Steve Persall

The man's goodness and his support team's devotion are quickly obvious; Gleason is nearly two hours long. Tweel could get to every uplifting turn his movie makes a bit sooner.

Maverick has everything going for it except a sense of cinematic adventure and a stopwatch. [20 May 1994, p.6]

Taylor's movie is overly episodic, but a number of those episodes are marvelous.

I’m stunned by where this movie dares to go with a star like Lawrence (and female co-stars) at a time like this, nearly as much as I’m impressed by Red Sparrow’s total investment in such trashy, grindhouse affairs while maintaining a veneer of high-toned quality. Blood lust and carnality at its classiest. Guilty pleasures as charged.

The performances are constantly spot-on, especially Scott during a wonderfully written rant during a group vacation.

The Amazing Spider-Man is fun, as any summer movie amusement ride can be. But it left me feeling the same as Raimi's version; that groundwork has been dutifully laid for a winning franchise in need of a few surprises.

Eastwood keeps the tension humming from his director's chair and contributes a little too much comic relief, but gives Costner an eye-opening, image-shattering showcase that adds a sheen to his often-criticized acting career. [24 Nov 1993, p.6B]

Starting with a mountainside rescue setting up Ray's bravery, through cities ruined and a tsunami leveling San Francisco, San Andreas is gnaw-your-knuckle fun. Which is the roller coaster conflict that comes with the disaster movie genre, the closeness to horrific reality that attracts millions yet repels a sensitive few.

Concussion is essentially Erin Brockovich with shoulder pads, a crowd pleaser built upon an issue long ignored.

Chuck is a character study of fleeting fame in prolonged decline, anchored by Liev Schreiber's brutish charisma in the title role.

To borrow just a few of Aleichem's words that are ingrained in Jewish culture: "It could be worse."

Lion can't avoid seeming lesser in the second half after Davis' mesmeric first but it's solid storytelling nonetheless. Bring the Kleenex.

Bad Words isn't an entirely auspicious beginning to Bateman's career behind the camera, but a riotous performance suggests what a wonderful louse he can be.

Movies about cooperating Africans and Americans often take a condescending risk of great white saviors making everything better for poor black folks. The Good Lie isn't that sort of movie, except in its marketing.

The Campaign is below-the-Beltway humor, stretching obvious targets to raunchy extremes.

It's a movie of terrific performances and rousing comeuppances, with a side order of corn pone for the soul.

Directors Pierre Coffin and Chris Renaud craft a fun stretch run, wrapping the story with warm, fuzzy funnies and nothing to suggest a sequel, which is probably wise.

Not rocket science by a moonshot but sporadically dumb fun.

It's a welcome chance to learn more about Lisbeth Salander, the kinky, punk hacker and pop culture phenom played by Noomi Rapace.

Danny Collins isn't the most artistic or surprising movie, and Fogelman's appropriation of Lennon's music to explain what's obvious gets stale. But it does contain a wonderful performance by Pacino, when it was debatable if we'd ever say that again.

Anchored by Natalie Portman's uncanny impersonation — wispy voice, aristocratic posture — Jackie fascinates and frustrates, sometimes at once. We can't be certain any of her actions here are true. Some don't seem likely.

Director Wes Ball makes a solid feature film debut, without any noticeable video game envy to his action sequences.

It's easy to see why neither Home Depot nor Lowe's chose to go the product placement route. Too many cleanups in the power tool department.

Nick Cassavetes, like his father, works out his movies through the instincts of the actors, not the camera lens. It's a fitting, and occasionally fitful, eulogy to an unheralded legend. [29 Aug 1997, p.3]

Fortunately, Hooper has a pair of extraordinary actors on which to hang The Danish Girl, two of the finest performances of women this year.

Big Eyes is an entertaining take on a pop culture footnote, short on the bizarre flourishes Burton typically employs.

There are strange, midnight movie pleasures found in Smith's movie.

Edge of Tomorrow may be the best video game movie ever made. Which is strange since it isn't actually based on a video game.

The globetrotting is reined in, the mayhem at each stop just as exciting. Renner is a sturdy action hero, with an interesting face that unlike Damon's appears to have taken a punch or two.

Spurlock's meetings with skeptical corporate types are punctuated by comments from filmmakers about how product placement - or in Quentin Tarantino's case, being turned down by Denny's - influences creativity.

Black Swan is a stage door melodrama putting new spins on cliches as old as "All About Eve" (and maybe Adam). Setting them among ballerinas as opposed to showgirls or movie stars doesn't make them any less familiar.

Youth is a movie of dreamscapes and insinuated feelings, gorgeous and puzzling at once.

It's rare to wish a movie were an hour or two longer, when it already feels an hour longer than it is.

A boxing movie swinging in too many directions at once, as if someone sneaked a third clubber into the ring. All the emotional punches land solidly, to occasionally devastating effect, but at the conclusion you're not sure which competing cliche wins.

