American Fable possesses an amorphous, dreamlike quality that proves increasingly irritating as it wears on.

If it had skipped the clichéd supernatural elements to instead concentrate on the relationship between the two central characters, Don’t Knock Twice might have emerged as an interesting film.

The screenplay, credited to the five original Blazing Saddles writers as well as Ed Stone and Nate Hopper, is relentlessly silly but only intermittently funny.

Doesn't bring anything new to its very tired genre.

The film is ingratiating enough, but its main value is to make us eager for another, more substantial Shelton movie long before another decade has slipped by.

A pervy premise and top-flight cast yield a mixed-bag spy flick.

The film is often so deterministically plotted that a sense of creative detachment hangs over far too many scenes, leaving an impression that the filmmakers may sometimes be more interested in making grand statements than in engaging interest.

It’s all about as clichéd and predictable as it sounds, although the proceedings are mildly enjoyable in an old-fashioned, Andy Hardy sort of way.

Klein conveys his characters’ shifting mental states with expressionistic sequences that are often unevenly framed, shot from behind his subjects or even unfocused. The result can be intentionally disorienting, but not always particularly revealing. By contrast, the performances are far more compelling.

Despite the strong efforts of everyone involved, Havenhurst proves all too unimaginative in its formulaic recycling of genre tropes.

The movie flirts with the usual mixed-signals of romantic comedy, but is on much more solid ground with sight gags (as when Drac's jello-like blob friend happily absorbs the slice-and-smash violence Ericka aims at the vampire) and character work that depends less on celebrity voice talent than on body-language animation.

Unfortunately, he (Schwarzenegger)doesn’t quite have the chops to do full justice to the material, and his decades-long, popcorn movie image proves a further impediment. Despite the seriousness of his intentions, Aftermath doesn’t pack sufficient emotional punch.

Even if the immediacy of the director's approach gives the material an electric charge, 100 minutes of it becomes monotonous.

If you’re going to attempt a quasi-farcical look at the behavior of thirtysomething strivers in Hollywood, you need to cut more sharply and dig more deeply than does L.A. Times.

Donald Cries demonstrates that cringeworthy isn’t necessarily the same as funny.

First-time director McMurray, who worked as an associate producer on Fruitvale Station, does a decent job of staging the action and maintaining viewer attention on the straight-line story. But there’s no subtext, investigation of his characters’ various stories or motivations for doing what they’re doing. It’s a very shallow film.

Australian director Jonathan Teplitzky has fashioned a small-scale chamber drama from huge historical events, with a functional script and modest budget that fails to match the grand sweep of its story.

That the film works to the extent that it does is a testament to Murphy’s ability to command the screen with stillness. His anguished expressions and halting body language go a long way toward filling in the frustrating narrative blanks.

On the plus side, Mifti does at times become an endearing person despite her big mouth and bad behavior, with credit due to Bauer for her rather subdued depiction of a girl searching for emotional attachment in a world where everyone seems blinded by their own pleasures or problems.

A little more subtlety and a more nuanced approach to the dynamics of this culture clash would have made the film that little bit more effective.

With its uneven performances and purposeful touches of theatrical artifice, Alligator Girl is finally more distancing than involving.

Give Me Future only comes alive when it focuses on the underlying forces that allow the trio's radical sense of fun to take hold.

An excellent novel about the Iraq War and its homefront fallout has been turned into a rather flat and disappointing film in The Yellow Birds.

The film conjures a strong sense of atmosphere, with the gritty NYC locations — yes, there are still some in the gentrified city — well captured by cinematographer Juanmil Azpiroz. And the performances are first-rate.... But by the time it reaches its hoary climax...Wolves has reached such an absurd level of schmaltz that it practically feels like a parody of itself.

The Demon Strikes Back soldiers loudly along, alternating between high-octane, digitally enhanced skirmishes and the equally cacophonic bickering between the monk and the monkey.

The lead performers deliver faultless performances, and are certainly not tough on the eyes. But their efforts are not enough to lift this moody erotic thriller above its pretensions.

The movie is well acted and mostly absorbing, but it spells out everything so painstakingly that there's zero room for subtext.

The Ticket is underwhelming in several ways, but the performance driving it is magnetic — and helps alleviate some of the bludgeoning obviousness of a morality tale that New York-based Israeli writer-director Ido Fluk hasn’t fully figured out how to tell.