Jeff Nichols fashions three-quarters of a terrific movie with Midnight Special, a slow burn science fiction thriller. The rest is merely gripping, which isn't a bad problem to have.

At least the latest movie about the financial meltdown doesn't make the same mistake as the last one. It also doesn't prove that a fictional film can explain the downturn's causes and effects better than a documentary.

While the villains are standard issue evil, Wonder Woman is remarkable in the genre for its early 20th century setting and Gadot's galvanizing performance.

The Revenant is an action blockbuster with an art house soul, a headlong rush of motion with meaning. Pure cinema from Iñárritu and Lubezki, two undisputed masters working at their peaks.

Most of the time the film slides along on funky music, lively dance and snappy street-style dialogue. Other teen comedies feature more hair-raising plots and spectacular stunts; other teen comedies are far more sexually explicit. House Party has a wistful, almost naive, air that runs counter to the broad-based perception of young blacks as hardened and hopeless, one step away from doing hard time. [9 Mar 1990, p.6]

Green studies characters, allowing scenes more time to expand personalities and usually knowing when to cut. Stronger is his most conventional, audience-friendly material ever but is still a movie of such quiet intimacies.

Robespierre does a nice job of balancing the seriousness of this situation with the no-boundaries irreverence of Donna's comedy background.

10 Cloverfield Lane superbly shuffles what we know (and don't) and what the characters are experiencing.

A Dangerous Method is a movie believing the most formidable sex organ really is the brain.

Sounds depressing, although Rabbit Hole isn't, with David Lindsay-Abaire presenting a perceptive, subtly dark-humored adaptation of his Pulitzer Prize-winning play.

The Last of the Mohicans is grand entertainment. Romantic, exciting, though unremittingly violent at times, it is rich in frontier lore and in its respect for the land that the conquering settlers too often take for granted. [25 Sep 1992, p.5]

The movie has a caffeinated spirit worthy of its graveyard shift milieu, a darkness artfully breached by cinematographer Robert Elswit, who previously framed L.A.'s unstill life in Magnolia and Boogie Nights.

The Hunger Games: Catching Fire is movie escapism made with intelligence, and that doesn't come around often enough. As I sensed this movie ending I wished it wouldn't, and when it did I wanted the next one now. Take that, Bilbo.

Nothing much happens in Greenberg, yet Stiller and co-star Greta Gerwig make inconsequence tolerable with solid performances.

Rapace is a magnetic presence in a far-ranging mystery requiring such a solid character to orbit around.

Mistress America is certainly funnier and sunnier than While We're Young, mostly thanks to Gerwig, America's dizzy, dazzling new girl on the side.

Rango is wild, woolly and weird, and the first movie of 2011 that I must see again.

Writer-director Levinson returns to Baltimore (his home town) with a perceptive, rueful comedy called Tin Men. It is about male camaraderie and revenge, and it, too, uses its setting as a statement. Baltimore, circa 1963, represents hope, transition and a fading American Dream. [13 Mar 1987, p.1D]

The movie always fascinates thanks to Olsen, who'll never be just a semifamous sister again.

For all of its carnal frivolity, The Wolf of Wall Street lacks passion and purpose, qualities Scorsese at his best has in abundance.

The standout in Win Win is Alex Shaffer, a former New Jersey state champion cast as Kyle.

A Cry in the Dark reaches out from the screen to make an emotional connection that doesn't let go until the final credits. It is a wonderful film. [16 Nov 1988, p.1D]

Bridesmaids is a bit of a groundbreaker... Not exactly a banner for feminism but equal time is overdue.

Yes, Kermit does reprise The Rainbow Connection, surely one of the loveliest movie songs ever and, yes, it still brings tears to your eyes. Happy tears, realizing some marvelous things never change.

Gary Oldman may finally get that Oscar he has long deserved for Darkest Hour, a movie that seems constructed to do little else.

I'll See You in My Dreams is a disarming romantic dramedy, constructed from "geezer flick" cliches, to be sure, yet lifted to another level by the performances, top-to-bottom.

One of the finest pictures released this year. [13 Nov 1987, p.1D]

This movie's balletic brutality, its relentless pacing and practical stunt work are breathtaking.