Rodrigo Perez

Intimate, soul-baring, and winning, The End Of The Tour is a special, lovely little gem.

Blackhat is a meticulous and exacting procedural, as obsessive with its hunt for its intangible antagonist as Mann’s compulsive desire to appreciate the flow of 1s and 0s in the virtual space. It’s chockablock with technobabble and jargon that may alienate the average viewer, but Mann’s secret weapon is his infectious fascination with the subject. The movie is like a conductive surface for his unmitigated zeal, and its potency is viral.

Campy and cartoonish, Burton’s Big Eyes is not the return to form many were hoping for. It is another phony and hollow piece of sugary kitschploitation masquerading under the guise of an “important true story” that places a nearly grotesque premium on style over any traces over substance.

Has its moments, especially any time Streep is on screen, but as it strains on at an overlong two hours, the glitter of fairy tale movie magic diminishes, leaving only a pale shadow.

Goodbye To All That is not going to impress the visual, form or style cinephiles of the world, but it really shouldn’t matter. The content is tops. And as an astute and empathetic portrait of human crisis, resolve and survival, it’s a wonderfully authentic and perfectly touching one.

The Salt of The Earth is a mesmeric and unforgettable look at the world and it sufferings through the eyes of a remarkably insightful and honorable artist.

Respectfully presented, Unbroken is competently made and even has a sequence or two that’s impressive, but it’s ultimately very familiar and eventually draining.

Meticulously crafted and investigated (and no doubt heavily vetted by lawyers), Berg brings a sobering solemnity to a very grave matter, but also lends a dignity to its subjects without pandering.

A darkly mysterious and extremely accomplished first feature.

Alluring and captivating, Thou Wast Mild and Lovely can’t ultimately overcome its undeveloped arty tendencies, but its hazy exploration of dread and desire is still unique enough to make an impression.

Decker is good at articulating sinister moods and unstable psyches, but anything resembling a cogent narrative is challenged.

When Horns thankfully concludes, relief sets in; this hellishly misguided effort concludes with an inferno and sequels are never sprung from the equivalent of a mouthful of ash.

An absorbing office saga and diverting dark comedy, Zero Motivation is a surprisingly insightful coming-of-age tale, utilizing the milieu of the military to look at desire, loneliness, identity, fitting in and many aspects of everyday complex female life.

Young Ones and its serious, bone-dry approach won’t be for everyone. The picture is languidly paced, but its ideas, moods and tones strike many thought-provoking chords.

Big, wonderfully oddball, sometimes confounding and beautiful, Inherent Vice supplies good dosages of stoner giggles. But its doobage is potent and reflects some heavy ideas you’ll need to unpack and meditate on for a long while.

Kill The Messenger hopes to solemnly lionize and exonerate Webb, but rarely does it reflect anything back to its audience other than reminding us how corrupt and unprincipled our system is.

Straightforwardly shot and sensitive of its subject, Art And Craft is a intriguing depiction of counterfeit impulses (both wrongly perceived and irrepressible), immense talent gone awry and what lies behind the desire to create.

There’s tremendous social and moral texture throughout the drama, but the socio-economic commentary of the movie is fabric, not heavy handed accessory. And the provocative ethical breaches—savage and scathing in the latter half—give the movie its delectable and wicked bite.

An uninspired narrative and disengaged performances ultimately keep persuasive deep feeling and captivation at a far distance.

Unremarkable but occasionally enjoyable, Levy’s dramedy is pleasant enough, but it grows tired, losing focus by the end.

Not particularly sophisticated, the searing intensity of revenge in The Equalizer is still occasionally arresting (and even entertaining) in its stylish hard-R violence.

An uninspired movie, The Drop would be utterly forgettable if it weren't for the fact that you’re left wondering how all this talent created something so unexceptional.

Frustratingly uneven, Kelly & Cal is too glib and prosaic to truly be insightful or impacting.

Wild never really earns its hard-fought struggle for redemption and personal reinvention.

The Imitation Game is entertaining and well-crafted, but one still can’t help but wish the drama had a bit more bite and nerve throughout.

