The Story: Based on the true story of Jeff Bauman, a man who struggled to cope with the loss of his legs and unexpected celebrity status following the Boston Marathon bombings. The Lowdown: A touching story of perseverance that never lets its penchant for inspiration overshadow its protagonists' human fallibility.

The Story: A hapless commercial airline pilot finds himself at the heart of  CIA drug running operation in the '80s. The Lowdown: How did American Made get made? The same two-word answer for why it failed: Tom Cruise.

The Story: A flying beast that drives a semiliteral monster truck returns to feed on the residents of a small town after two decades of dormancy. The Lowdown: Fodder for fans of the franchise, but of limited appeal to anyone else.

In Brief: That Summer Interlude (1951) is often considered second-tier Bergman is not all that surprising, but it is unfortunate — it's by far the most personal of the great auteur's early works, and would set the stage for many of his career-defining films. Bergman's subsequent explorations of memory, identity and femininity can all be traced back to Interlude, and while…

In Brief: The Asheville Film Society continues its October celebration of spook cinema with the first true big budget American horror feature, The Phantom of the Opera (1925). While it's mostly remembered for Lon Chaney's grotesque appearance — Roger Ebert called the Phantom's unmasking scene "one of the most famous moments in silent cinema" —it's easy for modern audiences…

The Story: Female tennis champ Billie Jean King's uphill fight for gender equality leads to a climactic showdown in the form of a highly-publicized spectacle when she goes up against self-proclaimed "male chauvinist pig" Bobby Riggs in a televised exhibition match. The Lowdown: A comedy about a serious subject that proves heavy-hearted but never heavy-handed.

The Story: Massively successful pop-folk act The Avett Brothers discuss their background while recording their latest hit album. The Lowdown: An endearing glimpse behind the scenes of a band rooted in its frontmen's almost implausibly close brotherly bond.

The Story: Kingsman operative Galahad (aka Eggsy) returns to save the world again, this time from a drug cartel that has poisoned its product. The Lowdown: Bond for the Twitter era returns in what feels like a perfunctory social media repost, a thoroughly unoriginal film that seems to exist solely to keep the studio accountants happy.

In Brief: While it sits chronologically amid the most notable period of French New Wave auteur Jean-Luc Godard's oeuvre, Made in USA (1966) isn't often mentioned alongside films like Breathless or Weekend — and that omission is not without due cause. But it is one of Godard's most overlooked and underrated works, and if it doesn't rank amongst his best-known movies…

In Brief: Basil Rathbone and Nigel Bruce's second pairing as Holmes and Watson, and arguably their best, Alfred L. Werker's 1939 The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes is a damned near unimpeachable mystery film. Though the plot is taken from William Gillette's play rather than any of the Arthur Conan Doyle source material, and Bruce's Watson is definitely far removed…

In Brief: The Asheville Film Society will kick off its month-long October celebration of horror with a double feature from one of the unrivaled greats of the early horror cinema, the legendary Tod Browning. While many are well acquainted with Browning's better known films such as 1932's Freaks or 1931's Bela Lugosi Dracula, few are as familiar with his early…

The Story: A couple trying to conceive find their bucolic life upended by unexpected guests. The Lowdown: Aronofsky goes full Buñuel in a career-defining work of symbolist genre-defiance, a polarizing magnum opus that requires an open mind and a strong constitution.  

The Story: A Brooklyn teen struggles to accept his homosexuality in the face of pressure from family and friends. The Lowdown: A film more interesting than enjoyable, redeemed largely by a remarkable performance from star Harris Dickinson and exceptional camera work from cinematographer Hélène Louvart.

In Brief: Louis Leterrier's 2013 Now You See Me basically has all of the elements that I hate in a film — it's an exercise in style over substance with effectively no attention payed to character or story, the cinematic equivalent of a cheap off-Strip Vegas floorshow. Which is why I'm surprised that I don't hate it, at least…

The Story: A recently widowed father must prove to his orthodox Jewish community that he is fit to retain custody of his son. The Lowdown: A touching, thoughtful and frequently tragic story that transcends its religious trappings to become something universally relatable.

The Story: A group of young misfits in small-town Maine must confront an ancient evil that feeds on fear. The Lowdown: A competently executed adaptation of Stephen King's classic novel that proves sufficiently scary to justify its existence, if not the excitement surrounding its release.

In Brief: If you could disregard the fact that Miracles For Sale (1939) is the last film of the great Tod Browning, it would a perfectly acceptable — if largely undistinguished — potboiler of a murder mystery. The fact that this film is the swan song of one of the greatest horror directors of the early cinema, however,…

The Story: Alejandro Jodorowsky continues his surrealist autobiographical fantasy by recounting his late adolescence and early adulthood in Chile, a period in which he devoted his life to becoming an artist. The Lowdown: A profoundly affecting examination of family and artistry from one of the great masters of modern cinema.

The Story: The civilian journalists of Raqqa is Being Silently Slaughtered risk their lives to expose the grotesque violence being perpetrated against the Syrian populace at the hands of ISIS. The Lowdown: An oppressively bleak but undeniably powerful portrait of the men struggling valiantly to undermine ISIS' stranglehold on the Middle East.

The Story: A young orphan is married off to a wealthy businessman in 17th-century Amsterdam, but her life is complicated by an inability to conceive and a torrid affair with a painter.  The Lowdown: Not even the profusion of attractive naked people on screen can justify the existence of something this irredeemably dumb.