There’s charm and delight here, to be sure, but it is occasionally obscured by attempts to make it somehow darker, deeper, and more dramatic.

This is design work of the highest caliber and it is impossible to not enjoy simply watching these little buggers run around. It is unfortunate, however, that the creativity, originality and propulsive storytelling found in the original “Monsters Inc.” just didn’t matriculate with them.

I'm not sure how elaborately I could defend Pola X, but I loved watching it.

Starting small and building steadily, the movie reaps some fall-down funny laughs.

A fascinating combination of dare, stunt and genuine artistic risk -- often disorganized, but never less than entertaining.

I spent the bulk of Paradise Love mimicking Edvard Munch’s “The Scream.” It’s been a long time since I’ve seen such a disturbing film.

An imaginative and disturbing work; well worth a look.

It is thrilling to look at, and that's more than one can say for the majority of pictures out there.

It is one of the better dumbass sci-fi action movies to come down the pike in quite some time.

A dark, dreary and dull “Mad Max in Neutral” from director David Michôd (“Animal Kingdom”) that tries to pass off its blunt narrative and repetitiveness as some sort of style.

Altman is just as nastily misogynistic as ever.

Kate Hudson's accent is spot-on, and she brings her megawattage to good use on the Gershwin standard, "The Man I Love."

Director Gary Winick ("Sweet Nothing") ingeniously complements Draper's layered approach by modulating the film's energy in fascinating ways.

An occasionally powerful, always heartfelt drama.

A masterfully queasy blend of dark humor and darker humanity.

Lots of movies deal with friends and lovers of a certain age growing apart. But few can hear, as Thraves does, the sound of death chains rattling in the background.

The boy (Osment) has an uncanny ability to suggest Cole's secretive, haunted soul, and he seems to have inspired Willis to give perhaps his most self-effacing performance.

At its core is a feminine realm (the beauty parlor) through which modern issues of alienation and casual-sex-as-a-drug are coupled with timeless questions about the natures of love and desire.

(Herron) just doesn't make the case that this book was worth filming.

Gorris has beefed up the role of Natalia (Watson), with the end result that the film's emphasis is appropriately divided between the two characters in an emotionally satisfying way.

Abittersweet fable about the raw joys of human revival.

Grass is often closer to the sobering tone of the PBS show than it is to the silly "Weed," with its stoned, barely literate potheads discussing the quality of their dope.

Thoroughly artificial and overly schematic, to the point of caricature even, but often lively and witty nonetheless.

Nearly the perfect balance between straight-faced pulp action and amused wonder at the outlandish world of comic books.

Nymphomaniac Vol. 1 is the worst thing Lars Von Trier has ever associated himself with.

This is a film like no other this year, and on that grounds alone you should see it.

As he explains the male-male relationships and the absence of stigma or judgment, the film soars.

Gibson's performance is robbed of his customary humor, and he flounders around in search of the character's core.

Out of the Furnace is no disaster, but it doesn’t achieve what it hopes to achieve, and it has no one to blame but itself.

The first half of “The Congress,” while still fascinating, does suffer a bit from keeping its focus on the gripes and accusations between Hollywood actors and producers...Once the Philip K. Dick-meets-”Inception” second half kicks in, the implications grow more universal.

The remarkable storytelling that eventually emerges in Eden is something you should see, providing you feel that you can stomach it.

It’s shallow, it’s boring, it’s poignant, it’s clever, it’s poorly acted, it’s intentionally poorly acted, it has no story, it has marvelous scenes, it is artful, it is hallucinatory, it is shoddily put together. All response is valid.

An efficient and effectively exciting globe-spanning zombie thriller.

Superbly written, handsomely made and full of terrific performances, Laggies is Shelton’s best film to date.

Directors Katie Graham and Andrew Matthews create a great framework for the epic nemesis battle, but also know when to pull back to keep the movie grounded in reality.

