Ornamented heavily with creative visual pleasures, the film is bogged down, not just by weighty thematic issues — death, divorce, bullying, unfairness — but by professions of its own grandeur.

When executed with love and peopled with actors who breathe life into their characters, Hidden Figures is precisely the delight it aims to be.

Fences is a feast of brilliant acting, in a story that’s sometimes as difficult as it is powerful.

Another entry in a long line of good video games adapted into terrible movies, Assassin’s Creed is ragingly stupid. That its incoherent plotline is treated with the utmost reverence by skilled thespians only brings its idiocy into sharper relief.

Sing is like an album with a good song here and there, but too much filler and not enough hits

Where the film falters a bit is with the story. The final act is reminiscent of any of your garden-variety sci-fi adventure movies, which is a jolt after we’ve spent the rest of the movie watching these two figure each other out and try to make peace with their situation.

Gosling is terrific, playing hangdog and irritable yet still managing to be someone you root for (even if you want to smack him in the head every now and then). Stone is even better. It’s her best performance, and that’s saying something. Their relationship, their chemistry, everything about it, and everything about La La Land is, well, magic.

This wildly distasteful premise is meant to be cute and enlightening, like a modern Frank Capra flick, but this is hardly "It's a Wonderful Life." Instead, the movie keeps tripping over itself.

Rogue One stands on its own, an entry that is at once part of the “Star Wars” franchise (obviously) but also separate – a tougher, grittier film.

The characteristics that make Evolution an intriguing piece of cinema also make it a not entirely successful one.

It’s fun enough in places, outrageous (in mostly a good way) in others. Ultimately, however, the plot falters enough that it’s more like a two-hour audition for Great Actress. Chastain passes with flying colors, even if the movie doesn’t.

There are some funny bits, to be sure. You can’t bring this bunch together without a few hits among the misses. But despite McKinnon’s best efforts, it’s just not enough. This is one Office Christmas Party you can skip.

Calling Jackie, director Pablo Larrain’s absorbing film, a construction project is not to demean it but to praise it.

I can give the filmmakers — director Dito Montiel and screenwriter Adam G. Simon — the benefit of the doubt on good intentions, but their approach doesn’t tug at the heartstrings so much as it pistol-whips the audience with its grandiose and (ineptly) manipulative storytelling.

Seasons is a gorgeous movie that is exceedingly strange — not necessarily in the story it tells, but in the way it tells it.

It’s so ridiculously overstuffed it’s kind of fun. That extends to, or perhaps begins with, the look of the film. It’s rich, overripe, yet still kind of seedy.

It’s a lot of fun. Unfortunately, in her slavish devotion to creating the world of schlocky, B-grade sex-infused horror films, she recreates the good and the bad, the latter including some boring stretches that could’ve been lost in the two-hour running time. But it’s all quite enjoyable and a knowing take on patriarchy besides.

Manchester by the Sea is a masterpiece in a minor key, an exploration of grief that never lets its characters — or its audience — off the hook. It manages this even when it’s funny, which is surprisingly often.

It’s kind of funny, it’s kind of revealing, it’s kind of insightful as a glimpse into Hughes’ increasingly twisted mind, but it never adds up to more than the sum of its parts.

What it lacks is magic, or at least a decent amount of it.

There are some laughs, sure, but not enough. It was funny the first time. This is the second time, and returns diminish accordingly.

Allied is a decent movie, but frustrating — it should have been great, but never gets out of its own way long enough to be.

The film is not a classic of the genre, but it definitely falls into the upper echelon of the “worthy entry” category, and Steinfeld and Harrelson worthier still.

Yes, it’s a boxing comeback story. But the car accident makes it different, and Teller and Eckhart make it better than it ought to be.

It’s an interesting film, no question. But too much of the message gets lost in the medium.

There’s a story within a story here, one more compelling and relatable than the other. Perhaps that’s by design. But even if that’s the case, it doesn’t mean the two parts co-exist comfortably, no matter what the intent.

It’s all quite intricate and entertaining and terrific to look at. The “Fantastic” of the title might be stretching things a bit, but it doesn’t miss the mark by much. Better still, it makes you look forward to, and not dread, the next installment — and that’s real magic.

Even with the revolving door of characters and plot developments, there are some laughs in Almost Christmas.

Bell lets the action onscreen tell a story that’s every bit as rousing as a Disney adventure.

Negga is fantastic. Her eyes alone convey passion, the feeling that she has had enough. Words aren’t needed. Good thing, because neither she nor Richard use them too much. They’re living their lives, harming no one, and being harmed for it. It makes the story one of the best examples of making a universal situation personal.

It is intelligent, moving and wholly original.

