Richard Roeper

A chilling and valuable reminder of acts of madness, and acts of heroism, that should never be forgotten.

Fortunately, Dumbo is so awesome and so determined and so brave, and the heartwarming aspects of the story are so impactful, we never stop caring.

An admittedly distinctive but ultimately mediocre movie that provides far more empty calories of exploitation than genuine food for thought.

Writer-director Nguyen cleverly unspools the story like a heist film, with Vincent wheeling and dealing every step of the way.

From the moment Rachael and Stefan look into each other’s eyes while we roll OUR eyes, The Aftermath is a runaway train of cornball cliches.

Even if you’ve somehow never even heard of the story upon which this film is based, it’s a crackling good lawman tale.

This is an unforgettable dance with the devil.

Though Captive State has plenty of action, it’s not a blood-and-guts sci-fi thriller. It aims for a more cerebral, social-commentary approach.

Finding Steve McQueen is a combo platter of crazy-but-true history mixed with creative fiction. The result is an entertaining if sometimes overly self-conscious 1970s period piece, bursting with pop culture references.

A well-made, rough-edged and solid frontier fable with a distinctive look and fine performances all around.

This is a quiet film, moving at its own pace, reflecting life with such realism it’s as if we’re invisible guests in Gloria Bell’s life. And yet there’s something thrilling about watching such a great actress hitting all the right notes every step of the way.

What a magnificent presence is J.K. Simmons. What an authentic, weathered, world-weary face he has. What a tremendous gift he has for conveying so much with such little dialogue in the stark and unsettling I’m Not Here.

Alas, with the notable exception of the empathetic Boutella, the cast of “Climax” consists primarily of dancers who are not actors. And as actors, they’re really good dancers.

First-time director D’Onofrio has as an admirable visual style, whether we get medium-long-shot takes or intimate close-ups. This is a good-looking period piece film, percolating with top-tier performances.

From the direction to the script to the production elements to the performances, Triple Frontier is a first-class ride.

This isn’t the greatest Marvel movie ever made, but it’s definitely one of the funniest — and one of the sweetest.

Despite the first-rate production values and the game performances from the cast, “Greta” can’t escape from the formulaic screenplay that dogs it at every turn. It’s almost as if it’s being stalked by mediocrity itself.

Directed by Alex Lehmann with a deft and indie-casual touch from a script by Lehmann and Mark Duplass, Paddleton is a low-key, sweet and heart-tugging buddy movie.

Fighting With My Family works as a cheeky but never condescending story of one of those “chin-up” working-class British families so often featured in the movies, and of course primarily as the story of an undersized, overmatched outcast who is determined to succeed against all odds.

Directed and co-written by Shawn Snyder, To Dust is a dark but not bleak comedy, an oddly effective love story and also a classic buddy movie, albeit presented within a framework I don’t we’ve ever seen before in the genre. It’s also lovely and offbeat and kind of wonderful.

All the cutting-edge pyrotechnics in the universe can’t overcome the uneven (and ultimately unsatisfying) screenplay.

A cheerfully twisted horror/comedy/sci-fi mash-up with a surprisingly sweet heart lurking beneath all the bloody-rinse-and-repeat hijinks, which aren’t all that bloody anyway.

With a combination of bone-dry wit and blood-drenched horror, writer-director Dan Gilroy’s Velvet Buzzsaw skewers some of the most pretentious denizens of the art world you’d ever want NOT to meet — and does so with precision and flair and pitch-black humor.

Gina Rodriguez: You deserve much better than this.

There’s much truth and food for thought contained within even the most over-the-top moments.

The LEGO Movie 2: The Second Part doesn’t quite match the original’s spark and creativity, but it’s a worthy chapter in the ever-expanding Lego movie universe.

Cold Pursuit moves forward with the assured and deliberate force of Nels’ massive snowplow. And with Neeson/Nels at the wheel, Cold Pursuit is one fantastically hot mess of a movie.

An Acceptable Loss is a B-movie with some A-level acting, particularly by Tika Sumpter.

The spiritual angle in Serenity is just one of the many elements making this one of the most ambitious, one of the most challenging — and one of the most entertaining thrillers in recent years.

From its opening moments through its pitch-perfect closing notes, Don’t Come Back from the Moon is a stunning and stark and beautiful thing to behold.

Director and co-writer Rhyan LaMarr’s made-in-Chicago indie film Canal Street is a work of fiction, but it contains so many essential truths, so many recognizable situations and characters, so many (sadly) familiar moments of heartache, it rings as true as a documentary.

As Fyre makes painfully clear, just about everyone involved with the project — including the co-founders — had to have known they were tumbling down a mountain at rapid speed and headed for almost guaranteed scandal and disaster, yet everyone kept on working, as if the denial would somehow soften the blow.

Shyamalan being Shyamalan, Glass does have a distinctive look and some pretty cool moments, and a half-decent twist or two. Mostly, though, it’s an underwhelming, half-baked, slightly sour and even off-putting finale.

Hart delivers a sincere and relatively low-key performance as Dell, but he’s playing an all-too-familiar movie stereotype.

Thanks to the subtle brilliance of Reilly and Coogan, even someone who’s never heard of Laurel and Hardy would likely see how magical these two were together.

Gaffigan’s a regular guy holding up a mirror to our everyday world, and turning those reflections into laughs and bigger laughs — and sometimes best of all, smiles of recognition.

At times Shock and Awe is reminiscent of journalistic procedurals from “President’s Men” to “Spotlight” to “The Post,” and it gets the nitty-gritty details of an early 2000s newsroom just right.