Mostly this film skims by on the surface, its conflict and climax visible from the opening five minutes.

A wry, rambling, smart comedy.

What makes the film ultimately successful, though, is the outstanding comic talents that inhabit it, especially Zahn and Macy.

Downey, Jr. remains a rightfully cherished smartass figure, having as much a ball with Black’s one-liners as he had in “KKBB,” and he sells Tony’s newfound post-traumatic vulnerability more credibly than the film does.

So campy that it almost plays like a sendup of the series. It is to Alien what "The Bride of Frankenstein" was to other 1930s Frankenstein movies, and it even shares some of the same themes.

A surprisingly adult exploration of religion refracted, as always, through (Smith's) insistently pop-culture kaleidoscope.

A kind and decent film, but doesn't add to Robinson's legacy.

Entertaining as it often is, Outside Providence feels as if it were a collection of installments from an unusually raunchy television series.

The best thing about this new Godzilla is that it spares no expense or effort to deliver big, burly IMAX-ified action... The worst thing about this new Godzilla is how that’s the best thing about it.

A film that inserts banal plot devices and endless cutesiness in place of where the “good parts” should be.

Coy, cutesy, sentimental, and shamelessly manipulative.

It's the hardships that led to Atlanta -- and that he faced after -- that make his story so compelling.

Blanchett projects a wounded dignity that anchors her character even when the film slips into silly hokum; she's never less than fantastic, and as such manages to keep the film on course.

Has a soundtrack crammed with infectious music gleaned from fairly surprising sources.

Despite a cheap, Hollywood ending and despite Kaye's kooky campaign, X is a killer.

The winks and nods to fans are deliciously satisfying.

This director's (Winterbottom) reach is impressive, but this time it doesn't quite grasp.

One of those hybrid projects: a major studio film, big star, homely storyline, but tempered by an indie director working in his own idiosyncratic style.

Where The Banshee Chapter thrives is the overwhelming claustrophobia of the film.

Despicable Me 2 is fun, especially near the culmination. Structural issues aside, it’s impossible not to like these characters, all of them, rendered with love, always entertaining even when the story around them doesn’t make much sense.

Were the casting stronger, the film -- would have had a better chance of transcending its lack of subtlety.

One sour note is Richard Marvin's derivative score. It's just awful and often pulls the movie down.

It’s funnier than it has any right to be, really.

It's witty, entertaining, often funny as hell and even, at times, surprisingly wise about the human condition.

Every bit as reverent as "Schindler's List," and no less successful.

A big disappointment.

Wish You Were Here goes to a dramatically gripping place of guilt and doubt; if only its grip had held just a bit tighter.

It's hard to think of a single memorable line from Restaurant, even a memorably bad one.

Even Besson’s most bold choices – and this is a film that goes weird, and then just keeps getting weirder – don’t seem so revolutionary when packaged in such well-tread trappings and increasingly shoddy writing.

Wood’s energetic, tightly wound performance carries the movie; his ability to juggle all the different information coming at him — keeping time on the piano while speaking and hitting his cues — is admirable and probably exhausting.

The Boxtrolls is a swing-and-miss for Laika; when you move forward with revolutionary techniques while standing still in terms of your themes, stories and settings, no amount of technical trickery or animation genius can bring the boring to vivid life.

Denis Villeneuve’s Enemy might have the scariest ending of any film ever made.

It’s clean, lean and smart.

[The Kings of Summer] is a wonderful mix of innocence, laughter and beauty that is enjoyable in the moment, yet it’s almost entirely forgettable. With too many odd asides and complications, what should have been a straightforward journey into self-discovery and the difficulties of growing up is waylaid by unnecessary moments and slightly self-indulgent filmmaking.

Mildly amusing, both charming and diverting, it plays like a La La Land home movie.

Much like Brandy, “List” tries and tries and tries to get the job done, but frankly, the satisfaction only ever comes in spurts.

The single best thing about Stuart Little is Nathan Lane.