The danger in making a movie like Coming Through the Rye is in the constant referencing and hero worship of bigger, better, towering works of art — you can only exist in their shadows and pale all the more for the comparison.

The characters are clichés and the plot is assembly-line predictable.

[Gibson's] talent as a filmmaker, Desmond’s story and Garfield’s understated performance make Hacksaw Ridge a good movie, a straightforward story of faith and courage whose complications arise not in the story, but in the telling of it.

Derrickson’s use of computer-generated action is a strength instead of a strain, and it’s not just showing off; in the context of the film, the bizarre images make sense.

Moonlight is a minor miracle, a movie that mines beauty out of the ugliest situations, and a glimmer of hope from heartbreak.

Michael Manasseri’s film wants to be one of those sweet-with-sharp-notes comedies, and in some respects it is. But it is overwhelmed with clichés, stereotypes and overly broad portrayals.

The Handmaiden is everything, in that it is a mystery, a graphically erotic romance, a black comedy and a little bit of a horror story. And, of course, really good.

Inferno...is the kind of movie that stops — and stoops — to explain, early and often. Not that the explanations amount to much; the movie makes almost no sense.

What makes In a Valley of Violence a notch better than a simple genre exercise is West’s sense of fun.

American Pastoral is a movie, like the Pulitzer Prize-winning Philip Roth novel on which it is based, dense with passion, politics and historical import. But Ewan McGregor, directing his first feature, never brings the film fully to life.

The acting is good throughout the film, but Gladstone and Stewart are a step up from everyone else. It’s tempting to say it could have been a feature all on its own, but as it stands it’s nearly perfect, making an already solid Certain Women that much better.

Relying wholly on good casting and the charisma of its actors, big and small, to elevate too-familiar material, the film’s stale humor hinges on two faulty premises: That the suburbs are inscrutable and that the people who live in them are clueless.

If anything, the movie's third act is the only thing that feels a bit a disappointing. The plot is carefully constructed, the performances are rich (both girls are excellent), the characters are believable and a sense of dread grows throughout. Heck, the movie is even great to look at, with its period sheen and slightly muted colors.

The first scene in Jack Reacher: Never Go Back promises something interesting but delivers something considerably less. That’s a problem with the whole movie.

American Honey is a remarkable movie, which doesn’t mean it’s perfect — its imperfections, in fact, are what help make it so urgent, so vital, so real.

If you dig Hart’s stuff, you’ll probably love the movie. So go.

We’ve seen crusty old geezers with hearts of gold plenty of times in films. Here we see how this one got that way, and thanks to Lassgard and Holm, it’s a journey we care about taking.

While Cuaron’s technical chops are beyond question, his storytelling could use some honing here.

The script, by Bill Dubuque, goes sideways in a hurry. Characters do inexplicable things for no reason other than advancing the plot, and sometimes not even that. There is a jaw-dropping coincidence that is as ridiculous as it is obvious.

This is one of those little movies that stays with you, the announcement of an original voice worth watching. It’s a quirky, magical delight.

It is a somber slog through the lives of one miserable wretch after another.

Demon is a powerful film, one that makes us wonder what greater films Wrona might have made.

It’s a complicated movie about a complex man that courts controversy, both intentional and not. If that doesn’t make it a great movie, it makes it a necessary one, now more than ever.

Burton reins in his worst impulses, bad habits that he’s been cultivating for over a decade, to make a wickedly dark children’s movie that is, finally, blessedly, fun to look at.

Berg keeps the story personal, which is certainly one way to tell it, though it would have been nice to see a little more about the devastating effects of the massive oil spill triggered by the rig's destruction.

Sometimes it’s absurdist comedy. Sometimes it’s dark comedy. Sometimes it’s out-and-out killing-people drama (almost, but not quite). It’s often funny, but it never quite hangs together as a coherent movie.

It’s a slight film, but one that hits all the tricky emotional and comedic notes without a hint of cruelty.

This is one of those films in which you feel like you’re known the characters for years; Moretti and his actors establish a kind of instant empathy that makes the story all the more affecting.

Winslet and Davis salvage what they can from the movie — a heroic effort, almost, making it a fun trifle, albeit one with some deadly serious overtones.

Storks is charmless with rote obligation. This is a kid’s film for hire, with none of the creativity, emotion and design that elevate the genre to art, or even simply a fun time at the movies.

It’s a fun movie, a nicely made Western in which bad guys get to be good guys sometimes. Maybe that should be enough, but you can’t help wanting more.

Wood’s terrific direction and an outstanding performance by Morgan Saylor make it an involving cautionary tale.

Without real innovation or story evolution, Blair Witch becomes a trip down a rabbit hole of misery and suffering.

