New and Noteworthy: Movies

Black Sea A former submarine captain searches the bottom of the Black Sea for a ship rumored to be filled with gold. Jude Law and Ben Mendelsohn star.

Coming Home A Chinese man who was sent to a labor camp during the Cultural Revolution struggles to reconnect with his wife upon his release from captivity. Mandarin with subtitles.

Leviathan A Russian man invites trouble when he asks an old army friend to help him save his home from demolition. Russian with subtitles.

The Loft A dead body is discovered in a loft apartment shared by five friends who are all carrying on extramarital affairs.

Mommy A widow struggling to raise her violent son finds unexpected help from a mysterious neighbor. English and French with subtitles.

Project Almanac A group of teens get into big trouble when they build a time machine and try it out.

Reviewed by critics Steven Rea (S.R.), Tirdad Derakhshani (T.D.), Dan DeLuca (D.D.), and David Hiltbrand (D.H.). W.S. denotes a wire-service review.

Birdman Michael Keaton is a faded Hollywood star trying to reclaim his career by mounting a Broadway drama in Alejandro G. Iñárritu's fierce, funny, breathless dive into the head of a man in deep trouble. An exhilarating, out-of-the-blue masterwork that ranks as one of the best films of the year, the decade, the century. With Edward Norton, Emma Stone, and Naomi Watts. 1 hr. 59 R (profanity, violence, sex, adult themes) - S.R.

Boyhood Richard Linklater's unassuming masterpiece follows a Texas kid (newcomer Ellar Coltrane) from grade school to college dorm, reconvening cast and crew (including Patricia Arquette and Ethan Hawke as the parents) a few weeks every year for 12 years, and its carefully observed series of small moments takes on quiet, metaphoric power. 2 hrs. 46 R (profanity, sex, adult themes) - S.R.

Foxcatcher Steve Carell, sporting an aquiline nose and a marionette's gait, morphs into Newtown Square multimillionaire John du Pont, a self-styled coach and sponsor of American wrestling. By inviting Olympic gold medalists Dave and Mark Schultz (Mark Ruffalo and Channing Tatum) to live and train on his estate, du Pont invited disaster, too. Bennett Miller directs this slow-burning, brilliant account of a real-life tragedy. 2 hrs. 14 R (violence, profanity, drugs, adult themes) - S.R.

Mr. Turner Mike Leigh's meticulously observed chronicle of the last quarter in the life of the British artist J.M.W. Turner, with Timothy Spall grunting, grimacing and deeply moving as the son of a London barber who becomes one of the great painters of his time. Of any time. 2 hrs. 30 R (sex, adult themes) - S.R.

Still Alice Shot through with piercing detail, and devoid of cheap sentimentality, the sad, beautifully realized story of a linguistics professor, a mother, a wife, diagnosed with early onset Alzheimer's. One of the defining performances of Julianne Moore's career, rightly nominated for an Academy Award. With Alec Baldwin, Kat Bosworth and Kristen Stewart. 1 hr. 53 PG-13 (profanity, adult themes) - S.R.

Big Eyes Director Tim Burton finds his dream subject: husband and wife Walter and Margaret Keane, whose paintings of saucer-eyed waifs and tearful clowns were the kitsch hit of the 1960s. He claimed the images as his, but she really made them, locked away in a studio like some Grimm Brothers unfortunate. Christoph Waltz and a great Amy Adams bring the couple to life in this wondrously strange true story about art, heartbreak and intellectual property theft. 1 hr. 45 PG-13 (profanity, adult themes) - S.R.

Paddington The tale of the 3-foot-6 bear from Peru taken in by a British family is perfect for today's audiences, so long overfed on comic-book fodder. The bear's impeccable manners, perfect diction, and earnestness make him the ultimate anti-Bart Simpson. 1 hr. 35 PG (mild action, rude humor) - T.D.

Selma A powerful, poignant restaging of a crucial time in American history, and the figure at its center: Martin Luther King, Jr. David Oyelowo brings the Civil Rights leader to life with nuance and grace, and if director Ava DuVernay's decision to portray LBJ (Tom Wilkinson) as an antagonistic force has drawn criticism and controversy, that's almost beside the point. What matters is the depiction of King, and the portrait of a country in the throes of racial conflict. 2 hrs. 07 R (violence, profanity, racial epithets, adult themes) - S.R.

The Theory of Everything The life, and loves, of British theoretical physicist Stephen Hawking are given keen, poignant treatment inJames Marsh's film, starring Eddie Redmayne as Hawking and Felicity Jones as Jane Wilde, the student he meets at Cambridge and falls for (and vice versa). Then, the challenge of the disease that cripples Hawking's body. 2 hrs. 03 PG-13 (adult themes) - S.R.

