Jackie, The Comedian, Things to Come

Jackie

The Comedian

Things to Come (L'Avenir)

Capsules on a light but truly terrible December week of movies:

Hands of Stone, The Hollars, In Order of Disappearance, The Intervention, Mia Madre, My King, Southside With You

Hands of Stone

The Hollars



In Order of Disappearance

The Intervention



Mia Madre

My King



Southside with You

One thumb up, six down:

Dirty Grandpa, Aferim!, Yosemite, Prescription Thugs

Dirty Grandpa

Aferim!

Yosemite

Prescription Thugs

Another mixed bag:

The Wolf of Wall Street, Grudge Match

Grudge Match

The Wolf of Wall Street

About 10% of the time, I struggle with a movie’s star rating.

American Hustle

It's getting to be an annual tradition.

Last Vegas

There are a few laughs in the sexagenarian WHIVSIV comedy "Last Vegas," flashes of wit among the warmed-over sentiment and tiresome plot machinations.

The Family

If you've seen the trailer, you've seen the two decent minutes of Luc Besson's "The Family," a painful exercise in paycheck cashing by Robert De Niro, as a former Mafioso who ratted out his colleagues, and Tommy Lee Jones, as the Witness Protection Program agent assigned to watch over him and his family.

The Big Wedding

How sad is it that Robert De Niro, Diane Keaton, and Susan Sarandon have made a movie together, and that that movie is "The Big Wedding," a crude, cynical comedy with a couple of chuckles at most. Its oversexed humor comes off not playful and horizon-expanding but crass and desperate.

Silver Linings Playbook

It’s uncanny how many of the truest and best movie moments are the quietest. Volume is so often a sign of desperation, of not having anything honest to say and so saying it louder. “Silver Linings Playbook” is above all a loud movie, full of hocking and shrying, carping and caterwauling – and false to the core. Plot, plot, two hours of churning, roiling plot – with situations too ridiculous even to think about, surprise twists that the densest viewers will have assumed from the beginning (the entire story arc, actually), and sketches of characters where the human beings are supposed to go.

Being Flynn

Passionately in love with the sound of its own voice, "Being Flynn" builds a house of pseudo-literary artifice on a foundation of risible coincidence. It's every inch the torturefest a glance at the cast list would cause you to surmise.