores, but a trial for us Muggles.

Levinson wants nothing less than to capture the hope and despair of the American dream through the saga of one family — his family. It’s a grand ambition. But the film, though exquisitely crafted, lacks the political, spiritual and sociological depth to realize it. What Avalon does offer are rich period details, abundant scenes of humor and heartbreak and outstanding performances.

Witherspoon -- though miles from the keen satire of "Election" -- stays one sharp cookie even as her film crumbles.

You’ll laugh. You’ll cry. But first you have to cut through the noise.

Too crude for the kids and not crude enough for connoisseurs of the "Something About Mary" school of hair jism and balls caught in zippers, Osmosis Jones seems doomed to fall between the cracks.

This psychological thriller about a demonic hand puppet only works in fits and starts. But watching virtuoso actors John Lithgow and Geoffrey Rush let their freak flags fly as nursing home patients in a fight to the death is a blast of fun and fright to make you squirm.

Official Secrets remains a compelling tale of injustice on an individual and global level. It’s a shame that it hasn’t been told better, but give it points for being told at all.

The fans show up for this kind of movie to watch Neeson knock heads with bad guys, and Moland lets him rip. There’s no dawdling over sentiment. If you want to see a snowplow used as a weapon of mass destruction, you’ve come to the right movie.

A charming Elizabeth Olsen must choose between two men in the afterlife. The trouble with this often-beguiling romp is that it takes an eternity to wrap up. Too bad no one ever learns how to quit while they’re ahead.

There’s not a twist you can’t see coming, but thanks to Kiefer Sutherland and a cast of up-for-anything actors, this trifle goes down easy and leaves a smile on your face for the holidays that might just last all season long.

This Minions prequel would have to go some to make it as flimsy, but Steve Carell is pricelessly funny doing the voice of a pre-teen wannabe villain wrangling an army of goggle-wearing little buggers and you could do worse in a search for animated family fun

Anne Hathaway and Michaela Coel are dynamite in a pop rock opera from director David Lowery that wins points for visuals and suffers from a terminal case of grandiosity

Noah Baumbach thonors Don DeLillo’s virtuoso 1985 novel about the comic-absurdist chaos of consumerism with a too cautious respect. The result is his most constricted film which only breaks free when he allows costars Adam Driver and Greta Gerwig to fly on their own wings.

I could have done more with the edgy humor of "Diner" and "Tin Men" and less of the mythmaking of "Avalon."

You could do way worse if you’re looking for a comic blast for the holidays.

A Marvel epic that values personal connections over spectacle? Sorry adrenaline junkies, but that’s what Oscar-winning, indie director Chloe Zhao brings to her first superhero blockbuster. The slow-paced result is uneven, but memorably inclusive and unique.

In Seberg, Kristen Stewart gives a fully-inhabited, body-and-soul performance as a Hollywood casualty pushed beyond the limit. It’s such a stellar turn that she almost redeems this well-meaning but wobbly biopic — which earns points for trying to do her justice.

Set against the German bombing of London, Steve McQueen stirring WW2 epic misses greatness by failing to fully engage with the starker, deeper implications of seeing war through the eyes of a mixed-race child facing an evil that’s scarily close to home

The something extra comes with watching Black and Blanchett match wits, especially the former; he radiates his signature comic moxie with glimmers of the dramatic chops he demonstrated in movies like "Bernie" (2011) and this year’s "Don’t Worry, He Won’t Get Far on Foot."

The script by William Goldman (Misery) is based on fact, and when the movie sticks to fact (in an unprecedented bout of man-eating, the lions took just a few months to slaughter 130 bridge builders), the result is a hypnotic spectacle. The natives fear that the lions are unkillable demons. The hunters — Douglas and Kilmer spar splendidly in their roles — aim to prove them wrong. Hopkins, unfortunately, won’t leave well enough alone.

The script hits rough patches, especially when Phoebe and Wolf get it on, but the sisters cut to the heart.