Slogging along from one slaughter to the next, a benign narrative unfolds about a family of savages hell-bent on their own self-destruction, with no redeeming qualities.

A little of this corn goes a long way.

The problem is the movie never gives us a reason to care about Colin in the first place, or even to dislike him that much, if that’s how we’re supposed to feel. Colin is neutral, a kind of empty vessel, and Mr. Cage is his typical aloof self with a "Con Air" accent.

Directed by Ang Lee (Brokeback Mountain) with an impressive cast that includes Will Smith and Clive Owen, the sci-fi action thriller Gemini Man should be better than the ossified bore it is. Instead, it substitutes the gimmicks technology-freaks might call “innovative” for anything that remotely resembles any element of plot, character development, or entertainment value.

The main issue is the script. The tale it tells is shopworn.

Ms. Farmiga is the only one who seems to be having any fun, as an aging flower child stuck in an earlier decade and addicted to healing vortex workshops and primal screams. Mellow, but very much a work in progress, Goats has a bland but overcrowded menu that could benefit from a little feta.

The bottom line is, whether you worship God, Satan, Xenu or Ron Paul, The Rite gets it wrong.

Seeking Justice is an intense thriller so full of shocks it keeps you wired from start to finish.

Yes, it’s a bit helter-skelter, but it is also an adequately enjoyable and untaxing way to kill off a couple of hours.

The insurmountable problem is that Imogene is not a very original, dynamic or charismatic character, and Kristen Wiig is not a very original, dynamic or charismatic actress. Nobody in this movie is really appealing enough to be much fun. The state of New Jersey should sue.

A tender showcase for a different kind of Jerry Lewis that utilizes the strengths and frailties of a 90-year-old show business survivor as few films have ever done.

The terrific cast is well worth watching, but everything else about this wayward movie mistake leaves you feeling just awful.

In retrospect, it's preposterous. But while you're gasping for air, it's one hell of a thrill ride, like being stuck on a malfunctioning roller coaster for an hour and a half at top speed, and unable to get off.

Clumsy and contrived, the film never manages to connect the dots in a trio of stories set in three different cities, and I had to pinch myself to keep from falling asleep.

With terrific Appalachian ambience and moments of carefully constructed action, Devil’s Peak is not a terrible movie, but in the bigger picture, it’s not a particularly memorable one, either. It just lies there on the table, like day-old grits.

Trevorrow does not add one fresh idea to this franchise. We are simply too far along in this technological revolution to think that the computer generated creatures themselves are enough, no matter how artfully they are arranged.

With so much to look at and a plot to digest as thick as Dutch cocoa, it is not without a few problems, but I found this astonishing movie so rich and satisfying that I liked it in spite of itself. It’s the kind of guilty pleasure that sometimes confuses, but never bores. Color it flawed but gorgeous.

Instead of the feel-good comedy they intended, you are left with the suspicion that the movie is really about a man suffering from an undiagnosed mental illness for which there is no cure.

The film's weakest link is Rufus Sewell's rumpled gumshoe, inarticulate and mumbling to the point of madness.

How many ways can a film go wrong? Too many to list, and Trespass finds them all.

The film is a deeply heartfelt experience that addresses the struggles of everyday people in a strange land most of us know nothing about. You will not go away unmoved. See it, and learn something.

Every once in a while a movie comes along that is so bad it makes you feel terrible for everyone involved. Flypaper, a new indie that's little more than a haphazard assemblage of clichés, clunky camera tricks and cringe-worthy dialogue, is just such a film.

The remarkably expressive Mr. Siddig is sympathetic and true as the tortured father, communicating reams of emotion with his eyes, and Ms. Tomei is totally charismatic as his discarded lover who helps him out of a sense of humanity.

It’s not for the squeamish, but thanks to a riveting central performance by Vanessa Hudgens and a compassionate screenplay by Ron Krauss, who also directed, this is a far more sobering and substantial exposé of homeless teenage girls on the dangerous edge of society than you might expect.

The director is Joe Dante, a protégé of B-movie producer Roger Corman, who makes cheesy horror spoofs like "Gremlins" and "Piranha," along with a few good ones like "The Howling." This is not one of the good ones.

The new year is not even a month old, but a hunk of junk called Serenity already qualifies as the worst film of 2019. Both moronically written and directed with shocking, amateurish ineptitude by Stephen Knight.

One thing that defies debate: Zac Efron is going places as an actor of value. But he deserves better movies than Charlie St. Cloud.

All Nighter is an alleged comedy that doesn’t know how to be funny. But at 80 minutes long, it does know how to be merciful.

Has brief moments of levity and charm, but mostly it's depressing.

