Although it brings nothing new to the con-artist fold, or even anything thrilling, Focus is a seductive enough rehash that benefits from the built-in pleasures of the trade.

The movie makes some observations about the worth of human life — the title refers to the monetary value put on the life of the injured waiter — and the economic class system, but they're not terribly interesting or surprising.

Hot Tub Time Machine 2 is a movie that didn't need to be made, and certainly doesn't need to be seen — not when you can rent the original and still feel good about yourself afterward.

Caro's direction, Costner's performance and the winning cast, along with the shining of a sliver of light on the plight of field workers, however thin that sliver may be, combine to make McFarland a much better movie than it has any right to be.

Yes, there are sex scenes in the film, quite a few. But for a movie where people are naked for a large chunk of time and play at bondage and dominance (without ever really seeming all that committed to it), it sure is boring.

A sense of dread hovers over all these characters, and, by extension, the audience. It's in the air of the place, like oxygen. And vodka. Lots of vodka. Yet Zvyagintsev's achievement, or one of them, is creating a film that is not one long downer. It's not exactly a laugh riot, but we do care about these people.

Seventh Son is recommended only for the most far-gone of fantasy addicts, for whom it will serve as a sort of methadone. It won't exactly satisfy, but it will tide you over until the next season of "Game of Thrones."

As tiresome as those live-action sequences are, they are more than outweighed by laughs — some riotous, some groaning and some very, very befuddled, but none predictable.

The Wachowskis never lack for ambition. It's in the execution where they run into trouble.

There is strength in simplicity, something the Dardenne brothers' Two Days, One Night and its brilliant star, Marion Cotillard, prove emphatically.

Match is no masterpiece, but it is an intriguing and entertaining example of actors lifting the material they're given to greater heights, with Stewart leading the way.

Director Kevin Macdonald offers a suffocating visual feast. Some of the particulars don't add up, so much so that you do notice them even as the action plows forward. But it's still a thrilling ride.

Song of the Sea is a lyrical treat for those willing to sit still and let it wash over them.

Black or White is more remarkable for what it isn't than for what it is. For example, it isn't ripe with drama. It isn't a thoughtful exploration of racial identity in America. It isn't a compelling look at judicial bias and class conflict. It is, instead, a movie that's every bit as oversimplified and obvious as its title.

It's not a fascinating (or even particularly interesting) character study — the film never lets you get close enough to its leading man to understand his damage — but it's nevertheless an intermittently moving one.

Song One is an odd little movie. It seems as if there is more going on than there is, which you realize after it's over. As pleasant diversions in the moment go, however, you could do much worse.

It's Moore who makes the movie worthwhile, who elevates it from disease-of-the-week fare to the role of a lifetime.

[Jennifer Aniston's] performance in Cake is rightly being praised as a dramatic breakthrough (no one doubts her comedic chops). She's really good. It's just too bad the movie does her no favors.

It's no surprise The Boy Next Door is junk. What is disappointing is that it's not fun junk. It doesn't even merit a good hate-watching, because the whole thing is so meh.

A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night is a terrific film, if you give yourself to it. You should, because, with Amirpour's blending of influences and pop culture, she has created a true original.

There are some poignant moments in the movie's latter half, as well as a couple of genuine laughs. If it never achieves the heft it wants, it at least manages a sitcommy kind of charm, like an extended episode of "The Golden Girls." Perhaps more importantly, it gives Rowlands a lead role, which is never a bad thing.

Director and co-writer Jeremy Garelick doesn't even reach high enough to pick the low-hanging fruit, opting instead to gather half-rotted, fly-infested jokes off the ground and expect Kevin Hart to make them funny by virtue of being Kevin Hart. Only grudgingly will I acknowledge that he sometimes does.

Spare Parts is the kind of feel-good underdog movie that almost can't help getting waylaid by cliches.

Paddington is a mostly smart update loaded with charm, and it preserves enough of the fuzzy feelings for purists to walk away with a smile.

Blackhat is a mess of a movie from Michael Mann, a would-be cyberthriller slowed by stupidity and sabotaged by a stunningly silly subplot.

The film is slow at times, despite bursts of action, and Chandor could have let it breathe a little more. The seriousness grows stuffy every now and then, but these are small quibbles. A Most Violent Year is an outstanding movie about business and marriage, not necessarily in that order.

It's Cooper's movie, and, although he has been good in pretty much everything we've seen him in, there is a depth to this performance we haven't seen before. It's a tricky balance: As the legend grows, the man diminishes. Cooper and Eastwood do an exceptionally good job of maintaining that.

Olivier Megaton (he helmed "Taken 2") starts things off at a sluggish pace and never picks up speed. Even the action scenes, which often are filmed in jittery fashion, don't generate thrills.