Worth a look, even if it doesn't quite find the internal logic it seems to be searching for.

The adherence to specific facts and actual events hampers the film, as it often does biographical movies.

A movie that keeps you wondering about its characters' true feelings and motives long after you've left the theater.

It's darker, stranger and pushes more buttons.

This is a franchise entirely comfortable with what it is, what it’s not, and what it has to offer. It has a whole mess of “Fast” for us all, and woe be the souls who enter this film hoping to go slow.

With Muppets Most Wanted, the vaudevillian pandaemonium is alive and well.

Xiaoshuai isn't really interested in glamorizing or even exploring the gangster lifestyle; nor is he interested in conventional dramatic arcs.

While writer-director Frank Darabont often fails to make King's story plausible, that's no fault of the actors. The performances are the movie's strong suit.

More aggravating than endearing, although there’s an interesting idea buried beneath all the cutesy plot details.

Wargnier is also a lousy storyteller who seems not to understand how to shape a narrative.

But it's the boy and the dog who make My Dog Skip resonate. The formula may be an old one, but it's still a good one.

A shapelessly propulsive mess of pop psychology and poor drama.

A class act, from top to bottom.

Subtlety is hardly at home here, with Quaid’s especially earnest performance a well-suited mask for Henry’s desperation that nonetheless amplifies the phoniness of the entire enterprise.

Frankly, Elysium is a bit of a liberal’s wet dream: the good guys want accessible healthcare, while the bad guys want to do away with undocumented immigrants.

The Wolverine reveals itself to be a film in desperate need of a point, in dire need of consequences and in a wandering search of any semblance of emotional weight.

Has moments of terrific lucidity, even brilliance.

Less would have been more, and this film is sabotaged by its maker's unchecked pretension.

Levine – whose last picture was the intriguing, if only partly effective, cancer comedy “50/50” — is going for something more here, exploring what makes us human by contrasting it with a character who has lost all the basics and is desperate to get them back.

Too long, too predictable.

A bawdy and belligerent comedy, meant mostly for folks looking for nothing more than to enjoy a few laughs.

I'll be damned if I can figure out how its various ingredients are supposed to blend together.

Irresistibly entertaining and beautiful to look at it, the film is pleasant at worst, and – at best – wisely defies its slapped-on American title, a warm reminder that love isn’t a solution so much as it’s a brilliant way of embracing life’s problems.

He spent 28 years in prison and this is what he gets?

Barrymore's sunny energy pushes the movie along, but halfway through you realize there just isn't that much to push.

As the movie plods on, the jokes start to fall flat...Worst of all is a centerpiece scene, when Ben has to pretend to be a mafioso (but sounds more like a cross between Martin and Lewis), when Crystal is so unfunny that you almost feel sorry for him.

They Came Together is a very fast, often very funny riff on a very tired Hollywood formula.

Unfortunately, whenever the story quiets down for exposition or to move the plot forward, it all becomes a grinding and often confusing bore.

Discordance, meet The Iceman, a film so wrong-footed it should take Eugene Levy out for a coffee.

Ultimately seems at war with itself, torn between its duties as an entertaining, engaging movie and a somber, sincere memorial, and in splitting the difference, the film effectively assaults its audience almost as aggressively as its subjects.

Hateship, Loveship suffers due to its dedication to an oddly unsettling type of earnestness.

Expertly done, and a real joy to watch.

Once at sea, The Perfect Storm collapses in a heap of spectacle and a dubious piling-on of scary incidents.

Little of this is plausible, but it is beguiling.

The problem is that the motion picture around these individual stunts is patently a committee-made artifact.

Crudup tends to take average parts in standard genre films and turn them into something special.

Glover and Bassett ground the film, in the flashbacks and in the body of the film, and lessen the riskiness of maintaining the play's theatricality.

The Best Man Holiday goes whole hog on the holiday cheese, and there’s something admirable about an adult feature that doesn’t balk at real feelings, especially around the holidays (sex montages notwithstanding).

