As someone who’s absorbed bits and pieces of the Miles Davis story over the years but never felt like I had the big picture, I found “Birth of the Cool” to be intensely gratifying. Nelson is a filmmaker with a sixth sense for how to nudge history into the present.

For a film bursting with so many ideas, only a fraction of them seem to work. And yet, as an artistic statement, “Tigers” proves as fearless as its kid characters, and an indicator of incredible things to come from its creator.

You can forge a decent drama out of elements this scrappy, but not necessarily a film like Jacob’s Ladder.

An entertaining if hardly exhaustive overview of how the unlikely success came to be. The story it tells might easily have filled an engrossing documentary twice the length of this competent, not-particularly-inspired one.

The problem is that writer-director Mike Gan’s first feature, though competently handled in most departments, doesn’t commit enough to any approach to fulfill its potential.

As Vita & Virginia loses its girlishness, drawn like the tides to the solemn maturity of Debicki’s performance. With her as the lodestar, this is a stranger and more intriguing film than it really has a right to be, one that becomes less about a clandestine courtship between famous women, and more about Woolf’s relationship with her writing, and with the workings of her own beautiful, restless mind.

A watchable mess with ultra-laid-back Me Decade vibe.

Laced with white-savior undertones this vaguely “The Blind Side”-esque sports drama doesn’t bother investigating (if it recognizes them at all), Overcomer offers nothing in the way of nuance — even its title is awkward — and, also, no respite from its religious propagandizing.

The plot — which is to say, the plot against the president — is, once again, a violently overwrought confection of “topical” comic-strip ludicrousness; that’s the DNA of the “Fallen” series. Yet when you’re watching a big-budget B-movie, there’s good preposterous and there’s bad preposterous.

Though it’s far from the last word on ZZ Top, “That Little Ol’ Band From Texas” fills in the nuts and bolts, giving you enough of a glimpse of how it all happened to make it seem like a down-home rock ‘n’ roll mirage come true.

Steve Kelly’s lightweight film spins allegedly true events into the stuff of pure sitcom: affable enough, but so glibly inauthentic as to make “Bend It Like Beckham” look like cinéma vérité by comparison. It’s curious how the world’s most popular sport maintains such a thin roster of truly classic movies in its honor; that is unchanged here.

Director and co-writer Wen Muye’s feature debut is a classy crowd-pleaser and an interesting example of a Chinese film that shows public protests and casts officialdom in a frequently unflattering light yet still received the stamp of approval from state censors.

Kim’s film is a slick concoction that affords moderate guilty-pleasure fun for a while, though it goes on too long to diminishing effect.

A dose of 21st century attitude mixes nicely with other winning ingredients in Kingdom, a thoroughly entertaining adaptation of Yasuhisa Hara’s hugely popular manga set in China, 245 B.C.

Chronic cynics and inveterate snarkers would do themselves — and everyone else — a great big favor by steering clear of Mission Mangal, an entertaining and ingratiating feel-good movie about the 2013 launch of the Mangalyann space probe, an against-all-odds triumph of the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO).

What was novel when Eddie Murphy did it for “The Nutty Professor,” however, feels lazy by comparison here, with hardly enough story to support them, and even though the transformations are impressive, there’s an alarming clumsiness when it comes to Wayans acting against himself.

Against the film’s own boisterous inclinations, Pace gives it something like a heart, albeit a closed, melancholic one: that’s some acting, and it’s maybe more than these agreeably derivative proceedings deserve. Like its less interesting chancer of a protagonist, however, Driven will take what brushes with greatness it can get.

Though undeniably charming, Buñuel can be a difficult character to like here, but that’s the point: The movie dares to imagine the exact moment when Buñuel the callow prankster became Buñuel, engaged anthropologist of the human condition, whose later Mexico City masterpiece “Los Olvidados” was clearly informed by what he witnessed in Las Hurdes.

A feast of HD imagery so crisp as to be almost disorienting, this is immersive experiential cinema with no firm storytelling trajectory, though viewers can read what environmental warnings they may into its rushing spectacle.

While the narrative occasionally falters, the visceral way in which the writer-director captures his subjects’ triumphs and travails provides an unflinching portrait of modern teens on the fringes of society.

Linklater, as brilliant a filmmaker as he is, is a kind of Zen rationalist; his shot language and essential humanity invite us to look at Bernadette and think, “You need help.” But that stops the character, even in her baroquely witty lashing out, from becoming a projection of a larger passion.

The violence here is so over-the-top that it can lapse into comedy, prompting shocked laughter when certain characters are unexpectedly killed, and again when it comes time to dispose of their bodies, none of which can adequately prepare you for the film’s explosively funny finale.