The mission of Eating Animals isn’t to get you to swear off meat (though I’m sure the filmmaker and the narrator would applaud that). It’s to raise your consciousness about the good, the bad and the ugly of animal agriculture.

Egerton is miscast. He and Hewson have nary a spark in their love scenes. Dornan overplays his hand. Foxx belts out nearly every line as if he’s trying to be heard above a parade of fire engines on a Fourth of July parade

But so much of the humor and so many of the situations in Second Act feel like warmed-over Second Helpings of a dinner from long ago...A dinner that wasn’t all that memorable in the first place.

Blindspotting moves at a brisk pace and raises the dramatic stakes with each scene; director Estrada has a masterful touch for pacing.

This movie is bat-bleep crazy even as it makes solid and thought-provoking arguments. It veers all over the place, at times scoring major laughs, on occasion working quite well as a social satire and a screwball romance. But it also falters with some running jokes that stumble and collapse, and a few cringe-inducing scenes that aim for provocation but seem forced.

If you told me Bird Box was based on a Stephen King story — yep, I could see that. It’s that chilling. That suspenseful. And oh yes, that scary.

On the Basis of Sex is almost always solid. But “solid” is about as high as it goes.

A giant pile of shiny gift-wrapped garbage.

As McKay acknowledges in the introduction, Dick Cheney remains an enigma after all these years. I’m not sure Vice sheds any new light on the Cheney story. It places him in a spotlight that continually changes colors and tones but is almost never flattering.

A great American novel has been turned into a great American film.

One of the many graceful touches in Welcome to Marwen is the total lack of pity or condescension in either world.

I don’t see Aquaman ever reaching icon status, but I’ll say this: He’s a lot more fun on his own, when he’s not saddled with those overly serious stiffs Superman and Batman.

Ben Is Back shifts gears and becomes as much a thriller as a family drama, and some of the developments stretch credulity. Through it all, though, there’s the magnificence of Julia Roberts, and the fine performances from Hedges, Vance and the rest of the cast. They do great justice to this finely constructed slice of fractured family life.

Despite the sometimes clever and surely deliberately anachronistic dialogue from the terrific screenwriter Beau Willimon (“The Ides of March,” the Netflix series “House of Cards”), capable direction from Josie Rourke and strong performances from Saoirse Ronan as Mary Stuart and Margot Robbie as Queen Elizabeth, Mary Queen of Scots often comes across as stultified and stagnant.

It’s an entertaining enough offbeat crime comedy/drama featuring an amazing cast — led by the grizzled, shuffling, mumbling, wisecracking old dog playing the lead.

This is a wall-to-wall smile of a movie: big of heart and large in scale, lavishly staged, beautifully photographed and brimming with show-stopping musical numbers.

This is an inclusive, diverse, multi-level, multi-layered, funny, warm, cool, richly detailed, lovingly rendered, friendly neighborhood instant classic.

It’s a period piece with a wink. It’s also funny as hell and a true big-screen treat.

Cuarón’s artistry yields a film with the pinpoint authenticity of a docudrama, but also the intoxicating and lyrical poetry of memories as filtered through a perfect dream. Sometimes we go to the movies and we’re rewarded with a masterpiece.

Of course, the aging-hit-man theme is hardly original, and at times Asher feels almost TOO familiar — but thanks to the great performances by Perlman and the supporting cast; a knowing and literate script by Jay Zaretsky, and the slick direction of Michael Caton-Jones, this is a sparkling black diamond of film noir.

Dumplin’ sometimes takes the easy road.... But there’s so much more to enjoy, from the nuanced work by Jennifer Aniston that ensures Rosie’s never a caricature of a pageant mom; to the warm and natural best-buddy chemistry between Danielle MacDonald and Odeya Rush; to that instant classic of a soundtrack courtesy of Ms. Parton, with a little help from her friends.

The script by Stallone and Juel Taylor is solid, adhering to the time-honored “Rocky” formula of relatively intimate character scenes, training montages and of course a couple of big fights.

Dafoe’s Vincent is a tormented, almost childlike soul who is never comfortable in his own skin, and veers from being monumentally needy to frighteningly rash. It’s a mesmerizing performance in an inconsistent and uneven film.

For such a sweet-natured, candy-colored, family-friendly animated adventure, Ralph Breaks the Internet serves up quite the mega-helping of meta material.

The Front Runner doesn’t hit us over the head with parallels to today’s political and media world. It doesn’t have to.

If six people walked into a screening of the Coen brothers’ Western anthology The Ballad of Buster Scruggs at six different times, they too would come away with vastly contrasting impressions.

Thanks in large part to the winning chemistry between Ali and Mortensen, and a pretty darn inspirational true-life story as its foundation, this was one of the best times I’ve had at the movies this year.

Instant Family has heart and good intentions. It’s a shame the journey is such a bumpy ride as it takes us all over the map.

As always, Steve McQueen is an original and bold storyteller, delivering the goods with dazzling creativity. Even when “Widows” delves into pulpy, blood-soaked material, everything is filtered through the lens of a true artist. This is one of the best movies of the year.

At times The Girl in the Spider’s Web almost feels like a superhero movie, with Lisbeth as Bat Girl.

From time to time you’ll laugh and maybe shed a tear But this isn’t the kind of “Grinch” you’ll want to see each year.

Despite the occasional moment where the depiction of newsroom procedures doesn’t quite ring true, or a supporting character delivers a line that’s a little too perfect and succinct for the moment, most of what transpires feels grimly authentic and true to the real-life characters and events.

While the performances are solid and we do get a few touching moments, the film sinks under the weight of too many intersecting storylines and too many loud and fiery and surprisingly mediocre action sequences.

