It's a noteworthy achievement for director Damien Chazelle to infuse a tale about the development of a musician with all the tension and intensity of a top-notch thriller. Whiplash is riveting.

The images in The Good Lie have the power to disturb but lack the gut-punch impact necessary to give us an immediate and lasting connection to the protagonists.

John Wick is a rousing action thriller of the sort rarely encountered in theaters these days. The once popular genre, which was headlined by the likes of Stallone and Schwarzenegger during its heyday, has been a dying breed during the past two decades.

The movie is punctuated by comedy that at times verges on slapstick but there's an underlying anger in evidence - anger at the popular mindset that allows movies like "Transformers" to flourish while artistic endeavors fail.

In a way, Fury and 1970's "Patton" could be considered companion pieces. Both deal extensively with tank warfare but from different perspectives.

St. Vincent may be a little kinder and gentler than the likes of "Bad Santa," but there's enough inappropriate behavior and comedic friction to fuel an entertaining 103 minutes.

The Book of Life represents Guillermo del Toro's most hands-on foray (to date) into the realm of family friendly entertainment; this is closer in tone and sensibility to one of Tim Burton's offbeat animated films than one of Pixar's more "vanilla" productions.

There's enough compelling drama here to overcome elements of artifice. Men, Women & Children feels meaningful although perhaps not profound.

Instead of being respectful of Bram Stoker's creation, it attempts to remake him as a tragic figure with superhero powers.

Two words that come to mind when considering The Judge are generic and predictable. It's also well-intentioned and earnest (perhaps to a fault).

Pride will get viewers cheering while reflecting upon how far we have come in 30 years… and how far we have yet to go.

Kill the Messenger is compelling material but the recognition that the core of the narrative is based on true events gives it additional power.

Not only is this an amateurish travesty combining fundamentalist Christian eschatology with disaster movie b.s., but it's plodding and tedious.

Gone Girl is a rare movie: a delicious thriller that provides plenty of titillation and gruesome pleasure while offering a dollop of social commentary. It's smart, twisted, bloody, and almost guaranteed to satisfy anyone with a penchant for the macabre.

In order to show the "happiness" noted in the title, director Peter Chelsom ventures into some dark territory to provide a contrast. This results in a surprisingly unpleasant scene of torture and deprivation that may shock some viewers expecting to see a lightweight Simon Pegg dramedy about the meaning of joy.

There's probably enough content here to warrant a three-hour movie but Good People is only 90 minutes long.

With top-notch animation, effective voice casting, and a screenplay that falters only toward the end when faced with the need to provide a resolution, The Boxtrolls offers solid entertainment for older children and the parents that accompany them.

Director Anton Fuqua has jettisoned almost everything related to the TV series except the title, the main character's name, and the bare-bones premise. Even the theme song is gone. For all intents and purposes, The Equalizer isn't so much a reboot as it is an entirely new entity.

The white hats are stained dark gray as if by ashes and soot. The villains are twisted, cruel, and vile. The heroes aren't much better.

Despite a strong opening and riveting first 45 minutes, The Maze Runner devolves into one of the weakest post-apocalyptic Young Adult movies to reach theaters in recent years.

Even considering some of its late-innings flaws, this is an engaging movie that doesn't mistake histrionics and bile for solid family reunion drama.

The performances are uniformly strong and there are some powerful scenes but the overall story arc is less insightful or affecting than one might hope.

The Drop's unpredictability is organic rather than sensationalistic. The movie doesn't pull surprises out of thin air for the sole purpose of shocking an audience - it lets them develop naturally.

The November Man feels like just about every B-grade spy thriller that has ever been committed to the silver screen.

When the Game Stands Tall is one of those cliché-riddled feel good movies that, by trying too hard to be inspirational, ends up as cloying and overly sentimental.

This movie is mostly about visual razzle-dazzle and riffing on film noir conceits. Rodriguez hasn't deviated far from his mission statement for the original and that's a good thing for Sin City fans.

The problem with all of this is that Are You Here is less than two hours long and, to effectively explore issues and themes of this magnitude would require at least a full season of a TV series. So we're left with half-developed characters and quickly sketched relationships.

One of the most curious aspects of If I Stay is the way it rigorously ignores religion and spirituality. With the exception of an undefined "white light" image that recurs, the movie never once mentions "God" (as an entity). For a movie that is so much about death, it seems like an odd omission.