As a Nicolas Cage movie — not just as a movie, but as a vehicle for what a specific actor can do onscreen — this is the most interesting thing Cage has done since “Face/Off.”

Black Widow is what happens when movies abandon human values for the emotional deadness and emptiness of the superhero movie.

For all the hip checks and bloody noses, it doesn't have a mean bone in its body.

Especially terrific is Rieger, who is a 25-year-old rising star in Israel. She displays a fierce intensity and an appealing vulnerability, and here’s betting that if she chose to, she could follow Gal Gadot’s path from Israel to Hollywood stardom.

The relentlessly downbeat drama American Woman is a star vehicle that lets Sienna Miller (“American Sniper,” HBO’s “The Girl”) really show what she can do. But she does too much.

In creating his modern homage to the classic film, Im has twisted all the heated melodrama into a satiric - and in the end, surrealist - attack on the terrors of the polished upper class.

Almost satirical.

Most important, the relationship between P-Orridge and Lady Jaye comes off as heartfelt, and "Ballad" makes you feel something. Just like art.

Savagely lyrical, Vazante offers a harsh, impressionistic take on slavery in 19th century Brazil. And though the storytelling leans toward the opaque, the film has a sense of authenticity and power that keep it interesting.

Doesn't always work, but it challenges, nonetheless.

What it's really about - and this sounds so boring, and so nothing, when in fact it's really rather wonderful - is people. Just regular people, a mother and daughter, whose lives are observed with economy and precision, and with an eye for the telling detail and the tense, revealing moment.

Probably the world's first jihad terrorist comedy, Four Lions is a daring, brilliantly conceptualized film, but like the bumbling bombers of the title, the execution tends to be hit-and-miss.

Domingo, who began his career as a stage actor in San Francisco, brings velocity to all the scenes involving the march. He seems unbound, possessed by an understanding that he’s doing something bigger than himself.

In a deceptively low-key manner, Danish filmmaker Michael Madsen has beautifully crafted one of the most provocative movies of the year.

Though it ultimately recovers, too much of The Good Thief forgets about Bob, and in the process the movie loses much of its allure and vividness.

There’s much of value to be had along the way to a nicely handled ending. It would be a mistake to call it a surprise, but it’s something that few viewers are likely to expect.

At 2 1/2 hours, Gladiator is a long ride, but it doesn't drag.

Short on complexity and depth, The Divine Order gives us a parade of heroines and villains. Instead of raising questions, it seems to want to induce in viewers a sense of smugness.

Moon is boring. Agonizingly, deadeningly, coma-inducingly, they-could-bury-you-alive-accidentally boring.

Band Aid is her (Zoe Lister-Jones) first film as a director — she also wrote and stars in it — and something about her and this film is really appealing.

It’s a complicated situation despite how morally straightforward it appears. Scout’s Honor deserves some kind of merit badge for trying to untangle the knotty, awful mess.

Deserves to ride the wave of the latest, hottest micro-trend in pictures: the romantic comedy for guys.

The film itself is wretched. A grueling, numbing black hole.

This 1968 William Friedkin comedy set in 1925 New York will be appreciated by those who enjoy the corny humor and bawdy broads of burlesque.

By the end you can't help but wonder whether it was a good idea to keep the youngsters under camera scrutiny for more than 12 years.

If “Dead Man’s Wire” has a weakness it’s that it doesn’t create an intense desire to find out how it all turns out. It compensates with dark humor and with a central performance by Skarsgård that’s fascinating.

Beyond the superb acting, Concrete Cowboy gets a lot of mileage from its visually arresting riding scenes and its spot-on score, which is both haunting and inspirational.

Avatar: The Way of Water is a one-hour story rattling around in a 192-minute bag.