Considering that it was filmed in bits and pieces over two decades, it's not surprising that 17 Blocks is disjointed in its storytelling, nor that its technical elements are ragged (subtitles are frequently employed due to poor sound quality). But it nonetheless packs a potent emotional punch.

The idea is cartoonish in its essence but the pic is shot and played with such straight-faced realism that Swallow becomes utterly ridiculous.

A drama with dazzling visuals, subtle performances and deft nods to classics like Days of Heaven and Bonnie and Clyde. ... While Dreamland doesn’t entirely overcome its familiar trajectory, the film is so stunning in every other way that its narrative shortcoming hardly matters.

Final Cut will be screened theatrically ... and it demands to be seen there, both by longtime admirers and by young viewers lucky enough to have their first viewing be in a theater. ... This is an overwhelming sensory experience, with deep colors and nuanced sound amplifying the film's hypnotic effect.

Sensitive, keenly observed and unflinchingly honest. ... House of Hummingbird can be a little too deliberate in its contemplations and contextualizing Eunhee in her solitude and search for intimacy can be bloated at times, but ultimately it's an assured and affecting portrait of teenaged uncertainty and insecurity.

Handsomely made in the customarily fastidious style of most period biographical dramas, Tolkien is strongly served by Hoult, who, after four X-Men outings (and a supporting role in last year's The Favourite), demonstrates that it's high time he moved on from that sort of thing to more interesting and challenging dramatic characterizations.

It turns out Pokemon Detective Pikachu isn’t half bad.

Irizarry sees locals who survived these challenges acquiring new layers of toughness and pride, increasingly ready to fight for their communities.

Some would say the jury's out on that issue; but near-unanimous love and admiration suggests Hesburgh's stance was a great way to win friends and influence people.

This labor of love should be embraced wherever the term cinephile means anything.

Despite some narrative cliches, the painstaking way that the movie documents a very dark period in Cambodian history is a noteworthy achievement.

As a teaching and consciousness-raising tool, it will be an indispensable resource.

Although she seems primarily concerned with whether conflicting views of sexuality can be reconciled in a committed relationship, Cash dresses the issues up in so many layers of cuteness that the message practically gets smothered by the candy-colored cinematography and insistent indie-pop soundtrack.

It looks and feels far more substantial than most indie debuts, confidently bending genre rules with its minimalist dialogue and hallucinatory plot, which owes more to David Lynch or Lars von Trier than to more orthodox horror maestros.

The plot machinations of Stuart Flack's screenplay can be seen from a mile away, but that doesn't make this familiar tale of a vengeful, obsessed woman any less satisfying.

The film, marking Ben Hernandez Bray's directorial debut, is mainly a violent police procedural and vigilante drama that succeeds well enough on those terms. It's also notable for its almost entirely Latino cast and deep immersion into East Los Angeles culture. The pic certainly looks authentic, despite the fact that it was largely shot in Calgary.

A cookie-cutter thriller that takes its time getting to the (sorta) good stuff, it's for die-hards only.

Astutely chronicling an amazing musical career that ended prematurely due to Parkinson's disease, the doc will delight the singer's old fans and likely make her many new ones as well.

A finding-yourself dramedy grounded in a sense of place that's socioeconomic as much as geographical, the warm-hearted film ... is an understated but assured debut.

Clara forgets to have anything resembling a compelling plot. Or an original one. Even science geeks will find little here compelling.

The film weaves enough social, political and personal themes into its mix to make it interesting even for those who mainly think of "hockey puck" as a Don Rickles insult.

Nearly eight years on from the signing of all the brand extension contracts, here is the primarily pop-star-voiced animated musical UglyDolls, an imbecilic eyesore that could lay claim to being one of the worst movies ever made if it was worth such hyperbole.

Don't tell anyone I said this, but the result is not only pleasingly emotionally purgative, but also has some elements worthy of genuine admiration, despite the fact that the third word in the title is one that should now be entirely banished from the English language for its precious, psychobabble connotations.

It's the kind of serious but broadly appealing, modestly scaled picture that people love to say doesn't exist any more.

Savage rivals most mid-budget Euro-American wintry police actioners in its lush production values and slick execution of genre tropes. There are plenty of visceral thrills on offer in the dark and violent confrontations between a hard-boiled detective and a gang of cold-blooded robbers, as the action unfolds in impressively choreographed sequences on Changbai’s snow-covered slopes in northeastern China.

Herzog’s film may not be the final word on Gorbachev, but it is affectionate and candid and leaves audiences in a melancholy mood about the sometimes short-lived nature of reform.

It’s hard to dislike this pleasant, earnest work.

[A] fascinatingly oddball story.