Dirty Girl is a bad movie with no insights that is broadly drawn and genuinely plagued by filthy dialogue. You don't laugh. You just wince, and wonder how the whole thing ever got financed.

Even Helen Mirren on a bad day is better than nine out of ten American film queens polluting movie screens on any given Sunday, but really, this is one time she should have stayed in bed.

It’s sexy, violent and creepy, but damn if it didn’t keep me glued to my chair with tension.

Rarely has Mr. Gere walked through any movie with so little energy and so much indifference. I've seen more fervor on the face of a man parking a car.

In Cannes, one wag described it as “cinematic defecation” in print. I’d like to top that one, but as James Agee used to say, I know when I’m licked.

A vague and forgettable crime thriller that would have benefited from more character development or at least a grounding of the narrative in one central protagonist.

The actors are fine, but the roles they are forced to play are so deadly they might as well have stayed home reading screenplays for better films.

The Out-Laws may not be for everyone, but two things are for sure: DeVine has the potential to be a major comedy star and Brosnan needs more roles where he doesn’t have to play serious. The rest is a welcome distraction for a Friday night at home.

Admirable and respectable, it engages you while you’re watching it, then leaves you empty and wanting more.

After.Life, with a pretentious point between the two words in the title for no explainable reason, is a horror film with a macabre style but few of the creepy chills of cheaper, cliché-riddled thrillers that are a dime a dozen these days.

It’s a real pleasure to share some quality time with Mr. Caine as an old man wise enough to know there’s rarely any such thing as a second time around but brave enough to take a chance anyway. But the writing and direction by Sandra Nettelbeck barely support his forceful presence.

At least Gong is ravishing, which occasionally takes your mind off the gibberish that is going full tilt around her.

Has more charm and wit than most of its J.D. Salinger-inspired cousins in the same genre, and is undeniably engaging.

Gifted and sincere as she always is, there's not much Ms. Seyfried can do with this tripe.

It’s not about Peter Pan, but about what happened before Peter Pan. The noise you hear is J. M. Barrie turning over in his grave.

It’s the witless script by Shane Atkinson and the petrified direction by Zara Hayes that lands everyone in traction.

This is an unfortunate next step for Mr. Cooper, while Ms. Lawrence, who co-starred with him memorably in "Silver Linings Playbook" and "American Hustle," finds the third time far from a charm, more like a curse.

Red Lights goes astray on so many levels that I gave up trying to figure it out before the end of the second reel.

Portman’s delicate and damaged portrayal is mesmerizing.

If you have already begun to suspect that Something Borrowed may be something less than the sum of its parts-all of which do indeed seem borrowed from other movies and TV rom-coms too numerous to mention-you are right.

The film, written by Jason Fuchs and based on a novel Elly Conway (who fans have, perhaps incorrectly, suspected is a pen name for Taylor Swift), boasts strong performances and creatively memorable sequences, but sometimes loses itself in a roller coaster of plot twists that many will see coming.

It's a stupid farrago of aborted ideas, misguided actors, lame direction, submental writing and follow-the-dots plotting that never comes anywhere within a 10-mile radius of what I used to call coherent filmmaking.

After Words is part adventure, part love story, part travelogue, and all as synthetic as rayon.

The truth is, the film represents a troubling trend in films today, where production and marketing types think they can get by providing shallow examples of things that are popular in the social justice zeitgeist — women being tough-as-nails lead characters, for example — and act like that’s enough. It’s not. Give us real characters; give us good writing; give us a compelling story. Otherwise, don’t bother.

Identity Thief is so bad it’s hard to believe it wasn’t directed by Judd Apatow or the Farrelly Brothers.

This movie is as lifeless as the bodies Morbius drains and throws on the floor.

The best thing about reviewing the new PG-13 horror movie The Turning is that you don’t have to worry about spoiling the ending because it doesn’t have one. It just, sort of, stops.

The salacious sadism in Everly is nothing more than "Die Hard" meets Victoria’s Secret. That is not a recommendation.

Another ho-hum slacker heist flick.

The filmmaking works in and of itself, but that Lakewood feels so emotionally in tune with its lead actress is a feat all on its own.

Not a great movie, but satisfying enough to hold attention and win your affection - a rare blue-plate combo on today's overcrowded menu of movie chaos that sticks to your ribs and stays there.

Despite a lot of silliness, primarily thanks to Nivola’s absurdist performance as the Rhino, Kraven the Hunter is entertaining—far more so than expected based on Morbius and Madame Web. If only it wasn’t so convoluted or dragged down by extraneous characters. If only the CGI was better.

Despite the work of a first-rate cast, it doesn’t feel real to me.

A vulgar, happy-as-cancer aberration that takes the dysfunctional family idea to a new low. Whimsical, yes. Happy, never.

