With the great American filmmaker R.J. Cutler (“The War Room,” “Billie Eilish: The World’s a Little Blurry”) delivering a briskly paced but thorough film that ticks off the many amazing chapters in Stewart’s life, “Martha” is one of the best documentaries of the year.

This is every inch the prestige Brit biopic, from the use of certain visuals as transitions to the lush and rousing music by Oscar-winning composer Volker Bertelmann aka Hauschka (“All Quiet on the Western Front”) to the sometimes heavy-handed messaging in the dialogue, but the story of the man who came to be known as “The British Oskar Schindler” is deserving of the reverent biography treatment, and who better than Anthony Hopkins to tell us that story?

Some of the stories are pretty good, especially Charles Burns' tale involving a nasty and vaguely humanoid insect that burrows under the skin.

The movie has a real bittersweet charm. The baseball sequences, we've seen before. What's fresh are the personalities of the players, the gradual unfolding of their coach and the way this early chapter of women's liberation fit into the hidebound traditions of professional baseball.

We know where Moore stands on the political spectrum, but Fahrenheit 11/9 isn’t an anti-Republican screed. He’s arguing, quite convincingly, it’s the system that’s broken, with career politicians on both sides of the aisle culpable and accountable.

Writer-director DuVall is a talented filmmaker and she keeps the mostly superficial story humming along at an entertaining pace, and the cast is terrific and gets the maximum value out of the material.

The material is pretty thin and some of the jokes get repetitive, but Get Duked! is good stoner comedy fun, and quite the promising debut from a rookie filmmaker.

Performance is a bizarre, disconnected attempt to link the inhabitants of two kinds of London underworlds: pop stars and gangsters. It isn’t altogether successful, largely because it tries too hard and doesn’t pace itself to let its effects sink in.

Writer-director-star Cooper Raiff’s smart and charming and delightfully offbeat Cha Cha Real Smooth is a movie very much of the present day, but there’s something almost nostalgic about the self-consciously indie material in that it reminded me of somewhat similarly themed gems such as “Rushmore” (1998), “Igby Goes Down” (1998) and “Tadpole” (1998) — and all of these films are generational descendants of “The Graduate” (1966).

About half the scenes in Our Souls at Night consist of Jane Fonda and Robert Redford simply talking to one another. Those scenes are more exhilarating, more intoxicating and more memorable than many if not most gigantic action sequences in big-budget movies.

It is easy to analyze the mechanism, but more difficult to explain why this film is so deeply moving.

A raw, wounding, powerfully acted film, and you cannot look away from it.

This is one of the best movies of the year.

Its best scenes come as the characters are established and get to know one another. Sharif at 71 still has the fire in his eyes that we remember from "Lawrence of Arabia," and is still a handsome presence.

Carry-On is a sharp, smallish thriller with some big and satisfying payoffs.

Did I enjoy Ong-Bak? As brainless but skillful action choreography, yes. And I would have enjoyed it even more if I'd known going in that the stunts were being performed in the old-fashioned, pre-computer way.

This is a remarkable film about a strange and prophetic man. What does it tell us? Did living a virtual life destroy him?

Even with all the shootouts and robberies and action sequences, this is also a wonderful showcase for screen-stealing acting, with virtually everyone in the all-star cast getting some center stage moments and knocking it out of the park. This is one of those movies where we sense the cast had just as much fun making it as we have watching it.

This is a well-made film, with plausible performances by all the leads, especially Ann Dowd.

Donald Sutherland is perfectly cast and quietly effective as a man who will not be turned aside, who does not wish misfortune upon himself or his family, but cannot ignore what has happened to the family of his friend.

It's got a unique . . . well, I was about to say charm, but the movie's last scene doesn't quite let me get away with that.

When a movie does have a lot to say – as, for example, “Nashville” did – it’s a relief when the director finds a way to say it through the characters, instead of to them. Still, “Swept Away” is an absorbing movie, it tells a story we get involved in and (despite all I’ve said) it’s often very funny.

Even with its big-screen pyrotechnics and its feature-length running time, Star Trek Beyond plays like an extended version of one of the better episodes from the original series, and I mean that in the best possible way.

Gloria is tough, sweet and goofy.

After "Monster," here is another extraordinary role from an actress [Theron] who has the beauty of a fashion model but has found resources within herself for these powerful roles about unglamorous women in the world of men.

Bullhead contains the elements for a simple but overwhelming personal tragedy. It also contains other elements that create a muddle. It's one of those films you have to reconstruct in your mind.

Francis Ford Coppola's The Cotton Club is, quite simply, a wonderful movie. It has the confidence and momentum of a movie where every shot was premeditated -- and even if we know that wasn't the case, and this was one of the most troubled productions in recent movie history, what difference does that make when the result is so entertaining?

Like Crazy is a well-made film. The scenes showing Jacob and Anna falling in love have a freshness, and I learn Doremus handed his actors an outline and together they improvised every scene. Some of the whispered endearments under the sheets are delightful.