Zootopia, the latest offering from Disney Animation Studios, splashes the screen with vivid color, lots of humor, and a great cast of characters, even if some of them are really scary and some of them are cute and fuzzy. Unfortunately, lurking beneath the surface are some messages that will have adults scratching their heads.Judy Hopps (Ginnifer Goodwin) dreams that she can be a police officer but never before has a bunny made it through the academy. Determined as she is, she works hard and grad...

Rudyard Kipling’s timeless story of the boy raised by wolves in the jungle returns to the big screen once again, courtesy of Disney Studios. If you remember the animated 1967 version, I just bet you’re humming the tune for “Bare Necessities” in your head right this minute. This live-action version of the story features only one live person, the man-cub Mowgli (Neel Sethi), although the digital wizardry performed by the filmmakers just might have us believing that the animals are real, too.

You can now add The Divergent Series to the number of film franchises that have suffered from studio greed and have failed audiences by unnecessarily splitting the last part of the story into two films. It happened to The Hunger Games and Twilight and the ridiculous trend backfires once again with the latest film in the Divergent series, Allegiant.With the death of Jeanine in Insurgent, Tris (Shailene Woodley), Four (Theo James), Peter (Miles Teller), Christina (Zoe Kravitz), and Caleb (Ansel El...

Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice fits perfectly into the Easter Season, although I’m pretty sure the seasons of the Church year had absolutely nothing to do with the consideration of release dates by Zack Snyder and crew. The film is also the first in two comic book movies this year that are pitting the good guys against each other. Maybe the film industry is tapping into our culture’s difficulty with intelligent and mature conflict resolution.The darkness in Bruce Wayne’s (B...

Ethical dilemmas abound in "Eye in the Sky" and the filmmakers respect the audience enough that they don’t preach an easy conclusion. Although a course of action is finally decided upon, the viewer is left to wonder, “If I were in that situation, what would I have done?” or even, “What is the right thing to do in this situation?” There are no easy answers and I could feel the same tension that the characters experienced.

"Midnight Special," the new film from "Mud" director, Jeff Nichols, follows Alton Meyer (Jaeden Lieberher) on his journey of discovering who he is and where he belongs. Sounds pretty normal, right? Not in Alton’s case. This 8-year-old boy has special powers of some kind. He can’t go out in daylight and this bright light shoots from his eyes whenever he removes the blue goggles he wears.

In a city like many others in the United States, a diverse group of students and faculty go about their daily routines. The football team bends a knee in prayer and the flag is prominent. In a history class about non-violence to achieve civil rights Brooke (Hayley Orrantia), a junior, asks the teacher Grace Wesley (Melissa Joan Hart) if the teachings of Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr. are like those of Jesus because they all taught nonviolence, stood up for what they believed in and died for ...

Annabelle Beam, “Anna” (Kylie Rogers) is a ten year-old girl who lives with her two sisters and parents, Christy (Jennifer Garner) and Kevin (Martin Henderson) in Burleson TX. Anna suffers from “pseudo-obstruction motility disorder” meaning that her intestines are not able to function. As her condition worsens with increasing pain, Christy desperately tries to find a doctor that can help Anna but is frustrated at every turn.Christy finally finds Dr. Nurko (Eugenio Derbez)...

From time to time, instead of an actual review, we will be posting an example of how film can be brought to prayer using a format called "Cinema Divina." It's a modern spin on the ancient prayer form of "Lectio Divina" practiced since the days of the early Church. Please click on the link below for a detailed explanation of Cinema Divina. This reflection is the outcome of one person's prayer, connecting Scripture, film, and everyday life. We hope that in reading it, you might be inspired to do y...

An imaginative portrayal of one year in the life of the Child Jesus. The story begins with Jesus in Egypt being bullied by another boy from the Jewish community, and escalates into some gripping action which it maintains to one degree or another throughout the film. Never boring. Never trite. Faithful to the Scriptures and with sound theology, this film has everything in it but the sensational.