Entertainment

THE HATEFUL EIGHT // GRITTY WESTERN The world emerges as a hostile, inhospitable setting in writer & director Quentin Tarantino’s second western “The Hateful Eight," and everybody but the innocent...

SPECTRE // BEST EVER BOND Ultimately, despite a variety of problems, this globe-trotting 007 outing boasts enough good stuff to offset the bad. If picturesque settings, robust performances, sumptuous...

LAST WITCH HUNTER // HEX-RATED RUBBISH The Last Witch Hunter casts spells that are far from inspired and mediocre at best. “Dungeons & Dragons” aficionado Vin Diesel toplines this ponderous, PG-13...

PAN // NO EXPENSE SPARED Whether on the big-screen or the small screen, the media has venerated Scottish writer J.M. Barrie’s classic 1904 play and 1911 novel about a rambunctious boy who refused to grow...

BLACK MASS // DREARY, SLUGGISH “Out of the Furnace” director Scott Cooper’s “Black Mass,” qualifies as a gritty, atmospheric, but middling mobster melodrama that chronicles the life and crimes of...

THE VISIT // HOMEGROWN HOKUM Humans do incredibly asinine things in horror movies. First, there are the unreasonable psychos. Think of Norman Bates in “Psycho,” Michael Myers in “Halloween,” Jason...

TRANSPORTER // REFUELED Tall, wiry, British actor Ed Skrein resembles the late Hollywood superstar actor James Coburn of the “Our Man Flint” franchise. Not only does Skrein make a suitable substitute for...

NO ESCAPE // SPELLBOUNDING Occasionally, life imitates art, even in the cinema. “As Above, So Below” director John Erick Dowdle’s “No Escape,” qualifies as a spellbinding, ‘stranger-in-a-strange...

AMERICAN ULTRA // AUDACIOUS Imagine crisscrossing the amnesia, espionage thriller “The Bourne Identity” with the stoner saga “The Pineapple Express,” and you’ve got the nitty-gritty of “Project...

THROWBACK THURSDAY Sometimes you need to sit back and watch some classics. Summer is a dull time for television shows, since new seasons start in fall and come back from a break in the spring. When in...