It takes a lot of chops to shoot the majority of a movie underwater, and Johannes Roberts is a skillful crafter of images ... But he’s a throw-what-he-can-at-the-audience director, and there’s little in 47 Meters Down: Uncaged that really sticks. The shocks, however, are consistently well-timed, and for the audience that seeks out a movie like this one that’s probably enough.

You don’t have to be a “dog person” to find these two irresistible, although those with a soft spot for animals may be surprised by how deeply attached they get over the course of the film.

There’s more repetition and ponderousness than compelling intrigue in the end result here.

Mostly known for his behind-the-camera TV credits on shows like “Modern Family” and “1600 Penn,” Winer doesn’t bring much finesse into the generic visuals of Ode to Joy. In fairness to him, no amount of directorial elegance could have saved the artificial beats of a narrative that fails to create believable sexual tension between its “romantic” leads and amounts only to an utterly shallow showdown between brothers with long-standing scores to settle.

The fact that none of this usually-surefire mindless stimulus is remotely inspired — let alone that the plot feels like a barely-there afterthought — turns so much cheerful sound and fury into near-senseless din.

The emotions of the stories have been lost. We could be watching the standard ghoulish CGI effects that take place in any horror movie of the week.

We see, in Melissa McCarthy’s increasingly fierce performance, a hint of what the movie might have been: the tale of a new kind of feminine mystique — a methodical fury that weds the imperatives of a mother to the style of a gangster. But that movie needed a better script.

Approach the film with managed genre expectations, however, and there’s much to admire (and duly shiver over) in its formidable, stormcloud-hued atmospherics, low-simmer storytelling and a particularly fine, unaffected breakout performance by teenage actress Eleanor Worthington-Cox in the testing title role.

Grivois’ purpose is not to force a conversation about France’s colonial past or a comparison between Africa then and now. As the body count increases in this tense but troublingly context-free drama, he mistakenly believes we’ll gladly put politics aside to revel in the French gift for the kill shot.

An attempt to do for the smiling, claw-handed Playmobil collective what “The Lego Movie” did for the humble plastic brick — but without that blockbuster’s dizzy, self-aware wit and visual invention — Lino DiSalvo’s hyperactive film never transcends its blatant product-flogging purpose.

So, where do Shadyac and Atchison expect audiences to direct their frustration at such a miscarriage of justice? Well, that’s what makes “Brian Banks” special: It is not an angry film, but one that preaches forgiveness in the face of such adversity.

Granted, there aren’t a lot of surprises in The Art of Racing in the Rain. If anything, knowing — or at least anticipating — how the film’s myriad tragedies will unfold seems to heighten the effect.

A touching and surprising portrait of an actor who had much more going on in his life – from a serious illness to some seriously left-field artistic inclinations – than was mentioned in his obituaries.

While the filmmakers have crafted compelling characters and conundrums, they unfortunately fail to give them better connective tissue and a satisfying third act.

While the movie doesn’t work, it isn’t idiosyncratic enough even to hold attention as a misfired oddity.

You may enter a film like this one believing you had some grasp of how gravity works, or the human threshold for pain, or what constitutes a good movie, but the experience is so exhilaratingly mind-altering, so radically untethered from terra firma, you basically have to readjust your basic understanding of everything you know to be true and just go with the flow.

After watching Jay Myself, you yourself may begin to see the world in a whole new way, as if you’d woken up to all the images that might have been invisible before, but only because you passed them by.

As bad as Dead Water might seem while you’re watching it, it’s even worse when you replay it in your mind after the fact, and pay stricter attention to holes in the plot and gaps in the logic.

Lesage’s filmmaking, with its unhurried editing and eerily echoing music cues, is in expert sympathy with his hovering, out-of-time protagonists.

Van Orman, Emmy-nominated creator of the quirky, cult-inspiring kids’ cartoon series “The Marvelous Misadventures of Flapjack,” brings just the right level of dippy zeal to the project, committing to extended, farcical routines that, at their most immaculately choreographed and paced, channel the pure, physical hilarity of vintage Chaplin or Sellers.

American audiences typically adore “white savior movies,” but this one pushes the stereotype to such an extreme ... it’s impossible to ignore how badly the film marginalizes the courageous Ethiopian refugees about whom it purports to care so deeply.

The most endearing quality of Nicholas Stoller and Matthew Robinson’s script — not counting the fact they didn’t try to whitewash their Latina heroine — is the way it permits Dora to remain indefatigably upbeat no matter what the situation, whether navigating treacherous Incan temples or facing an auditorium of jeering teenage peers.

Steamier and sleeker than a Hallmark Channel movie, but with just as many idealized scenarios, it’s “so bad, it’s good” escapism at its finest.