A strong and steady drama from writer-director-actor Joel Edgerton, featuring yet another effective and authentic performance by Lucas Hedges as a teenager in crisis.

The only redeeming value of Bohemian Rhapsody is it’s so bad, there’s plenty of room left for a much better biopic about the one and only Freddie Mercury.

Despite some interesting performances and impressive art direction, director Luca Guadagnino’s take on the 1977, cult-favorite, supernatural horror film by Dario Argento is an arduous, overstuffed, convoluted and trashy piece — bloated and graphically blood-soaked, guaranteed to make you cringe at times, but not the least bit chilling or haunting.

Carey Mulligan is terrific, even when the script calls for Jeanette to make a quick, not entirely plausible transition from a repressed housewife from the Eisenhower era into a diva from an overwrought B-movie. It’s a great performance in an almost-good movie.

From start to finish, Hunter Killer is all wet.

The original Studio 54 lasted for only 33 months. In 98 minutes, Studio 54 captures the club on its best nights and on its worst mornings.

There’s something quite beautiful and quite melancholy and sometimes achingly relatable about the tone of writer-director Elizabeth Chomko’s lovely and memorable What They Had, which is based in part on the Chicago-born Chomko’s own family history.

For most of the ride, Mid90s feels like an accurate time capsule — and a relatable journey even if you’ve never been on a skateboard in your life.

This movie had me smiling from start to finish. Murray can be a mercurial and elusive figure, but we come away from this doc convinced there is nothing cynical or self-serving or ego-driven about his interactions with “regular” folks.

At times Can You Ever Forgive Me? is actually quite funny and of course McCarthy is great in those scenes — but she’s equally effective in the darkest, most dramatic moments. It’s one of the finest performances of the year.

I found it to be the equivalent of a free-swinging slugger who is willing to strike out once, twice, even three times — but then hits one clear out of the park. It’s worth the risk-reward ratio.

Chalamet is asked to hit some big notes in this performance, but we never see him acting. That’s true greatness in the making.

Director Green isn’t trying to reinvent the squeal. Halloween, the 2018 version, is the B-movie sequel “Halloween,” the 1978 version, has always deserved.

The Hate U Give is indeed a message movie, and yes, there are a few times when certain characters come close to becoming caricatures. But those are minor drawbacks to a story filled with immediacy and urgency but also so much heart and soul.

Sometimes it’s a creepy thriller. Sometimes it’s a gripping and heartbreaking story of a man losing his memory. Sometimes it’s drive-in movie about a charismatic and thoroughly reprehensible cult leader. And then, from time to time, it’s for all intents and purposes a musical.

Mary Elizabeth Winstead, who has consistently delivered good work in countless genres on TV and in the movies, delivers one of her most memorable performances as the title character, who is smart and cool and infuriating and sympathetic and odious and entertaining and so much more.

What makes the movie so memorable, so good, so strong, is the unvarnished, warts-and-all perspective.

Tom Hardy is one of the best actors in the world, but as he flounders his way through Venom, we’re reminded even the finest talents can sink under the weight of a terrible movie.

It’s a carefully crafted, almost reverential character study of man and music Hawke clearly and greatly admires.

Forrest Tucker’s swan song moments in The Old Man & the Gun are well tailored for Robert Redford’s swan song as an actor. It’s a damn good performance that also serves as a fitting curtain call.

One of the many wonderful surprises in A Star is Born is how director/co-writer/leading man Cooper strikes the perfect balance between a showbiz fable with emotional histrionics and performance numbers and a finely honed, intimate story with universal truths and experiences hardly unique to the entertainment world.

It’s not often an animated children’s movie features lessons about critical thinking, especially when the movie on the whole is a zippy, silly, zany, cheery little tale with the obligatory upbeat musical numbers, wonderfully entertaining voice work from the eclectic cast, and a gentle, PG tone with nary a sequence that will have the little ones scurrying for cover under your wing.

D’Apolito does a beautiful job of honoring Radner, but I found myself wishing Love, Gilda was a two-part, four-hour documentary, a la Judd Apatow’s “The Zen Diaries of Garry Shandling.” There’s just too much Gilda greatness — on and off camera — to be contained in an 86-minute box.

This is an extra-cheesy and terrible film.

In the case of the awkwardly titled, swing-and-a-big-miss workplace comedy A Happening of Monumental Proportions, there are numerous scenes so tone-deaf, so off-putting and fundamentally unsound in structure and dialogue, the execution of those sequences is doomed from the get-go.

Life Itself begins with a cinematic shell game, with Fogelman pulling a short con on the viewer for no discernible reason.

We know where Moore stands on the political spectrum, but Fahrenheit 11/9 isn’t an anti-Republican screed. He’s arguing, quite convincingly, it’s the system that’s broken, with career politicians on both sides of the aisle culpable and accountable.

[Stern] comes across as a sincere presence who is almost too polite and doesn’t challenge some interviewees who make wildly inaccurate and sometimes racist assertions based on ignorant viewpoints. But it could be argued his gentle, respectful style of an effective tool to get his subjects to reveal their true selves.

Thanks to the stylish direction by Paul Feig, a whip-smart screenplay by Jessica Sharzer (adapting Darcey Bells’ novel) and performances that pop from the screen, A Simple Favor is a sharp-edged delight.

The problem is, despite the efforts of the talented cast, the supposedly lovable former soldiers aren’t all that lovable, the primary human villain is a cocky fool with cloudy motives — and the predators don’t seem all that intimidating compared to a lot of the Earth-loathing alien invaders we see at the movies these days.

Slice is schlock, but that’s kind of the point. It doesn’t have a tenth of the production values of, say, last week’s violent thriller “Peppermint” (and no doubt it was made for even less than a tenth of that film’s budget). But it has originality, and originality goes a long way.

