The Desolation of Smaug is, on the whole, a vast improvement over The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey. It’s a popcorn movie (in the best sense) disguised as deep-core nerdism.

Shaky science fiction shacks up with a corny redemption tale.

Here Hill makes his debut as a filmmaker while trying to prove himself as the voice for an entire generation. And there are even times where Hill succeeds, navigating his own missteps as a first-time filmmaker to create a promising – albeit unsatisfactory  –  story of adolescent millennial angst.

It's a finely-crafted puzzle box that speaks as much to the heart and the head, with a simple but poignant message that we are only ourselves if we are complete.

This is highly personal artwork writ in a grand, towering script, and all the more intellectually and artistically legible for it.

In short, the character is a lot like the way Stan Lee first envisioned him, but the trilogy's screenwriter Steve Ditko would probably loathe this new, unsatisfying, and hollow-feeling entry into the new cinematic Marvel Universe.

For all its unwieldy temporal scope and narrowness of perspective, Nixon is an amazingly graceful beast, flawed yet invigorating, packed with enough material that will fascinate and irk moviegoers of all stripes for quite a time to come.

It results in very little fresh insight that might allow us to feel that Linda Bishop didn’t die in vain.

The action is neither cathartic nor supremely exhilarating. "Bullitt" on a bike this film is not.

Goldstein, better known for his comic work and coming off a wincing dramatic arc on Shrinking, has limited range but nestles into his sweet spot here, a combination of smirking and sincere, and the underrated Poots is magnetic. The script – witty, anemic – only gestures at her character’s chronic depression, but no matter. Poots bodily fills in the blanks, transforming an underwritten part into a complex, rounded person. She’s an original.

Lowlife is also far more bloodstained than Tarantino’s normal fare. Grisly isn’t the word: The entire effects and makeup team work overtime for some of the most splattertastic effects in any non-horror film since the bone-shattering, skull-squishing glories of "Brawl on Cell Block 99."

What's makes Tommaso stand out among thinly veiled autobiographical movies is that it’s not, like Tarkovsky’s "Mirror," an attempt to reduce an entire life into two hours; nor, as in "Fanny and Alexander" or "The 400 Blows," a portrait of the artist as a young man. This is Ferrara at this precise moment.

The screenplay by father-son team Jacob and Michael Koskoff, the latter of whom is also an actual trial lawyer in Connecticut, is tight and lean; even the courtroom scenes are punctuated by honestly unexpected revelations.

Splice is a twisted little genetic updating that's not half as electrifying as Shelley's novel twist on the whole man/God/creation situation (and the perils thereof).

All too often, in life and in cinema, systems are shown as working simply to oppress: Thirteen Lives reminds us that communal acts can be what literally save us.

This is joyful filmmaking, imbued with an infectious, giddy enthusiasm.

It's 99 and 44/100% pure Mamet all the way.

Towers head and hairpiece above much of what passes for urban comedy these days.

As much romantic fantasy as it is social satire, but more to the point -- it is gloriously and tear-wellingly funny.

While the movie’s nonlinear construction is its selling point, at least for those moviegoers who prefer a bit of a challenge, an underlying vibe of melancholy gives Mothering Sunday thematic weight.

A movie that’s so profoundly ridiculous that it has to be admired, if for no other reason other than its sheer willingness to run with its premise and take it to the end of the line.

Ultimately, however, The Way Back fails to connect on the all-important visceral, emotional level.

The first 15-20 minutes of this documentary are solid gold.

The easy, fast-talking rapport between the four young women is The Sisterhood’s biggest selling point. Too bad, then, that the premise demands they spend most of the film away from each other.

Unfortunately, someone (screenwriter Justin Lader, perhaps?) needed to improvise some kind of satisfying denouement because the film’s third act just collapses in on itself. The One I Love is imaginative and provocative until … until it isn’t.

Like a classroom history lesson, the script by director Lemmons and Gregory Allen Howard dutifully recounts the life of this extraordinary person. The movie feels prosaic, although Tubman’s occasional intonation of a timeless spiritual in lieu of dialogue is an unexpected lyrical touch enhanced by the purity of Erivo’s voice.

Noa may not be Caesar's heir as leader of the apes, but he definitely walks in his footsteps as a worthy protagonist in the latest iteration of this ever-intriguing sci-fi classic.

You end up feeling -- despite Jones' dead-on performance -- like you've been cheated. It looks good. It feels right. It gets the job done…. But there's nothing there. Just like Cobb. Maybe that's the point.