Stephanie Merry

The Night Before is hardly a Christmas miracle, but it’s good for a laugh or two. And that’s not a bad way to get into the holiday spirit.

By the Sea is dazzlingly gorgeous, as are its stars. But peeling back layer upon layer of exquisite ennui reveals nothing but emptiness, sprinkled with stilted sentiments.

Good camerawork only goes so far. Love drags on and on, alternating between arguments and intimacy, breakups and makeups. The movie never passes the authenticity test; if this is what sex feels like, we’ll all soon be extinct.

It’s not pretty, but it captures something that few cooking movies do: reality.

The movie turns out to be something we’ve seen before: an underdog tale mixed with a redemption narrative.

Hunter proves to be an engaging if low-key narrator, whose greatest asset is his refusal to take himself too seriously.

Experimenter’s most striking quality is the way it encourages us to think deeply, from the first frame to the last, even if it’s just to consider what on Earth an elephant is doing on screen.

Some of the characters make more of an impression than others, and the vignettes aren’t always entirely thrilling or well-acted. But Panahi’s movie remains a political coup considering his significant constraints.

It’s occasionally funny and sometimes suspenseful, but it isn’t particularly imaginative. Then again, neither are Stine’s popular novellas.

Labyrinth of Lies is an eye-opening story about the importance of seeking the truth — even when it’s complicated, ugly and buried beneath years of secrecy and deceit.

Pan doesn’t deliver on its own promise. The movie doesn’t so much enhance our understanding of the flying boy as it demonstrates how little thought went into crafting his back story.

99 Homes isn’t just a straightforward drama. It’s a suspense movie.

The Second Mother feels lovingly handcrafted. All the elements of the story fit impeccably together for a humorous and occasionally wrenching examination of relationships.

Every scene of calm, potentially, is trip-wired for an explosion. But for all its chilling tension and horrific imagery, Sicario is also a beautiful movie.

The romantic comedy boasts two winning leads in Jason Sudeikis and Alison Brie, as well as some sweet, funny moments amid the Aaron Sorkin-esque dialogue — courtesy of writer-director Leslye Headland — that’s a little too clever for its own believability.

Overall, the movie presents a worthy and historical look at the link between genius and mental illness.

The movie sometimes dillydallies, but the unhurried rhythms ultimately have a hypnotic effect.

The movie has an unhurried pace, lulling the teens — and by extension the audience — into occasional complacency with the regular rhythms of each chugging train.

For a moment, the movie tries to be about something deeper — some existential epiphany, perhaps. The book didn’t deal in platitudes. It was content to be lightly educational, but mostly just entertaining. The movie aspires to be more than that, only to reveal how much less than that it really is.

Every Asian character is either a ruthless murderer or anonymous collateral damage. A lot of locals have to die, the film suggests, in order for one white family to survive.

The movie captures the city vibrantly, in moments of beauty and brilliance.... But Jude, our narrator, is paper thin.

The movie — which looks and sounds like a more brutal Bond knockoff — is at least consistently stylish, though its tone is less assured.

Hoss’s breathtaking portrayal, especially in the film’s final minutes, makes it clear why director Christian Petzold has made a habit of working with her.

Overall the movie is a fun peek at the birth of Lego bricks and their ever-evolving place in the world.

The Look of Silence is as beautiful as it is bleak.

For the most part, Vacation is a sad, cynical rip-off of writer John Hughes’s source material. No one expects originality, but the new movie may end up making history: It’s already looking like the worst movie of the year.

Under Riklis’s direction, the film’s first act lulls the audience into a sense of familiarity, before plunging into a darker reality. The effect is shattering.

Lazy humor and familiar plotting aside, Pixels at least gets a little mileage out of its affection for the 1980s.