Clearly a microbudget labor of love, the earnest documentary never attempts to assess the road pic's place in film history or the culture generally; most frustratingly, it never asks what a young viewer today might think of it.

Too often coming across as an elaborate home movie, the doc would have benefited from its story being told by a more experienced filmmaker who was less emotionally involved in the proceedings.

The film is lively and detailed enough so it is never boring, but it never takes off dramatically or realizes its intriguing possibilities either.

Deadly earnest in its highbrow seriousness, William would seem ripe for parody, except that "Encino Man" got there first.

Her (Zoey Deutch) wildly entertaining performance proves the standout element of the picture, which never quite reaches the comic heights for which it's aiming.

Unfortunately, the movie is far more effective in its first half than its second, which degenerates into cheap shocks, absurd plot contrivances and vulgarism for its own sake (including an excrement-covered pen). It's a shame, because the opening section proves deliciously unsettling, thanks to the screenplay that keeps you off-balance and the terrific performances.

This tale of a teenage gang of petty criminals whose alliance becomes fractured by a surprisingly big haul doesn't generate any real suspense and lacks the depth of characterization to make up for it.

The filmmaking here is plain, prosaic and earnest. For some, just getting worked up all over again about capital punishment will be enough, but without flair or fresh insights into its chosen subject, this just seems like spinning more wheels about on oft-discussed subject.

The coming-of-age theme doesn't mesh entirely well with the more lurid elements, and Coyote Lake doesn't quite achieve the narrative tension sufficient to lift it above the story's slow spots. The film is carried along by the strength of Mendes' emotionally complex, restrained performance that makes clear that Ester is as much victim as accomplice.

It's as stylistically straightforward as concert films get, but should play well to fans in its limited theatrical release as it simultaneously arrives on digital platforms.

Game Girls doesn’t really go beyond its fly-on-the-wall approach to its heroines, offering us lots of intimacy but nothing that really sets its story within a greater social or political context.

It's much more dry than one might expect, demonstrating the truth of something interviewees suggest more than once: As intriguing a person as Berg was, it was not easy to know him.

Mayfair's picture feels like the work of a seasoned veteran rather than a newcomer, but this isn't necessarily a compliment. It's sensitively poetic and tremulously delicate to a fault, with every beat seemingly accompanied and underlined by an intrusive score from Ton That An which is heavily freighted with plangent strings and mournful piano notes.

There’s nothing glaringly wrong with the new movie. ... What’s missing is the blazing urgency.

There's little in terms of the tension associated with police thrillers, but it's also not a socio-realist drama or a character study, instead echoing parts of these genres at different times so there's a constant sense of deja vu and reminders of other, better films without the material ever really coming into its own.

In the end, Young Ahmed feels like little more than a pained shrug, elegantly made, yes, but vaporous and virtue-signaling an empathy that's more gestural than heartfelt.

Some will say that Nina Wu is a courageous work for exposing the abuse powerless young actresses face when trying to break into an acting career, while others will no doubt feel that, by what it shows, the movie remains part of the problem. As unevenly presented here, it’s a wobbly tightrope.

Very knowing about female friendships and the different possible reactions to forced social change, this is a lovingly acted film that, unfortunately, derails in the third act; the calamitous events depicted work fine as a blunt metaphor for where the country found itself or was headed, but doesn't convince on a narrative level or in terms of its psychological impact on the characters.

While some will embrace the shards as a Shane Carruth-like brain-teaser, the movie is ultimately too reflective of its genetically-engineered subjects — soulless under an entrancing veneer.

Lopsided in its balance between sentiment and scares, it's a very peculiar genre pic that will make the most sense to those familiar with the films of two of its producers — Aaron Moorhead and Justin Benson, whose trippy sci-fi outings like The Endless also balance the fantastic and the intimately human.

It works mainly in fits and starts, though there's no question that the movie's depiction of the effects of Soviet rule on a nomadic population will be eye-opening for many Western viewers, and deeply resonant for Kazakhstanis.

While the rapport between the middle-aged Paul and the thirtyish Alice is a fascinating give-and-take — they are essentially equals because one’s lack of experience is compensated for by the other’s lack of ideas — there is no real room for either to grow or be transformed. Their relationship, while full of exchanges, is finally quite stagnant.

Oddly, everyone from boat-tour guides to shot-bar patrons find time to ask our hero solicitous personal questions. If only he, or the film, had more interesting answers.

Performances are generally competent, but nobody in the cast has the kind of presence needed to overcome Ranarivelo's by-the-numbers dialogue.

Shaped by a near-constant monologue from a golden retriever named Enzo, The Art of Racing in the Rain is watchable but flat, with only occasional flashes of wit and feeling.

This is such a uniquely bizarre story that it can't help but exert a certain fascination. But it's hard to avoid the feeling that it would have been better served by a compelling dramatization rather than this too-dry documentary.

While Cox's typically sterling performance is not quite enough to rescue The Etruscan Smile from succumbing to bathos, it goes a long way toward making the film palatable.

Frustratingly timid documentary.