Teo Bugbee

The original “American Pie” was tasteless; this version is flavorless.

The documentary fares better when it cuts the interviews and simply follows working class people in their daily lives.

While the documentary successfully champions stunt women’s dignity in the workplace, it lacks finesse — failing to showcase their talents in a way that would be exciting for an audience outside the industry.

Its meticulous visuals do frequently tip into preciousness, yet this cuteness is offset by the movie’s refreshingly direct take on depression and despair. This unusual children’s film may be fussy, but to its credit, it is not frivolous.

Space Dogs commits to its art-house pretensions. The result isn’t pleasant, but it does effectively provoke.

What’s fascinating is Arquette’s vulnerability, both emotionally and physically.

The narrative drifts, but the alienation communicated by the movie’s images feels purposeful and striking.

Though the movie does include footage of drum performances, it doesn’t move at the clip of sticks on snares. Instead, the film listens for this community’s heartbeat, finding its steady pulse just as expected: healthy and strong.

This movie about artistic inspiration is meandering and slight, but, in a way, it provides evidence for why it’s helpful to cast actors with movie-star charisma.

This is a pretty movie to be sure, with attractive cinematography, period costume and production design. But the film has no political or philosophical weight, and it is ultimately a movie that is as hard to take seriously as its somewhat dunderheaded protagonist.

The movie is generous about allowing Mercado to present his view of the world in his own words, but it’s a shame not to be able to see the world through his eyes.

For all the impetuousness of its subjects, this is a film of remarkable respect and restraint — a documentary that carves shape into a messy reality.

A film that feels exploitative, not enlightened.

With each successive trip to the grim vaults, the hard-won dignity of the film’s transgender speakers is brought into sharper and sharper relief.

Here is a movie that presents an intelligent vision of nature. What’s pleasing to the eye is pleasing to the earth — a sentiment the film rigorously supports with science.

The director Maya Newell gains access to both worlds that Dujuan traverses — home and school — and the trust that she seems to have built with all participants is vital to the success of this film.

Marona has three real homes in her life, and past abandonments have taught her that heartbreak waits in every happiness. But fortunately, the film stays buoyant through its unique, boisterous animation.

Parkland Rising passes the low bar of not undermining the people it covers, but by avoiding both research and conflict, it fails to provide a reason for its own existence.

What begins as a movie with two protagonists almost imperceptibly evolves into a movie with just one — a touching demonstration of how narratives that seem inevitably intertwined can unravel.

An unconventional labor story, the movie doesn’t bask in the triumph of rebellion; instead, it’s an introspective portrait of men for whom working is a replacement for living.

Jumping between wildly dissimilar styles makes for an occasionally jarring film. Yet despite this awkwardness, the movie works.

The remembrances are the movie’s heart — not a family secret, but a community’s pride.

Selah and the Spades shimmers with youthful promise, both in front of the camera and behind it.

The aimless characters in Almost Love like to talk through their feelings, their aspirations, their disappointments, but there is little substance in their epiphanies, and the comedy is too low key to make up for its absence.

For audiences who don’t mind being jealous of sick dogs, The Dog Doc is a thought-provoking look at what is missing from modern medicine — for animals and for people.

The writer-director Takashi Doscher forgoes apocalyptic spectacle to focus on the pandemic’s effects on Will and Eva’s romance. Too bad. Most of the scenes could have been lifted from a generic relationship drama, and it is only the couple’s conversation, not their visually desaturated world, that distinguishes them.

The biggest trouble here is in the writing. By the time the film gets around to showing what a character has felt, they have already told the audience twice — and most likely another character has explained as well, just in case anyone missed the memo.

This is canny, passionate filmmaking, a reminder of the power of two-dimensional animation. First, it humanizes, then it astounds.