Calling The Angry Birds Movie an “animated film” is giving it airs. It’s a cartoon. Deal with it.

Aside from the lip service paid to the pros and cons of releasing free hydrogen onto the world market, Chain Reaction doesn't contain anything that we haven't already seen this summer. The explosive destruction that wipes out a portion of Chicago looks like it could have been excised from Independence Day. The action sequences recall Mission Impossible, Eraser, and The Rock, albeit with less energy. The concept of government agents being bad guys has been used so often that it has long since turned into a tired cliche. Chain Reaction isn't dull -- the film is paced to keep audiences attentive -- but the lack of originality dampens its enjoyability. As a result, box office reaction will almost certainly be more like a spark than an explosion.

Distilled to its essence, The Girl in the Spider’s Web is a generic espionage/crime thriller. Although briskly paced, the plot is far from airtight and demands a deus ex machina to reach its climax.

Watching this movie, I wished I knew how to use dental floss, a paper clip, and a crumpled movie ticket to break the projector.

Although the second installment is effective at moving the story forward rather than re-treading familiar ground, it enters a patch of quicksand from which it is unprepared to escape. Disney is adept at doing many things but offering a sobering and intelligent examination of genocide is not among them.

Anything Else may not be the second coming of "Annie Hall," but it has more wit and substance than almost every post-college romance that sees the inside of a projection booth.

Great premise, terrible execution.

All I See Is You ultimately fails to deliver much beyond a gradual descent into disinterest and watch-checking.

The biggest flaw of the 1990 Total Recall was how disappointingly banal the endgame was. Wiseman adds some special effects and Michael Bay-style pyrotechnics, but the result is similar. It's doubly deflating because one of the great advantages of remaking a movie is being given the opportunity to correct problems - something not attempted here.

With a script that waffles between being hilariously absurd and insultingly stupid, and action scenes that won't cause anyone's pulse to skip a beat, Paycheck is less appealing than a lump of coal in a Christmas stocking.

An insipid, stillborn drama that drags its viewers through a ghetto of despair before finally, unexpectedly plopping them down in the midst of a happy ending.

The really disgusting thing about this movie isn't the crude jokes themselves, but how grossly unfunny they all are.

Hocus Pocus is an occasionally dull, mostly pedantic motion picture with little to recommend it. It belongs on the long list of summer movies that will quickly be buried and forgotten until the surface on video in six months. For real fun at the expense of the dead, see instead Sam Raimi's Army of Darkness.

The root problem with The Wolfman is that it's a hybrid.

The appeal is there for those who crave formulaic romantic drama, but there's little of interest for a wider audience.

The story is unfocused and the character development is virtually nonexistent.

It is disappointing (and a little boring). The chief problem relates to structure. The film unspools more like a puzzle than a cohesive narrative.

Those who have seen Richard Lester's '70s tongue-in-cheek version of the adventure should avoid this one, lest they feel compelled to hurl popcorn and invectives at the screen.

As a follow-up/homage, Chapter 1 isn’t bad but it feels superfluous, adding little substantive to what was previously provided by The Strangers and the second film in the series, 2018’s The Strangers: Prey at Night.

Strong acting is one of the film's hallmarks. It has been a while since Samuel L. Jackson has given a performance with this much intensity.

With each new outing, the Final Destination movies are getting better.

Where the Crawdads Sing is not without flaws but it draws the viewer into its specific time and place and offers an engaging two-hour escape into the life of a memorable individual.

"Twister" is a rush. Dante's Peak, on the other hand, is a bore. Oh, it has its moments, but most of them are concentrated in the final forty-five minutes. The first hour, which is all typical disaster movie setup, is interminable.

This is made-for-TV material dressed up by Eddie Murphy's participation into a theatrical release.

Newell has followed up a respectable adaptation of a Harry Potter novel with an ignominious translation of something more delicate and literate. It's hard to recommend this movie to anyone except perhaps the MST3K crew.

Meet Joe Black has the dubious distinction of being the longest film to date of 1998. It is also one of the most tedious and bombastic.

Evans' goal is to do for high school baseball what "Hoosiers" did for high school basketball, but to mention both titles in one sentence is almost an insult to a picture that many rank as the first or second all-time sports film.

This movie is a vast improvement over the tired and uninspired "American Pie 2," although it fails to make it to the lofty perch occupied by the first film.

Rarely does The Man with the Golden Gun take anything seriously. Mary Goodnight is as clumsy as they come. Pepper and Nick Nack are cartoonish. There are more jokes-per-minute than in any other Bond film. Even John Barry's score is less earnest than usual, and the opening song is ridiculous.

The Uninvited is a flawed production, but gratifying in the way it delivers. The interesting and unique elements of the movie effectively compensate for the formulaic way in which the plot develops.

A profoundly unsatisfying experience - and that doesn't consider the derivative nature of the plot and a lackluster performance by the lead actor.

