The Globe and Mail (Toronto)

Matt Johnson creates a film that bridges the faux-doc jitteriness of his earlier work with the richness of classic one-perfect-summer cinema.

A tonally uneven, blandly shot and rather unoriginally imagined riff on Steven Spielberg’s A.I. (not to mention a half-dozen other films), Sheep in the Box is a true head-scratcher – as if Kore-eda himself had been replaced by some digitally conceived facsimile.

Aided by an engrossing performance from Ferreira that punctuates every awkward interaction and terrible decision with aplomb, Levack encapsulates the pain and joy of our first steps into adulthood with an assured and humorous hand.

As a character, Spider-Man is above all vigilant. But the crushing length of his adventure this time around makes it a challenge to stay even passively alert.

Occasionally, Araki will punctuate the rather by-the-book story with loopy animation and surreal flashes of fantasy. Yet the bulk of the film is so staid that the effect is like slathering a handful of lube on top of the King James Bible: theoretically provocative, but more so empty-headed.

Her Private Hell is a remarkably worthless creation.

When the film comes back to focusing on Daniel and Michelle, and when O’Brien and Wu are able to fire sparks at one another over grand cosmic questions, the dark forest of The Outer Threat feels rather bright.

What makes me want to take this trip again is the way Nolan moves through Homer’s epic, the filmmaker’s usual tinkering with time giving way to new visual rhythms.

This high-budget production clearly aims to bring Polynesian mythology and culture to the big screen. But instead, you’ll wish they had the imagination to give wind to the sail of new stories.

The result is a film that is haunting and singular – a furnace-blast of the past reshaped and refashioned for our modern times.