There's a lot of chutzpah on display throughout the film, even during essentially soggy, dialogue-intensive sequences, which are broken up by disorienting flashbacks. But Jung's biggest failing is his inability to make Sook-hee a heroine worth caring about.

A figure as unusual and distinctive as Fields certainly deserves a commemoration. The bad news here is that he deserves better than what Danny Says serves up.

If this particular kind of performance is not your cup of tea (and, admittedly, it is not mine), you might find yourself resisting the journey of female empowerment and the uplift that's ultimately in store.

A puzzle movie with too many unnecessary pieces and not enough essential ones, but it's superior to its predecessor in a few basic ways.

Features some of the worst post-synching seen in any recent movie. If Eisenstein, the consummate craftsman, would have regretted Greenaway’s penchant for pointless and overdone circular tracking shots, he surely would have groaned at how the actors’ lips here and the words they speak are so often on different timetables.

Dark Harvest misses many beats necessary for a fully realized narrative. And yet the concept and its action-driven execution make a fun watch with some laughs of incredulity.

Feels more like a collection of interrelated short stories cobbled into an flavorful but ultimately unwieldy narrative.

The exceptionally talented Richardson does her best with a woefully underwritten character.

The particularly outstanding cinematography is by Dante Spinotti, the craftsman who also shot the likes of “Heat” and “L.A. Confidential.”

The film's retro, John Carpenter-esque synthesizer score, composed by Jeff Grace, further pushes viewers away.

Once we're able to see Harlin's new trilogy as a whole, “Chapter 1” might feel more essential to the 4.5-hour experience. Right now, it just feels overly familiar.

Someday, there will be a take on the life and work of John Belushi that is as fascinating, complex, and entertaining as he was. Belushi, however, is not quite that film.

Franco fills his ensemble with recognizable faces, many of whom give great one-or-two-scene performances. Most notably, Vincent D’Onofrio shines as London.

Players, written by Whit Anderson and directed by Trish Sie, struggles with the inherent artificiality of its setup. The tropes are so front and center that real life barely has any room to breathe.

Outpost only succeeds if we are invested in Kate’s trajectory and ultimate fate, and I never was.

A gentle low-key comedy.

The problem with “Vice is Broke” is it never quite gets around to answering what went wrong with Vice, content to mimic its “quirky” form of filmmaking as interview subjects recall the toxic workplace atmosphere that undeniably produced some formative journalism.

By playing with formalism, using faux documentary, and cranking out hedonistic scenes of excessive drug taking and partying, Yates aims to blend “Erin Brockovich” and “The Wolf of Wall Street.” But the director’s filmic language never offers quite enough sex, quite enough excess, quite enough of capitalism’s depravity. Pain Hustlers just doesn’t know how to commit.

Castañeda and Van Damme's scene-stealing performances don't significantly improve writer/director Lior Geller's frequent reliance on racial stereotypes and gangster movie cliches.

While the settings may indeed be beautiful, every frame here has been location-scouted and dressed to a fare-thee-well that sucks all the life out of every image—the viewer might also rest easy at the near-certain prospect that The Unfortunate Events will be conveyed as antiseptically and tastefully as possible.

At Middleton is the just the sort of trite if inoffensive diversion that barely tiptoes into theaters before landing in the cable and video-on-demand listings.

A grueling coming-of-age thriller on the cliché-heavy side, with little hook to offer other than Wolff’s aching screen presence.

Lasse Hallström‘s latest film, The Map That Leads to You, has the makings of a Gen Z “Before Sunset” meets “Eat Pray Love,” but unfortunately, it also has the depth of a mediocre beach read weepy. That is to say, I enjoyed it as I watched, but it has had no lasting effect on my memory or, even worse, my heart.

The Woman in Black 2 might have served as an effective tribute to movies like "Curse of the Cat People." That is, if it hadn't completely squandered all this goodwill in its last third.

As a gangster film, “The Alto Knights” does little more than putter along, taking in very few new or interesting sights along the way.

For every delicate element there are many others that are heavy-handed or cringe-inducing, including some painfully on-the-nose musical selections. (Salt-N-Pepa’s perky “Push It” plays while Collins’ character, Rosie, is giving birth. Get it? Because she’s pushing!)

Your appreciation for this film will depend in large part on where this all falls on your personal continuum from “funny” to “funny-ish,” to “eww.”

For despite how much I liked about Hunnam’s work here, I could never completely engage with Papillon given how little it adds to the story that’s already been told and the overdone genre of humans surviving outright torture.