Writer-director Victor Levin takes an interesting although ultimately tedious and distracting approach to nearly every scene.

In the stylishly directed but gratuitously nasty and cliché-riddled Peppermint, Garner plays essentially two characters cut from the same person.

Everything unfolds pretty much as we anticipate, and at times “Operation Finale” IS gripping and involving — but more often, the story slows to a crawl and actually becomes less involving just when we should be holding our breath. This is a well-made but formulaic, by-the-numbers drama.

The editing is brilliant, as we jump back in forth in time, seeing these three as kids and then as young men, marveling at their skateboard moves and smiling at their rebellious spirit, and wondering if there’s any hope for any of them given all they’ve been through in their young lives.

At times The Little Stranger is frustratingly vague, and some of the developments don’t add up … Until they do. Quite nicely and quite eerily.

The Wife is visually arresting, but Runge wisely opts for a straightforward approach overall, giving center stage to the dialogue and the actors.

It is an impressively staged and appropriately rain-soaked, mud-splattered, bone-crunching tale, more violent and filled with rougher language than its predecessor, if not quite as powerful or moving.

Hope began to die about five minutes into this off-putting, cheap-looking, virtually laugh-free disaster. Hope was dead at the 10-minute mark.

Down a Dark Hall eventually goes Down a Convoluted Tunnel, with some admittedly creepy but also just plain crazy sequences that play like “Eyes Wide Shut” meets “The Shining.”

The real support group at this place is the one formed by a small band of students, who lean on each other and reinforce each other in the face of the small-minded bigotry of the so-called adults in their lives.

Though it crackles with energy and has some impressive albeit gratuitously bloody kill sequences, the Big Picture plot is a dud, up to and including the preposterous final scenes.

Crazy Rich Asians glimmers and sparkles, gives us characters to root for, and is pure escapist fantasy fun.

Kudos to writer-director Frizzell for demonstrating a sharp ear for comedic dialogue, a fine sense of storytelling as a director — and for incorporating Michael Bolton’s “How Am I Supposed to Live Without You?” as well as Barry Manilow’s “Mandy” into the soundtrack.

BlacKkKlansman is one of Spike Lee’s most accomplished films in recent memory, and one of the best films of 2018.

Bell and Grammer are wonderful playing off one another. Funny when the moment calls for funny, authentic and believable when the moment calls for substantive drama.

This is Agnes’ story, and this is Kelly Macdonald’s movie.

McKinnon has so much energy and creativity she nearly jumps out of the frame. It’s an uneven performance with mixed results — but we’re left hoping she’ll be matched up with a better film role sometime soon, one that makes full use of her unique talents.

“Fallout” just might be the best of the franchise, and what a rare thing that is for a long-running series.

Writer-director Bo Burnham’s Eighth Grade is a sweet and intelligent and sometimes absolutely heartbreaking slice of modern-day, eighth-grade life, which, in some ways (hello social media), is radically different from the eighth-grade experience of 1998 or 1978 or 1958, but in many ways is absolutely relatable to audiences of any age or gender.

In The Equalizer 2 the great Denzel Washington hits a variety of notes reprising his role as McCall, in a brilliant performance that often rises above the pulpy, blood-soaked material.

We’re not supposed to think about a movie like Skyscraper. This is superficial summer popcorn fare, given a PG-13 because when innocents are mowed down, the camera lingers on the smugly smiling sociopathic villains, not the carnage.

In the alternately exhilarating and heartbreaking documentary Whitney, the Oscar-winning director Kevin Macdonald (“Touching the Void,” “The Last King of Scotland”) does a magnificent job of taking us through the paces of Houston’s life and times.

We’re hardly in original territory when a movie relies not once, but twice, on truth-serum humor — but even when things get ultra-corny, “Ant-Man and the Wasp” keeps merrily buzzing along.

The only thing less satisfying than the build-up is the finale, which goes from mind-boggling to you’ve got to be kidding me.

Nearly every scene takes a sideways turn, and nearly every expectation we have doesn’t work out the way we anticipate it working out, and that’s what makes the journey so much fun.

Even though Uncle Drew is outlandish and predictable and downright corny, I loved the positive energy of this film, I got a kick out of the winning performances from a cast of All-Star comic actors and All-Star, well, All-Stars — and I laughed out loud at a steady diet of inside-basketball jokes.

This is one of my favorite movies of 2018.

How bad is “Fallen Kingdom”? How terrible is a movie that pounds us with a pretentious, nearly operatic score while indulging in B-movie clichés and calling for the main characters to make idiotic decisions just to keep the story rolling? I have to dig deep into the Awful Sequel Playbook to draw parallels to this exercise in wretched excess.

The long-delayed biopic Gotti is an entertaining and well-acted but uneven B-movie.

We’re not even halfway through 2018, but when it comes time to compile my list of the worst movies of the year, I have a strong sense there will be a moment when I’ll be saying to Tag: You’re it.

It’s a solid double and that’s just fine, but I’ll admit to a feeling of mild disappointment it wasn’t a grand slam, given the greatness of the first adventure and the grand and creative mind of Mr. Bird.

Superfly succeeds at it what it wants to be: an action-packed, sexy, violent, 21st century blaxploitation crime thriller with a stylish look, a downloadable soundtrack, a great-looking and talented cast, a few slick twists and even some genuinely funny moments.

It’s just a muddled, overcrowded, trigger-happy heist movie brimming with clichés while constantly trying our patience.

Positive points to the Hotel Artemis for trying to achieve something original, and for the quality of the cast. But after that bloody boldness, the analogies and the life lessons and the moments of closure are all too predictable and familiar.

