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    ‘Kung Fu Panda 4’ Review: Trouble in Juniper City

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    Jack Black’s Po faces a new adversary, a chameleon voiced by Viola Davis, in the latest installment of this popular animated franchise.“Kung Fu Panda 4,” like previous installments of this DreamWorks franchise, punches above its weight.Once again starring Jack Black as the gullible martial arts master Po, the animated film melds together wisecracking comedy and sprightly action sequences with a message of kindness, inner peace and self-discovery.In this movie, directed by Mike Mitchell, Po grapples with his new responsibility as the spiritual leader of the Valley of Peace, taking the place of his mentor Shifu (Dustin Hoffman). Shifu urges Po to name a successor, but Po is reluctant to give up a life of butt-kicking in exchange for doling out wisdom.The halfhearted search for Po’s replacement is cut short with the arrival of a thieving fox, Zhen (Awkwafina). Threatened with jail time, she offers information on a mysterious new villain, the Chameleon (Viola Davis), who threatens to take over the Valley with the power of Po’s previous adversaries combined.As Po and Zhen set out for the Chameleon’s palace in faraway Juniper City, Po’s two guardians — his biological father, Li Shan (Bryan Cranston) and adopted father, Mr. Ping (James Hong) — follow him in comical pursuit.Witty gags abound (there’s a standout “bull in the china shop” sequence), and Black and Awkwafina make a charming lead duo, particularly when Po encounters the sights, sounds and bountiful food of Juniper City. The art direction is also a step above the typical animated blockbuster. But what’s missing are the antics of Po’s “Furious Five” compatriots from the earlier films, like Angelina Jolie’s Tigress and Jackie Chan’s Monkey, who are written off in this installment.Still, don’t expect a total downgrade: This is an enjoyable “Kung Fu Panda” movie, even if it’s missing some of the pizazz of the earlier ones.Kung Fu Panda 4Rated PG. Running time: 1 hour 34 minutes. In theaters. More

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      ‘Sam & Kate’ Review: It’s a Family Affair

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      Darren Le Gallo’s drama stars two real-life parent-child duos — Dustin and Jake Hoffman, and Sissy Spacek and Schuyler Fisk — as lonely small-towners looking for love.“Sam & Kate” is the kind of film in which a car breakdown kindles a romance, fireworks provide the backdrop for a first kiss and a misplaced box (almost) ends a relationship.It’s a story about serendipity, except the signs from the universe that drive Darren Le Gallo’s film, a drama about finding love after loss, feel a little too … plotted. Twists of fate lose their magic when they’re obvious as clumsy script contrivances.If there’s a ring of truth to the film, it’s in the casting. The movie stars two real-life parent-child pairs: Dustin Hoffman and Jake Hoffman play a father-son duo, Bill and Sam, while Schuyler Fisk and Sissy Spacek appear as Kate and her mother, Tina. Sam is an aspiring artist who has returned to his hometown to take care of the ailing, cantankerous Bill; Kate, a bookstore owner, is grieving a personal tragedy (the details are revealed gradually) and trying to manage Tina’s hoarding problem.Sam asks Kate out and is gently turned away, but — per the fantasies of many a spurned man — he persists, and she finally gives in.Sam and Kate are such broad archetypes that it’s hard to feel the depth of their scars or the spark of their chemistry. The younger Hoffman’s messy hair and hangdog face do little to explain why, exactly, Sam is such a sad sack. The effervescent Fisk is mostly tasked with smiling sadly — until, of course, Sam draws Kate out of her shell with his supposed charms.The parents, however, fill out their thin roles with an authentic melancholy that “Sam & Kate” struggles otherwise to muster. Underneath Bill’s orneriness and Tina’s neuroses, one glimpses two aging actors confronting their own mortality with touching candor.Sam & KateRated R for crass language and some scenes of pot smoking. Running time: 1 hour 44 minutes. In theaters. More

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      ‘As They Made Us’ Review: If the Apple Falls, Who Retrieves It?

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      A dutiful daughter navigates the consequences of her parents’ failings in Mayim Bialik’s engagingly compassionate directorial debut.,For her directorial debut, Mayim Bialik — the neuroscientist, sitcom star, and finalist for the “Jeopardy!” host gig — hewed to what she knew: reckoning with the legacy of volatile parents.At the start of her smartly observed, well-cast drama “As They Made Us,” a young Abigail and her brother, Nathan, listen from the back seat of a car while their parents downshift into a nasty argument. It’s clearly not a one-off. The youngsters appear in flashbacks illuminating the power of their parents’ undiagnosed mental illness to shape the adults they become — especially Abigail (Dianna Agron).Dustin Hoffman and Candice Bergen portray the parents as they were — when eruptions of violence and stubborn denial were routine — and as they are now. Eugene is suffering a degenerative condition that exacerbates confusion; Barbara, so uncomfortable with vulnerability, doubles down on control even as she leans on Abigail.Abigail has two children, has been divorced a year and is a columnist for a glossy magazine, The Modern Jew. She’s smart, overtaxed and a textbook dutiful daughter. Decades earlier, Nathan (Simon Helberg) high-tailed it and remains estranged.Bialik gets adroit work from the ensemble. Helberg brings moving nuance to Nathan’s sullen reckoning. Justin Chu Cary keeps Abigail’s love interest on the grown-up side of what could have been a too-good-to-be true character. Still, even with veterans like Hoffman and Bergen, it’s Agron’s film. She and Bialik make Abigail’s filial loyalty as sympathetic as it is exasperating, and as rife with difficult truths about aging as it is understatedly hopeful about growing up.As They Made UsRated R for abusive and explosive language. Running time: 1 hour 40 minutes. In theaters and available to rent or buy on Amazon, Google Play and other streaming platforms and pay TV operators. More