OPENING THIS WEEK
AVENGERS: AGE OF ULTRON In the latest, increasingly confusing chapter of the Marvel-verse, Iron Man/Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.) accidentally creates an artificial intelligence (voiced by James Spader) that wants to wipe out humanity. At least it also has a sense of humour. (Chris Knight)
CLOUDS OF SILS MARIA Olivier Assayas (Something in the Air) returns with a film with youth once again its subject, but it’s brought forward to address a contemporary milieu: political strife exchanged for celebrity scandal, activism exchanged for selfpromotion, blackjacks exchanged for BlackBerrys. As counterweight Assayas has added Maria Enders (Juliette Binoche), a French actress looming close, as she sees it, to the wasteland of middle age. Also starring Kristen Stewart, Chloë Grace Moretz. (Calum Marsh) KURT COBAIN: MONTAGE OF — NOT RATED Writer-director Brett Morgen (The Kid Stays in the Picture) presents this authorized documentary on the late musician Kurt Cobain, from his early days in Aberdeen, Wash., to his success and downfall with the grunge band Nirvana. Featuring personal archives, performance footage, unheard songs, artwork, photography, journals and demos. (Melissa Hank)
RED ARMY — NOT RATED During the Cold War, just about everyone was an underdog against the Soviet Red Army hockey team. Director Gabe Polsky’s documentary centres on the career hockey players who were recruited as young boys, then trained and programmed like precise cogs in a machine, and became crucial to the ongoing propaganda war with the west. Polsky talks to Red Army legends such as Viacheslav Fetisov, Igor Larionov and Vladislav Tretiak — as well as coach Scotty Bowman. (Katherine Monk)
THE WATER DIVINER
The Water Diviner is a film that knows how important the Battle of Gallipoli should be treated, and takes its pains to remind you about how solemn all these events are. It’s so concerned with making a statement about the horrors of war, and showing off Russell Crowe’s sensitive face, it never bothers to liven things up with actual touches of humanity. (David Berry)
RECENT RELEASES
THE AGE OF ADALINE Blake Lively gives a poised performance in this film about the travails of a woman sentenced to immortality without the possibility of crow’s feet. Director Lee Toland Krieger shrewdly avoids earnestness and resists classic feminine movie tropes, as he explores the larger theme of intimacy in a film that may be overly tidy but exerts its own resonant charms. (Julia Cooper)
CINDERELLA This earnest affair retells the 65-year-old Disney animated classic in live-action, with Lily James as the title character and Richard Madden as the charming prince. What it lacks in ironic winking it more than makes up for in twinkling and sparkling, with sets and costumes to dazzle and delight, including a little number for wicked stepmother Cate Blanchett in wicked-witch green. (Chris Knight) THE DIVERGENT SERIES: INSURGENT The second chapter in the Divergent trilogy (three books, four movies) opens with a bang and closes with a belief-beggaring revelation that nonetheless sets up the sequel. In between, Tris (Shailene Woodley) must navigate young love and the five factions in a future dystopia. (Chris Knight)
FURIOUS 7 Furious 7 commits its fair share of cinematic crimes. There’s its blatant disregard for the laws of physics, its rebuke of narrative logic and its criminal underuse of The Rock. Yet it’s incapable of being indictable: It’s pure popcorn escapism, brashly dumb and knowing at the same time. The plot finds Jason Statham’s mercenary hunting down Vin Diesel’s street-racing crew. (Barry Hertz)
GET HARD
HOME The Will Ferrell-Kevin Hart comedy aims for biting satire but falls short when it tips over from making fun of people who stereotype to trading in them: There just isn’t a lot of funny here. But it is more unabashedly eatthe-rich than some critics have given it credit for. And it’s consistently ridiculous enough to be funny more often than not. (David Berry) Based on Adam Rex’s The True Meaning of Smekday — though not as edgy — Home follows a bumbling alien invader (Jim Parsons) who teams up with a human girl named Gratuity — Tip for short, and voiced by Rihanna — after Earth is invaded. Simple wisdom and squishy aliens: Should be fun for kids. (Chris Knight)
JUPITER ASCENDING In this latest from the Wachowski siblings (The Matrix), Mila Kunis is Jupiter Jones, who learns from an intergalactic mercenary (Channing Tatum) that she’s the ruler of the Earth. Beautiful to look at, painful to comprehend. (Chris Knight)
THE LONGEST RIDE Yet another of Nicholas Sparks’s adaptations, this one features an art major (Britt Robertson) who falls for a bull rider (Scott Eastwood, son of Clint). They meet an old man (Alan Alda) and gather wisdom from his own love story. (Chris Knight)
MONKEY KINGDOM Tina Fey winningly narrates this Disneynature doc about a troop of monkeys in Sri Lanka, and especially the efforts of a mother monkey, Maya, and her young son Kip to eke out an existence. Sure there are dangers. But don’t worry: You can bring the kids without fear they’ll be overly traumatized by events. (Chris Knight)
PADDINGTON This mix of live-action and computer animation conjures all the magic you want from a kids’ movie, especially one based on the beloved Paddington Bear. (Katherine Monk)
PAUL BLART: MALL COP 2 Gaps in logic and motivation are the least of the problems in this lacklustre sequel, where characters randomly appear and disappear along with any legitimate attempt at comedy. Kevin James as Paul Blart gets slapped around by people and animals. (Chris Knight)
TRUE STORY It is a true story, but this dramatization doesn’t always feel like it. Jonah Hill plays Michael Finkel, fired from The New York Times for inaccuracies in a story. He befriends jailed, accused killer Christian Longo (James Franco), who had pretended to be Finkel while on the run. Fails to live up to its potential. (Chris Knight)
UNFINISHED BUSINESS The film never gets down to the business of telling us what it’s about, much less making us care. Vince Vaughn and some business friends travel to Germany to drum up business. Or something like that. There’s a subplot about his son being bullied, but that only highlights how crass the rest of it all is. (David Berry)
UNFRIENDED The twist is this found-footage horror is that the footage unfolds in real time as students confront what appears to be the ghost of a girl who killed herself after being bullied. We get a view of the monitor as Blaire (Shelley Hennig) and her friends Skype, text and freak out. (Chris Knight)
WHILE WE’RE YOUNG Writer-director Noah Baumbach’s latest prosciutto-thin slices of observation skewer the middle-aged with their ossified flaws, and the young who are busy making up new ones. Ben Stiller, Naomi Watts, Adam Driver and Amanda Seyfried star. (Chris Knight)
WOMAN IN GOLD Woman in Gold fails to tap into the potential richness of its source material, the matter of art plundered from Austrian Jews by the Nazis during the Second World War and its restitution. Based on a true story, the film’s trite characterizations and lazy oversimplifications ignore the complexities of a tale that in this cinematic telling, feels resoundingly false, despite the rapport between stars Helen Mirren and Ryan Reynolds. (Adam Nayman)