Mother and Child is depressively interesting, with characters constantly ruining their best chances at happiness.

Despite its unsavory aspects, Sin City: A Dame to Kill For is always a pleasure to observe, so artfully artificial with its green-screened backdrops and CGI props.

We can now agree that Johnson is not only the Sexiest Man Alive but also our strongest, lifting Moana on his character's beefy shoulders, carrying it like other hits before. No movie left behind.

The Farrellys affectionately structure their movie to resemble the Stooges' one-reelers from the 1930s, while the modern setting shows how timeless their rapid-fire puns, insults and pratfalls truly are. Silliness never goes out of style.

Even with its flaws, Snowden is Stone's return to relevance, in subject and execution.

Director and co-writer Sebastian Lelio keeps the melodrama muted, allowing Vega’s expressive passivity to move viewers. She’s a tragically striking character, a face of abruptly lost love seldom seen in movies.

Rise of the Guardians is an all-star addition to holiday movies lists but the real question is: Which holiday?

Is Carrey funny? Of course, because Stiller and the script allow him to be funny, at the expense of tension. [14 June 1996, p.3]

Wolverine is a solid start to the ever-lengthening summer movie season, when all that matters is the bang and the bucks paid for it.

The latest incarnation of Bob Kane's classic comic book creation shares the same angular, menacing animation style of the Fox TV Network afternoon series that inspired it. [25 Dec 1993, p.7B]

Ponderous and perplexing, a somberly audacious film to make viewers swoon or snore, take your pick. It is defiantly opaque, a free-form meditation on nature and nurture across millennia with a tinge of biblical grace.

The movie's erratic pleasures are like its ghosts; now you see them, now you don't.

Christine is a movie as bleak and withdrawn as its protagonist, with Hall making the most of her best role in years, a slow death spiral that's hard to look away from.

As far as sophisticated caper flicks go, Tower Heist is oceans away from George Clooney's crew. Compared to other recent comedies, it's pretty light on the laughs.

Kind of like Lawless, a movie about bootleggers more violently authentic than previous takes on the subject, from "Thunder Road" to the first half of "The Last American Hero." What Lawless has over those moonshine melodramas is a striking sense of period and setting.

Cars 3 is a better time at the movies than Cars 2 led me to expect. Not exactly ringing praise but we take amusement from sequels where we can get it these days.

Deepwater Horizon is a brawny hybrid of technical expertise and real-life tragedy, with neither quality getting shortchanged.

They’re called comic books for a reason too many superhero movies neglect. Not Thor: Ragnarok, one keenly aware of how silly all this universe saving stuff is. Guardians of the Galaxy is fun; this movie’s funny. There’s a difference.

It's a crudely populist movie designed to rouse the rabble, to loudly remind us greed isn't good. Viewers seeking another "The Big Short" will leave shortchanged.

What makes Central Intelligence appealing in appalling times is volcanic chemistry between Dwayne Johnson and Kevin Hart.

The movie is mostly fun and ultimately disposable, which is a letdown after Pixar's previous greatness.

Foster's manipulation of Nell's strange language holds us in rapt attention and empathy until Apted falsely gooses his film. It's an excellent performance slightly cheapened by the filmmaker's dramatic framing. [23 Dec 1994, p.17]

Beautiful Creatures gives supernatural teenage romance a good name, or at least a better one than the entire "Twilight Saga" offered.

An efficiently preposterous thriller.

The harrowing scenes of Stahl's drug abuse and strung-out aftermaths are dulled by Stiller's quips, while the laughs stick in our throats because of sheer embarrassment for Stahl's character. By trying to have it both ways, Veloz does full service to neither. [09 Oct 1998, p.8]

Finding Dory is a good sequel to a great film, and perhaps that's all fans could hope for.

The Dark Knight Rises declares its importance with each scene but seldom backs up the claims. It is a climax more fitful than fulfilling, solemn to a fault and begging the Joker's question: "Why so serious?"

Black's performance is the key to making The D-Train more than just another sophomoric bromance. The wild-eyed mania is still evident, but channeled through a filter of pity.

Hotel Transylvania doesn't raise the bar for animation or comedy but it's fun, and nice for once to have a different reason to say "boo" after an Adam Sandler flick.

The Man Who Invented Christmas is good at its feel-iest, a beloved but stale tale retold with novelty while revealing an interesting rest of the story. Let’s hope it becomes a perennial like so many versions before, with Plummer’s Scrooge as a yearly gift.

Most of the time I was distracted by the superb photorealism of The Good Dinosaur's American Southwest backdrops, wondering how much money Disney would save by just filming the real thing.

Unknown is finely tuned pulp filmmaking, a dumb movie with a smart veneer, which is nothing to sneeze at.