By the way, for reasons nobody bothers to explain, Las Vegas is played by New Orleans. Go figure.

Dementedly written, and directed as though it was under the influence of something stronger than cough syrup.

The movie doesn’t know if it wants to be a comedy, a morality play or a cautionary tale about being careful what you wish for. I wish for fewer disasters in my future like A Long Way Down.

My reservations about Copperhead are outweighed by the noble intentions that inspired it.

The movie sinks without a trace.

On a scale of one to four stars, any film with a bit part for Helen Mirren, no matter how small and insignificant, deserves at least one. But nothing else about Berlin, I Love You rates a single mention.

It opens our eyes to a subculture about which most of us know very little, but it is so unsteady in its focus that interest wanes.

Ghosted, the new feature film on Apple TV+ from Ana de Armas, Chris Evans, and director Dexter Fletcher, is 50% romantic comedy, 50% action blockbuster, and 100% forgettable.

The formulaic cat-and-mouse game played to the death rattle by Michael Douglas’ rich, vicious corporate maniac and Jeremy Irvine’s nice, clean-cut, homespun country boy in Beyond the Reach is so old it’s hairy.

It eventually fails, not because of its philosophical ideas, but because it introduces so many of them at the same time that even a viewer with a score pad can't keep up.

Not a masterpiece, perhaps, but technically polished, with inspired performances and enough suspense that by the time Mr. Hamm found the redemption that freed him from his own demons, I was so wired I needed a Valium.

Ms. Sevigny is not called “the queen of the weirdo Bs” for nothing. (In fairness, she was a weekly television addiction as one of the polygamous Mormon wives on the hit TV series Big Love.) But not since she performed real-time fellatio on scruffy Vincent Gallo in the forgettable 2003 bomb "The Brown Bunny" has she stooped this low.

Sensitively acted, carefully written and directed with heartfelt compassion, Bringing Up Bobby is an engrossing little independent film made on an austere budget in 22 days.

It simply turns into another slash-and-dice horror flick, replete with enough screams for three more installments of the "Nightmare on Elm Street" franchise.

Everything is tenuous, including a performance by Keanu Reeves that borders on catatonia. Just because he stopped shaving doesn’t mean he can suddenly act.

The film, poorly edited and weakly unfocused by Turkish writer-director Deniz Gamze Ergüven, is a real mess.

As a bare-knuckle assault on the corruption that has come to define the creeping rot of American politics, Knife Fight is neither as satirical as Barry Levinson's "Wag the Dog" nor as incisive and wrenching as George Clooney's "The Ides of March," but it's a noble, shocking and inspired film worthy of attention.

It’s a romantic piffle stuffed with so much candy that your skin could break out.

This one blends the scented candles of a daytime soap with the tamer aspects of a middling thriller. Some folks will bring Kleenex. Others will need NoDoz.

All we know is that the only sure way to avoid the loss of any more I.Q. points in the world today is to stay away from movies like Erased.

You only have to watch the trailer to know that Producer-Director Alex Kurtzman’s reboot of Brendan Fraser’s once-charming mummy movies is full of embalming fluid.

The movie spends the bulk of its largely inert runtime painfully unaware that it is an example of the self-indulgent narcissism it’s intended to send up.

The dependable Australian actor Guy Pearce is always welcome, even in a well-meaning dud like 33 Postcards.

Anthony Hopkins plays the king of the hops, and he is excellent. So is the rest of the movie, a sober, no-frills account about the highest ransom ever collected up to that time — $10 million and counting.

Think Arnold Schwarzenegger in "Kindergarten Cop," but better.

Burning Palms is too sick to attract the masses, but he's onto something subversively valid, and the film is never boring.

Five Nights at Freddy’s takes a novel, off-the-wall premise and makes it feel rote. Even as someone who has no experience with the games, I felt as if I was on my third or fourth playthrough already.

Starts out as though it’s gearing up for romantic comedy terrain, but quickly confounds your expectations.

The resulting mayhem and slaughter is vile and disgusting.

Unfortunately, there aren’t many thrills and the pace is so slow that I fell asleep from tedium waiting for something that resembled a goose bump.

It’s fifty times more boring than the first one. It is also fifty shades dumber.

James Franco's role hardly exists. He's a doped-up cipher who attends museum openings and drives his car into a cement wall, looking as bored and out of place as he did hosting the Academy Awards.

Despite good performances from a first-rate cast, the problem here is that the movie was written and directed by Amanda Sthers, who adapted it from her own novel. The result is too literary, but not in a good way. It’s choppy like paragraphs from a book, instead of chapters.

I’ve had bigger scares from the windows at FAO Schwarz.

The 5th Wave is a typical example of the kind of dopey junk that passes for literature among today’s unsophisticated teens.