Two Days, One Night Marion Cotillard stars as a laid-off factory worker who can get her job back if she can persuade her colleagues to forgo a bonus. And so she goes knocking on doors, asking, entreating, begging. An almost biblical parable about compassion and community, from the Belgian kitchen sinkers, the Dardenne Brothers. 1 hr, 35 R (drugs, profanity, adult themes) - S.R.

The Wedding Ringer In this riotous celebration of love and friendship, Josh Gad is geeky and cuddly muckety-muck in international tax law who hires a professional best man (Kevin Hart) for his wedding to a narcissistic, manipulative, and bossy woman (Kaley Cuoco-Sweeting). 1 hr. 41 R (profanity, nudity, sexual content, drugs) - T.D.

Whiplash Miles Teller (the student) and J.K. Simmons (the teacher) star in Damien Chazelle's propulsive drama about an aspiring jazz musician's torturous mentorship at a prestigious New York conservatory. It's a hyperventilated nightmare about artistic struggle and ambition - as much a horror movie as a keenly realized indie about jazz, about art, about what it takes to claim greatness. 1 hr. 46 R (violence, profanity, adult themes) - S.R.

American Sniper *** Bradley Cooper delivers a powerful turn as Chris Kyle, the real-life Navy SEAL credited with the most kills of any sniper in U.S. military history. Clint Eastwood directs this taut Iraq War-era drama, although the sequences with Kyle returning stateside are diminished by textbook scenarios of family dysfunction and discord. 2 hrs. 12 R (violence, profanity, adult themes) - S.R.

The Boy Next Door * Jennifer Lopez knows it's wrong. But she gets it on with the neighbor's nephew (Ryan Guzman) and pays an unimaginable price in this thoroughly predictable thriller with a nasty finale. 1 hr. 31 R (violence, sex, adult themes, nudity, profanity) - D.H.

Cake ** An exercise in epic misery that has less to do with genuine suffering than it has to do with winning its star some serious acting cred. Jennifer Aniston is said star, playing a well-to-do Los Angeleno whose body, and psyche, are wracked with pain. Suicide looms as an option, and vials of Percocet and Oxycontin are consumed. 1 hr. 42 R (drugs, sex, profanity, adult themes) - S.R.

   The Imitation Game *** A gripping story, a sad story, a true story, about British mathematician Alan Turing, who led the team of Brits during World War II trying to crack the German's daunting Enigma encryption machine. Secretly gay, this unsung hero's life was brought to a grievous conclusion. Benedict Cumberbatch stars (another remarkable performance), with Keira Knightley, Matthew Goode, and Mark Strong. 1 hr. 54 PG-13 (sex, adult themes) - S.R.

The Interview *** Beyond the cyber attack and terroristic threats against theaters that screened it, Seth Rogen's political satire is crazy funny. A supercharged, wonderfully super-freaky James Franco stars as the host of a celeb TV tabloid show who scores an interview with the supreme leader of North Korea, Kim Jong-un. Co-writer, co-director and co-star Rogen is terrific as Franco's best friend and producer, while Lizzy Caplan is scintillating and playful as the sexy CIA officer who preps them to assassinate Kim. Thoroughly crude, rude and profane, the film also is surprisingly well-written and clever. 1 hr. 52 R (profanity, sexuality, nudity, violence, drug use) - T.D.

Into the Woods *** A jolly mash-up of symbol-laden, signature once-upon-a-time tales about lust, envy, greed, and misguided pursuits of happiness. James Corden, Johnny Depp, Meryl Streep, Emily Blunt, Anna Kendrick, et al., have fun with the rat-tat-tat rhymes and polygraphic melodies of the James Lapine/ Stephen Sondheim musical from which this all sprang. 2 hrs. 04 PG (scary creatures, adult themes) - S.R.

A Most Violent Year *** Set in 1981 New York, in a winter marked by crime, grime and dread, J.C. Chandor's Lumet-style drama stars Oscar Isaac as an upright businessman trying to make a go of it while thuggish rivals, and the D.A.'s office, bear down. Jessica Chastain stands by her man - up to a point, but even she starts looking at him like maybe he's not strong enough for the job. Beautifully acted, and just shy of being great, but still a compellling, suspenseful drama. 2 hrs. 05 R (violence, profanity, adult themes) - S.R.

Song One **1/2 Anne Hathaway is a headstrong Ph.D. candidate in anthropology who has to cut short her work in the North African desert when her brother (Ben Rosenfield) falls into a coma after a Brooklyn car accident. The movie burns with genuine sentiment, charismatic actors, and good music - but is held together by only a series of moods. 1 hr. 26 PG-13 (some profanity, sexuality) - T.D.

 Unbroken *1/2 Based on the life of Louis Zamperini, an airman who suffered greatly in WWII. You'll know how he felt after enduring this long, grim grinder directed by Angelina Jolie. 2 hrs. 17 PG-13 (violence, brutality, profanity) - D.H.