At the Movies

THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN — The basics are the same, but in tone, characters, performances and visual effects, this finds a distinct voice. PG-13 for action and violence. 138 mins.

BEASTS OF THE SOUTHERN WILD – Benh Zeitlin's intensely strange and wonderful film, about a girl named Hushpuppy, her defiant but deathly ill father, and the ragged Louisiana delta community they inhabit is dreamlike and full of grand emotional swells. PG-13 for intense imagery, violence, adult themes. 91 mins.

BRAVE — A beautiful-to-look-at princess story that begins promisingly but still feels old-fashioned and safe. PG for scary action, rude humor. 93 mins.

THE DARK KNIGHT RISES – It aims to be nothing less than the be-all, end-all of the comic-book genre. It has dozens of characters, an epically complicated vision of good and evil and a score that rises up every few minutes. What's missing is the anguish, perversity and danger that gave such weight to its predecessor. PG-13 for action violence, sensuality, strong language. 164 mins.

DIARY OF A WIMPY KID: DOG DAYS – An adolescent boy tries to survive summer misadventures in such fraught situations as swimming at the public pool and going camping. PG for rude humor. 94 mins.

ICE AGE: CONTINENTAL DRIFT – That squirrel-rat combination called Scrat, as usual, inadvertently causes a cataclysmic event. PG for mild rude humor and action. 87 mins.

STEP UP REVOLUTION – The latest in the series taps into the dance "flash mob" phenomenon and moves to Miami to give us the sunniest and most entertaining of the kids-gotta-dance musicals. PG-13 for some suggestive dancing and language. 97 mins.

1/2

TED – A pot-smoking, four-letter-word-spewing, anthropomorphic teddy bear is front and center in this deliciously weird assault on middle-class American values. R for crude and sexual content, pervasive language and some drug use. 106 mins.

TOTAL RECALL – In the future, a factory worker's role-playing mental vacation as a super-spy goes awry, leaving him a hunted man and blurring the lines between reality and fantasy. PG-13 for intense sci-fi violence/action, sexual content, brief nudity and language. 116 mins.

THE WATCH – Suburban paranoia can be as funny as it can be dangerous. But here the threat to an ordered Ohio town isn't anything with contemporary resonance. It's just aliens. R for strong sexual content, pervasive language and violent images. 102 mins.