'Pets' with a cartoon kick

The Secret Life of Pets asks a question that's rich in both comic and dramatic potential. When owners leave their pets behind and head off to work, what do those lonely animals do? The team behind Despicable Me and Minions answers the questions in ways that turn The Secret Life of Pets into a jaunty series of cartoon-like episodes. Here's what happens: A terrier named Max (voice by Louis C.K.) lives a wonderful existence with an owner who loves him and whom he adores. Max's life is upset when his owner introduces a new pet into Max's environment, a large, floppy dog named Duke (Eric Stonestreet). Instant antagonists, Max and Duke are nonetheless destined to form a lasting bond. They do this by escaping into the streets of Manhattan, where they meet Snowball (Kevin Hart), a rambunctious rabbit who leads a movement aimed at liberating all animals from the humiliations of domestication. Additional characters include a rather large cat (Lake Bell) and a Pomeranian (Jenny Slate). Secret Life builds toward an action-oriented finale that no doubt will appeal to younger audiences, but struck me as a tad charmless. I don't know if Secret Life of Pets will knock Finding Dory off its box-office pedestal -- it probably will -- but both movies feature work from Albert Brooks, who, in this case, provides the voice of a hawk. I'm not sure that's a step up from the fish to which Brooks gave voice in Finding Dory, but I look forward to the time when he gets back to being human.

A fish searches for Mom and Dad

Finding Dory is a sweet little sequel to 2003's Finding Nemo.

Suffice it to say that although Finding Dory, the latest animated feature from the Disney/Pixar alliance, lacks the freshness of its predecessor, Finding Nemo, and although it wears its "you-can-do-it" message with all the subtlety of a political yard sign, it's entertaining and touching enough to garner well-deserved attention.

This time, Nemo and his dad Marlin (Hayden Rolence and Albert Brooks) are relegated to supporting roles as Dory (Ellen DeGeneres) tries to reunite with her long-lost parents.

Dory, you'll recall from the first movie, is a blue tang fish with short-term memory problems: Dory's disability causes her to be separated from her parents at the movie's outset. Can Dory ever remember enough to find her way home, home symbolizing all that is safe and good in the world of Disney?

Along the way, Dory meets a variety of new characters who become like a new family. These include Hank the octopus (Ed O'Neill), Bailey the whale (Ty Burrell), and a shark named Destiny (Kaitlin Olson). None of these characters are groundbreakers, but they're all serviceable and sometimes amusing.

Eugene Levy and Diane Keaton provide voices for Dory's parents.

The movie follows Dory as she travels to waters off the California coast. Once there, she discovers The Marine Life Institute, a facility where ocean life is rescued before being sent to an aquarium in Cleveland or returned to the ocean.

Directors Andrew Stanton and Angus MacLane offer the best visual diversions when the movie plumbs ocean depths.

The filmmakers also make a few bows to ecological issues; the closer Dory and friends get to shore, the more dangerous life seems to become. Images of debris-littered waters send a reminder about human carelessness when it comes to natural life.

The movie culminates with an action-oriented finale that feels overly cartoonish and anti-climactic, especially considering that it occurs after Dory reunites with her parents. It's likely, though, that the movie's primary audience -- i.e., kids -- won't care.

Dory's overall sweetness, its colorful ocean environments and its fine, jokey use of a recognizable voice (no, I'm not telling) make it a worthwhile dip into summer waters.

Predatory aspects of natural life in the ocean, by the way, mostly are avoided.

The doctor who fought the NFL

The story of one-man's battle to warn against the damage of concussions.

Concussion, a movie about the dangers of playing pro-football, may not be a classic, but it's worth seeing, particularly for Will Smith's highly concentrated performance as Dr. Bennet Omalu, the Nigerian born pathologist who identified brain trauma in a number of deceased NFL veterans.

Also -- and more important -- there's the subject of the movie; i.e., the dangers of prolonged football careers that can ruin lives, leading to dementia, violent outbursts, depression and even suicide.

The movie begins when Omalu, working in the Pittsburgh coroner's office, decides to do an autopsy on former Steelers star Mike Webster, rendered in small, early scenes by an appropriately alarming David Morse.

Omalu takes a detective's approach to his work; he respectfully talks to corpses, encouraging them to yield their secrets before he cuts them open. Eventually, he discovers that Webster suffered from CTE, Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy, the result of repeated blows to the head.

If you've been reading the papers, you know that the NFL originally paid little attention to the brain traumas caused by repeated hits. That makes for the movie's tension: Omalu's findings weren't welcomed by an organization that's heavily invested in a game that thrives on violence. (And, no, I'm not being holier than thou. I watch and enjoy professional football, too.)

Concussion, which was directed by Peter Landesman (Parkland), tells the straightforward story of a physician who worked hard to bring the truth of CTE to light and who also confronted racial prejudice, an aspect of the story that probably should have received more attention.