Gibney never quite finds Fela, and the quest isn’t always remarkable either, but such is the spirited brio of the seminal subject that some of his dynamic essence still shines through.

Elusively told to the point of irritation, joyless and shot in chilly incarcerating rooms, War Story has the look and feel of an exhausted ashtray and borders on the pretentiously unclear.

Magic In The Moonlight is good in many regards, and mostly enjoyable for most of its 97 minute running time. But it’s also admittedly uneven in spots, familiar and ultimately a bit slight.

In truth, the deeply absorbing and thematically rich ‘Apes’ sequel is more akin to a drama than an action film, but it's one that still satisfies the desires and demands of big, blockbuster filmmaking.

Da Sweet Blood Of Jesus is, without question, bold, distinct, and idiosyncratic filmmaking with its own voice. Unfortunately, that doesn’t necessarily mean it’s good or in any kind of reasoned key.

Political thriller, procedural, emotional drama and rousing cry for basic human rights and values.

Spanning across several continents, and obviously decades, Days Of Future Past feels vast and epic in scope. But as large as the movie is, it never loses sight of character and themes (at least the ones that matter).

Admittedly heartbreaking and moving in its final moments, Hellion just can’t quite convince or coalesce its ideas of struggle, pain and fury in a meaningful or new way.

Godzilla asks you to care about its characters, achieves that aspiration, earns your trust, and then not only pivots towards a far less interesting character, but abandons most of its absorbing emotional legwork for a fairly rote and straightforward rock ‘em, sock ‘em monster movie.

The film is curiously schizophrenic. Brill’s screenplay mixes traditional rom-com generics with sporadically funny R-rated vulgarity and ludicrously dumb gags.

Time Is Illmatic is comprehensive, even wisely holistic, but still feels as though something is missing; it’s as if in trying to cover the history, the music, the ecosystem, the upbringing and the man itself, each cancels out the other out, leaving only a surface exploration.

There’s a terrific ensemble at the heart of Magic Magic, including its talented director, but this psychological horror is only creepily superficial and has very little of anything insightful to say about people, its characters or its lead.

Cold In July doesn’t always work and it takes quite a long time to get adjusted to its coiling rhythm, but it’s far better than it has any right to be and perhaps, more significantly, is unusually absorbing and memorable.

Featuring two exceptional lead performances from these two boys, first rate beauty-in-ugliness photography and an unusually extraordinary command of tone, Carbone’s picture skillfully articulates the inexpressible.

Need For Speed possesses eye-rolling, tone deaf dialogue, passable performances (unless you’re Dominic Cooper or Kid Cudi) and plotting so conventional, there’s not even one surprise U-turn anywhere.

Forgettable and only mildly entertaining, 300: Rise of An Empire seals its own fate at the initial story level by being so deeply invested in its own mythmaking and playing super safe.

The Babadook is a smart, respectful horror that puts character and emotional issues first, yet never at the cost of a delightful and haunting fright.

Song One is well intentioned, well-shot and has its musical heart in the right place, but it often feels incredibly familiar, and the more contrived, credulity-straining moments don’t help.

The film plays nary a note of reprieve and the dank aesthetic does nothing to help the mood. “Low Down” is unequivocally a downer.

Trenchantly reflecting on the mishandling of success, blind ambition, idolatry, hero worship and the complex and competitive nature of artists in romantic relationships, Listen Up Philip is brilliantly chock-a-block with resonant observations.

Gently involving, but never quite engrossing, there’s a first draft shape to the picture that feels slight and makes for a minor work.

Its patchy tone, plot, characters and sympathies make for a film that’s difficult to wholeheartedly endorse.

Kumiko The Treasure Hunter is a striking film, a bizarre joy and a beautiful delight.

I Origins is a fascinating examination of belief, spirituality and otherworldliness through the skeptical lens of science, however, it's not always perfect.

The film does possess ample charms and insights, though admittedly, they do take quite a long time to coalesce.

Warm, soulful, funny and quietly insightful, Boyhood shines in its engrossing, experiential understanding and it’s a special achievement that should be cherished and acknowledged.

This terrific and sublime experience, and strikingly original film, is mandatory watching for the adventurous viewer.