The shock moments here (including one that might send one or two viewers running for the exit) are truly stunning, and grotesque, and bizarre — and they will stay with you long after you’ve gone home for the night.

While the spectacularly gifted and enormously likable cast has the firepower and charisma to match the testosterone-fueled ensembles of those earlier films, Ocean’s 8 is more of a smooth glide than an exhilarating adventure.

On more than one occasion, this looks and feels like a parody.

This is director Atsuko Hirayanagi’s feature-length debut (based on her own short film), and it is a most impressive first effort. Oh Lucy! is quirky and offbeat and strange and sometimes quite dark — and yet oddly lovable.

Even when Mary finally gets her due, the film badly fumbles the moment.

Woodley is a stronger screen presence than the low-key Claflin, but they have a lovely and natural chemistry together.

What a remarkable performance by Laura Dern. It’s a beautifully nuanced portrayal of a smart, accomplished, independent woman who finds the courage and strength to confront the past — and to understand that the demons poking at her subconscious all this time were not of her own making.

With First Reformed, Schrader delivers his most impactful work in years, with Ethan Hawke’s haunting and brilliant work as Ernst Toller joining the ranks of great lead performances in Schrader films. This is an inescapably memorable and at times almost unbearably sorrowful piece of work.

This is a well-made, well-acted and sometimes intriguing but also coldly cynical and manipulative murder mystery.

[An] insightful and occasionally revealing look at the 88-year-old Manhattan institution where the rich and famous enjoy being rich and famous.

What a waste of some perfectly wonderful legends.

The real treasures, though, are all those pre-iconic moments, all those launching points for beautiful friendships and future conflicts. In some ways this is one of the “lighter” of the “Star Wars” adventures, as we know beyond any doubt Han, Lando and Chewy will live to fight another day.

Deadpool 2 is wicked, dark fun from start to finish, with some twisted and very funny special effects, cool production elements, terrific ensemble work — and for dessert, perhaps the best end-credits “cookie” scene ever.

Even when it doesn’t work, Terminal is a film with never a dull moment.

I’m giving Life of the Party three stars — a solid B, if you will — on the strength of at least a half-dozen laugh-out-loud moments, some truly sharp dialogue, a tremendously likable cast, and the sheer force of its cheerful goofiness.

It’s a sweet and knowing and lovely and funny story, but occasionally the spell of warm nostalgia is broken by painful moments of family heartbreak and cruel bullying.

Disobedience comes across as a challenging but also deeply respectful and thoughtful meditation on traditions and mores that date back thousands of years.

I can’t tell you I bought every last twist and turn in the final act, but thanks to Niccol’s creative direction and the offbeat but effective chemistry between Owen’s emotionally damaged Sal and Seyfried’s is-she-hero-or-villain mystery woman, Anon kept me in its grips throughout.

The final chapters of Tully take us to a place I certainly didn’t anticipate, causing us to re-examine everything we’ve seen from the outset. It might not be a perfectly constructed journey, but it’s pretty close.

The jokes in The Week Of are big and obvious and sometimes mildly tasteless.

The English-language debut from the brilliant talent behind best foreign film picture nominee “Mustang” is a terribly uneven, borderline absurdist jumble that undercuts its own message again and again.

Infinity War might be the biggest and most ambitious Marvel movie yet, but it’s certainly not the best. (I’d put it somewhere in the bottom half of the Top 10.) However, there’s plenty of action, humor and heart — and some genuinely effective dramatic moments in which familiar and beloved characters experience real, seemingly irreversible losses.

While the members of the Broken Lizard comedy group retain their likability, and there’s something kind of endearing about the disjointed, throw-everything-at-the-wall, “Caddyshack” type chaos behind the comedy, there are simply too many dead spots and cheap jokes and flat gags to carry a full-length feature.

Schumer is doing another slightly tweaked but virtually indistinguishable variation on the same wisecracking, self-deprecating, insecure, if-only-she-could-see-her-wonderfulness underdog she’s played before. She’s clearly in her comfort zone and she eventually wins us over in this uneven, hit-and-miss, broad comedy — but here’s hoping the next time around, she tries something new.

Joaquin Phoenix has never been shy about going big if the role called for it — and maybe even if the role didn’t necessarily call for it — but his performance here ranks as one of his best because of what happens between the outbursts.

Rampage might not be the worst movie of the year so far, but it’s a contender for most pointless.

As the film takes deeper and darker turns, it also becomes something special, something unflinchingly honest, something that will punch you in the gut AND touch your heart.

The stakes in Beirut are deadly serious, but the film itself is not presented as a major political statement or commentary beyond: The more things change, the more they stay the same. This is an old-fashioned spy thriller, and as such it succeeds.

Blockers becomes less interesting and less funny as the onscreen hijinks grow more outlandish and stupid and demeaning and crotch-oriented.

Chappaquiddick does a remarkably economical job of encapsulating the madness of that week without overwhelming us with historical detail. The story moves from moment to moment, day to day, with clarity and great dramatic effect — and (rightfully) condemns Kennedy’s actions without turning him into a monster.

A Quiet Place doesn’t have the pin-you-to-your-seat originality of “Get Out,” or the psychological depth and pure scare impact of “Lights Out” or the wall-to-wall intensity of “Don’t Breathe,” but it is one of the smarter and more involving horror films of the last few years.

Final Portrait has the feel of a work that might be quite effective on a modest stage in a small theater. As a film, it’s well-made and the performances are fine, but it feels slight and thin and inconsequential — quite the opposite of the work Alberto Giacometti left behind.