As interesting as all this is, and as challenging and perilous it must have been to capture these images, Jirga’s elliptical approach to plot and selective use of subtitles does the finished product no favors.

Simple in concept and shattering in execution, blending hard-headed reportage with unguarded personal testimony, it’s you-are-there cinema of the most literal order.

With any luck, Relive will get a reboot down the road, in which someone takes better advantage of the basic idea.

Lavant’s performance as a wordless, deranged, bloodthirsty cult leader is the one note of genuine eccentricity and menace in a film that’s mostly devoted to slapstick comedy and decapitation.

In the end, only a fraction of McLeod’s ambitions sticks a landing. But Astronaut stays afloat with sweetness, thanks to a measured performance from Dreyfuss.

The movie itself isn’t bad, though I wish it were better.

Of viciously pointed relevance anywhere populism is on the rise, “Barbarians” is a fiercely intelligent, engaging and challenging wake-up call, a film that leaves you smarter at the end than when you went in, but also sadder and significantly more terrified.

Privacy issues aside (and I’m second to none in my concern about them), the movie, in its ham-fisted fashion, is trying to come up with some way to regulate what it despises.

Trace Adkins looms large in a dark and brooding sagebrush saga with a healthy dose of Spaghetti Western fatalism.

Chances are, if you work in Hollywood, This Changes Everything won’t teach you anything you don’t already know. But that doesn’t mean it’s not helpful to hear it articulately communicated by some of the most respected women in the business.

Angels Are Made of Light serves as a lament for a prosperous past that can’t be reclaimed, a volatile present that affords few prospects for joy or success, and a future that’s terrifyingly uncertain.

If “Two Lovers” was a lively New Wave lark, exploding with color and energy, then A Faithful Man is its sober, cerebral opposite, gray and stylistically restrained, an efficient short story of a film that feels more like an intellectual exercise than an emotional experience.

Comparisons do not come easy with Luz, an arresting first feature for German writer-director Tilman Singer that is equal measures demonic-possession thriller, experiment in formalist rigor, and flummoxing narrative puzzle-box.

This small, tough film provides no easy solutions.

Director Raymond De Felitta steps back up to the plate with Bottom of the 9th, another dramatically solid and emotionally satisfying drama that pivots on a long-shot attempt to fulfill long-delayed dreams.

This magical-realist fairy tale, about a young woman feeling so isolated and insignificant after a tragic loss that she’s literally invisible to everyone except one other struggling soul, is certainly imaginative and intelligent in its ideas. However, the savvy smarts within don’t quite sustain the running time and, much like its protagonist, the film becomes transparent in its motives and sentimentality.

To the extent that audiences are willing to go along with an overwrought documentary that strives to imitate what far more professionally executed podcasts have innovated in recent years ..., Berman’s stunt could turn into one of the year’s buzzier nonfiction releases.

While the production package is merely workman-like, the commitment, honesty and heart of the main interviewees makes the material compelling.

Vigorously directed by prolific veteran Herman Yau (“Shock Wave”) and well served by an all-star cast headed by Andy Lau and Louis Koo, this Hong Kong action-thriller isn’t deep but is certainly not dull.

Mozaffari has an incredible eye for the details that bring a situation or place to life, working with inexperienced actors to create electrifying characters and a sense of edgy unpredictability.

A documentary that recaps Hamilton’s life in compelling fashion without adding anything of special novelty or depth (though much of the surfing footage is spectacular), it can feel like you’re seeing a perfectly fine devotional sports biography that doesn’t elevate the saga it’s telling to the next level.

Yet even given its budgetary limits and second-tier cast, Lying and Stealing manages to be a retro escapist pleasure — one whose cleverness might actually have been muffled by flashier surface assets.

Crawl has no pretense and not very much range; it’s “Jaws” set in an old dark house.

"American Heretics" is eye-opening, but it's never explosive.

Favreau’s most important responsibility in overseeing the remake was simply not to mess it up. Which he doesn’t. Then again, nor does he bring the kind of visionary new take to the material that Julie Taymor added when staging the Broadway musical. That makes Favreau’s “The Lion King” an undeniably impressive, but incredibly safe entry to the catalog — one whose greatest accomplishment may not be technical (which is not to diminish the incredible work required to make talking animals look believable), but in perfecting the performances.

While the film may feel at times like it was made under the auspices of an Asbury Park tourism board, it’s at least a theoretical tourism board that has a good awareness that a dystopia doesn’t shift back to utopia overnight, or even over a neat 50 years.

Hari Sama’s fourth feature as writer-director is something special, and one of the best of its particular subgenre.