This relationship might be strong enough to carry an observational novel, but the movie feels like it's missing something.

The sequel quadruples the recipe, with gags on top of gags on top of gags in a way only animation could achieve. Like a foodie “Jurassic Park” conjured up by Tex Avery, “Cloudy 2″ is a sight to behold … as long as your brain hasn’t turned to mush by the halfway point.

Go For Sisters is something of a frustration. It’s the least interesting crime caper ever, and there are fascinating characters forced to go through the motions as if any of us could possibly care.

A modest picture with quiet ambitions that is likely to disappear into that lush tropical rainforest where so many films of this sort, some much worse and others much better, have all gone in time. Catch it while you can.

A sophomore writing-directing effort from former film critic Rod Lurie.

Suffers from a script that places dramatic emphasis in all the wrong places.

The kids’ performances are effective and strong, with little touches that bring them to life as recognizable types of smart young people.

Everyone will be indifferent, as indifferent and uncaring as the characters the film portrays.

I just really, really, really, don't like this movie, and I don't care who knows it.

Appalling because it never transcends its adolescent-boy glee at being allowed entry to the highly sexualized arena of prostitution.

The film is simplicity itself.

Has its own sense of logic and integrity that demand a kind of begrudged respect.

The F Word would be commendable on the strength of its unusual wit and warmth alone, but it becomes a far more satisfying (even somewhat illuminating) experience because it doesn’t shy away from the often ugly psychology engendered by cross-gendered friendships.

A deliciously romantic story, in all senses of the word.

Here is a pitch-black psycho-horror-comedy to restore one’s faith in the “What the eff did I just watch?” genre.

Murdoch’s film is fraught with ambition and aspiration, but a little thin on talent and technique.

To the Wonder is distinctly lacking in oomph and, without an emotional connection, without anything interesting happening on the screen, the beauty can only take you so far before the endeavor falls like a house of cards.

What’s truly unnerving about the whole thing is how good certain scenes are, and how great a few of the performances come off, especially Julia Roberts and Meryl Streep – they’re doing amazing work, only it’s the equivalent of building a lovely home on a foundation of quicksand.

A rich and challenging variation on the serial-killer genre.

The story moves beyond the limitations of its setting, transforming itself into an affecting parable about the lengths to which parents will go to protect their children from trauma, cruelty and knowledge of evil.

Park allows this macabre coming-of-age tale to be defined by mood and style above all else.

Particular credit must be given to Samuel L. Jackson’s voicing of Whiplash and Paul Giamatti’s work on the voice of Chet. The chemistry between the two is awesome, hilarious even.

There's nothing terribly wrong with the movie, but nothing terribly right about it either.

Boyd would be smart to add a little sound and fury next time around. War is hell, after all.

Regretfully, the beginning of this movie is as good as it ever gets.

Wrong is more absurd and more laugh-out-loud silly than “Rubber;” it’s also less focused and more pointless.

It’s just boring – and boring in a way that apparently has no endgame.

A magic-realistic fable whose lows soon prove as infuriating as its highs are intoxicating.

The fact that isolated bits are amusing shouldn't keep us from strongly noting that this movie really is pretty awful -- not at all worthy of guilty pleasure status.

Fading Gigolo wants to be some sort of sunny tapestry about New York’s social groups, but it’s impossible to see past its absurd premise.

The Walt Disney World-set Escape From Tomorrow is both a great gimmick-dependent story and a remarkable piece of filmmaking. It is a radical, transgressive departure that exploits new technology in heretofore unseen ways.

Don't be misled by claims that you've seen this one already. You haven't, and you should.

The film’s final shot ranks among its least graphic and yet most puzzling, a slap-in-the-face piece of punctuation that reminds the most accommodating viewers that, even on his good days, Mr. Zombie is really only making movies for an audience of one.

