Niceties have fallen by the wayside for this dreary sequel, which seems to exist for the sole purpose of serving as a vanity project for its aging star (who also produced).

Smart movies tend to avoid offering obvious patterns, imbecilic narrative coincidences, and imploding third acts. Unfortunately, The Accountant isn’t that smart.

The movie is based on the 1997 Loomis Fargo robbery that took place in Charlotte, and scripters Chris Bowman, Hubbel Palmer and Emily Spivey refused to change the names to protect the stupid.

While it’s admirable that the filmmakers forged their own path, it’s also lamentable in that, overall, these men aren’t nearly as interesting or as memorable as the 1960 models.

The film clearly views Snowden as a hero rather than a traitor, and it cuts no slack for anyone on either side of the political aisle.

Most films need some semblance of villainy to provide dramatic tension, and here it comes in the form of a panel of National Transportation Safety Board investigators determined to prove that a water landing wasn’t necessary and Sully could easily have made it back to LaGuardia.

What’s particularly noteworthy about the picture is not so much its crude comic content (some of it rather insipid) but the weightier thematic elements that envelop the storyline. Sausage Party is about nothing less than existential angst, spiritual fulfillment, and the search for a higher power in a potentially Godless universe.

What’s most shocking about Ben-Hur is how thoroughly it bungles the two most iconic and riveting sequences from the 1959 original.