Jim Walton, Ann Morrison and other original cast members talk about what the show meant to them, and how it felt (in a word: lousy) to have their dreams crash into a brick wall of harsh reviews.

Pure spectacle has since been subsumed into narrative filmmaking, but the cinema of attractions is always present, especially in modern action movies, and there may be no greater current example of this than xXx: The Return of Xander Cage.

Certain things get fudged in The Founder, among them Kroc's middle marriage, and director Hancock can't completely resolve the warring strains in what he sees as Kroc's personality. But that's what gives the movie its tension, and it works.

While McAvoy is known for his dramatic roles, and as the young Charles Xavier in the "X-Men" franchise, he's delightful when let off the leash and allowed to show off his loud, campy, unhinged side.

The damper here is Affleck, who appears to have been too concerned with placing himself just so, and then posing, so that nothing drew attention away from cinematographer Robert Richardson's pretty light.

The easiest thing you can say about Silence is that it's a labor of love, made by a valiant soldier for his chosen storytelling medium.

Ever since she took "The Grifters" by storm, Bening has been a spectacular if often ill-used actress. Here, it's a marvelous fit of performer and role, and she makes Dorothea a dozen things at once: warm, chilly, open, wary, worldly, insecure, grave, blithe.

The biggest problem with Why Him? though, isn't him, it's her. Stephanie is so underwritten, that though these men are competing ruthlessly over her, she drops out of the story completely. She's the center of attention, but she's a void.

The beauty of Lion is that it explores and allows for the unique possibilities and power of multiple homes, multiple families and multiple selves.

A fairly entertaining gloss of a docudrama elevated by its cast.

The problem is that one can't help but think of better, more interesting movies based on this premise.

It's just a mediocre action movie, poorly edited and larded with a terrible musical score, based on a video game. Nothing new there.

Robust, delicate, sublimely acted and a close cinematic cousin to the theatrical original, director Denzel Washington's film version of Fences makes up for a lot of overeager or undercooked stage-to-screen adaptations over the decades.

Collateral Beauty is much more shallow nonsense than anything else.

Stone is spectacular, and she's reason enough to see La La Land. Chazelle is a born filmmaker, and he doesn't settle for rehashing familiar bits from musicals we already love. He's too busy giving us reasons to fall for this one.

I do wish Felicity Jones’ character popped the way Daisy Ridley’s did in last year’s franchise offering. “The Force Awakens,” directed by J.J. Abrams, was smooth, consistent, even-toned, nostalgic. Rogue One zigzags, and it’s more willfully jarring. Yet it takes time for callbacks and shout-outs to characters we’ve seen before, and we’ll see again. And again. And again.

Office Christmas Party, which delights in a grotesque carnival of the worst behavior, and still has its heart firmly in the right place.

It's an odd, hermetic and fascinating picture.

At its best, Seasons shakes off its predecessors and captures the simple, grand ideas it's after purely visually.

LaBeouf's quivering instability creates the impression that his performance is constantly buffering on us. He's never dull — he is, in fact, a compelling actor in any circumstance — but the material ends up cheapening the experiences of so many real-life veterans, which surely was not the filmmakers' intention.

The movie's neither hopeful in contrived ways, nor hopeless in different contrived ways. Somehow it manages to be wonderful.

This lazy sequel is a lump of coal in a dirty stocking.

There may be less than meets the eye here. But what meets the eye is pretty striking.

It would still be a stinker even if it wasn't cloaked in a dark shroud of cultural and political relevancy. It's just that bad.

The film is bright, busy, enjoyable, progressive without being insufferable.

In a movie built around two characters, Pitt does not hold up his 50 percent.

An interesting misfire. It's also the victim of lousy timing.

Don't expect miracles. Not every biopic needs to reinvent the form. Sometimes it's enough to inhabit it, engagingly.