It’s a gripping movie, and Joseph Gordon-Levitt is good as Snowden (his voice alone is terrific), capturing his nerdy intelligence and passion for patriotism.

Maybe there are no more stones unturned when it comes to the Beatles. Maybe The Beatles: Eight Days a Week – The Touring Years is not especially revelatory or earth-shaking. But the band was.

The film could merely coast on the charms of its three stars, but it's smarter and brighter than you'd expect.

The best thing about the movie is Matthew Rhys.

With Transpecos, Kwedar doesn’t offer any easy answers. Instead he points out the problems, how entrenched and intertwined they are, and asks other questions: How far will you go to survive? And will it be enough in the end?

Other People has its flaws, certainly, but when Kelly focuses more on the characters than their quirks, it’s an effective look at life and death.

There is something compelling about someone who simply shows up for the job, day after day, carving out the remarkable from the unremarkable.

It’s a compelling portrait both of Bauer and of a fraught moment in German history. But from the vantage of the present, the issues — and the characters — seem pretty black and white.

Much is promised and too little is delivered. What is delivered are intense performances by two terrific actors.

Krasinski is likable and Martindale can make the lamest dialogue sound believable. But even they can't make us invest in characters that are nothing more than a collection of stock quirks and tics stuck in wildly contrived situations.

Scott does a nice job with the first part of the film, setting the stage for what is ultimately a disappointing conclusion.

For all of Cianfrance’s seriousness, the material proves too essentially melodramatic, hokey and self-serious to save. No gorgeous cinematography and no cast, no matter how A-list, can ultimately save this material from itself.

It is all very respectful, all very serious, all very important-feeling and often a little dull. As such, it’s a good start for Portman, with promise of better things to come.

Individually Christmas and Robinson are outstanding. Together they are even better, making Morris from America an unexpected treat.

Winocour has crafted such a tightly coiled film that once violence finally erupts, it's more of a letdown than an emotional release. But the movie still works, both for its bracing ability to keep a viewer on edge and the sheer force of Schoenaerts' performance.

Helped by good performances from Edgar Ramirez as Duran, Usher Raymond as Leonard and Robert De Niro as Duran’s trainer, Ray Arcel, the film chugs along well enough, but never rises close to boxing films like “Raging Bull” (few films do) or “Creed.”

When the material falters, Sumpter and Sawyers suck you back in with their pitch-perfect performances.

Alvarez puts us in the interesting position of rooting for the bad guy, and continually changing our ideas of who that is, a genuinely intriguing idea. Don’t Breathe doesn’t always live up to that potential, but for much of the movie it comes close.

If you’re a fan willing to look past his misfires (or why he agreed to a “Bad News Bears” remake) or a film buff wondering about how a director operates on a set, “Dream Is Destiny” will be a delight.

Koreeda makes thrilling the rich inner lives of four young women trying to navigate rocky emotional terrain in the wake of their father’s death.

The most remarkable thing about Ira Sachs’ richly textured new film Little Men is how it manages to be about so much, and yet so little.

The story is captivating from the very first moments.

There’s a limit to how much patience one has for spending time with terrible people living large. But for all the lackluster familiarity of the film’s style, the story is too interesting, too baffling to deny.

It’s another showcase for Streep — nothing new on that front, but still enjoyable.

The comedy hits more than it misses; this is a really funny movie. And it’s thoughtful, in its @$*# way.

If there is a criticism to be made, it’s that Equity is just a bit too low-key to fully draw the audience in. The chiaroscuro lighting and thrumming mood music build tension slowly and surely, but never enough to make you inch forward in your seat. Just a smidgen of Gordon Gekko bombast might kick things up a notch.

Ultimately, Anthropoid is quite gripping, even if it feels like two movies in one.

Pete’s Dragon is a good movie. But it could have used a little more of the magic its characters are searching for.

Foster was born to this kind of role, rugged but soulful, and he’s outstanding. The surprise is Pine, giving by far his best performance.

Gleason is disturbing, brave and compelling, which is exactly what it needs to be.

Indignation sneaks up on you, and that may be its greatest difference from the blockbuster mentality. Its explosions are quieter, but just as destructive.

It’s a zombie movie that, amidst the giddy bloodshed, allows room for philosophical questions about our fundamental responsibilities to one another. It may not be something we’ve never seen before, but it’s something we can benefit from seeing again.

Birbiglia, whose previous feature was the well-received “Sleepwalk with Me,” has made a tiny gem, a delightful film as surprising as it is satisfying.

It’s probably best to think of Suicide Squad as a primer, an entry into a side world of the DC Universe that may pay bigger benefits in later films. It certainly seems like that’s how the filmmakers thought of it.