The actors are so good, though, that they make you want to see what they could do in a better movie than this tedious acting-class experiment.

I found the whole thing pokey and plodding, but there’s no denying the fact that even when sitting through Mr. Holmes seems numbing, Mr. McKellen is a force so powerful he’s his own reward.

Petunia augurs more titillation than it delivers and only works occasionally.

If you’re patience doesn’t wear out, the movie culminates in that clever shock ending that not only explains everything but gives what you’ve just seen a rewarding jolt.

Brief moments of light shine through the darkness, but mostly it’s a disappointing study of the confusing time we live in now. It’s a noble experiment that wears itself out fast, then drags out the running time until the idea of Covid-19 fades in the rearview mirror and we’re left facing even more problems than we started out with.

It’s meant to be a gritty slice of cornpone about revenge from a woman’s point of view, but the female protagonist who emerges is nothing but a cartoon.

Dreary, depressing and desultory, A Most Wanted Man is not my cup of Schokolade mit Schlagsahne.

The caterpillar crawl that passes for pacing succeeds in putting any number of viewers to sleep, including me.

Of course, you can’t really make a movie that combines elements of the metaphysical, zombie and haunted-house genres without a few splatter-movie clichés, but Mr. Geoghegan makes them creepier and more unpredictable than I thought possible.

King Cobra is a cut above most homoerotic masturbatory screen fantasies, but not by much.

The director’s vision is so dark — and Mr. Crowe’s grumbling, sour-stomach persona so much like a Tums commercial — that you don’t care much what happens to him or his ark, which looks like a big barge with a stove pipe in the middle.

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.

OK, it’s an action thriller with a maximum of preposterous set-ups, fraught with a minimum of actual thrills. Lamely directed by Baltasar Kormakur, every scene is built on cinder blocks of tension, but the riotous screenplay is so silly and one-dimensional you find yourself laughing in spite of yourself.

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.

There are so many ideas rattling around in Backstabbing for Beginners that are never resolved, and so many duplicitous characters that are never satisfactorily explained, that the end result is a muddle of confusion and violence that could end the future of tourism in Baghdad forever.

It is still Gerard Butler who keeps it all afloat, negotiating rough waters with superior skill.

Both the songs (once again written by two-time Oscar-winners Kristen Anderson-Lopez and Robert Lopez) and the relationships between the characters — strong points of the original film — register with less energy and originality this time around.

Our Brand Is Crisis adds up to a toothless exercise in missed opportunities that is half cautionary tale, half political satire and oddly insignificant as both.

To its credit, the latest and seemingly last Guardians installment— which at times can feel like a Spotify playlist in search of a movie— mostly manages to drown out the corporate exhaustion of its parent company with copious and often inspired needle drops, even more hit-or-miss one-liners, and a visual playfulness that recalls actual comic books.

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

Despite good intentions, the movie never lives up to the breathless excitement the real-life story promises.

This works in her favor, since everything around her is trashy and forgettable. J-Lo is the only reason to see it. As a pop flick of no consequence, it’s inviting but forgettable an hour later — but the praise Lopez has received is well deserved. She’s developed nicely as an actress. Call it learning on the job.

The love affair part of the film is so wholesomely family-oriented that it’s about as sexy as an algebra book. There isn’t even one single kiss. Fortunately, the action sequences are nothing bland or dull, adding up to a whale of entertainment.

By presenting this crucial cultural phenomenon in a staid documentary form and in the reverent tone of a hushed docent, The League has the unintentional impact of making Black baseball seem like ancient rather than living history.

In the title role of the sometimes clever but mostly contrived Carrie Pilby, she (Bel Powley) taxes the boundaries of both.

A good idea gone bad plagues this movie adaptation of D.M.W. Greer’s controversial 1992 play Burning Blue.

The cinematography is beautiful (filming in the Virgin Islands, you’d have to be a moron to make a movie that looks ugly) and the four-member cast is easy to take. Not the worst way to spend 90 minutes on a hot day.

Though there are glimmers of greatness tucked away in this film, its full potential goes unrealized and this fantastical, pharmaceutical flick ends up surprisingly unmemorable.