Sex, violence, and action sell movie tickets. An inspirational theme can also draw viewers to theater seats for a 90-minute escape, but into nobler realms. The first half-hour of the new film Bennett’s War allows for some modest expectations, but thereafter settles for a generic story.

In the new HBO documentary Alternate Endings, one woman hand mixes her father’s cremated remains with concrete she will have cemented inside an artificial coral reef. “That is the legacy,” a guide tells her. “Not only is it a resting place for your loved one, but it is an active, producing part of the environment. It’s creating new life, and will do so for hundreds of years to come.”

Overcomer, the Kendrick Brothers’ new release, is billed “from the creators of War Room.” That 2015 film reached No. 1 in its second week at the box office. But look for the next movie that Alex and Stephen make to be marketed as “from the creators of Overcomer.” Genuine and compelling, Overcomer is the Kendricks’ best effort yet.

Mayra Rodriguez thought she was helping women when she reported problems at the Planned Parenthood Arizona facilities she ran.

Her supervisors didn’t see it that way and fired her in 2017. Rodriguez filed a lawsuit for wrongful termination, and last week, a jury awarded her $3 million in damages.

Political protests and unrest in Hong Kong have engulfed Disney’s upcoming live-action remake of Mulan.

A public rift between Marvel Studios and Sony Pictures could mean big changes for popular superhero movies. Sony owns the movie rights to the Spider-Man character and just had its highest-grossing movie ever this summer with Spider-Man: Far From Home. The two studios have cooperated in recent years, with Spider-Man appearing in Avengers movies and Marvel’s Iron Man playing an important role in the Spider-Verse.

It has become a cliché to refer to Quentin Tarantino’s Once Upon a Time in Hollywood as a “love letter”—to Tinseltown, to Tarantino’s youth, to 1969 itself (just in time for the year’s 50th anniversary!). But even with its smattering of gratuitous violence, the film is better described as a fairy tale (hence its title’s first four words).