Miles Teller, Aaron Eckhart, Ciarán Hinds, Katey Sagal, Ted Levine

Ben Younger

Boxing movies tend to follow a very clear formula. If it’s an underdog story, it’s typically obvious what conflicts will arise and, whether won or not, there’s the catharsis that comes after the final boxing match. The newest entry in the subgenre, “Bleed for This,” checks a lot of boxes, but it isn’t without heart or a good, albeit familiar, story to tell. Writer/director Ben Younger’s film entertains with some immersive boxing scenes, a real sense of time and place, and some standout supporting performances.

The movie is based on the true story of Vinny “The Pazamanian Devil” Pazienza (Miles Teller), a boxer who didn’t believe in quitting and won three championships in three different weight classes. The story begins with the local Providence boxer having just gained some notoriety after winning two world title fights. At the beginning of the film, we see Vinny taking a beating from Roger Mayweather for the lightweight championship. His trainer Lou (Ted Levine) tells him he should throw in the towel and leave boxing forever. That’s something Vinny isn’t going to do, so Lou teams him up with fellow underdog Kevin Rooney (Aaron Eckhart), Mike Tyson’s former trainer. Rooney convinces Vinny to move up a weight class, and the gamble pays off in their first fight together. After a rousing victory and some hope, Vinny gets into a brutal car wreck, leaving him with a broken neck. The doctor tells him he’ll never box again, but Vinny doesn’t know how to do anything else. Boxing is his life, so with Kevin’s help and his family’s support, he trains hard enough to return to boxing in a year’s time to fight the biggest, and most dangerous, match of his career.

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Tom Hanks, Aaron Eckhart, Laura Linney, Mike O’Malley, Anna Gunn

Clint Eastwood

On January 15, 2009, commercial airline pilot Captain Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger safely landed US Airways Flight 1549 in the middle of the Hudson River when the plane struck a flock of geese shortly after takeoff, causing both engines to fail. It took the combined efforts of Sully’s crew and over 1,000 first responders in New York City and New Jersey to ensure the safety of all 155 passengers. But director Clint Eastwood’s big screen adaptation of the famous incident opens with an alternate version of the crash – one that ends in a fiery (and eerily familiar) explosion into the side of a New York City skyscraper. Why risk the fury of moviegoers with such distressing 9/11 imagery? Because it shows how differently it could have ended without Sully’s heroic act, and in doing so, gets the audience firmly behind its subject from the start.

The film begins several weeks after the so-called Miracle on the Hudson, with Sully (Tom Hanks) and his crew, including First Officer Jeffrey Skiles (Aaron Eckhart), making the talk show rounds to discuss their experience. Unbeknownst to the general public, there was an investigation taking place behind closed doors with the National Transportation Safety Board in order to determine whether Sully’s “forced water landing” (he refuses to use the word “crash”) was justified or reckless. So when a computer simulation of the accident reveals new data that suggests the airplane could have made it back to LaGuardia or Teterboro Airport without injury to any of the passengers, it casts a shadow of self-doubt on the experienced pilot, who’s already under an immense amount of pressure between the ongoing investigation, the numerous media commitments and financial problems at home, not to mention the PTSD caused by the incident itself.

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Gerard Butler, Aaron Eckhart, Morgan Freeman, Angela Bassett, Charlotte Riley, Colin Salmon, Robert Forster

Babak Najafi

“Olympus Has Fallen” was a pretty blatant rip-off of John McTiernan’s “Die Hard,” so it should come as no surprise that “London Has Fallen” – which is more of a spiritual successor than a literal sequel to the 2013 film – takes a page from another installment in the John McClane series, “Die Hard with a Vengeance,” by staging it as a buddy movie between Gerard Butler‘s gruff, no-nonsense Secret Service agent and Aaron Eckhart‘s hostage-prone president. The premise itself isn’t all that different from its somewhat enjoyable predecessor, but while “London Has Fallen” has its charms, this lean, mean POTUS-in-peril action thriller is ultimately hindered by its reluctance to fully embrace its own stupidity.

When the British Prime Minister unexpectedly dies after a routine surgery, U.S. President Benjamin Asher (Eckhart) insists on traveling to London for the funeral to pay his respects, despite the logistical nightmare that it creates for Secret Service director Lynne Jacobs (Angela Bassett) and head of security Mike Banning (Butler). Many of the world’s most powerful leaders are scheduled to attend, which provides the perfect opportunity for Yemenian arms dealer Aamir Barkawi (Alon Aboutboul) to launch a synchronized terrorist attack that kills several heads of state and reduces London’s most famous landmarks to rubble. President Asher manages to survive the initial attack, but when his rescue chopper is shot down, he’s forced to go on the run from his pursuers, relying once again on the highly skilled Banning to keep him safe and neutralize the threat.

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