Amy Biancolli

In the end - and every story needs one - The Words is a decent, ambitious, unoriginal film about a decent, ambitious, unoriginal writer. Both aim for greatness. Both fall short.

It looks like an exploding art project - but fails to capture the books' childlike voice and charm.

Until its final seconds, Seven Days in Utopia is just a piece of gee-whiz, G-rated, nicely shot evangelism outfitted as a golf movie. Then it cuts away at the pivotal moment that's normally the life's blood of inspirational sports dramas - and becomes something vastly more obnoxious.

The movie turns lighter and less morose as it rolls along, which is good for viewers who prefer a bit of honey to offset the bitter taste of hormones.

When its biggest trick is finally revealed, it is not entirely satisfying.

Best reason to stay home and rent "Disturbia": I Am Number Four is a little better and makes loads more sense than "Eagle Eye." But neither has the sass and pluck of "Disturbia."

Visually, Jonah Hex is an orgy of overstatement: rapid edits, garish colors, harsh light.

The whole thing runs about an hour too long: It should have been a TV show. The adventure's too big for the kids who would love it the most.

The chief problem with Your Highness is its lack of imagination - its misuse and overuse of language and visual riffs that are only marginally amusing at best.

The screenplay is so cognitively impaired that the filmmakers might have been better off hacking up "Fast Times at Ridgemont High," "Dazed and Confused" and "Dude, Where's My Car?" and then sticking together random bits with masking tape. At least that would have made some sense.

It's harmless.

In this case, it's considerably better, adapting the 007 template in a story of a crazed bald cat named Kitty Galore (voiced by a hissing, chichi Bette Midler) and her malevolent plot to conquer the world. It's brilliant in its simplicity

The film has some chuckles, if no belly laughs; it has some warmth, if no great heat.

The result is a diligent brand of gloom. When it isn't being diligently gloomy, it's being obvious. When it isn't being obvious, it's being sneaky, and when it isn't being sneaky, it's marching toward a climax of B-movie violence, stupidity and nuttiness that summarily bumps off the movie's least annoying character.

Catherine Hardwicke's prettified movie is a strange adaptation because it supplants the woodsy horror of the original fairy tale with two new elements: a romantic triangle and a witch hunt.