Calvary may not be for all audiences, with its pitch-black heart and sober existentialism not exactly commercial stuff, but its unwavering commitment to the intelligent thorniness of its themes, and the masterful control McDonagh exerts over the shifts in tone are worth cherishing, bringing it soaring close to something divine.

A major gaffe, God Help The Girl finds a great artist taking on a huge challenge and stumbling painfully on its ambition almost every step of the way.

A genuinely sweet, charming and funny tale of identity lost and found.

Mordaunt’s eye indicates a thoughtful filmmaker able to listen to the winds of what a movie needs. Effortlessly natural, his workmanlike craft carries the capacity to keep an ear open to happenstance.

As an sensory experience, 'WOWS' is mostly a terrifically visceral one, a full throttle fast and furious bacchanalia of drug-fueled madness. But as a scathing indictment of American rapacity, it isn't particularly deep or resonant beyond the exterior.

The Peter Jackson-directed Hobbit sequel might be the more vigorous, action-packed, darker and more (superficially) engaging version of the series thus far, but that doesn’t actually mean it’s a keeper of any sort.

Narco Cultura is gripping, gruesome and arresting; a disquieting look a pop (sub)-culture phenomenon that is mushrooming all over the United States and Latin America.

It’s an incredibly melancholy, intimate and yet often hilarious look at relationships and connection that provides a surprisingly great deal of insight into the human condition. It’s both sweet and considered, as well as observant about our fears, masks and growing alienation.

Charlie Countryman opens up with an interesting first section, but only backslides deeper and deeper in its overwrought and incoherent second and third acts.

Part escapist action-adventure, part would-be exhilarating quest of self-discovery, The Secret Life Of Walter Mitty isn’t so much a mess because it wants to be everything at once, but because it employs hackneyed and mawkish methods to achieve a false sense of joyfulness.

It’s a breathlessly told movie; both meticulous and frenetic, sweat-soaked and methodical. It will take hold and won’t let you go, and it’s one of the most engaging movies of the year.

Unflinchingly honest and grim, Sunlight Jr. is a valuable piece of work from a filmmaker who has a distinctive voice and concerns.

There’s some interesting ideas floating around about identity, manhood, and what it means to connect with someone in an over-connected world, but A Case Of You (named for a Joni Mitchell song that’s not actually in the film) never actively explores them. Instead, it delves into generic rom-com and ropey cliché to little comic effect.

Enemy is a transfixing grand slam that certifies Villeneuve as the real deal and one of the most exciting new voices in cinema today.

Paradise is neither a good film nor is there any evidence it was a good script.

Semi-flat with only a few jokes and emotional beats that land, the picture is often dull when it should be poignant.

Well shot and well made, Kill Your Darlings is a very competently constructed effort on a whole, but there’s an emptiness and familiarity at its core that it cannot transcend.

The picture is often graphic and pulls no punches in its disturbing violence, but its unflinching nature gives it a memorable sear that won't soon be forgotten.

While Muscle Shoals and its presentation doesn't reinvent the wheel—this is your standard talking heads documentary—the treasure trove of stills and found footage makes for a compelling and effortlessly watchable film that even the casual music fan should find themselves totally engrossed in.

The cavernous emptiness of The Canyons cannot sustain itself, and it makes for a mostly flat, strained and uninvolving experience (not helped by the pace which makes 90 minutes, feels like a sluggish two hours).

The Wolverine wants to have it both ways: a dark character story and an action-packed superhero film. But it never reconciles the two notes, and thus becomes more and more atonal as it wobbles towards its symphonically jarring ending.

It’s part raw and ugly character study, part ensemble comedy, but it’s that first element that is so striking, bold and unnerving, while the latter element is sometimes amusing, but familiar.

If your basic movie needs demand a little bit more -- logical premises; interesting, marginally original characters; dialogue that doesn’t reek of throaty, aspirational monologue after monologue -- Pacific Rim will leave you feeling hollow and wanting.

Acerbic and purposefully vile, LaBute’s story is clearly self-aware of its various cruel manipulations of character and audience, but the formula itself -- taken from his early modus operandi -- is simply becoming more and more rote.

Intimate, expressive, agonizing and beautifully rendered.

