Sometimes hilarious and pleasingly intense, “Day the Earth Blew Up” can also be kind of meh. But even when not as clever as its legacy demands, there’s enough of the old aesthetic and eclecticism to make us hope that this ain’t all, folks.

The last half-hour of “Opus” is an unbearable slog, with an unsatisfying ending.

There is a sweet romantic comedy action that sometimes emerges in this bone crunching, bloody spectacle, but only occasionally does it surface.

Bong has an original vision and a distinctive style that’s not to be dismissed. He’s our era’s Terry Gilliam, where hope pushes through the tragicomic nihilism.

This is a lean, fast-moving and effective movie, with an undersea world that is as vast and lonely as outer space.

Seriously, if you dislike Liza, you might want to take a look at yourself and figure out what’s going on there. Or, better yet, just go see “Liza: A Truly Terrific Absolutely True Story,” the new documentary about her life and career, and become a convert.

If Quentin Tarantino ever made a family film, it might look like “Riff Raff.”

Fundamentally, though, “My Dead Friend Zoe” is a tricky story told exceedingly well. It earns our attention — and a few salutes.

All this could work, but Perkins never finds the proper tone in what is almost a spoof of the horror genre.

Cleaner is a good-not-great thriller in the “Die Hard” mold that gets an extra lift from Campbell’s skillful direction and from Ridley, who is slowly but surely showing herself to be a performer of wide range and appeal.

Complete with cliches and culturally cringe-inducing stereotypes — poor but happy villagers, sweaty villains — Peruvians will hardly use this film in their tourist advertising.

Captain America: Brave New World doesn’t have such lofty ambitions — its makers probably just thought it was a cool title — but it is surprisingly engaging, primarily because of the people in ‘t.

It can be charmingly elliptical at first (and even again toward end, when things get momentarily, gleefully weird), but the film gradually loses its power as Parthenope’s life becomes a kind of pointless merry-go-round showcasing new permutations of her seductive beauty.

The key to any Amy Schumer comedy is how often she gets to play self-delusion, embarrassment, fear and rage. As long as the emotions, terrors and humiliations are big, she’s funny, and her latest, “Kinda Pregnant,” gives her lots of opportunities to be funny.

Love Hurts is that rare action movie almost devoid of noticeable computer effects. It’s a hand-to-hand, bone-crunching martial arts movie with tongue firmly in cheek, resembling those Jackie Chan action comedies from the 1980s and ’90s.

Sly Lives! may not provide definitive answers, but the fact that it even asks those questions puts it a cut above most films in its genre.

The emotion the Zucheros are trying to express and illustrate here is a deep, fathomless, infinite loneliness, and here and there, but more than once or twice, they hit their target.

It’s a film that feels instantly antiquated, despite its attempts to capture Gen Z angst.

It’s just not very fun or engaging.

At its core, Star Trek: Section 31 suffers from a kind of existential emptiness. It appropriates some of the surface-level iconography of “Trek” but fails to uphold its spirit. It nods to continuity, but the dense lore feels like a gatekeeping exercise and the breezy tone undermines the gravitas of its own premise.

Back in Action is no comedy classic, but it’s a better than average excuse for getting back on the Cameron Diaz train.

Jerome and Lopez build an undeniable chemistry that powers the movie, and it wouldn’t work at all unless Jerome wasn’t excellent as well. He is.

Wolf Man does not fully compel until it becomes ridiculous, employing a wolf-cam perspective that shows what a werewolf sees when he encounters people: glowing-eyed figures who look like AI-hallucinuted Teletubbies.

Well, there’s one way for a biopic about a self-loathing, self-aggrandizing, self-pitying and self-involved music star seem different: Make him an ape.

The suffering artist story is as old as time. Yet “The Brutalist” tells it with such specificity and visceral conviction, it feels entirely fresh. Modern, even.

Oh, Canada is about not so much Fife’s artistic growth as his journey to hermetically sealed narcissism.

Hard Truths lacks subplots, or, come to think of it, a plot. Good thing, then, that it features one of the best lead performances of the movie awards season. Pansy might remain a bit of a mystery, but Jean-Baptiste is clearly a revelation.

Clocking in at a mere 79 minutes, featuring plenty of laughs and climaxing with a rousing chase, “Wallace & Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl” is an impressive feat of clay, a winning choice in a competitive animated holiday season.