Ixcanul provides a window into a culture that we rarely see. But it’s not just an anthropological study — it has a powerful story to tell, too.

Starts as a taut thriller, but loses some momentum before picking up again, and Klaussner’s fine performance keeps us on edge through most of the film, even though we know the result.

Southside With You proves once and for all that a romantic film doesn’t rely on suspense. We know these people are getting together. What holds us to our seats is wondering how it will happen.

A film that can’t decide whether it wants to be “Raging Bull” or “Remember the Titans.” In the end, it’s a little too much of both.

It’s best to accept Don’t Breathe as simply a piece of lowdown fun — connoisseurs of creepy and sometimes brutal chills will have a good time.

The problem comes down to this: If you take the spirituality out of Ben-Hur, you take the Ben-Hur out of Ben-Hur.

What Laika achieves is an effective mixture of hyper-real and hyper-stylized, a combination that keeps “Kubo” appealing to the eye for audiences of all ages. If the film’s plotting and dialogue had measured up, “Kubo” might have been a masterpiece.

Herzog is not able to go into a lot of depth. That keeps Lo and Behold from greatness, but it is nonetheless compelling, because of the way Herzog organizes the material.

A solid piece of in-the-moment entertainment that fails in its attempt to be something more.

The movie is as interesting as spying on your neighbors during the most interesting 85 minutes of their lives.

In the end, what makes Equity an intelligent and honest movie keeps it from being a total crowd-pleaser.

What Mackenzie has crafted here is a crowd-pleaser with undeniable art-house elements.

There should be more American family movies like Pete’s Dragon. Since there aren’t, we should get behind this one.

Sausage Party is definitely not for everyone. Its well-earned R rating guarantees that. But what might prove the often hilarious and startlingly intelligent film’s greatest bar to blockbuster status is the very thing that sets it apart: its ideas.

It’s mildly amusing when it should be funny, sentimental when it should be deep and all too easy when it should be unsettling. It’s still some kind of success, but a modest one.

A film that is at its best onstage.

Like the best wines and the best films, there’s a complexity to the finish, so that it reverberates with meanings beyond the obvious. Indignation has the disconcerting quality of truth and is an altogether adult piece of work.

It’s a lot of ground to cover, but if the movie fails to plumb the depth of Lear’s mystery, it succeeds in being an entertaining look at an influential figure.

It’s the kind of torment you can wish on your worst enemy without feeling too guilty, not something to inflict permanent damage, just two hours of soul-sickening confusion and sensory torment.

Cliche piles on top of cliche to make a nearly two-hour film feel twice as long, simply because we see so many things coming that we feel as though we’re watching each section twice.

The complicated truth is that the Internet’s dangers are entwined with its pleasures, the allure of instant fame, the illusion of contact with masses of people. Nerve is the first movie to capture all that, and the result is a successful and memorable thriller.

Ultimately, while Gleason can be tough to watch, it has a strong message about the value of relationships and how to spend a life doing meaningful work against great odds.

Phantom Boy has a cute, comic-book vibe to it, a visually pleasing style and a fast pace. It’s fun, for sure.

The character motivations are weak, and the story is poorly structured. But its camera work, possibly intended to distract audiences from the movie’s flaws, only compounds its problems. It distances the audience and makes Jason Bourne a chore to sit through.

You can’t make a raunchy comedy and a sentimental paean to motherhood at the same time. You have to choose either one or the other. Raunchiness or sincerity. Try to do both, and you end up with a flailing, unfunny wreck, like the mix of contradictory and self-defeating impulses that we find here.

Engaging to watch partly because of the three young stars’ personalities — despite a few adolescent squabbles, they remain likable sorts.

The Ice Age screenwriters seem to be making up the rules as they go along, distracted by tired side plots to give the other characters a reason to exist in the film.

Lights Out presents actual characters that are interesting, that have rough edges, that act like real people, not victims in waiting.