Smith masters Omalu's accent and gives a memorable performance as a doctor who's sure of himself, sometimes to the point of annoyance: Not everyone admires Omalu's persistence and some believe that he refuses to understand the importance of football in the city's communal life. They're right.

Albert Brooks gives a notable performance as Omalu's boss, one of the few doctors who takes his side. Alec Baldwin may be a bit miscast as a former Steelers physician who comes to see the light about the terrible consequences of head injuries and the athletic culture that produces them.

There's also a romance when Omalu meets Prema (Gugu Mbatha-Raw), a Kenyan nurse who becomes his wife, as well as an important part of his support system.

It's not easy to buy Luke Wilson as NFL commissioner Pete Godell, but Smith and Landesman put their story over with enough conviction to make us a tad uncomfortable the next time we sit down for an afternoon of hard-hitting football. We're fans, yes, but let's be real: We're also enablers.

Ambition, morality -- and oil trucks

Well-acted and smart, A Most Violent Year tackles tough moral issues.

The year: 1981. New York City is in the middle of one of its worst periods for violent crime. Other changes are happening, as well. It's a time -- not entirely unlike our own -- when the line between legitimacy and illegitimacy seems to have blurred, and ethics appear to have become variable.

How bad would it really be if a burgeoning business fudged a bit on its taxes? How far should one go in an attempt to outdo one's competition?

And in the world of urban business, how do things begin to shake out when new ethnic groups start to assert their dominance? Can there be room for new kids on the block?

A Most Violent Year -- the drama that encompasses all these questions -- demonstrates how big issues can be found by narrowing and sharpening one's focus. Directed by J.C. Chandor, A Most Violent Year revolves around a business that delivers home heating oil in New York City.

Within this narrow gauge, Chandor -- aided by a terrific cast -- has made a rare and quietly compelling movie that's willing to examine how people try to reconcile ambition and morality.

Chandor (Margin Call and All Is Lost) focuses on Abel Morales, played by Oscar Isaac. Abel wants to expand his footprint in the heating oil business.

To accomplish his goal, he decides to buy several storage tanks owned by a Hasidic Jewish family that drives a hard bargain. Abel must make a large cash down payment and come up the rest of the money -- another $1.5 million -- within 30 days.

If he can't, he loses his down payment and his business along with it.

The scene in which Abel and his attorney make the deal is a rich one. The sellers are careful to point out that what they're asking could have devastating consequences for Abel. He's set his mind on the purchase, and won't be deterred. He likes to own the things he uses, he says.

As is the case with many scenes in A Most Violent Year, the drama is carefully developed, even understated, and unlike many movies I see, I believed every moment of it.

Chandor allows the tension in Abel's situation to emerge through the performances and through the establishment of a dreary slice of urban winter.

Last seen in Inside Llewyn Davis, Isaac proves masterful as a well-dressed businessman who says he's trying to operate in legitimate fashion. It's not always clear where Abel is willing to draw the line that will keep him from felonious behavior.

That's because Abel doesn't arrive on screen in prefabricated form; he's in the process of picking his way through a tough world while keeping as much of his integrity as possible.

A man of pride, composure and impeccable dress, Abel's a commanding figure in his camel-colored overcoat.

In one of her best performances yet, Jessica Chastain plays Abel's wife Anna, the daughter of a Mafia don. Anna wonders whether her husband -- for all his attempts to control everything -- has the right stuff to make his way in a business environment in which someone is hijacking his trucks and stealing his oil.

She wants Abel to bring her family into the mix. Abel refuses.

Abel's nothing if not determined, but Anna seems the tougher of the two. Everything about her suggests that she understands more about the way the world works than her husband. He doesn't want to be defined as a gangster. That's less of a problem for Anna.

The supporting players are all in fine form. Two are especially noteworthy: Albert Brooks plays Abel's morally dubious attorney, a man whose face shows the wear of a career spent making deals that probably were ethically challenged.

David Oyelowo -- currently on views as Dr. Martin Luther King in Selma -- portrays a district attorney who's investigating the heating oil business, using Abel's company as a target.

When you're expecting to borrow big money from a bank -- as Abel is -- a criminal investigation isn't exactly what you want on your resume.

As the story develops, Abel's forced to juggle any number of balls. Drop even one and he could be ruined.

Working with cinematographer Bradford Young, Chandor creates an urban environment that gives A Most Violent Year the feel and texture of a crime drama. Some reviewers have likened A Most Violent Year to a Sidney Lumet movie.

It's an apt enough comparison, although Chandor's style tends to be less teeming and comprehensive than the approach the late Lumet took in movies such as Serpico, Prince of the City, Dog Day Afternoon and Q & A.

Still, the fact that Chandor is continuing this tradition at all strikes me as worthy, honorable and important.

There's nothing mythic about A Most violent Year. The movie takes us into a world populated by strivers, thieves and wannabes, and it sets out an ethic that -- for better or worse -- may be the only one that works in a time of compromised morality:

In the end, the honorable man does what's most right. Maybe that's all he can do.