Joe Eszterhas' screenplay doesn't make sense, and he doesn't bother to hide this fact. In the end, Basic Instinct teases and screws us with the same efficiency that the film's femme fatale handles the protagonist.

Although it’s being marketed as a love story, The Aftermath is more about grief and recovery than romance. In fact, the film’s illicit relationship is a cold, passionless affair that generates as much heat as a dying ember in a snowstorm.

Kogonada's direction crafts a variety of visually arresting—though not ostentatious—set pieces. Yet somehow, it doesn’t all come together. The whimsical magic evident early on grows stale. The movie’s tone is herky-jerky and never settles. And the ending feels undercooked and unearned.

Once you leave Wonderland, you may feel like you need a shower, but, while you're in the moment, it's a compelling journey into the depths of hell on earth.

This movie is about mayhem on wheels, tough guys viewers can root for, and villains whose comeuppances audiences crave. That's what Death Race is all about and, for what it is, it does a solid job.

The action sequences are energetic and suspenseful but they don't always mesh well with the dramatic material.

A perfect example of how solid directing and good acting can almost redeem a derivative story.

This could easily go down as the year's best example of solid acting in a wretched motion picture.

Retribution seems especially disappointing, however, because of its untapped potential to be cheesily entertaining. The finished product is so bad that I can’t even recommend it for viewing on a streaming service – somewhere it should land very quickly.

My reaction is that I could learn a lot more about Winehouse by listening to her music than by watching this by-the-numbers sketch of her adult life.

Eternal isn't that bad. Actually, it is. But it's kind of fun, too, in a way only cheesy exploitation films can be fun.

Those who have an inherent distaste for this sort of entertainment will appreciate Conan the Barbarian's impeccable production values without enjoying the story; most everyone else will be swept away by the film's spectacle.

Its strength is its humor, which is half-"Seinfeld" and half-"Sex in the City." There's a reason why those shows ran for only 30 minutes each - it's difficult to sustain comedic momentum for longer, as becomes apparent here.

Dark Phoenix is closer to the comic book story than the previous iteration, retaining many of the core elements. Unfortunately, it suffers from a massive condensation that not only mutes the film’s emotional impact but creates an erratic tone.

Fuqua's portrait of Brooklyn is brutal and gritty; if only his characters were as vivid.

The movie, however, seems to make the wrong decision at almost every opportunity, trying for the kind of melodramatic tragedy that only works in opera.

The end result is a meandering story featuring shallow, unconvincing characters attempting to illustrate the evils of technology in its undermining of individual liberties. The Circle offers a lot of good bullet arguments but this is a movie not a Powerpoint presentation.

Glass, the third film in what has become a trilogy, comes across as a mix of half-formed ideas baked into an uneven casserole. Overlong, talky, filled with meta references, and with a strangely low-energy tone, the movie never fully gels.

Isn't much better or worse than the average James Bond movie, except, of course, that it doesn't have the cars, the gadgets, the girls, or Bond himself.

The worst action movie of the summer. I liked Bad Boys II a little less, but making the comparison is like distinguishing between a cow turd and a horse turd. And that pretty much sums it up nicely.

There's nothing worse than a film which mistakenly believes it's the comic event of the year. For no legitimate reason whatsoever, When Nature Calls is full of itself to the point of being offensive.

Zero-star movies are a rare and terrifying breed - films that warrant recommendation only as an alternative to physical distress.

The acting in Beach House is uniformly strong and that’s one reason why the film works despite various narrative shortcomings.

There are some jokes no one under 10 will get (a few of which are pretty funny) to go along with the visual diarrhea that clutters the screen with needless “action” sequences. The resolution to the emotional component of the climax feels like an unearned cheat, but I suppose it’s okay when one considers it will probably work for children.

The story told by Jackson's The Lovely Bones is the same as the one related by Sebold, but it lacks the complexity and empathy evident in the book.

The greatest flaw in My Father the Hero isn't the feeble laugh-to-running length ratio, the limp characterization, or the mediocre acting. Instead, it's the feeling of unease that pervades the first forty-five minutes as Nicole and Andre clash while the film tries unsuccessfully to make light of their dysfunctional relationship. There are serious issues bubbling away here that the movie doesn't know how to address properly. Lighthearted motion pictures should never cause discomfort, but this one does.

The Time Machine is stupid -- too stupid for the impressive special effects or the competently directed action sequences to wash away the bitter taste.

There's some entertainment value, but the production as a whole is unfocused.

Stuber is as bland and generic a mismatched buddy action-comedy as you’re likely to find.

Insurgent is more clumsy than bad, but it disappoints because it wastes the world-building of Divergent, which set the stage for something more momentous than what the sequel delivers.

Director Lucky McKee and screenwriters Jared Butler and Lars Norberg take a standard premise and tweak it sufficiently to make it interesting and, at times, even darkly humorous.

Although it's true that a father/son relationship lies at Sanctum's emotional core, the movie is at its best when it highlights the defiance of the protagonists to yield to despair and give up.