It’s smart and different and sometimes deliberately odd and really funny — rarely in a laugh-out-loud way, more in a smile-and-nod-I-get-the-joke kind of way.

You need to see this one on the biggest screen possible, and let it wash over you as if you had stepped inside the most incredible video game experience ever created — one in which events in the manufactured universe can have lasting and serious real-world consequences.

Directed with creative style by Anders Walter (with a screenplay by Joe Kelly, adapting his own comic book), I Kill Giants is a good-looking adventure fable that makes great use of the Northeastern coastal locations.

Midnight Sun is cheesy and implausible and manipulative, but it did chip away at my cynicism through the sheer force of its corny and sincere heart.

Claire Foy (“The Crown”) delivers a smashing performance.

It’s an impressively staged, well-acted, thoughtful and faithful telling of the last days of the Apostle Paul — and how Luke risked his life again and again to visit his great mentor in prison and make a written record of Paul’s life experiences and teachings.

Whenever Pacific Rim Uprising gives itself the chance to do something fresh or unique or original, it passes up that opportunity to embrace the cliché.

A wonderful, uplifting, endearing, thoroughly entertaining story.

From start to finish, director/co-writer Armando Iannucci (creator of HBO’s brilliant “Veep”) delivers an audacious and insightful and ridiculous and hilarious send-up that reminded me of the classic Monty Python films of the 1970s and 1980s.

Vikander is in nearly every scene in the movie, and she’s absolutely terrific. Endearing and funny in the early scenes in London, easy to root for as she dives into the cartoon of an adventure. Of course Tomb Raider sets the table for future adventures, but if the future chapters are to be this silly and disposable, one hopes Vikander moves on as quickly from this film as I did as a viewer.

[A] disappointingly listless thriller, in which at least four of the titular seven days feel like place-holders, with everyone holding their positions and regurgitating the same concerns and regrets and debates.

With a movie like this, either you’ll tap out after 15 minutes or you’ll settle in for an evening of popcorn and beverage-of-your choice escapism.

Director Johannes Roberts is clearly a fan of films such as “Christine” and “Halloween.” The production elements are first-rate, including the expansive setting that includes multiple cabins, a playground and a swimming pool.

Movie magic is an elusive thing. A Wrinkle in Time is a bold film that takes big chances from start to finish, in a courageous effort to be something special.... But for all its scenes of characters flying and soaring and zooming here and there, it never really takes off.

Again and again, Death Wish feels anything but real.

[An] uneven but timely and quite funny feminist satire.

There are more than enough laughs and clever surprises in this broad and sometimes violent farce to warrant a recommendation, thanks to a solidly funny script by Mark Perez, some pretty neat camera moves and choreographed action/comedic sequences from directors John Francis Daley and Jonathan Goldstein — and a likable and talented ensemble cast, led by two of my favorites.

Rogers Park is poetic and lovely and muscular and unforgiving at the same time, much like the area itself and the city as a whole.

Garland (adapting a novel by Jeff VanderMeer that is the first of a trilogy) does a masterful job of building the mystery, dropping plot hints like so many bread crumbs, jolting us with “gotcha!” moments.

The director of the film is Tim Hunter, whose feature career goes back to such 1980s gems as “Tex” and “River’s Edge,” and whose TV credits include everything from episodes of the original “Twin Peaks” to “Mad Men.” That explains why it’s such a good-looking film. Nicolas Cage’s starring presence explains why it’s such a compelling and offbeat little thriller.

On a pure pop level, as a piece of big-time mainstream entertainment, let us also celebrate this: Black Panther is one of the best superhero movies of the century.

It is a terrible film, and it skirts (but does not cross) the line of offensiveness...but it is undeniably watchable in the same way you can’t turn away from a talent show featuring a medley of acts that are pretty awful but quite confident they’ve got something to share.

In the home stretch, Fifty Shades Freed leaves the sexy stuff behind and turns into a combo platter of a cheesy, easily solved mystery-thriller and an overwrought, daytime soap opera melodrama.

Even though of course we recognize the bravery and selfless heroism of the men on that train who risked their lives to save others, and even though there are a few pulse-quickening moments in The 15:17 to Paris, the movie is slow-paced and feels padded, even with that running time of just over an hour and a half.

This is a Western that places the sidekick front and center, and in doing so gives reliable everyman supporting character actor Bill Pullman a rare chance to carry the film, and what a fine job he does with the added responsibilities.

A mildly entertaining and sometimes thought-provoking but ultimately ludicrous deep space thriller.

This is essential viewing for any Bears fan, and for that matter any football fan.

Writer-director Jack C. Newell’s 42 Grams is a smartly executed, well-photographed and at times almost painfully raw profile.

This is quite possibly the most self-referential, inside-jokey, look-at-how-clever-we-are, off-the-charts Meta Movie I’ve ever seen. Sometimes that’s pretty great. At other times, it detracts from the core story at hand.

It’s a funky, violent, nasty exploitation film, highlighted by a performance of operatic madness by the one and only Nicolas Cage.

What might have been a slick, smash-mouth, fast-paced piece of entertainment clocking in at 90 or 100 minutes somehow turns into a bloated, half-baked pie that drags on for 2 hours and 20 minutes.

12 Strong winds up being an almost-good film about some great American soldiers.

Bening is magnificent.

Virtually every big twist and every major reveal in The Commuter is telegraphed well in advance, and from the moment the train leaves the station and the story really begins to kick into gear, we find ourselves rolling our eyes about every 10 minutes.

Anderson shoots and paces Phantom Thread almost like a 1950s mystery, and there ARE some dark elements of intrigue in the story — but this is not a Hitchcockian tale of lust and betrayal and murder. It’s a fascinating examination of an obsessive-compulsive, maddeningly self-centered, magnificently talented man .

