A Time to Kill, based on the first novel by John Grisham, is a skillfully constructed morality play that pushes all the right buttons and arrives at all the right conclusions.

For the 77-year-old Woo, who has influenced generations of directors with films such as “The Killer,” “Bullet in the Head” and “Face/Off,” this is his first American film since 2003’s “Paycheck,” and it is hardcore evidence Woo regains his signature style and his flair for over-the-top, sometimes poetically brutal action.

An efficient delivery system for Gotcha! Moments, of which it has about 19. Audiences who want to be Gotchaed will enjoy it.

You have to make some distinctions in your mind. In one category, "2001: A Space Odyssey" remains inviolate, one of the handful of true film masterpieces. In a more temporal sphere, "2010" qualifies as superior entertainment, a movie more at home with technique than poetry, with character than with mystery, a movie that explains too much and leaves too little to our sense of wonderment, but a good movie all the same.

The Dead Don’t Die is delivered in one long, deadpan note. Some of the sight gags and quips are gold; others are just filler, but still kind of interesting in a wacky sort of way.

Just remember that its hero stands for countless others.

And then there is Vincent D'Onofrio, as a university professor of the occult and mythological, who opens up a line of possibility that eventually saves the ending from being a red herring. Yes, the ending is horrifying, but I don't believe in that stuff. I'm pretty sure I don't.

It is a joy to look at frame by frame, and it would be worth getting the Blu-ray to do that. I am not quite so thrilled by the story, which at times threatens to make "Gormenghast" seem straightforward.

"Alice" plays better as an adult hallucination, which is how Burton rather brilliantly interprets it until a pointless third act flies off the rails.

Movie magic is an elusive thing. A Wrinkle in Time is a bold film that takes big chances from start to finish, in a courageous effort to be something special.... But for all its scenes of characters flying and soaring and zooming here and there, it never really takes off.

The movie fails to work up much excitement, and the title song by Bob Dylan is quite simply awful.

Conan the Destroyer is more cheerful than the first Conan movie, and it probably has more sustained action, including a good sequence in the glass palace.

The Big Year is getting the enthusiastic support of the Audubon Society, and has an innocence and charm that will make it appealing for families, especially those who have had enough whales and dolphins for the year.

It Ends with Us handles the issue of domestic violence with admirable sensitivity and noble intentions, but with a far too long running time of 130 minutes and a plot that depends on not one, not two, but three major coincidences, it isn’t as impactful or resonant as it could have been.

What a waste of some perfectly wonderful legends.

The material can get awfully sudsy and we can see a couple of the big reveals coming two scenes in advance, but on balance this is a well-written, moving story bolstered by an outstanding cast.

Historical dramas can be fun if you approach them in the right spirit, and I enjoyed Mary, Queen of Scots.

An “Escape From New York”-meets-“Mad Max” ripoff that desperately wants to be a bonkers, midnight drive-in cult classic but doesn’t have the camp value or the memorably off-the-wall storyline to make the cut.

An odd, desperate film, lost in its own audacity, and yet there are passages of surreal beauty and preposterous invention that I have to admire. The film doesn't work, and indeed seems to have no clear idea of what its job is, and yet (sigh) there is the temptation to forgive its trespasses simply because it is utterly, if pointlessly, original.

It has that unwound Roddy Doyle humor; the laughs don't hit you over the head, but tickle you behind the knee.

Above all, this is a movie where the characters ask the same questions we do: They're as smart about themselves as we are.

A high-spirited charmer, a fantasy that sparkles with delights.

A movie that is sort of funny some of the time and then occasionally hilarious.

Look, this isn't a great movie. If you're not a kid, don't go unless there's a kid you want to take. But if you are a kid, and you have ever for a moment wondered what it would be like to play major-league ball at your age, then take it from the old Little Leaguer and see this movie.

If there’s anything worse than a long, slow, boring buildup to a payoff, it’s the buildup without the payoff. This movie doesn’t feel finished.

I feel something is missing. There had to be dark nights of the soul. Times of grief and rage. The temptation of nihilism. The lure of despair. Can a 13-year-old girl lose an arm and keep right on smiling?

Dumplin’ sometimes takes the easy road.... But there’s so much more to enjoy, from the nuanced work by Jennifer Aniston that ensures Rosie’s never a caricature of a pageant mom; to the warm and natural best-buddy chemistry between Danielle MacDonald and Odeya Rush; to that instant classic of a soundtrack courtesy of Ms. Parton, with a little help from her friends.

Not very funny, and maybe couldn't have been very funny no matter what, because the pieces for comedy are not in place.