NEW YORK (CNS) -- Director Steven Soderbergh reinvents his "Ocean's Eleven" trilogy with a backwoods twist in "Logan Lucky" (Bleecker Street), a zany heist caper. Instead of suave leading men like George Clooney and Brad Pitt, who rob casinos with sophistication and flair, Rebecca Blunt's screenplay presents a band of mismatched misfits from West Virginia who turn to crime in the hope of a better life beyond the trailer park.
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NEW YORK (CNS) -- Morality is never allowed to get in the way of style as Samuel L. Jackson and Ryan Reynolds find creative ways to dispatch a host of extras in the excessively mayhem-ridden action flick "The Hitman's Bodyguard" (Summit).
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NEW YORK (CNS) -- Much of the action in the animated children's comedy "The Nut Job 2: Nutty by Nature" (Open Road) unfolds at a frenzied pace. Yet, for all the sound and fury, this is in the end a bland film, unlikely to please any but the least discerning viewers.
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NEW YORK (CNS) -- Anyone who's endured the ignominy of grinding poverty with an alcoholic, out-of- work parent understands that there's nothing ennobling about the experience. It's something to endure, to escape if one can, and it leaves deep psychic scars for which later wealth is weak compensation. It's not an experience to be sentimentalized.
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NEW YORK (CNS) -- Most of the mayhem wreaked by the figurine-haunting demon at the center of the horror prequel "Annabelle: Creation" (Warner Bros.) is restrained. Yet, as the film progresses, director David F. Sandberg and his collaborators allow their imagery to become briefly but disturbingly graphic.
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NEW YORK (CNS) -- Awash in high-flown metaphysical hooey, director and co-writer Nikolaj Arcel's dull sci-fi fantasy "The Dark Tower" (Columbia) is inappropriate for the impressionable. As for grown viewers, they should be prepared to slog through an involved exposition of non-scriptural ideas borrowed from the series of novels by Stephen King on which the film -- penned with Akiva Goldsman, Jeff Pinkner and Anders Thomas Jensen -- is built.
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NEW YORK (CNS) -- A dark chapter of the Motor City's history is revisited in "Detroit" (Annapurna), a searing period drama. The setting is the summer of 1967, when race riots broke out in several cities across the country. In Detroit, simmering discontent over systemic discrimination and growing unemployment erupted in African-American neighborhoods. As protesters clashed with police, businesses were set afire and looting was widespread.
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NEW YORK (CNS) -- "A Ghost Story" (A24) could be the best film about purgatory you'll see this year. That depends, of course, on whether you think that purgatory is the state in which Casey Affleck's recently departed character exists. Writer-director David Lowery hasn't attempted a story about religion specifically or spirituality generally, but rather has made a reflection on loss.
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NEW YORK (CNS) -- Tech savvy viewers will especially enjoy the wacky proceedings of "The Emoji Movie" (Columbia). But patrons of all stripes will appreciate the film's themes of loyal friendship and faithful romance.
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NEW YORK (CNS) -- The annulment process provides the unusual courtroom setting for the romantic drama "The Tribunal" (Freestyle). While the movie's Catholic values are strong, they come filtered through some faulty filmmaking.
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NEW YORK (CNS) -- Aspiring to be edgy and stylish, the espionage thriller "Atomic Blonde" (Focus), matches sometimes sadistic brawling with exploitative scenes of aberrant sex. The result is not only degraded but tedious as well.
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NEW YORK (CNS) -- Despite its ponderous title, "Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets" (STX) turns out to be a flashy but lightweight sci-fi adventure likely to divert those grown viewers content to munch their popcorn and enjoy a break from the heat of summer.
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NEW YORK (CNS) -- Buried underneath several layers of crass gags, "Girls Trip" (Universal) has a substantial story about loyalty and moral decisions. But libidinous raunch is the evident lure. The intended audience for this film is women in groups, eager to vicariously enjoy some road-trip misbehavior that comes with a considerable helping of melodrama. It's meant to be a bonding experience.
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NEW YORK (CNS) -- Historical kitsch applied to World War II espionage doesn't get more gloriously over the top than in "The Exception" (A24). Based on Alan Judd's 2003 novel "The Kaiser's Last Kiss," it has, as billed, Kaiser Wilhelm II (Christopher Plummer) living out the last year of his exile in the Netherlands before his 1941 death.
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NEW YORK (CNS) -- Monkey business turns deadly serious in "War for the Planet of the Apes" (Fox), the climactic installment of the rebooted film franchise based on the work of French science-fiction author Pierre Boulle (1912-1994).
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