I'm not even sure the movie makes sense at times, yet Campion's offbeat rhythms and eye for startling images always made me happy to be looking at the screen.

Puts the Bond film series (this one makes number 19)-- back on track by stressing the fundamentals and applying a bit of authentic drama for a change.

An acerbically comic fable.

Despite the frivolous feel, it's clear the director intends for Bossa Nova to be a love letter to his two passions: Brazil and his leading lady (who's also his real-life wife). Neither lets him down.

For every poignant moment there’s a gaudy dream sequence, wretched internal monologue, ham-fisted zoom or an exchange of dialogue sorely lacking nuance.

While Bad Words is a little too dopey to take seriously, this is compensated for with a handful of truly amusing sequences.

Hopefully, the next time around, Chadha's imagination will be in the service of not just excellent casting and directing, but a script to match those other cinematic components.

The downright gnarliest mainstream horror release in recent memory, Evil Dead is certainly a considerable and occasionally commendable dose of the ol’ ultra-violence, but Fede Alvarez’ Raimi-sanctioned update of 1981’s cult favorite only really has that demented determination going for it.

Few movies this year have been quite so rewarding with their 11th hour epiphanies.

An often gorgeous, dizzying assault of ideas and visual flourishes...it's just not very good.

Unlike the original, Hannibal may make us hide our eyes, but it doesn't get inside our heads.

For a genre that so often sacrifices character development and smaller narrative developments, the majority of The Maze Runner feels quite refreshing and worth the navigation.

Derivative, cliché-ridden and old hat.

Two Buckleys for the price of one, but the real star here is Penn Badgley.

Frank’s film is much more of a noir outing than a straight action feature, and Neeson slips right into the tone and feel of the hard-boiled detective offering. Neeson may have been treated to a big career resurgence thanks to his knack for big action, but he’s great as Matt Scudder, and the darker charms of the film suit him wonderfully.

Somewhere around the beginning of Hour Two, the narrative loses momentum, and Pino Donaggio's molasses-thick score begins to drag everything down with it. The ending also lacks the surprise twist that seems to be promised .

Mama is one of those pictures that holds you aloft on its vaporous mood of dread – the occasional silliness of the plot mechanics don’t matter so much.

The Company You Keep at least manages to maintain an audience’s interest for a solid 80 percent of the film. The ending is a slight flop, which keeps the film from an overall recommendation, and in the stark light of day, it seems fairly evident not everything adds up.

I Origins is about on-par with “Another Earth,” but it’s still disappointing that a film so obsessed with the eye has such a fuzzy, blurred vision of what it wants to do.

Hamstrung by a script that is too often smug, obvious and self-important.

The accidental beating and killing of innocent people satirizes "Pulp Fiction," or is this Sabu's homage to Tarantino?

Simply can't sustain interest for much of its final hour.

This mild but amusing comedy wasn't written by Levinson, and the accents may be different, but the feel is similar.

A bold film anchored by Weigert's impressive lead performance.

What ensues is never exactly unpredictable, but always witty, fresh and fun.

This is a film about a journey, and while the destination – baseball’s major leagues – is continuously dangled in front of its protagonists, it’s getting there that counts. Oh, and also how fast you can throw a ball. That counts, too.

A mostly mundane single-father drama.

Breaks no new ground and is tedious in the extreme.

It's like one of the baker's cakes, handsomely rendered on the outside but lacking flavor.

Mr Kumble: Keep your hands off the classics! You don't deserve to read them, let alone paraphrase them.

A relatively high-flying adventure, injecting the always-entertaining airplane-set thriller with some fresh thrills and a cadre of characters worth getting invested in.

It is Foster who presents the biggest single problem, delivering a monochromatic performance that finds her character not much more than flinty and strained.

Afflicted is an exciting, adept and smartly skillful debut horror film.

Infuriating on almost every conceivable level.

Fancher seems uninterested in developing real suspense, or incapable of it, at least until the end, when there's plenty of it, but artificially imposed.

