Anniversary is a political thriller. No, make that an apolitical thriller. Directed and co-written by Jan Komasa, it’s a hot-button story where all the buttons have gone cold. I’ve been in airport elevators with more pep.

The crude if silly humour of the movie’s first 90 minutes is followed by a dollop of sentiment at the film’s end, resulting in a case of tonal whiplash... like a slap with a wet fish followed by a forced bear hug. No doubt Tag means to be a rude but heart-warming trifle, but it just isn’t funny enough to get past its awful taste.

What can be said about series director Wes Ball is that he has a flair for noisy gun and air battles, pyro, fights, destruction, pursuit and escape. But it signifies nothing if there is no plausible reason for pretty much anything that happens.

It tries to mine humour and a bit of horror from the era but fails to make much of an impact in either genre.

As is often the case with a not-so-great film, I can report that I wanted to like it more than I did. But I just couldn’t.

While 88 has characters who have lots to say about the history of white supremacy, dark money in politics, and the delusion of fixing a corrupt system from within, this is a stiff, artless effort that barely makes the transition from explanatory journalism to fiction.

Sometimes researching the background of a movie proves more revealing than the film itself.

You’ve probably heard punchier dialog at dinner parties.

The sharks are disappointingly not scary but they’re interesting-looking with their plastic torpedo heads and serrated-saw smiles. When they leap out of the dark to dismember bodies, they bloody the waters in swirling lava lamp patterns that feel almost peaceful. Or perhaps I’m just trying to find a nicer way to say dull.

A wearying spoof, the film, with its Regency-era setting, takes a smart, sombre drama and turns it into a juvenile inanity.

Is it worth the wait? I mean, if you’ve already sat through The Last Dance — and I can’t advise that you do — then you might at well see it through to the bitter end. And I do mean bitter.

Perhaps the only scary thing about the new horror movie The Curse of La Llarona is the fear of mispronouncing the title.

It’s hard to imagine The Darkest Minds becoming the franchise it was intended to be. The plot is murky confusing and unengaging, and the entire genre may just be worn out by now.

The underdog formula doesn’t work in this film. Highlighted by Snoop Dogg’s ham-fisted acting, the script really doesn’t allow for any sort of forgiveness of his character’s oversights.

No one sets out to make a bad film, but at over two hours, the shot-in-Toronto Big Gold Brick seems like a bunch of ideas that must have looked good on paper, but just didn’t gel. Both Garcia and Isaac are terrific actors, and charismatic as hell. But neither can bring this listless film to life.

It’s awful by any metric you apply.

As flat and uncompelling as its title, Jiu Jitsu plays like a hybrid of rejected audition tapes from Predator with the outtakes from the fifth Highlander movie (and not the ones starring Christopher Lambert). But just how bad is Jiu Jitsu? Well, bad enough that the phrase “a waste of Nicolas Cage's talents” actually means something.

Neeson maintains a certain doleful dignity as an action star who apparently takes no pleasure in his gift for violence, but Blacklight has little else going for it.

A family movie with lots of CGI-talking animals and star Robert Downey Jr. hiding his charisma, Dolittle is a tiresomely chaotic concoction.

An hour and 40 minutes of noise without any tension or sense of purpose, Borderlands would be Exhibit Z in the conventional wisdom that video games don’t transfer well filmically – that is, if recent efforts like The Last of Us or Fallout hadn’t proved otherwise.

Zero “rom” and very little “com.” The action sequences are perhaps the best parts of the film. Director Pierre Morel sure knows how to crash a helicopter! But there’s only so many times you can watch Cena shoot, fight or drive his way out of danger.

To be fair to Curtis, Off the Rails is more like a Richard Curtis make-your-own-dramedy at-home game, with each character’s personality stamped on a card and they roll the dice to see which complications ensue.

A farce that fizzles, a satire that sags, and a dead-end for its gifted cast, Breaking News In Yuba County at least starts well.

At first so-bad-it's-good, then merely it’s-so-bad, Replicas’ source of interest is primarily forensic. How did director Jeffrey Nachmanoff and writer Chad St. John (London Has Fallen) think they could get away with it?

Nemesis is a low-grade gangster saga with a home-invasion twist and a cast that sounds like bigger stars from other movies.

The film is a confusing, rather than complex, series of threats and reveals and confessions that never successfully gel into a suitable resolve.

The movie attempts to strike a nerve and, in its efforts, occasionally demonstrates promise. A memorable death scene is accomplished with a blend of comedy, horror, and style. But it is a rare moment.

The script is a dazed, meandering, thing, involving drugs, pornography, neon-lit slo-mo, debauched starlets, car chases, soft-core sex scenes and loud gun fights.