Steve Davis

Though occasionally emotional, this ain’t no heart-tugging rehash of Lassie Come Home. And there’s something to be said for that.

A white-trash riff on Little Red Riding Hood, the oddly titled Freeway is a road movie that hits a dead end.

Any film in which grande dames Maggie Smith and Judi Dench share the screen is one worth seeing, if only to marvel at their deft skills in the art of acting.

This re-energized franchise has found its second wind, bursting with a creative vitality and boisterous humor that makes everything seem new again.

A reprehensible movie from just about every perspective, Ransom tries to justify the behavior of its lead character as something grounded in principle, but make no mistake about it: This is the act of a man who can't bear the thought of losing, a man who will turn the tables on his enemy at the risk of a beloved's death.

There’s some gorgeous animation and impeccable camerawork on display here. But as George Lucas’ 2015 fiasco "Strange Magic" demonstrated, beautifully executed visuals will get you only so far. There’s no emotional core to Abominable, which mostly proceeds at a glacial pace as the travelers’ journey across China.

An example of how good intentions don’t necessarily make for a good movie.

Bill & Ted's Bogus Journey isn't much of a trip. In a word...NOT!!!

Compared to other franchises that have resurrected their seemingly indestructible purveyors of murderous mayhem long after they should have remained dead and buried (Halloween Ends, anyone?), this latest entry in the ongoing saga of Ghostface demonstrates its premise remains viable, though admittedly showing a few signs of calcification.

Boys on the Side is surprisingly effective, although its narrative often advances awkwardly.

It's bigger, but it ain't necessarily better.

There’s little juicy about his life, except for maybe when he briefly left his stalwart, long-time male lover and business associate, André Oliver, for the sultry French actress, Jeanne Moreau. While House of Cardin devotes a few more than a glancing minute to this intriguing episode, perhaps it’s a worthy topic for another documentary at another time.

While Scandalous ultimately touches upon the tabloid’s plausible impact on the present-day state of affairs, it’s a killjoy way to begin a movie that’s so engagingly lively.

Allied is so full of itself it forgets to entertain most of the time. Here’s so not looking at you, kid.

As improbable as Valerie’s endgame seems once revealed, it plainly demonstrates she’s nobody's chump. It’s not exactly a feminist reading, but one that gives Fatale a little backbone.

Davies tells David's story in a striking series of tableaux and dioramas, all impeccably executed to the last detail. As in Martin Scorsese's work, there's a great deal of control in Davies' directorial style, to the point that it seems totally lacking in spontaneity. But unlike a Scorsese movie, The Neon Bible implodes rather than explodes.

Bigelow stages the film's action sequences with a brutal efficiency (they almost redeem the movie), but she can't keep the increasingly silly script in check.

At best, Goosebumps is a who’s who in the Stine literary oeuvre, featuring characters who were terrifying on paper but rendered toothless here.

Mighty Aphrodite may take its thematic and structural cues from Greek tragedy, but it's second-rate Borscht Belt all the way.

What About Bob? is a one-joke movie, but what a funny joke!

Strives to depict its love-hate relationship in emotionally neutral terms, but the sympathies are ultimately lopsided.

For both kids and adults, CWCM2 is little more than a vague memory as soon as it’s over.

Cape of Good Hope is a hopeful piece of humanism that is difficult to begrudge too much.

Both Farmiga and Akerman emotionally connect in the film, which culminates in an ultimate act of maternal sacrifice more moving than you might imagine. Finally! A slasher movie with both brains and heart, both intact.

If the movie isn’t so fabulous, should die-hard fans who can quote the show by heart see it? Absolutely. (The gays are sure to love it.)

Whatever the reason for its disappointments, Mission: Impossible is a mission gone awry, prompting you to hope that reruns of its television incarnation will pop up on cable soon.

Ryan and Duchovny hold their own in this talky two-hander, navigating their characters’ highs and lows with conviction.

All icing, with a few crumbs devoted to the notion that it is futile to resist the heart's desires.

In the end, while both of these performers look great together, they really don't seem to belong together. And that's the biggest hitch in Hitch.

A valentine to the happenstance miracle of lovers and other strangers, a movie that regards modern romance as something that is, ultimately, old-fashioned to its core.

The jokes fly in the college intramural football comedy Balls Out like a fourth-down Hail Mary thrown deep toward the end zone: unpredictable, risky, and just a little desperate. But when they hit their marks – and make no mistake, the number of completed passes here is high – they score big laughs in the most unconventionally funny, weirdly absurd movie of the year.

Up until now, Roberts and Franco have been second-tier actors in the industry food chain, but their first-rate performances in this better-than-average genre flick exude something called charisma. After this film, the two of them may graduate from watchers to players.

In the end, I Declare War is both enthralling and a little frustrating in its refusal to fit neatly in any box. Its unpredictable tone clicks back and forth between the comical and the serious like the safety catch on a firearm.

Refreshingly unsentimental and straightforward.

Regardless of whether Cry Macho merits a rating of good, bad, or ugly, Eastwood’s mere presence, despite any perceived physical frailties, can’t help but dwarf this slenderest of movies.