Everything is lathered with a syrupy, string-laden musical score designed to gnaw at a viewer's tear ducts. It's about as subtle as having an off-screen narrator yell "Start crying!" before big scenes, and probably as effective.

This isn't a warts-and-all portrayal. More like a warts-and-little-else one. But it is an inspired film, a beautiful exploration of art and creation and difficulty, with Spall's brilliant performance at its center.

Does it all add up? Maybe, if you follow the letter of narrative law. It's certainly imaginative, with high-minded ideas, but Hawke and Snook are what keep it grounded in truth.

Inherent Vice is an aggressively weird movie, which you should take not as a warning but as a compliment and an invitation to see it, to let its stoner vibes wash all over you.

It is not hyperbole to say Oyelowo is a revelation. The British actor brings phenomenal humanity, grace and torment to a historical figure who once seemed to loom too large a legend to make flesh on screen.

You can't get close to Bennett — not because he's a morally ambiguous character, as the movie would have you believe, but because he never puts anything on the table. He struts through every consequence, a man with nothing to lose because he never had anything worth losing in the first place.

The story is just so downright weird that the film can't help but be compelling. Just not as compelling as it could have been.

It is a harrowing journey, and an inspirational one. But, as director, Jolie takes far too long to tell it, particularly in such a conventional manner.

The cast is top-notch, the story is satisfyingly dark, the performances are fun and, of course, the songs are terrific.

Give credit to Esmail, however, for coming up with an inventive way to tell the story, even if the execution doesn't live up to the idea. He shows great confidence as a director, and the film has a unique look, with heightened reality providing clues that this really is a different world, or worlds, even.

Lavie, who directs and wrote the film, actually has more in mind than a comedy of errors. But the dramatic bits don't quite gel, and the film never quite takes off the way she apparently would like it to. Yet it's the kind of movie that offers small rewards along the way.

Night at the Museum: Secret of the Tomb is a rather lackluster affair, a cash grab that tries to aim a little higher but confuses sappy shortcuts with real emotion.

Annie has never been the most sophisticated of children's stories. The latest version is formulaic and predictable, but it has its charms, not the least of which is Wallis' easy smile and sassy screen presence.

Even though Five Armies is the shortest Hobbit movie, it also is the least thrilling as it chugs toward the finish line weighted down with all the added characters and confusing subplots that have been tacked on along the way.

The Babadook is a terrific horror film.

the performances, even from some really good actors, are wooden, the huge CGI effects are a distraction and the best thing about the movie is the one thing that, other than the casting, will probably make the most people angry: God is a kid.

When it's good, The Imitation Game is very good. Cumberbatch is terrific, which is not surprising, given the marriage of role and actor.

Top Five is a funny movie, but Rock has his sights set higher than lowbrow, and for the most part, he succeeds.

There's a surface elegance that might play as depth in smaller doses, but at feature length, the stylistic flourishes seem to be covering for deficiencies rather than servicing the material.

Miller maintains control over the proceedings at all times, which is impressive enough. But where he really soars is in the performances he gets from his three lead actors.

Witherspoon is an outstanding actress whose material doesn't always fit her talents. "Wild" meanders a bit, in its trips from present to past and back, but Witherspoon remains the constant, doing what sounds simple enough but proves so difficult: soldiering on.

A lackluster second effort that mines a lot of the same jokes. Only no joke is as funny the second time around, even when it's being delivered by really funny people.

All the glossy, kinetic animation and inventive action sequences get lost in the gag machine. The film throws jokes out like a tennis-ball machine on the fritz: gross humor, slapstick pratfalls, bizarre non sequiturs. The randomness does land a few laughs, but it's also exhausting.

Uplifting, it's not. But Low Down is a worthwhile look at a deeply flawed man, his daughter, and the unusual bond that existed between them.

It's a modestly interesting coming-of-age movie, and a totally forgettable mystery.

Point and Shoot is a fascinating, frequently frustrating documentary.

Jones is patient — the film could have ended in two or three places before it does with no great loss — but the effort required by the audience pays off. We see the familiar in a new, if harsh light. We can hardly ask for more.

Director Francis Lawrence does a nice job capturing the claustrophobic environment of District 13 and has a good eye for action shots. But the actors are what really sell the movie.

Beyond the leaps in logic, the most troubling part of this film is that it just feels like a defense of the excess of Christmas.

The film soldiers on through a couple of possible endings, and if its real destination is never truly in doubt, Mbatha-Raw makes the trip interesting.

Carrey and Daniels are good actors, and it's understandable when an artist wants to revisit a career-high point. How much you enjoy Dumb and Dumber To will depend greatly upon whether you think "Dumb and Dumber" was one.

Stewart proves to be an able filmmaker in Rosewater. But he also shows hints of being something more.

