An action thriller in which the Irish actor plays Nels Coxman, a snowplow operator at a Colorado ski resort with the death-dealing skills of a special-ops commando. This time, the absurdity is intentional.

Dragged Across Concrete may not be the kind of movie you’d expect to emerge from such inspiration, yet the impassioned energy of those composers is echoed in Zahler’s feverish yet stubbornly patient approach to storytelling.

While the movie doesn’t shy away from confronting the obstacles of foster parenthood, it never fully earns its happy ending.

In ways both large and small, Midway may be the most realistic war movie you’ve ever seen, as those involved in the production of this World War II action film, including Naval historians, have touted it to be. That’s not to say it’s as real as “Saving Private Ryan.”

The documentary might make you believe in miracles, considering how tedious — if not impossible — this interactive artwork comes across.

In the end, Shadow suffers from a kind of shallow narcissism. Yes, it’s beautiful. Sure, it’s hard to take your eyes off it, with all the slow-motion action, enhanced by an ever-present, photogenic drizzle. But in an ironic departure from the theme of the balance, it too often emphasizes style over substance.

Downton Abbey is eye and ear candy of the highest order: rich and delicious, but not especially nutritious.

One problem is that the action in the film is restricted to a few basic locations; the medical supply house, a nearby cemetery and an adjoining mortuary. Romero made highly productive use of confinement. O'Bannon does not, but he does earn points with inventive gall, and there are enough lunatic thrills along the way to leave one with the giddy sensation of having been alternately scared silly and tickled even sillier. [19 Aug 1985, p.D1]

Ultimately, Happy Death Day 2U doesn’t live up to its aspirations. Landon’s script may be better than his direction, but he leaves a potentially resonant subplot — one that involves existential questions — flat and lifeless, as if our most important choices were of no more consequence than a joystick maneuver.

As Eleanor, Bonham Carter delivers a sweetly oddball performance playing a high-maintenance but fiercely determined grouch who is mostly impossible to like. Swank, for her part, is no picnic either: A former psychiatric nurse who discovered law later in life, her Colette is a largely charmless workaholic.

If the metaphor of xenophobia and nationalism is obvious — and it is, to the point of eye-rolling — the telling of the tale has a certain poetry.

Although it breaks new ground visually, elements of the tale don’t always meld with grace.

The movie is colorful and pretty, and Smith brings a fresh, more street-wise approach to his character, while still honoring the motor-mouthed spirit of Williams’s scene-stealing performance.

The Best of Enemies is perhaps the first account of the United States’s traumatic racial history that could be adapted into a sitcom.

Disney has created a movie that, like Quasimodo himself, is half formed.

See the problem here? There are so many subplots, it’s like herding cats.

Childhood anecdotes and charming vignettes are set against bright-light, big-city sets, a-dazzle with beautiful players. All that doesn't disguise the emptiness at the center of Radio Days, which misses the momentum that comes with a plot.

Robbins, who scripted and directed, creates more than enough on his own. Bob's un-hackneyed character is the prime case in point.

If its heart-pounding romance doesn’t make you cry, its sorely needed sense of optimism will surely make you smile.

Shaft is also funny, with a sharp, fast-paced humor (though one transphobic joke is a tone-deaf clunker). And it’s always enjoyable to watch Jackson walking around while dropping f-bombs (and mother-f-bombs) all over the place.

If it’s not quite as good as the doll’s origin story, “Creation,” it’s still way more fun than any sequel — especially one this deep into a franchise — has any right to be.

There’s something in the relationship between these two partnerless men — their yearning for connection — that feels, beneath the jokes, very real and very recognizable.

A silly breeze of a movie starring two of Britain’s finest actors, each having a blast playing cat-and-mouse with the other.

Kumail Nanjiani is the best thing about Men in Black: International. That’s saying something, considering that the actor never appears on camera and that the character he lends his expressively plaintive voice to is a CGI alien the size of a gerbil.

A fleecy romantic caper with a dusting of feminism, the picture is basically a one-joke movie successfully nursed by director Ivan Reitman.

Few will accuse Spike Lee's Mo' Better Blues of being a masterpiece. But it's still full of the things that make Spike Lee films, well, Spike Lee films. Full of the fun, full of the spirit.

Director Bruce Malmuth keeps the pace taut, the shots tight.

What drags this “Squad” down to the dreary level of Ayer’s vision is the tone of Gunn’s film, which is more violent and less lighthearted than his “Guardians” movies.