An informative if uninvigorating look at the violinist Itzhak Perlman calls "the first true modern virtuoso player," Peter Rosen's God's Fiddler: Jascha Heifetz will draw only the most ardent classical fans to its niche theatrical run but should please a wider audience after making its way to educational TV.

While the documentary stops short of hagiography, it offers a delicate portrait of a man with an extraordinarily youthful energy and enthusiasm for music, people and life.

Leave it to the folks who brought us "Wallace & Gromit," "Chicken Run" and "Flushed Away" to bring a delightful blast of fresh air to the conventional Christmas genre. Aardman's Arthur Christmas is that and more - an endlessly amusing 3D, CG-animated Yuletide romp with lively innovation at every turn and a dream voice cast headed by James McAvoy, Hugh Laurie and Bill Nighy.

Immortals is not only entirely without humor, but is dominated by a lot of huffing and puffing, thunderous self-importance and windy Socratic quotations about the immortality and divinity of men's souls. You just have to roll your eyes after a while.

Jack and Jill is witless and sloppily constructed, getting by on fart gags, homeless jokes, Latino stereotypes and that old favorite, explosive chimichanga diarrhea -- and no, not in an inspired "Bridesmaids" way.

The cast is fine, but the roles are superficial and too concentrated on the film's theme.

This is clearly not a film made for everyone, but for a fortunate few, it will feel like a cleansing in nature.

The film, both in scope and tone, has a downsized vibe that would have made it a much better fit on an ABC Family than in a movie theater.

A thoughtful piece of advocacy journalism.

Driven by a brilliant, ferocious performance by Michael Fassbender, Shame is a real walk on the wild side, a scorching look at a case of sexual addiction that's as all-encompassing as a craving for drugs.

The script makes no attempt to assert its plausibility or realism; it is, instead, refreshingly frank about what it is, a simple, workable framework for the melees and mayhem.

It satisfies not only in the tradition of yarns boiled hard and wry, but as a savvy comment on fame and ambition.

An amusing yet lightweight political farce.

But above all it's a portrait of stunned grief, of the devastation families endure, whether through violence, accidents, illness or incarceration.

This surprising collaboration between director Clint Eastwood and "Milk" screenwriter Dustin Lance Black tackles its trickiest challenges with plausibility and good sense, while serving up a simmeringly caustic view of its controversial subject's behavior, public and private.

A mildly diverting naughty comedy, lacking the pure comic nastiness of "Bad Santa" or the sheer audacity of "Up in Smoke."

Stölzl's film falls gently between the stools of high-brow camp and genuine seduction by its many period charms, fine actors and lovely landscapes.

Gigandet, whose star has been rising thanks to his roles in such films as "Twilight," "Burlesque" and "Easy A," delivers a sensitive portrayal that proves he's more than just a hunk. Malone is as appealing as always, and Hartman is wonderfully fun as the Buster Poindexter-like singer. But the script lacks the depth to transcend its cutesy gimmick.

This cleverly conceived, behind-the-scenes tale features fine lead performances and enough nods to the epic group's early days to interest fans outside the U.K.

Dennis Farina gets the enviable opportunity to humanize the kind of character he has sometimes exaggerated comically in glossier films.

Performances are strong across the board, and the movie offers a solid sense of place. But the mysteries, once explained, don't make a lot of sense.

Though some of the movie's performances flirt with caricature (Siobhan Fallon's loud-mouthed aunt, Demi Moore as a brash and overtly sexual second wife), the movie has a center of gravity just strong enough to contain them.

A smoothly engineered crowd pleaser.

As leaden as the bullets whose random behavior it revolves around, Géla Babluani's 13 fails to recapture the sweaty tension of his original 13 Tzameti, a French import that reeked of style and first-timer ambition.

From the opening credits -- an animated sequence so crude a junior-high art student would be ashamed of it -- to a climax in which Kate's dog is taken hostage with a crossbow, there's not an ounce of mirth in this parade of ghastly accents, tin-eared romantic montages and dime-store knavery.

Astin's endearingly game performance isn't enough to carry the film, which won't likely see a second week in theaters.

You don't have to be an enthusiast of Bollywood to embrace RA.ONE, but it sure would help.

As novel and absorbing as In Time is in several respects, however, Andrew Niccol's latest conception of an altered but still recognizable future feels undernourished in other ways that are not as salutary, preventing the film from fulfilling its strong inherent promise.