While stylishly capturing the verve, exotica, and free-spirited mojo of swinging '60s London, uber-prolific English director Michael Winterbottom's portrait of legendary U.K. smut impresario Paul Raymond is otherwise a shallow misfire.

There's a great movie somewhere inside Touchy Feely desperately trying to swim to the surface, but its obscurity also comes with an inarticulateness that robs it of its potential.

The Internship might be the best worst comedy of the year thus far.

It would be unfair and an exaggeration to say 'Part III' ends with a whimper, as there are a few moments to savor, but there's hardly a climatic bang and, sadly, absolutely nothing epic and explosive about this rather tepid and forgettable trilogy closer.

With the sound off, Baz Luhrmann’s The Great Gatsby surely looks as radiant and extraordinary as some of the most dazzling movies ever committed to celluloid, but with the sound up and the experience on full volume, the movie is mostly a cacophony of style, excess and noise that makes you want to turn it all down a notch...or three...

Pain & Gain fails at being an entertaining and ridiculously fun Michael Bay movie and curdles into something much more tone deaf and obnoxious.

A wonderfully eccentric examination of unlikely friendships that illuminates the absurd and lovely corners of life, Prince Avalanche is a deeply enjoyable, wondrous delight.

A beguiling romantic comedy with a heart, soul and pulse that will pleasure you for a full 90 minutes with hardly breaking a sweat.

Lowery is the real deal and understands filmmaking, and this is abundantly clear in this searing, romantic crime drama and love story.

While far from perfect, Welcome To Pine Hill works more often than it doesn’t and is an intimate and existential character study of a man out of place with his past, himself, and his surroundings, and the push and pull of former and future worlds beckoning him.

The Spectacular Now is wise beyond its years, charismatic, measured and authentic in its depiction of the pains, confusions and insecurities of the teenage experience, and while its deliberate rhythm may prove to be a harder sell among the teen crowd, it’s a valuable and honest film that’s worth the investment.

Beautiful, yet dark and moving, unsparing, but told with a sympathetic eye, Ginger & Rosa is sometimes relentless in its examination of emotional pain.

Loose, limber and driven by a fierce energy and staccato/pause rhythm we haven't seen previously from this filmmaker, Noah Baumbach's sublime Frances Ha is a fresh and vivacious near-reinvention of the director/writer's comedic milieu.

A Good Day To Die Hard isn’t dead on arrival because that would suggest it has a pulse.

Richard Linklater's Before Midnight isn't the most digestible picture, but its challenging, funny, painful, very present and alive depiction of relationships at 40 is so honest and real that we wouldn't have it any other way.

You may not be able to figure it out, but that's part of the point of this sensually-directed, sensory-laden experiential (and experimental) piece of art that washes over you like a sonorous bath of beguiling visuals, ambient sounds and corporeal textures.

The risible Stoker is a brutally empty, deeply unfortunate movie, and Park Chan-wook's jackhammer of a tool he calls a brush is, on this evidence, something that should be locked away.

Though not a poor effort per se -- David Chase's Not Fade Away does authentically captures the heart and soul of the music of the era and the intoxicating/naive dream of making it big -- the picture isn't exactly a remarkable one either.

Anyone who finds this conclusion a humanistic or socially reprehensible dealbreaker can hardly be faulted. Before these questionable issues come to a head and then falter in the finale, there is a lot of value in The Girl.

It's not particularly funny or moving and it's terribly self-indulgent. Flamboyance and cartoonishness rule, there's hardly a moment of genuine emotion, and most overtures in that direction are superficial. As a picture ostensibly about love, revenge and the ugliness of slavery, Django Unchained has almost zero subtext and is a largely soulless bloodbath, in which the history of pain and retribution is coupled carelessly with a cool soundtrack and some verbose dialogue. Though it might just entertain the sh.t out of the less discerning.

While 'Les Mis' ends terrifically, it cannot make up for the largely uneven experience that comes before it. There is no doubt an abundance of passion and commitment in Les Miserables but when the musical isn't connecting emotionally -- which is at least half the time -- it's a lot of blustering sound and fury that could either use a dialogue break or an edit.