As AIDS has changed in the United States, so has the AIDS documentary. When the epidemic began in the 1980s, the disease was almost inescapably fatal, killing off thousands at an alarming rate; subsequently, the movies on the subject were heart-breaking, tragic pieces like “Silverlake Life” and “Common Threads: Stories from the Quilt.”

With the later development of protease inhibitors — popularly known as the “AIDS cocktail” — the death rates slowed dramatically. And the story of how those drugs came to be is told in a new kind of AIDS documentary, the empowering and uplifting “How to Survive a Plague,” which...

Remember that old TV cartoon show “Clutch Cargo”? It was so low-budget that, rather than animate the characters talking, they would cut a hole in the face and show a real, human mouth speaking the dialogue. It was creepy, but that effect at least made the kiddie program something of a standout in bizarro pop culture.

Don’t expect “Dredd 3D” to be nearly as memorable, despite the fact that actor Karl Urban spends the whole film wearing a helmet that covers practically his entire face, leaving only the movements of his mouth to do all the acting. If the 1995 Sylvester Stallone vehicle “Judge Dredd” annoyed fans of the original British comics by having the hero wear his trademark helmet too infrequently, “Dredd 3D” will no doubt put off mainstream audiences by trapping the hero in both headgear and an underwritten screenplay...

It’s ambitiously hitting (selected) screens in 70 millimeter and dealing with huge topics like war and religion, but for all its exquisite craftsmanship, Paul Thomas Anderson’s “The Master” lacks the narrative sweep that made “There Will Be Blood” such a work of genius.

This latest one definitely merits a look, but two viewings later, I still find myself both impressed and strangely disengaged.

While most of the advance buzz has centered around how much the film’s title character does or doesn’t resemble Scientology founder L. Ron Hubbard, “The Master” winds up being more interested in exploring the surrogate father-son dynamic that Anderson previously plumbed in both “Blood” and “Boogie Nights.”

This time, however, the son is so damaged and the father so unable to provide...

It’s a recipe Hitchcock would have enjoyed: Take a stressed-out American businessman, plop him into a foreign country with no luggage or ability to speak the language, then thrust him into a plot in which he must rescue his family from kidnappers while being pursued by bad guys and sought out by police who are either in on the conspiracy or who wrongly assume that he has killed a cop.

Granted, director Mabrouk El Michri (“JCVD”) is no Hitchcock, but “The Cold Light of Day” winds up being relentlessly entertaining and almost giddily ridiculous. This isn’t great cinema, or even a movie you’ll remember four hours later, but as stupid thrill rides go, it’s smart enough to show you a good time.

Our imperiled American is Will Shaw (Henry Cavill), who’s flown to Spain from San Francisco to spend time with his mom, his...