There’s still plenty of laughs left over for the audience, and the aggressive randomness of the script fuels some genuinely inventive comic moments. Although the writers of this R-rated cinematic binge frequently lose their focus, they never lose their sense of humor.

The result is a reminder that, with weak material, it’s often worse to have a really good actor. The weaknesses just stands out in sharper relief.

Perhaps it's the soothing, storybook quality of Steve Martin's narration, or the predictable third act turn, but Love the Coopers does come together in the end.

Even the brilliant Juliette Binoche, a welcome presence in any film, is reduced to whipping up empanadas and looking wistfully beyond a fence — basically standing there and doing nothing. And this is one of the most developed characters in the movie.

One of the best films of the year.

Every key plot turn is telegraphed at least twice, just in case you missed it the first time. Every emotional moment in the movie is foreshadowed a few beats in advance by the manipulative musical score.

The magic of Brooklyn can’t be analyzed, but something in the richness of its relationships puts an essential truth before us — the brevity and immensity of life. We know all about that, of course, but that’s the beauty of great art: It takes what you already know and makes you feel it.

Gripping and compelling.

Trumbo is breezy and pithy without ever undercutting the seriousness of the subject. A certain degree of wit is appropriate in a writer’s story, just as any Hollywood tale must at least have a whiff of absurdity, or else it can’t be true.

Spotlight one of the best movies about journalism ever made, at once gripping and accurate. It doesn’t just get the big things right, such as how news stories evolve, but the small things, such as what offices look like and how staff tends to react to a new boss.

Nowar keeps the exposition to a minimum; there is barely a mention of the geopolitical events surrounding Theeb. Instead, this film is a cautionary tale about survival — and keeping one’s enemies in their place.

In this her third feature as a director, Jolie once again shows a marked talent for the visual aspects of storytelling. Her shot selection is impeccable and her compositions are artful without being self-consciousness.

Although few would confuse The Nightingale with greatness (it’s just way too predictable), production-wise, everything is top notch, especially the cinematography of Sun Ming, who captures some almost epic images of rural Guangxi — makes you want to go there. Also, Li’s quiet strength as the grandfather grounds the film in a gentle, simple and appealing way.

In all, it’s a relaxed portrait of a likable fellow.

The Peanuts Movie delivers genuine happiness with the door left open for woe.

A little more character dimension would have made these between-the-sheet sessions a lot more charged.

The movie’s intelligent respect for that which is unknowable allows it to cover an enormous swath of ground in just 85 minutes. Sarah Silverman is very good in I Smile Back, and the movie is even better.

One of the great satisfactions of Spectre is that, in addition to all the stirring action, and all the timely references to a secret organization out to steal everyone’s personal information, we get to believe in Bond as a person.

Hand it to directors Michael Beach Nichols and Christopher K. Walker, who could have made the story into a black-hat/white-hat affair. Without soft-pedaling Cobb’s noxious ideology, they implicitly raise questions about how Leith responded to the perceived danger.

The attempt is to create a reality wide enough to accommodate the extremes of absurdity and hard political truth, but the pieces never cohere, and so we end up with a rattling bag of disparate elements.

The real issue is that everything about Adam’s journey feels half digested and tossed back up. We’ve seen it before. It was better the first time.

This is a movie that you will admire both for its courage and its creativity.

Occasionally, “All Things” gets stuck in a groove of industry and business minutiae — a 10-minute trim would have made this film even better — but overall, this is an assured effort: informative, bittersweet and appealing for both the young and the not so young.

By avoiding the usual cliches of the freedom saga, Suffragette finds its way to its own, specific integrity. It’s a movie that’s easier to respect than love, but it is something to respect.

This “Guide” is not for everyone; it gleefully earns its hard-R rating. But folks who enjoy their teen humor splattered with zombie guts won’t be disappointed. Scout’s honor.

While The Assassin is a noble misfire, here’s hoping Hou, who is 68, can saddle up for another ride soon. Another decade would be too long to wait for another vision from this most special director.

In the end, the film shakes down as a kind of eat-your-spinach exercise, a movie that’s worthy and perhaps good for you, but is labored and only enjoyable intermittently.

Truth is a journalism horror story, something like “All the President’s Men” but with the wrong ending and plenty of blame on all sides. It is one of the most frustrating speak-truth-to-power tales ever put onscreen, because it dares to show how that usually works out: Power wins. Big.