The humor is broad, the satirical targets many, the overall effect mixed.

The characters are uninvolving, the emotional stakes never fully take hold and the physical action invariably promises more than it delivers.

Here the burn can be too slow to handle at times, as if the gas had been forever left at medium-low heat. You're ultimately left wanting more from a movie that tries to drift away from the usual policier template, even though shots are fired and bodies drop.

The unconsummated attraction between best friends played by Carice van Houten and Hanna Alström clearly is meant to be its emotional pulse. Yet however sensitive the two leads' performances, The Affair rarely gathers the necessary intensity.

This is all passably satisfying, but would be vastly better if the screenwriters weren't lazily explaining every single detail in voiceover. Grillo generally excels as a man of few words, but here his disembodied voice is a wall-to-wall shag carpet, dampening the fun we'd be having if we could just focus on the mayhem Carnahan delivers.

There's enough good, previously unseen stuff in Biggie: I Got a Story to Tell to make it an easy recommendation, though seeing and hearing stuff you haven't seen before isn't the same as learning a lot of things you didn't know before. It's captivating because Biggie was captivating, without being enlightening.

It's the integrity of the performances by Hovig and Skarsgard that keeps the classy drama so engrossing, with the director making neither character entirely saint or sinner but giving them both infinite shadings in between.

My Octopus Teacher is not the first documentary to plunge us into the otherworldly flora and fauna of Earth's oceans . . . But it is the first to chronicle a single sea creature's story from such a personal, openhearted perspective, revealing not just emotional connections but animal behaviors previously unknown to scientists.

It’s the kind of movie that needs a feather-light touch or plenty of humor to avoid feeling overly parental. Moxie has neither.

The best thing about the movie is the way in which it subverts all the clichés of the star-is-born story.

Raya and the Last Dragon occasionally crawls, but most of the time it’s got urgency and momentum to spare. Just as impressively, it builds to a deeply moving climax whose resolution is unexpected yet consummate. This is a film that knows how to soar.

Three hours long yet anything but leisurely, the doc is charged with energy, anger and disappointment.

The frenetic plot makes about as much sense as it needs to within this world of slapstick insanity, random detours, crazy chases, gambling fever and a talent quest for "the coveted Campy Award." You'll either give in to it, or you won't.

Bolstered by lush imagery and, perhaps more importantly, immensely naturalistic performances from its non-professional child actors, the film conjures up a quietly heartbreaking drama that works on multiple levels. These nuances probably allowed Wang to elude the stringent demands of China's censors.

Tim Story's Tom & Jerry is five to ten minutes of action that might have worked in one of the cartoon duo's shorts, surrounded by an inordinate amount of unimaginative, unfunny human-based conflict.

The film is a staggeringly impressive debut, blending color, sound and story to create an intricate emotional tapestry.

As the documentary vividly illustrates, it's what's motivating that evangelical support that proves problematic.

Walker's story no doubt is grounded in a very real milieu that reflects the grim existence of countless Americans returning from active duty to a country blighted by economic downturn, shrinking opportunity and substance abuse. But the only reality Cherry reflects with numbing insistence is that of co-directors getting high on their own high style.

This well-intentioned if somewhat heavy-handed historical affair is anchored by Coogan’s solid lead turn, with support from Andrea Riseborough as a hard-hitting state prosecutor and promising newcomer Garion Dowds as an executioner who could wind up facing the gallows.

Ultimately, none of the storylines offers a surprise or tells us anything we don't already know, this many years into America's opioid ordeal. And arriving at a moment when Crisis could refer to so many other calamities, its failure to illuminate anything makes it feel like a distraction.

An agonizing tale about the weight society hoists upon too many black gay men’s weary shoulders, it’s the kind of film that lingers in your mind days after you’ve seen it, as much due to the relevant subject matter as to Tunde’s penetrating gaze.

Of course, ravishing Malick-esque visuals cannot quite excuse muddled plotting, portentous dialogue and wobbly performances. But In Full Bloom is still an impressively polished debut feature, admirably ambitious and elegantly crafted.

Day mesmerizes even when Lee Daniels' unwieldy bio-drama careens all over the map with stylistic inconsistency and narrative dysfunction, settling for episodic electricity in the absence of a robust connective thread. It's a mess, albeit an absorbing one, driven by a raw central performance of blistering indignation, both tough and vulnerable.

In its tiresome attempts to send up its star's image and not take itself too seriously, the film becomes exceedingly laborious.

At this point, Cage's movies don't have to be reviewed, but rather stamped with official certificates of weirdness. This effort directed by Kevin Lewis certainly qualifies.

Ultimately, it all feels less like a romance than a curiosity.

A captivating lead performance and a truly massive central metaphor make it a memorable arthouse film.

As much as Pelé inspired love and awe among his fans, this polished and well-intentioned biography doesn’t quite do the same.