Arts & Culture

“Life of the Party” (Warner Bros.) turns out to be an especially poor choice of title for a campus-set comedy that is, essentially, lifeless. Flat and boring, the film also winks at — though it doesn’t display — extracurricular bedroom activities.

If you’re the type of person to ever wonder why the word “disgruntled” is commonplace, but calling someone “gruntled” decidedly less so, “Angels, Barbarians and Nincompoops” offers a rollicking ride through the forgotten histories of everyday words.

Don’t mess with Mom; that’s the message of the less-than-credible and excessively violent thriller “Breaking In” (Universal). As it strains its tenuous premise, the film approaches a conclusion calculated to appeal to viewers’ worst instincts.

The book, “Running the Cobblestones,” published in 2017 under the pen name C.K. MacDonald, deepened a mother-daughter relationship that was overdue for attention.

Mary Haseltine’s debut book titled “Made for This: The Catholic Mom’s Guide to Birth,” draws on St. John Paul II’s theology of the body to show that childbirth is an essential part of who God created women to be, body and soul.

The real-life evil of abortion is blended with otherworldly and occult phenomena in the horror tale “Wraith” (Out Cold). The result is an earnest but flawed message movie.

Midwifery, the art or act of assisting with childbirth, has captivated St. Onge Carneiro since she was a teenager after the lifelong Catholic met her first midwife, her then-boyfriend’s mom, at 16.

Those few grown-ups for whom it can be considered acceptable will find the thriller “Bad Samaritan” (Electric Entertainment) intriguing but seamy.