Wells is a talent as a storyteller and as a director with a nice visual touch, and as a screen presence. Emily is wonderful. We like spending time with them. (Noel and Emily, I mean.)

Director Adam Robitel knows how to scare us with the classic, sudden-appearance-of-a-scary-thing-accompanied-by-a-loud-music-sting trick, which of course has been utilized a thousand times in hundreds of movies.

Hostiles is not for the faint of heart, but it winds up being about having a heart in a world that seems almost without hope.

This is a love letter to journalistic bravery and to the First Amendment, and it is the best movie about newspapers since “All the President’s Men.”

It doesn’t take itself too seriously, but it’s not nearly as self-deprecating and funny as it needed to be.

For a time this movie will probably be best known for the behind-the-scenes drama. But the work itself deserves to endure as one of the better films of 2017.

Few actors on the planet can shift gears as effortlessly as Chastain, who perfectly captures Molly’s chameleon-like ability to adapt to situations and to rationalize her worst behavior.

Damon is in prime everyman mode as Paul, a good guy with a good heart who wouldn’t mind catching a break, a big break, just once. Waltz has a blast playing the party king Dusan, who has some wise observations about the ways of this new world. And Hong Chau is brilliant as the fiery and funny and fantastically blunt Ngoc Lan.

I, Tonya is kitschy and smart and funny and insightful, and sometimes sobering.

Pitch Perfect 3 feels like an encore nobody asked for.

With all that corn and cheese and old-timey sentiment, “The Greatest Showman” ends up scoring some very timely social arguments. P.T. Barnum himself would have approved the dramatic sleight of hand.

In its own cheesy and entertaining way, Hangman kept me guessing throughout

It’s a beautiful film, finely written and well acted.

Huge, important things happen to characters secondary and primary. Surprises big and small abound. As is the case with all of the “Star Wars” films, where there is evil there is heroism, and where there is bravery there is sacrifice — and sometimes where there is love, there is heartbreak.

Writer-director Paul Solet serves up some intricately choreographed and creative action sequences and some gruesomely realistic violence.... Mostly, though, Bullet Head is about the characters and the crackling dialogue, and the first-rate actors giving just the right spin to their lines.

On its own “merits,” it would still be a dud. A sluggish, uninspired, period-piece retread of so many earlier and much better Allen films, filled with overly familiar characters and situations and of course a soundtrack seemingly selected from Woody’s personal record collection.

The Darkest Hour is filled with authentic touches, large and small. Most authentic of all is Oldman’s performance.

It’s certainly one of the most romantic and one of the most breathtakingly beautiful movies of the year.

Director Silver delivers a visually arresting melodrama with some stunning dramatic turns, and Lindsay Burdge is nothing sort of sensational as the sad and lost and potentially dangerous Gina.

This is a chronicle of two men — writer and subject — obsessed with the theme of spying on unsuspecting, innocent people who have no idea their private lives are on display.

The Disaster Artist is a breezy, entertaining and even affectionate movie about the making of “The Room.”

The astonishing thing about Gilbert is the behind-the-curtain record it provides of the real Gilbert Gottfried.

It’s filled with so many theatrical flourishes and fantastical touches, one can envision this material as a work for the stage, or even an animated film.

Roman J. Israel, Esq. has pockets of intrigue, and writer-director Gilroy and Washington have teamed up to create a promising dramatic character. We just never get full delivery on that promise.

Coco is full of life, especially when we’re hanging out the with the dead.

What elevates Stephen Chbosky’s adaptation of the bestselling novel of the same name by R.J. Palacio is the myriad ways in which Wonder catches us just a little off-guard and puts lumps in our throats even when Auggie is off-screen, and we’re learning about supporting characters who rarely get their own sections in movies such as this.

In this world, it seems as if every moment of happiness, every glimpse of a better future, is fraught with dangerous consequences.... But redemption and hope eventually shine through here and there, and when that happens, it’s a beautiful thing.

Following the path of “Three Billboards” is a little like driving down an unfamiliar road in beautiful but forbidding country late at night, and alternately marveling at the scenery and gripping the steering wheel tightly when yet another steep drop or sudden change of direction presents itself.

It’s a putting-the-band-together origins movie, executed with great fun and energy.

Suffice to say Tragedy Girls has great fun with myriad horror movie tropes.

Much of the “humor” in Daddy’s Home 2 is of questionable taste at best.

The end result is a brilliant and brave and beautifully honest film.

Joe Lynch’s fantastically creative, subversive and Tarantino-esque Mayhem stands alone as an entertainingly bloody and dark and twisted social satire — but it’s even more satisfying for those of us who loved Steven Yeun’s Glenn on The Walking Dead.

This is one of the best movies of 2017.

Kudos to director Kelly Richmond Pope for applying just the right mix of “What the Heck?” whimsy and respectful, serious reporting to this incredible tale.

It is smart without being smug, insightful without being condescending, funny without being mean-spirited and genuinely moving. It’s unique and original and fresh and wonderful, and can you tell I loved it?

Branagh is a world-class actor and a fine director, and he scores stylistic points on both counts here, but this “Orient Express” loses steam just when it should be gaining speed and racing to its putatively shocking conclusion, which isn’t all that surprising — even if you haven’t read the book or seen the 1974 movie

It’s a well-calibrated performance, with Harrelson convincingly conveying how Lyndon Johnson felt the weight of the world on his shoulders and took on that challenge in mostly admirable ways.

One of the many surprising delights in the bright and brassy and wonderfully funny Thor: Ragnarok is the recasting of the God of Thunder as a perpetual underdog.