Feels more like a backyard relaxation than a movie.

A bad movie about a great man.

A cool movie and a must-see for anyone who wants to see the next stage in computer-generated animation. But it could have been so much more.

There are countless clever dialogue parries as well as some quite outstanding rants. It definitely takes the movie outside of the world of pure realism, but the theatricality is well worth it.

First and foremost I’m So Excited! is late night cabaret – funny, filthy and more than a little bit sloshed.

Smith puts the soul in the machine of Series 7, producing an emotional power too real for reality-TV to handle.

From the concept on down, Cronenberg’s film inevitably resembles the ‘80s body horror with which father David made his name, but Brandon brings his own antiseptic eye to this queasy noir mutation, like “D.O.A.” for a self-serving near-future.

If the word “epic” has lost its meaning in the throes of recent summers, Man of Steel forcefully redefines it.

A very competent film, but it barely pulls you in.

Leaves almost no impression at all.

In a season stuffed with empty eye candy, 2 Guns comes along as something of a welcome burrito — plenty satisfying and hardly nutritious.

Then Bill Nighy shows up and is awesome and punches you in the heart. It ultimately feels like a cheat, and while there won’t be a dry eye in the house, it won’t be earned.

An amiable cast and a satisfying enough story make The Hundred-Foot Journey stick to your ribs, even if it’s hard to swallow early on.

This Chris Sanders fellow knows how to craft a heart-warming animation, and if not for a few minor problems this would have had a legitimate shot at the best animated movie of 2013.

It is -- in mood, execution, and shameless sentimentality -- a Bette Midler movie with an Irish accent.

Tusk is revolting, but that’s entirely the point of Kevin Smith’s admirably imaginative and utterly disgusting latest feature, a twisted fairy tale that trades on gross-out gags and visual shockers instead of actual story.

All the Pretty Horses may end up being a good movie to watch on DVD, when all the footage is restored and we can see the subtle shadings Thornton jettisoned.

It's possible that Ritchie's most important asset is the comic constant within his characters' existential dilemmas. To a man (and, indeed, they're all men), Ritchie's anti-heroes are at odds, in either large or small ways, with their own natures.

A terrible, tired piece of filmmaking.

But as objectionable as its subject matter is, the most objectionable thing is that it's not funny.

In the end, his (Luhrmann) Gatsby takes the fitting form of a cocktail glass, at once undeniably polished and unfailingly empty.

As a movie, quite frankly, it stinks. As an “entertainment object,” it will no doubt find its boosters.

This picture isn’t as showy or obvious as one of his (many) masterpieces, but it is quite good and deserves your time and respect.

Although The Reluctant Fundamentalist raises some complicated questions, in the end, it doesn’t challenge that much.

It's all overblown: too much music, too much cutting, too much zooming, too much computerized special effects, too much clanky symbolism that never works.

Palpably well-intentioned, The Secret Life of Walter Mitty is nevertheless phony to the core.

Despite being clever and crafty it can’t break out of the curiosity shop. It’s the finest diorama in there, but something to admire, linger over then move past.

If only all of Thor: The Dark World could capture the magic of its last act, the film wouldn’t feel like such a chink in Marvel’s otherwise solid armor.

The bloodshed speaks volumes enough, though, even if it takes some time getting to the mayhem proper.

Thanks for Sharing can’t quite find its footing as either a drama or a comedy, and near the end it’s actively sliding off the rails.

The story of Groove... provides an ingratiating road map to a cultural phenomenon. Just make sure you drink lots of water while you're there.

Never more than a dull, paint-by-numbers, overly literal transcription of the book.

Eastwood, who once upon a time was a flavorful director, is working in movie-of-the-week mode here. Cheesy, direct, bland.

There are tones of 1970s shaggy realism that are interrupted by moments of character-driven shtick. The wistful scenes aren’t rich enough to engross you and the comedy isn’t clever enough to make a difference.