It isn’t a documentarian’s job, necessarily, to prescribe remedies for the social problems she reports. But de Mare and Kelly never get as far as framing the scope of the problem in any real way.

Ultimately, the Tickells cram so much into their 90-minute cause machine that nothing really sticks, and seemingly crucial interviews soon become distant memories.

Janiak handles both horror and drama ably enough to suggest that she’d excel at either genre. She hasn’t yet mastered the combination, but it’s only her first try. Give her time.

The emotions evoked by Bird People should be familiar to anyone who ever stared out the window of a classroom, imagining what it would be like to leave school, hop on a bike, and go for a ride around the mostly empty neighborhood.

My Old Lady isn’t the tart slice of dessert that its initial scenes suggest it might be. In fact, it only becomes truly compelling in its second half, as Horovitz drives toward darker material and farther away from the light.

Stray Dogs evokes the whole of Tsai’s filmography, but also pays off his collaboration with Lee, who shows a side of himself that’s been hidden away for all these years.

The Green Prince relates gripping events in a doggedly subdued manner, via direct-to-camera interviews and dramatic re-creations.

For a first-time director, Amini demonstrates considerable skill both with actors and with the camera, giving the film a pungent balance of visual elegance and moral seediness.

As Christian knock-offs of secular films go, The Remaining is surprisingly respectable. At the risk of crazily overrating the film, The Remaining has to qualify as one of the most stirringly adequate, totally acceptable explicitly Christian horror movies ever made.

The film’s constant nods to the artificiality of its narrative highlight its precious, cloying phoniness rather than subvert it.

The structural missteps do little to diminish the immense pleasure of seeing White in motion, however. When he assumes a combat pose, the generic script and personality-free visuals fall back.

Even allowing The Identical its premise, the reframing of the Elvis myth as a wholesome example of following God’s plan is not as inspirational as the film seems to believe. Rock fantasies are rarely this milquetoast.

By turning her attention to an underreported chapter in recent history, Kennedy has found a trove rich with unreal imagery and stories of heroism in the face of defeat.

While Memphis is similar in style and in assurance to the lower-ambition Pavilion, it reaches toward something it can’t fully grasp.

Despite the abbreviated ending, No No: A Dockumentary is nevertheless a compelling, deeply moving, fun look at the highs and lows of a bygone era.

Kelly & Cal is worth seeing, if only because it gives Lewis her first truly meaty role in years.

While Murdoch exhibits masterful control in a recording studio, he isn’t a natural-born filmmaker. Much of God Help The Girl feels haphazardly stitched together, with pieces missing or placed in the wrong order, as though Murdoch didn’t get all the footage he needed.

The prevailing tone throughout Innocence is as somber as the onset-of-twilight blues and grays that dominate the movie’s color palette. All that seriousness ultimately doesn’t blend well with a narrative that marinates in the preposterous.

Once that rock gets rolling, Levitated Mass turns into a fun, loopy portrait of one crazy idea that became a SoCal public-art cornerstone.

German director David Wnendt and his co-writer, Claus Falkenberg, are determined to package one teenager’s unhygienic coming-of-age into a slick, funny, accessible romantic comedy. They mostly pull it off.

As Above/So Below purposefully generates a certain air of mystery by keeping the exact nature of its protagonists’ experience enigmatic, but for a film that takes place underground in tightly enclosed spaces, it’s surprisingly thin on suspense and palpable physical danger.

Only those looking to have their bleak worldview painfully confirmed will find this exercise in masochism fulfilling.

Directors Richard Glatzer and Wash Westmoreland (The Fluffer, Quinceañera) do their best to avoid sensationalism, but age difference and statutory rape are the only factors that make the story remotely interesting.

The most tremendous thing about Starred Up is exactly how simple it keeps things, and what a richly nuanced story emerges in the process.

Second Opinion doesn’t play like a revelatory exposé, so much as a conspiracy-minded chain email sent from a distant relative.

Canopy most convincingly creates the illusion of war when it narrows its eyes on the two men trying to endure it, and the urgency on their underlit faces is more transportive than the canned sounds of mortar fire.

Clarkson has great emotional authority onscreen, but even she can’t save Last Weekend. It’s beautifully filmed, with a great feel for location and atmosphere, but it feels petty. The vacation home is huge, but the emotions are exceedingly small.

The November Man doesn’t pause for a moment’s breath, which tightens up the action at the expense of clarity, character development, wit, politics, themes, subtext, and all the other things that can go into a thriller besides bang-bang and crash-crash.