If you’re the type of moviegoer who finds the idea of 19th-century characters using phrases such as "Be cool" and "You must work out" in their conversations, this is the film for you.

It’s a daunting task to mount a stage production of the play these days, given the college-lit symbolism embodied by its hapless titular bird and the narrative arcs to which today’s audiences are accustomed, much less adapt it for the big screen and still remain true to Chekhov’s delicate dramatic sensibilities. Either way, it’s an uphill climb. This film adaptation of this seminal play (the fourth, by most counts) gets about halfway up the hill.

The characterizations are sincere, but overly familiar.

The Aviary, a modest mindf*ck of a thriller about two young women fleeing a cult in the New Mexican desert, goes round and round and round in a circle like a snake swallowing itself. A beguiling metaphor, but by the end, you’re left with a self-cannibalized movie.

Aside from Segel’s grounding performance, the pleasures of Our Friend lie in some of its observational specifics about human behavior.

For a movie focusing so intently on personal faith, it doesn’t much trust your independent capacity to find religious, spiritual, or other meaning in what is truly an amazing story.

The premise is ripe for potent melodrama, but director Jacquot (who gets co-screenwriting credit) ultimately doesn’t finesse the situation.

Though Take Me to the River also offers up some civil rights history lessons between recordings, it feels like a mishmash effort overall, more a home movie than a theatrical release. That’s fine. If you approach it on those terms, you can’t help but feel the love, too.

It’s hard to completely accept the up-and-coming Wolff as a total geek with no social or love life. With those puppy-dog brown eyes and enticing grin, the guy exudes intelligence and charm from top to bottom of his lanky frame. Up until now, the actor has shined in secondary roles, but in Paper Towns he proves he may be the next prom king.

Animated films have trended toward a perceptive intelligence in the past few years, but Storks wades in shallow waters most of the time.

Because screenwriter-director Brock fails to create a moving relationship between its mentor and student in life's lessons, the film hardly resonates five minutes after it's over.

A confounding movie on many levels. For all its sophistication and sensitivity, it turns out to be little more than an upscale B-movie about getting even.

In the movies, black comedy is a difficult proposition: it's a genre more suited to a ten-minute sketch than a two-hour film. For every brilliant black comedy like Dr. Strangelove, there are a hundred duds. Unfortunately, the $50-million-plus Death Becomes Her doesn't quite make the grade either, although its wicked take on modern vanity is often hysterically on-target.

While Manglehorn eschews the traditional third-act redemption you’ve seen ad nauseam in films that neatly wrap things up right before the end credits roll, it’s nevertheless refreshingly optimistic about people’s ability to change. For any of us entering life’s third act, hope springs eternal.

Of course, the selling point of this movie is the boy wonder Culkin, making his first screen appearance since the inexplicable megahit Home Alone. Relegated to a supporting role, Culkin is natural and appealing, a picture of blue-eyed innocence. What a more interesting movie you'd have if it were entitled My Guy.

At its best, Joy celebrates the passage of a demoralized woman who finds the steel in her spine. At its worst, it panders in the name of female empowerment, occasionally delivering moments of pseudo-inspiration that ring so falsely it’s difficult to hear anything else.

While Yes defies film's conventions in many, many ways, it's still that same old story, the fight for love and glory.

After it has ended, you may want to view it all over again, just to see if you can beat the odds and pick up on what you missed the first time around.

As the whimsical setup in Yesterday deteriorates until its unimaginative conclusion, the familiar Lennon/McCartney collaborations (along with a couple written by Harrison) provide the only solace, timeless songs that make it better. Viva Los Beatles!

Screenwriters Nina Fiore and John Herrera have modernized Keene’s decades-old storyline without completely chucking the quaint qualities of the original.

Director Candler acquits herself nicely in her third feature-length film, never allowing the agonizing narrative to drown in self-pity. She keeps the film’s head above water despite the occasional contrivances in her screenplay.

This empty-headed comedy about a Playmate who finds herself a house mother to a group of misfit sorority sisters is little more than a recycled version of "Legally Blonde" with bunny ears.

Playing by Heart is, above all, an actor's movie: lots of monologues, lots of engaging conversation, lots of opportunities to shine without pouring it on too thickly. Everyone has his or her moment, although it is the older folks (Connery and Rowlands) and the youngsters (Jolie and Phillippe) who come off best, giving affecting performances in roles that serve as generational bookends in the film.

What is not debatable, however, is that Cruise is an actor of limited emotional resources, one who lacks the presence required for the film’s protagonist, a character intended to inhabit more than one dimension.

Even if you accept this plot contrivance, the consummation of this union of souls isn't very emotionally involving -- it lacks that transcendence you associate with stories in which love knows no bounds.

If you’ve ever felt the same about a Felis catus, you’ll cut A Street Cat Named Bob some slack for the same reason I did. You won’t be able to help yourself. And stock up on some Kleenex beforehand. You’re gonna need them.

By the end, however, the movie’s predictable wind-down and ho-hum twist at the end make this Life hardly worth living. In space, no one can hear you yawn.