Cities of Last Things has a puzzle-box structure that makes it seem complex and that tasks us with teasing out allusions and associations that a straighter telling would miss, but emotionally it is also simple: Nestled in the middle of this loop-the-loop enigma, skewering the slippery narrative to its timeline like a pin through the heart, it’s a love story.

The result falls short of being especially credible, let alone memorable. Still, this is a polished genre exercise that provides a decent night’s home entertainment.

“I’m going to fake it till I make it!” vows Austyn. At first, “Jawline” also feels committed to his rise. Mandelup changes her intention so gradually that the third act of the film feels a little aimless. Still, she’s smart to momentarily give the mic to the female fans to explain their devotion, though the uniformity of their answers is depressing.

Rojo is a witheringly provocative examination of temporary moral eclipse becoming permanent moral apocalypse.

This first feature from “Walking Dead” thesp-turned-writer/director Pollyanna McIntosh (who played the feral captive in “The Woman”) proves an increasingly wobbly mix of comedy, horror and social critique, its heavy-handed indictment of stereotypical religious hypocrisy finally dragging the enterprise into caricature.

Malheiros’ terrific turn makes this protagonist credibly tough by necessity, and mature beyond his years. Ordakji is also excellent as the not-much-older new friend whose reluctance to be more helpful is, like other backstory elements here, only partly explained later on. Despite the film’s raw realist air, these two actors aren’t amateur discoveries, but rather theater studies graduates making their screen debuts — at no doubt the beginning of long careers.

Jean Reno, whose reputation will only suffer the slightest ding after this lackluster outing quickly fades from memory, should ponder and deliberate a little harder the next time he’s asked to play an aging hitman.

Phil is a trifle, and there’s no harm in that, but it’s an unconvincing trifle. The words “coy” and “whimsical” scarcely do justice to its coy whimsicality.

Mixing archival photos and TV footage with straightforward to-the-camera remembrances, Greenfield-Sanders’ deft structural approach isn’t as daring as those found in Morrison’s own work.

It’s both funny and familiar to see these two incredibly different personalities thrust together for what’s meant to be a short ride. [SXSW work-in-progress review]

The final scenes stop far short of providing the cheap thrill of a feel-good wrap-up, and are all the more effective for that.

As tedious as rush-hour traffic and as bland as a communion wafer.

It doesn’t strike an assertively comic tone either, resulting in a superficially colorful but hollow pile of contrivances that are neither clever nor convincing enough to achieve more than time-passing diversion.

Director Lila Avilés has designed her debut feature, The Chambermaid, to give audiences the opposite opportunity, inviting us to step into the shoes of an invisible woman for two hours, and as such, her film is a rare and special thing.

Without proselytizing, and without distracting from the main thrust of her gripping, intelligent psychodrama, Kreutzer and her predominately female team have created a story both knottily specific and usefully general in its understanding that for many women, an ultimately untenable level of watchful self-control is the price of ambition.

The key to the new movie’s appeal, apart from the fact that Tom Holland acts with far greater confidence and verve in the title role, is that the entire film is a bit of a fake-out, and I mean that in a very positive way.

Name your fear trigger, and it’s probably there, somewhere, in Annabelle Comes Home. It looks like a horror film, but it’s really the horror equivalent of speed dating.

The screenplay, co-written by Nesher and psychology professor Noam Shpancer, feels well-researched, poignantly highlighting the little things parents do that unintentionally traumatize their children. It also brims with the snappy dialogue that Nesher’s films are known for.

The Specials, in the end, is not a very compelling movie. It’s arduous and rambling and repetitive; it skitters across the surface of the story it’s telling. The film lacks a vibrant structure, but more than that, it never brings us close to the people it shows us.

Shattering a glass ceiling has rarely been more engrossing — or grueling — than it is in Maiden.

The catharsis feels fake and unearned. Moreover, the film lacks the warmth and respect for all of of its characters displayed in Langseth’s previous work.

It’s nowhere near the embarrassment of Brian De Palma’s “Domino,” or any number of recent studio tentpoles. Nor is it fresh enough to pretend that audiences had missed out on something special if it had been buried altogether — except perhaps for Luss, who’s bound to get another shot.

If there are no outright duds, there’s no real triumph either. But the whole is certainly diverse, lively and reference-packed enough to please horror fans attracted to this kind of enterprise.

Burn Your Maps is one of those movies that’s glib and facile and threadbare all the way through, then the ending sort of gets to you (you’d have to be made of pretty stern stuff if it didn’t), so you think back over what you’ve seen — and it’s still a crock.

"Ladies” is let down by a screenplay lacking the sharp wit and emotional depth to bring its characters and themes fully to life.

A cheerfully vulgar, consistently amusing and sometimes hilarious parody of life in a suburban Aussie cul-de-sac in the mid-1970s.