Despite its fascinating and humorous moments, one can't help but be frustrated when at times it switches away to spiritual pretentiousness.

Yes, Charli is playing a version of herself, but she does it well.

Ovation has a self-involved air that may be off-putting to those who don’t feel deeply immersed in that world. You may get the sense you’ve wandered into a super-intense acting class or someone’s therapy session — a hothouse atmosphere that’s oppressive.

The result is a film that feels like unfinished business. At the end, there’s a compendium of scenes from the previous “Ip Man” films, and it’s a sweetly nostalgic way to go out. If only what had come before it had been more satisfying.

Amiable though slow-going.

It’s not for people in the midst of their teen years, but for kids who are right on the edge of that social, hormonal discombobulation and are anticipating it with fear and dread. If “To All the Boys” gives courage and reassurance to apprehensive preteens — and is there any other kind? — then it will have served its public service. Still, as a movie, as entertainment … eh, it’s OK.

This latest installation in the “Big Fat Greek” franchise is colorful and celebratory, eager to entertain and wears its heart on its sleeve. There’s something to be said for that.

At 116 minutes, Five Feet Apart is too much of a just-OK thing. All the same, I want to see Haley Lu Richardson’s next movie.

Eileen builds and builds and builds, and it definitely goes somewhere, but in a way more gimmicky than true — and that leaves us feeling like we were wrong for taking it seriously.

The movie is a fantasy, and the choice is either share the fantasy or don't participate.

It's the kind of movie that crumbles into trash -- non-recyclable -- if you spend more than 10 minutes thinking about it. It's designed for dumb fun, and delivers some. [10 July 1992, p.D3]

Doesn't quite measure up to the extraordinary sweetness of the classic children's book by E.B. White on which it is based. But then again, how could it?

The makers of We Are Your Friends got halfway there, and then lost the beat.

It all gets a little unwieldy at times, but Shooting the Mafia is far from boring. We can’t take our eyes off it, just like a photo that’s out of focus, yet somehow remains arresting.

The action is difficult to follow.

Although it’s good to have a critical accounting of his role in modern American politics, most of what we see here has been reported elsewhere, and this documentary seems aimed at rallying the troops.

There may be no more unusual movie around than Vengo.

For all its sensitivity to the horrors of mental illness, The Soloist ends up as a fairly canned piece of work.

There’s nothing here to match the ingenious audacity of, say, the hospital-shootout-with-infant sequence in 1982’s “Hard Boiled,” but once Silent Night finally unwraps its gratuitous gifts, the faithful Woo fans should find them worth the wait.

Midnight Special is a sincere movie, but sometimes sincerity is half the problem.

By the time audience members start to get the joke, the film is already over.

Bratton has made a film that isn’t necessarily anti-military — he is no doubt proud of his service — but pro-humanity. In a sense, Ellis is going through his own personal boot camp. Perhaps the film should have been called “The Introspection.”

To earnest for its own good. Sincere and heartfelt, it's the kind of family film that might be at home on cable.

The last half is so superior to the first that you wish they'd rethought the whole thing and devised a way to make it more of a one piece.

The people who made this film -- particularly the ones responsible for the story and the dialogue -- should look no further when trying to understand why In Her Shoes lands with such little impact. The characters seem authentic -- until the chick-flick template distorts them.

Eddie Murphy and Martin Lawrence are back together and give both of their careers some new life in this sentimental comedy.

The picture is a soggy, all-over-the- place mess.

The film is worth watching thanks to a flawless central performance by “Glee” alum Dianna Agron, solid elder annoyance shtick from Candice Bergen and Dustin Hoffman, and Bialik’s “Big Bang Theory” co-star Simon Helberg locating his pain and relishing every minute of it.