This is 40 -- and it's pretty funny

Judd Apatow puts a toe into mature waters, but doesn't forget to bring along the laughs.

It takes a long time to get to her, but when the new Judd Apatow comedy, This is 40, arrives at a scene that's stolen by Melissa McCarthy, the humor suddenly becomes incendiary, foul-mouthed and very funny. Building on the crudeness she established in Bridesmaids, McCarthy scores big -- so big, in fact, that writer/director Apatow had the good sense to include one of her character's rants in an outtake.

But I digress, even before I begin.

In this mostly enjoyable outing, Apatow casts Paul Rudd and Leslie Mann (Apatow's real-life wife) as a husband and wife who also happen to be the self-absorbed parents of two daughters (Apatow's real daughters, Maude and Iris). Rudd's Pete runs a Los Angeles-based record company devoted to indulging his passion for '70s rock. Mann's Debbie owns an upscale boutique. And, yes, This is 40 represents a reunion for Rudd and Mann, both of whom appeared in Apatow's 2007 comedy, Knocked Up.

Of course, Pete and Debbie are way past knocked up. They're deeply ensconced in the grind of family life. Over the years, their relationship has lost a good deal of its romantic luster. Not surprisingly, Pete and Debbie have issues -- not the least of which revolves around the financial help Pete gives to his father (Albert Brooks), a likable freeloader who has started a new family.

A sharply funny Brooks -- who immediately raises the movie's comic ante -- plays an older man married to a younger woman and now grappling with three young children. Long on gall, Dad views any resistance by Pete as evidence of his son's selfishness. Never mind that Pete has financial troubles of his own.

Perhaps to balance things, Debbie's father (John Lithgow) enters the picture, as well. He's also married to a younger woman, and has been estranged from his daughter for years.

As the movie progresses, Lithgow's character sheds the bonds of caricature and becomes a real, flesh-and-blood father. Credit Apatow with mixing some expectedly crude humor (not all of it funny) with a few well-played scenes in which the writer/director makes a welcome journey into adult territory. Hey, at least he's putting a toe in deeper waters.

Unlike a comedy such as The Guilt Trip, This is 40 is no anemic two-hander. Apatow not only makes room for Brooks and Lithgow, but for Jason Siegel (as an overly confident physical trainer), Graham Parker (as a musician who can't sell any of his new recordings), Chris O'Dowd (as one of Pete's employees) and Megan Fox (as a woman who works in Debbie's boutique).

That's a decent amount of support for a comedy that aspires to be attuned to the debilitations of middle-age, many of them shockingly trivial. Pete is a little too fond of cupcakes. Debbie likes to sneak cigarettes. In this sun-splashed and mostly prosperous LA world, what could be more sinful than overeating or doing something that poses a direct threat to robust good health?

At 134 minutes, This is 40 probably overstays its welcome, and no one's likely to confuse it with Ingmar Bergman's Scenes from a Marriage, which Apatow reportedly watched before making his movie. OK, so Apatow isn't making great art, but, then again, Bergman didn't get many laughs, either.

'Drive' is stylish, but where's it headed?

A compelling Ryan Gosling needed a better movie.

Ryan Gosling is an actor who's capable of projecting an unsettling sense of stillness. Gosling's thin half-smile can be difficult to read, a mixture of beneficence and menace that easily could spring in either direction. Like many great movie actors, he excels at holding things back, which gives him a quality of wary intelligence, as if he senses things that might be beyond ordinary reach.

Watching Drive -- a thriller from director Nicolas Winding Refn -- I kept waiting for a movie to materialize around Gosling, who easily holds the screen as a Hollywood stunt driver who also drives getaway cars. As a getaway driver, he gives his clients five minutes of total commitment, and then ... well ... all bets are off.

As Refn's camera wanders across Los Angeles' seamy side, the screen fills with deftly executed visual gestures, but Refn's movie ultimately lacks the brash invigoration of breakthrough style or the heft of real substance.

As it turns out, Drive may be most notable for giving Albert Brooks, a very funny actor, an opportunity to play an evil character. Brooks brings a relaxed sense of amorality to a low-life criminal who offers to back Gosling's character's career as a racecar driver.

Gosling's character -- he's never named -- seems a pure movie creation, an increasingly ferocious avenger who becomes a protector for a vulnerable woman (Carey Mulligan) and her young son.

If you think of Drive as a darkly hued noir meditation, you may find some artsy kick in it. I wouldn't say Refn totally has stumbled, but he hasn't gotten Drive into a consistently credible gear, either.

As has been pointed out by other reviewers, the movie's opening sequences qualifies as its best, largely because Refn understands that skillful driving involves knowing when to slow down, as well as when to speed up. Despite such interesting touches and some shockingly explosive violence, Drive proves a letdown. Maybe it's too damn minimal for its own good.