Robinson's movie flip-flops back and forth between being inept and goofy.

Had Home of the Brave presented credible stories about believable characters, it might have been a powerful drama.

This is cheap-looking, ugly filmmaking. It goes without saying that the story is nonsensical. The characters have the depth of crepe paper. But perhaps what’s most surprising is that the endless CGI hasn’t gotten a noticeable upgrade since 2017’s Transformers: The Last Knight. Modern video games look better.

It's an adequate superhero yarn, but, hopefully, it's not the best of the burgeoning genre that 2003 has to offer.

Robert the Bruce is too long by at least a half-hour for the surprisingly slight tale it has to tell.

Science fiction has an obligation to seduce the viewer into applying the "willing suspension of disbelief." With its plot holes and head-scratching incongruities, Transcendence fails in this arena thereby making the production as a whole feel bloated and unsatisfying.

With a movie of this sort, the viewer expects to undergo something grueling and disturbing. Trade's inability to deliver that sort of visceral experience makes it unworthy of anyone's hard-earned dollars.

Everything about it feels stale: the actors, the story, the comedy, everything. And, to make matters worse, that everything goes on for an interminable two hours.

A comedy without a single funny joke, Mafia Mamma will likely go down as one of the year’s worst theatrical releases.

The movie is rarely funny with much of the comedy being too broad, too predictable, or both.

The first Aquaman may have been low-brow fun but the second is a chore from start to finish.

The Ice Road may be the worst direct-to-Netflix movie to feature a major star. It may also offer the worst entry into Liam Neeson’s catalog of strong, resilient action heroes.

Despite its flaws, Total Eclipse is the kind of movie that stirs thoughts and ruminations about the nature of genius, the true meaning of art, and the unfailing capacity of great people to destroy themselves and others. Holland has not matched the success of two of her previous films -- Europa Europa and Olivier Olivier -- but this picture is still a respectable examination of a fascinating historical relationship.

The "Da Vinci Code" was adequate but forgettable. "Angels & Demons" was godawful. Inferno is somewhere in between - watchable but by no means worth the money and effort necessary to see it theatrically.

Captain America: Brave New World, the fourth title to co-opt the “Captain America” name and the first to star Anthony Mackie in the role, is another example of how badly unmoored the MCU has become in an era of unfamiliar heroes and stalled storylines.

Put simply, this movie is dumb.

The result is a poorly-focused motion picture characterized by limp satire and capped off by a final fifteen minutes that could send half of the audience into sugar shock.

A movie that is relentlessly inoffensive and completely unoriginal –- two qualities that combine to make it only sporadically charming and rarely (if ever) compelling.

This is yet another chapter in “When Smart Movies Turn Dumb.”

Stargate is peppered with numerous minor faults, some of which - although not all - are easily forgiven. It's the bigger plot problems and lackluster climax which are more difficult to excuse.

The action scenes are crisply directed, brutal, and invigorating.

It is a recognized truth of the movie industry that even the best film makers will have disappointments, and, for Woody Allen, Celebrity fits into that category.

If the film is to work on any level, even a comedic one, it's necessary for the viewers to sympathize with Joanna and Walter. However, the script and scattershot performances keep them at arm's length. Nicole Kidman is in full scenery-chewing mode, and Matthew Broderick hasn't been this invisible since Ferris Bueller had to go back to school.

The essential problem with the movie isn't that it's loud, violent, and gory, but that, before Carpenter ratchets up the tension in the final 35 minutes, it's not especially interesting.

I have never been a fan of the original Carrie, but, despite the different slant offered by The Rage, there's not enough new material here for me to like the sequel any better.

A shift in tone to something like "Kingsman" might have made this a more entertaining experience.

Armageddon is a testosterone and adrenaline cocktail, with almost no intelligence added for flavoring.

12 year old boys will love the result. That’s not a good sign for anyone who has passed beyond their teenage years.

Although For Love or Money is a marginal film by any standards, it isn't unwatchable, and it does fit nicely into the "date movie" niche. I can't honestly recommend the movie, but it isn't completely without redeeming qualities.

The movie's sincerity helps it get over some of the most difficult hurdles and the feeling after leaving theater is one of having experienced something worthwhile albeit unremarkable.

This isn't vintage De Niro but at least there's more substance here than in a lot of his other recent projects. Michelle Pfeiffer, who flirted with this sort of a role 25 years ago in "Married to the Mob," is enjoying something of a renaissance after working only sparingly for more than a decade.

Fred Claus is less enchanting than the 2003 fairy tale, "Elf" (which was directed by Vaughn's good buddy, Jon Favreau), but no worse than the inexplicably popular Tim Allen series.

It's pure comic book/popcorn action. If that's your kind of movie, it's hard to go wrong with this one.

An example of a vampire movie for the new century -- stylish, gothic, gory, and loud.

LaBeouf, who appeared to hit a low in "Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull," has sunk to greater levels of incompetence here.