Until it lapses into a Rube Goldberg farce with a tacked-on, present-day epilogue, the movie is a wonderful reminder of why we've tried so hard to get major league baseball in Tampa Bay. [7 Apr 1993, p.5B]

Leslie Harris wrote and directed this special jury prize winner at the 1993 Sundance Film Festival, which often slips into Afternoon Special territory with its story of teen pregnancy. What keeps it buoyant and engaging is a remarkable performance by newcomer Ariyan Johnson as Chantel, whose hip, flippant moods mask an ambitious, bright mind. [18 Jun 1993, p.10]

Doesn't revolutionize the romantic comedy like "(500) Days of Summer," or even match the Farrellys or Judd Apatow for clever smut. But it is cheerful raunch delivered by a solid cast.

The Queen of Versailles leaves viewers with one feeling about the Siegels: Let them eat stale cake.

The reclamation project that Ben Affleck calls a career continues with The Town, his second directing effort that would impress more if the first try weren't so terrific and visually similar.

Never Here is a moody inversion of the stalker genre, less of a thriller than a Lynchian thinker. Thoman has a bright future and we'll say we knew her when.

It's a heady blend, at times requiring more speechifying than throwaway pop deserves. But it keeps one guessing between ill-staged and frenetically edited fight scenes. Directors Anthony and Joe Russo handle vehicular mayhem better.

What lifts Equity above ordinary corporate melodrama is its staunchly feminine perspective, and not only in its lead character.

Whatever she lacks in filmmaking expertise or originality is balanced by an unadorned sincerity in the melodrama she chose for a debut. Down in the Delta isn't a great movie, but it constantly touches your heart and involves you with its characters. [25 Dec 1998, p.5]

For the most part, the performances can raise goosebumps, especially whenever Lea Michele, Amber Riley and Naya Rivera open their mouths.

This is among the funnier entries in the cancer-kid genre, flawed yet affable, with no fault in its dweebly charismatic stars.

It can get a bit redundant but always remains interesting, as young lives take shape on an asphalt oval.

It isn't a movie to embrace (except for Leguizamo's brilliance) but it deserves one of Noxeema's air kisses - a passing, passionless show of affection, and then we're off to the next party. [08 Sep 1995, p.8]

Now and Then is much better when Hoffman, Ricci, Birch and Aston Moore draw us into their clique, with all their worldly poses and brittle facades. [20 Oct 1995, p.12]

Romantic charm and racy humor in a neatly arranged package anyone can appreciate.

Eat Pray Love is like one of those rich dishes Liz consumes in Italy; robustly flavored and guiltily pleasurable.

Anything men can do women can do dirtier, funnier, fresher, since distaff raunchiness shows no signs of going stale and isn't contained to Melissa McCarthy.

It will mightily preach to the choirs of concerned citizens, and be ignored by anyone else.

A sequel needs to hit the ground running faster than Divergent does. Find more notes for Woodley's elegantly plain face to express.

Muppets Most Wanted is pleasant enough to recommend as family entertainment. But the movie falls short of what immediately preceded it, musically and emotionally.

True Story may someday be used in both acting and journalism classes, the former for what students should do, and the latter for what they shouldn't.

Appropriately, the best jokes in Trainwreck are unprintable, or too winding to describe. Schumer's sexual vocabulary and observational skills get a workout, surrounded by an occasionally surprising cast of foils.

Kingsman is as violently kinetic as anything Vaughn has made, a list including Kick-Ass (the good one) and Craig's U.S. breakthrough, Layer Cake. But Kingsman is also wildly uneven, often slowing its roll to stiff-upper-lip pacing necessary (or not) to create a new British secret agent movie mythology.

King's book isn't hallowed literature, just a little vicious fun, if 1,100 pages can be considered little. This is the spooky, overlong movie It deserves and It deserves that sequel. Float on.

Non-Stop mostly works by being aware of what other jet-in-jeopardy flicks have done before, adding a spin here and there. Nothing Hitchcockian but more ambitious than a Neeson action flick needs to be.

Succeeds where "Thor" didn't and the "Incredible Hulk" hasn't, twice. Unlike those drags, director Joe Johnston keeps things relatively simple and pleasantly stupid.

It is interesting even when nothing much happens, which is for most of its 3-hour running time.

Gang Related isn't perfect; the plot does get a bit far-fetched at times, bordering on ironic overkill, and the last 10 minutes of bloody revenge is needlessly out-of-synch with the rest of the movie. You walk away from Kouf's movie not entirely happy about what it turned out to be, but overjoyed at what it is not. Sometimes, that's good enough.

22 Jump Street is a mixed bag of clever spoofery and miscalculated outrageousness. The unveiled homoeroticism of practically all interaction between Jenko and Schmidt is amusing to the point when it isn't.

For all of its carnal frivolity, The Wolf of Wall Street lacks passion and purpose, qualities Scorsese at his best has in abundance.

The humor is an underdog's fantasy, tapping the same vein Murray bled dry with self-important camp counselors and military officers; the less cool they are, the harder they'll fall.

Bully is no more incisive than a Dateline NBC segment on the subject, although with a PG-13 rating it now can be a classroom tool for discussion.