The Theory of Everything breaks down simply, perhaps too much so: a great performance in a good movie.

It's a gentle and unassuming film, lingering over sometimes poignantly awkward conversations as Terry encourages his protege to persevere in his search for an original voice to go along with his skilled hands.

Floridly explicit, gleefully disgusting and yet somehow kind of sweet, the film is a showcase for Carla Juri.

This is a wonderful movie.

Freeland does a fine job, waiting for her characters to converge in a way that doesn't feel overly forced, though there is a bit of that "Crash" tidiness in how things fall together. Still, the film is moving and human.

A heartfelt, moving and bracingly honest document of a famous man as he fades away.

It's fun to watch the actors work. But you wish they had material a little stronger to work with. Laggies doesn't give it to them.

Unfortunately, while the swami taught his disciples to explore the depths of their very souls, the film barely scratches the surface of his life and teachings.

Take my word for it, or better yet go find out for yourself: Big Hero 6 is a treat.

In Interstellar, Nolan has created a universe where ultimately the possibilities are endless. At its best, the film feels the same way.

As an exegesis on tortured creative genius, Harmontown proves wanting. It's in the exploration of how "Community" fandom formed its own distinctive community of outcasts that the film excels.

First-time writer-director Peter Sattler keeps things glum and unsentimental, then tosses it all up in the air with a syrupy ending that derails everything. On another movie, the high-corn finale might have worked; here, it just feels patently false.

Ostlund's film is beautiful, capturing both the stunning scenery and the danger of the slopes and the mountains. Sure, everything looks great, but it could all fall apart in disastrous fashion at any moment.

Kidman and Firth both deliver compelling performances, although this kind of plot-driven fare is no real challenge to their considerable acting talents.

The story Snowden tells is, of course, absorbing, disturbing and, yes, scary. Poitras' film, playing out as more and more is revealed, reported and published, comes off like a real-life spy thriller.

It's an interesting idea that loses steam as it gains gore. The development of the story is much better than the payoff. It's fun while it lasts.

A thick film of sleaze coats every frame of Nightcrawler, a movie that takes a hard look at media culture and provides Jake Gyllenhaal a terrific opportunity to creep us all out.

There's something refreshing about a movie that knows what it is, and what it wants to be. John Wick is that kind of movie.

The acting is outstanding. And there's a lot of humor. True, we're often laughing at Philip (when we're not cringing), instead of with him. But Perry also goes for more traditional laughs.

It's the best kind of fairy tale — tough, deep and meaningful, with a heroine who stays true to herself in spite of shallow temptations.

The last act takes a couple of turns that rely too heavily on coincidence, but overall Whiplash (the title comes from the name of one of the songs the band plays) hits very few sour notes.

Simien's film is one of those rare works that teach by appearing not to — you laugh at some of the antics, cringe at others, but the film is so entertaining you may forget you're learning something.

Birdman is a treat. But it's also more than that. It's a full-fledged wonder.

Melfi, who also wrote the script, goes for broke on the sappy front. It's a credit to Murray's skill — or maybe the strength of his personality — that he never submits completely to all the heart-string tugging.

The film, directed and co-written by Jorge R. Gutierrez, is a visually stunning, funny movie that trusts children to deal with subject matter that many films don't: specifically, death.

The movie is not uninteresting, but a viewer isn't breathlessly waiting to see how things will wrap up, either. By the third act, you even start to get impatient with the characters. That's not exactly a ringing endorsement.

Rudderless is a quietly ambitious film, and if it eventually collapses under the dramatic weight it's asked to shoulder — and it does — at least it's trying.

You'll laugh, you'll cry, you'll be swept away — about as much as you would be by artificial roses. Movies like this may look like the real thing, but they're not.

Ultimately Fury is a good, conventional war movie that might have become something more.

You'd learn a lot more if you went out and, well, actually met a Mormon.

[Renner's] outstanding as a man passionate about his work. His character is not perfect — just ask his wife and children — but he is certainly a good man trying to do good things.

Aside from Dance and some hazy views of impaled bodies, the film is low on shock and gore. It's aiming more for sweeping historical epic, but it doesn't work on either level.

It is a quiet but intense and closely observed piece of work.

It's feel-good, no question about it. But it's also absorbing, important and inspiring.

The film does not have the courage of the book, which felt no need to tie a nice pretty bow on everything. But it's fun enough for a good while (it's only 81 minutes long), and that's enough.

Sure, these roles aren't exactly a stretch, with Duvall being crotchety and Downey being sharp-witted. But that familiarity is part of the appeal. They're good at this. Really good. After all, as has been noted, they're not movie stars for nothing.

Murray doesn't ignore the abuse of power. He just eases into it.

How disappointing that a movie about challenging authority should be such a slave to convention.