With nothing but artful austerity to offer as a tether back to reality, The Ice Tower shatters.

This pleasingly mellow portrait of a bunch of kids making movies is also an instance of defanged nostalgia — when it was an occasion to highlight the economic, political, cultural circumstances that made this kind of creativity possible.

Ill-defined, overlong and wandering with unlikable leads (even Alan is too feeble and useless to sympathize with), The Mend would be a disaster if it weren't for the fact that the lack of vision is marginally absorbing in a kind train wreck, “will this movie ever reveal what the hell it’s about?”-like manner.

The Plagiarists is a fantastic idea that is irredeemably marred by poor execution. There is a genuine sensation of effort on screen and a select few of the ideas the film touches upon are outright brilliant, but the product still falls remarkably flat.

Promising outer-space majesty and deep-thought topics like some modern variation on Stanley Kubrick's “2001: A Space Odyssey,” Interstellar instead plays like a confused mix of daringly unique space-travel footage like you’ve never seen and droningly familiar emotional and plot beats that you’ve seen all too many times before.

The concept of the film could have been played several different ways, from farce to high-drama to Hitchcock-ian thriller. Ozon decides to try it all, but in the end doesn’t pull off any.

A lot like many of the noisy artists on display, “Woodstock 99” has a lot to say, says it loudly but fails to connect in any meaningful way.

The Impossible strikes an insincere tone, one that doesn't let the obviously powerful moments stand on their own, but instead follows the beautiful Hollywood stars to safety, while the real story is left on the ground.

While it’s nice to see Toni Colette and Chris Messina face off both in and out of the courtroom and Zoey Deutch gives a strong dramatic performance as Ally, even the best acting can’t make Juror #2 make sense.

The Painted Bird is the kind of exploitative cinema that thinks drowning its viewers in increasingly drastic scenes of torture and brutality is inherently righteous. “Look at our terrible history!” “The Painted Bird” screams, but the film’s unrelenting onslaught of revolting ghastliness makes each chapter less impactful than the last.

Brad’s Status rarely affords its titular character an opportunity to have a real conversation with anyone else his own age, so the movie becomes a monologue from someone you quickly realize you don’t really want to get to know anyway.

The movie’s practical and special effects are a rogues’ gallery of gougings, stabbings, shavings, and scalpings; those who like to have their stomachs turned will find much to cheer about. But is it actually scary – suspenseful, tense, trafficking in more than the cheap shock of a jump scare or vivid effect? Not really, no.

Unfocused and unpolished, “Le Concours” might’ve been fared better if one of the prospective students picked up the camera instead.

Although the majority of Beirut proves to be quite the task to watch, it’s still rather refreshing to witness Hamm continue to come into his own as a genuine A-list talent.

There are so many interesting ideas and concepts that could have been spun from this framework. Instead, it's the work of a bunch of filmmakers who seemingly wanted to offer up a WTF-worthy twist ending and tried to reverse engineer a movie from it.

The meandering narrative flow leapfrogs without any sense of rhythm, almost as if the collection of scenes was augmented by a haywire randomizer.

While the more down-to-earth Chef does offer some fascinating autobiographical dimensions, the film is also an overlong, unfunny, largely insufferable bore.

Neither an exciting thriller nor a satisfactory (“elevated”) horror metaphor for one of society’s ills, FRESH is certified meh.

The film is not only one dimensional when it comes to its subject, but also of the time and place where Hendrix arrived.

This is an excruciatingly stupid movie, and the nicest thing I can say about it is that, at 83 minutes, at least it’s over quickly.

The Good Lie is so manufactured around a particular dramatic blueprint that any sense of spontaneity, surprise and engagement are sucked right out of the picture.

The Audition is a harsh, and often cheap, picture that offers a fragmented view of a family diseased by the pursuit of perfection, who yet enable the behavior to continue at the ongoing cost of their happiness.

Muddled, muffled and mixing empty comedy with empty dramatics, The We and the I is an abject failure.

‘Jane Doe’ never aspires beyond the ordinary, and more crucially even fails to meet that modest standard. Lifeless and lackluster, ‘Jane Doe’ never draws blood.

Look, America certainly needs relief, support, escape, and laughter, yes, but good god, ‘Barb & Star’ is not it.

Forbes’ script simply cannot make the things she lived through alive for us in anything but the most glib, shallow and contrived way.

Mr. Nobody is simply a failure.

For all its rage about moral decline and the psychic poison of content culture, Faces Of Death never rises above the same cheap sensationalism it pretends to condemn. Instead of confronting the sickness, it feeds on it and spits out something just as rancid as the faux snuff films it claims to abhor.