For those who adore McCourt's work, Angela's Ashes will most likely disappoint; for those unfamiliar with this inspiring chronicle of a survivor, it will neither impress nor dishearten to any degree.

As real as the Astroturf in the Brady's backyard and as eager to please as Alice's meat loaf, The Brady Bunch Movie is -- to exhaust this string of metaphors -- pure junk food. But like most junk food, it sure tastes good.

The movie struggles to find the right kind of humor for its adult demographic, given that a talking dog flick is a genre usually targeted at kids somewhere in PG territory.

No wonder the movie feels something like a retread: It gets you there, but the ride is neither nowhere as smooth, nor nearly as compelling.

It's an occasionally entertaining ride, although one fraught with numerous logical holes.

Franco Zeffirelli's contrived autobiographical film about his youth in fascist Italy has little social grace -- it's embarrassingly awkward, like a dilettante playing the doyenne.

What’s missing here is the full adrenaline rush associated with this dangerous but exhilarating sport and pastime. The documentary’s start/stop narrative structure never allows anything to accelerate full throttle.

While Levi gives you someone to genuinely root for, once the movie reaches Warner’s debut game for the Rams in 1999, all nuance goes out the window as you’re pounded into semi-hysterical submission to cheer for a proverbial win for the gipper.

Perhaps the fault lies not in our stars, but in our shameless need for a sappy ending.

It’s all veddy stiff-upper-lip -– this is romance from a masochist’s point of view -– and the intimacy of the emotions often feels cramped.

It’s a pity party to which you’d like to RSVP an unequivocal “no.”

The cast is an impossibly beautiful bunch of actors who could hold your attention even if they spoke nothing but gibberish, which sometimes is the case in the pillow-talk dialogue provided by director/screenwriter Chick.

It's an engaging recollection that's more sweet than bittersweet, tempered by an eagerness to please that pulls us into its remembrances of things past.

Will likely warm the cockles of your heart, even though it's hardly the stuff of great romance.

Given its can’t-miss potential, you’d think this would be one kick-ass movie. So why is The 15:17 to Paris such a trainwreck?

This is a movie tailor-made for cheering on the not-so-little guy to find his self-esteem, dazzle the judges, and win the girl.

At first, you fear this uncharted emotionalism may undercut the delicious pleasures of Christie’s clever plotting, this one being a particularly nifty stumper, but in the end, it subtly enhances the film without being pretentious.

About the only thing that makes any sense in La Vie Promise is Huppert's face, a visage that has aged in the most extraordinary way.

In the world of Mel Brooks, everything is fair game and anything is good for a laugh. God bless Mel Brooks.

In Triple 9 and so many other films today, the twists and turns of the contemporary thriller have become a Gordian knot that audiences are not invited to untangle. You may rightfully ask: Where’s the fun in that?

The storyline lacks credibility.

While retaining the core story of a bionic man tormented by the memory of his former human life, the film doesn’t play with the concept or give it new dimension. The whole enterprise raises the question: Why do filmmakers insist on remaking movies for no good reason?

In short, there's nothing remotely real or appealing about it.

The result is a visually fantastic but sometimes exasperating entertainment that (once again) gets lost in its own chaos. It’s one funned-up spectacle of a movie.

It’s a tale full of sound and fury, signifying something that’s nothing less than appalling.

No matter whether the cast is male, female, or somewhere in between, the absence of a well-constructed story, particularly when the humor goes south (literally), will doom any movie to quick obscurity, no matter how many d**k or p***y jokes get told.

You can almost smell the desperation in the twisted psychosexuality of Savage Grace.

Despite its predictability and sappiness, this conventional comedy about a worldly lounge singer who masquerades as a nun as part of a witness protection program busts loose as one of the funniest -- and happiest -- films in a long time.

Movies shouldn’t have to meet a PC checklist so they won’t offend – who wants that kind of cinema? – but when they poke you in the eye one too many times, it’s fair game to poke back.

Scatologically speaking, Mike and Dave Need Wedding Dates is best described as one of those summer movie turds: It passes easily and then disappears with a single flush. It’s crap any way you look at it, though there are less pleasant ways to spend your time on a day marked by triple-digit temperatures.

The biggest shame in this movie is how it wastes Frances McDormand.

Call it humanism, call it advocacy, call it old-fashioned entertainment – there’s little difference in the end. Whatever you call it, Spare Parts stands and delivers on its own intriguing merits.

A satisfying Cinderella story in which its outcast crew finally get their glass slippers, if not handsome princes. In the greatest of storytelling traditions, it is a true fairy tale with a happy ending.

Nothing more than an extended version of the syndicated television program, with the unkempt Irwin spending most of the movie excitedly shouting at the camera as he taunts something venomous.

Not surprisingly, the best thing about The Boss Baby is Baldwin’s imperious vocalization as the authoritative rugrat with a head the size of a bowling ball, punctuated by Margaret Keane eyes.

This overly sentimental family Christmas drama, featuring a veritable checklist of prominent Hispanic actors, falls victim to the shortcoming so prevalent in similarly ethnic-themed movies with similar casts – everything and everyone is so damn serious.