Joe Leydon

To be sure, the fans will appreciate it a lot more than casual viewers. But it’s also an irresistible hoot for anyone with fond memories of star-studded 1970s musical/variety TV specials.

In keeping with “Evil Dead” tradition, there’s also an abundance of bloody mayhem that increases exponentially until a hugely satisfying and splatterific climax.

Consider this review primarily as an encouragement: Stick around. Your patience will be amply rewarded.

Director Gracie Otto’s Seriously Red disarms and delights as a sensationally spirited concoction that neatly balances unfettered outrageousness and unabashed sentimentality.

To be fair: Maybe I Do is undemanding, painless and pleasantly diverting, and has the saving grace of never trying too hard for a cheap laugh. There are quite a few undeniably funny lines, many of them made all the more amusing by the perfect-pitch delivery of the pros in the cast.

The result is a movie that is not merely disappointingly uneven, but irredeemably unbalanced.

High Heat is a hoot. Though it may sound in synopsis like standard-issue genre fare suitable for quick-serve consumption on digital and streaming platforms, this satisfying mashup of crime thriller and dark comedy plays almost like a wink-and-a-nod sendup of such cookie-cutter time-killers.

Yes, the film overall is more diverting than stirring. Still, there is a good deal more than novelty value going for this group effort.

The predictability of events during the film’s first hour of gothic-thriller setup is all the more annoying because of the plodding pace. Evie finally stands up for herself during some modestly clever third-act turnabouts, but, really, that’s not quite enough to regenerate a rooting interest in the character.

Gutto demonstrates welcome restraint and a meticulous avoidance of anything that resembles exploitation, relying on indirect yet impactful allusions to keep us constantly aware of the mortal stakes involved. All in all, this is a singularly promising debut for a first-time feature filmmaker.

Its lack of manufactured drama is one of the most engaging things about it, especially if you are a baseball fan who has ever marveled at the miracle that was, and is, Nolan Ryan.

Director Richard Gray’s well-crafted and handsomely mounted indie is as much a solidly constructed mystery as it is it a conventionally satisfying oater, with much to recommend to fans of either genre who rarely get to sample such a mix.

The wonderful thing about Wild Men, a movie that suggests a dream-team collaboration of Hal Hartley and the Coen Brothers, is that everyone involved takes themselves extremely seriously, even as they behave and speak in ways that cause viewers who get the joke to smile, chuckle and occasionally laugh out loud.

[A] technically polished and emotionally stirring close-up view of celebrity chef José Andrés and his nonprofit World Central Kitchen.

Director Naveen A. Chathapuram and scripter Ashley James Louis, working from a story by Chathapuram and Doc Justin, have cobbled together a derivative and numbingly pretentious piece of work distinguished only by the relative novelty of a female lead (well played by Ali Larter) who’s as resourceful, resilient and, when push repeatedly comes to shove, purposefully brutal as guys usually are in movies like this.

Leterrier manages a few modestly exciting chase scenes, including one that begins in a laser tag course, continues through a bowling alley and a go-kart track, and ends in a crowded supermarket. And his two leads are agreeably amusing and for the most part engaging throughout the film.

To paraphrase an admonition from a classic Rolling Stones album: This movie should be played real loud. And in venues where people can, if they choose, get up and dance.

The movie is such an irresistible and intoxicating celebration of cinematic excess that even after 187 minutes (including intermission or, as the title card announces, “InteRRRval”), you are left exhilarated, not exhausted.

One thing leads to another, at a pace that somehow feels frenetic and ponderous all at once.

It would be unfair to expect an amusing but slight comedy like this one to serve as a substantial political statement. On the other hand, there’s a lot to be said for any movie that reminds us, in a heartfelt but unassuming way, that we are many, but we are one.

If you approach it with sufficiently lowered expectations, and have fond memories of the ’70s paranoid dramas that obviously inspired director and co-writer Mark Williams, this might be your house-brand jam.

A wink here or a smirk there, and the whole kit-and-caboodle could have collapsed into laughable nonsense way before “Warhunt” finally does run off the rails. You still might chuckle from time to time, but not as often as any plot synopsis might lead you to expect.

American Underdog is a thoroughly predictable yet hugely entertaining sports biopic that is bound to please almost anyone who’s not a sourball cynic or a snarky critic.

As timely as last night’s episode of “ESPN Sports Center,” and as riveting as a well-crafted tick-tock suspenser, National Champions adroitly avoids most of the pitfalls common to conventional “message movies” by raising and debating issues in the context of a solid and involving drama that can be enjoyed even by people who couldn’t tell an offside kick from a cheerleader’s cartwheel.

It’s a marked improvement over Feifer’s own “Catch the Bullet,” released just last September — and it features a ferociously nasty turn by Bruce Dern in a role that recalls a character from yet another golden oldie, Walter Brennan’s vicious Old Man Clanton in “My Darling Clementine.”

As inspirational college sports movies go, Heart of the Champions doesn’t go, or row, nearly far enough off the beaten path. It’s every bit as boilerplate as its generic title might indicate.

Instead of persuasive verisimilitude and compelling character development, we get scene after scene of Jesse waiting for something, anything.

Once again, Lee prefers to canter rather than gallop as he spins his storyline, allowing his well-cast leads enough time to reveal themselves in sometimes leisurely, sometimes suspenseful dialogue exchanges.