What one takes away from My Life As a Courgette might be a casually simple and forward affair, but a deeper, more considered look at Barras’ moving tale reveals an emotional resonance and non-saccharine uplift that is mostly rare in today’s animation world. Consider it a diamond in the rough.

A paean to the unsung, Hidden Figures is also a romanticized tribute to everyday problem solvers who, in the movie’s eyes, are their own kind of superheroes.

The ultimate effect of the film’s hackneyed material is as debilitating as it is frustrating.

Sure, there are some generally reliable players (T.J. Miller, Jason Bateman, Kate McKinnon), which keeps things from getting deathly dull, but the newest film from directors Josh Gordon and Will Speck (“Blades of Glory”) is mostly uninspired and bland.

Mostly this is a thrillingly compassionate, deceptively simple, and wholly invested look at a capable older woman with a lively mind coping with a series of common misfortunes. Where that could be depressing, or at least overridingly melancholy, here it is strangely hopeful.

Sleight is imaginative and refreshing as it shape-shifts effortlessly through familiar narrative tropes and invents something unexpected and unique.

The film not only traps its characters, but also corners its story, with the ‘Experiment’ by Mclean and Gunn not allowing any room for variables that might bring some inventiveness to this otherwise steel-shuttered bore.

Not only is Bobby Sands: 66 Days allows us to put together a great double feature with “Hunger,” it’s also an incredibly important and profoundly inspiring historical documentary that will become more and more relevant as we prepare to once again face the kinds of oppression that Sands fought against.

If the film’s climax comes off as thematically clear — an outgrowth of the tension heretofore developed — it otherwise leaves an aftertaste of slightness.

An inspired, spellbinding, wonderfully-realized tale and a dazzling, visually/morally beautiful treat for the eyes, ears, heart and soul that richly weaves an all-inclusive journey based in culture, heritage, friendship and self-importance.

With The Tree Of Life the director has once again created a cinematic experience that is uniquely his own, often powerful and mesmerizing, at times overreaching and overbearing, but never forgettable.

Jessica Chastain is a great actress, but with Miss Sloane, she also proves that she’s a great movie star.

Waters’ comedy — like its forerunner — comes impressively close to elevating cursing to an art form, especially when wielded by Thornton and Cox, who spit and sneer vulgar invectives at each other like gutter-trash virtuosos.

There’s nothing lost in the translation of Fences, but its high fidelity means there’s little, if any, inspiration to be found within.

It’s an engaging film in many respects, but one that exemplifies a lot of the problems that have trailed Zemeckis across his career.

Uneven though it is, and downright shaggy at times, Prevenge is valuable in that it plots so unexpected an expectant-mother story — one in which pregnancy is actually ultimately minimized in terms of its impact on the story.

The fine cinematography, set design and costumes only serve as a distraction from the sparsely drawn story and uninteresting characters.

Berg’s approach is blunt and effective. With Patriots Day, he’s made an action film that grabs you by the throat and doesn’t let up.

Benyamina displays an empathetic and insightful view of young women, and the challenges of growing up, even if the screenplay doesn’t always follow through. But what Divines absolutely gets right is the deep longing and hunger young people have to better their circumstances, and the desperate lengths they’ll go to reach those goals.

As a world-building exercise, Fantastic Beasts often succeeds. It’s charming, playful and welcoming in ways these movies haven’t been since the first two installments, and the patchiness of the plot is often forgiven because these characters are likable, rather affable, and well-cast.

As a visual love-letter to the Yangtze River, Crosscurrent takes your breath away. As a narrative film, it’s all washed up.

Magnus is gifted with a tremendous opportunity and mostly squanders it, creating a profile that certainly admires Carlsen, but does little to uncover the methodology or magic behind the dazzling display he demonstrates on the board.

Steinfeld’s performance and the script from Kelly Fremon Craig have created a young woman who feels entirely familiar, while never feeling like a retread of the other teenagers who have walked the cinematic high school halls before her.

This isn’t merely “eating your cinematic vegetables,” as Kennebeck manages to present a well-paced and structured documentary that’s also culturally significant.

There is a sense of exhaustive familiarity that permeates throughout Taylor Hackford’s new dramedy The Comedian.

Biller explores female fantasy in the most diabolical of ways imaginable and gender politics are dissected with a brutal honesty that could infuriate some feminists with its observations.

It’s what we don’t see, at least not in full, that makes the film scare so effectively. Bertino holds his monster in reserve, conceding its presence through brief and mostly obscured glimpses of its shape.

If its somewhat unfocused narrative comes at the cost of a picture that could be more cohesive and concise, it still gifts viewers with characters and an era that’s entertaining to explore.