Film.com

The first live-action endeavor from director Brad Bird (The Incredibles, The Iron Giant), Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol is filled with the verve and clarity of his animated action sequences while lending just enough gravity and remote plausibility to the stunts and gadgetry to keep it from becoming a glorified cartoon in and of itself.

Cooties, while suitably gross and buoyed by game performances, doesn’t exploit its concept nearly as well as it should.

Bluebird is undoubtedly a remarkable achievement, especially for a first-time filmmaker.

The genius of Kikuchi’s performance is that – by the end – her slow descent into mania humanizes Kumiko precisely when it would have been so easy to reduce her into caricature.

Gone Girl is a rare bird: a tricky, weird mystery that benefits from people knowing its twist from the outset.

The Boxtrolls is a swing-and-miss for Laika; when you move forward with revolutionary techniques while standing still in terms of your themes, stories and settings, no amount of technical trickery or animation genius can bring the boring to vivid life.

A closer, richer examination of a slice of time as specific as it is short.

Both Tipton and Teller are better than this material.

It is a rather sly affair, slipping in some genuine food for thought amongst its snickering.

Frank’s film is much more of a noir outing than a straight action feature, and Neeson slips right into the tone and feel of the hard-boiled detective offering. Neeson may have been treated to a big career resurgence thanks to his knack for big action, but he’s great as Matt Scudder, and the darker charms of the film suit him wonderfully.