It’s sloppy to the point of distraction — not that the forced hijinks and ridiculous storylines are actually worthy of our attention.

The Killing of a Sacred Deer never hedges its bets, never takes its foot off the gas. The same can be said of the actors, from skilled veterans Farrell and Kidman to young Barry Keoghan.

Wonderstruck is a smart and interesting and well-acted film. We’re just never really struck with … wonder.

This is a visually arresting film with two attractive and charismatic lead actors, but it’s doomed by the melodramatic twists and turns, and the ridiculous behavior by nearly every major character.

We’ve seen this movie before, or at least versions of this story — but thanks to Hall’s well-crafted script and sure-handed direction, and the heartbreakingly effective performances from Teller and the supporting players, this is a powerful and valuable addition to the coming-home war movie canon.

Killing Gunther is filled with explosive action. As a director, Killam displays a veteran’s knack for shooting the shootouts and fisticuffs, nearly all of it carried out in slapstick, nearly “Three Stooges”-level comedic fashion.

This Netflix original from writer-director Jeremy Rush is one of the most gripping and entertaining action mysteries of the year.

Goodbye Christopher Robin is a film of rough edges and jagged twists, at times beautiful to behold but more often shot in jarring close-ups that make Christopher Robin’s parents look like the villains in a gothic horror film.

Breathe is an inspirational story well told, but it’s essentially a paint-by-numbers biopic of a very deserving subject, with only a few bursts of stylistic flair and a couple of minor surprises at best.

It plays like a classic military story about soldiers from various walks of life who bond as brothers.

You won’t find much subtlety in the solid period-piece drama Marshall, but you will find plenty of crowd-pleasing courtroom theatrics, some wonderful performances from the main players — and yes, all sorts of reminders of how far we’ve come in terms of race relations since the early 1940s, and how very, very far we still have to go.

Sandler gives one of his most authentic performances.

In the middle of all the wince-inducing, limb-bending, bone-crunching, face-exploding bloodshed, Vaughn turns in a legitimately great performance that ranks among the finest work he’s ever done.

It’s film that’ll make you wince at times, and you’ll most likely not want to see twice, but seeing it once is an experience you’ll not soon forget.

This is a paint-by-numbers procedural that expects the audience to know the history of Watergate, hits the ground running—but then feels more like a steady jog through the past than a fast-paced thriller.

For the first hour or so, The Mountain Between Us is a tedious and corny survival story, but at least it’s bearable, thanks mainly to the all-in performances from Kate Winslet and Idris Elba.

Take a moment to absorb and interpret and appreciate the vibrant and gorgeous and sometimes brutal and mind-bending and occasionally incomprehensible hallucinatory epic that is Blade Runner 2049, which stands with the likes of “The Godfather Part II” and “Terminator 2” and “Aliens” as a sequel worthy of the original classic.

About half the scenes in Our Souls at Night consist of Jane Fonda and Robert Redford simply talking to one another. Those scenes are more exhilarating, more intoxicating and more memorable than many if not most gigantic action sequences in big-budget movies.

Woodshock is its own worst enemy. The more the filmmakers play around with what’s real and what’s a dream or an element of Theresa’s delusions, the less we’re invested in what’s actually happening with Theresa.

Doug Liman’s American Made is a fast-paced, breezy and mostly upbeat action-comedy-thriller that turns the likes of Escobar and Noriega into laugh-producing supporting players — and somehow manages to pull off that trick without offensively minimizing the evil ways of those legendarily ruthless drug kingpins.

I was stirred by the lush and pristine sounds of the band, including of course Eddie Vedder’s oft-imitated but never really duplicated guttural growl of a voice, and I was greatly impressed by the gorgeous visuals in the concert sequences. This is one of the most vibrant-looking rock performance films of recent years.

Stiller is very good at playing this kind of character. The issue is whether we’re tired of him playing this kind of character.

It is a straightforward and of course inspirational and at times profoundly moving tale, and even though we can predict just about every note it will strike before the opening credits roll, Green and screenwriter John Pollono and the outstanding cast elevate the material and make it something special and memorable.

If you liked the original, the best way to preserve that memory is to stay away from this sequel.

Battle of the Sexes stands on its own as a finely tuned period piece, a vibrant comedy, an effective character study and, yep, an inspirational sports movie.

With Rebel in the Rye, we get a solid, well-acted and basically standard biopic about the man who created Holden Caulfield, largely in his own image.

Unwise casting choices in two key roles. Increasingly ludicrous plot developments — even for a slick, escapist thriller. Dubious science about the potency of a nuclear warhead. Intellectually lazy pop psychology, much of it heavy on the daddy issues, as character motivation.

First They Killed My Father occasionally strays into overly sentimental territory — and with a running time of 2 hours, 16 minutes, the storyline stalls a bit at times. Mostly, though, this is an accomplished and moving and solid drama from a director who seems on the verge of giving us a great movie sometime soon.

The action and the scale of the acting are often more befitting an elaborate stage play than a film.

Nighy leaves behind his trick box of winks and sly smiles and sarcasm for a relatively straightforward performance, and wisely so. As outlandish as the material can get in The Limehouse Golem, this is serious stuff.

Home Again has a certain charm and polish. It’s hard not to like people who are so … likable. But it’s also hard not to feel a constant sense of disconnect from these characters and their so-called “crises.”

Gun Shy is a loud bang signifying nothing, a tired and second-rate actioner — and an embarrassing resume entry for the likes of Antonio Banderas (“Desperado,” “Once Upon a Time in Mexico”) and Olga Kurylenko (“Oblivion,” “Quantum of Solace”).