Andrea Gronvall

Slick, violent thriller that could seriously dampen tourism to Venezuela.

The movie includes some tony philosophizing about the conflict between science and faith, but it's mostly a beat-the-clock chase through Rome (nicely evoked in Salvatore Totino's lush cinematography).

Too slavish in its devotion to 50s sci-fi conventions to work as parody or camp, this indie comedy by "The X-Files" alumnus R.W. Goodwin sinks under the weight of its homage.

Credit production designer Therese DePrez and set decorator Clive Thomasson for the marvelous setting, a charmed building with a life of its own.

More tart than sweet, this contemporary fairy tale provides a worthy vehicle for the fearless Christina Ricci.

Benjamin Bratt lacks the dynamism one would expect of the commanding officer of a U.S. Rangers rescue unit; James Franco, however, is solid in the less flashy role of the mission's mastermind, and as the POW leader Joseph Fiennes manages to be heroic while prettily languishing from malaria.

The ancient body-switching premise is animated by a breezy script that briefly addresses some of its darker implications.

Director Anne Fletcher delivers more bite and brisker pacing than she did with "27 Dresses."

The gods, led by Sean Bean, are mostly stiffs; thank heaven for Uma Thurman, raising hell as a stylishly leather-clad Medusa.

This amiable romantic comedy benefits from its stellar ensemble.

The current burlesque revival is a throwback to ostensibly more innocent times, and writer-director Steven Antin finds something redemptive in each character.

The set-up is tediously slow, while the later murders are packed so tightly it's like watching a blender on high speed.

Matt Dillon almost runs away with the movie as a preening, conniving NASCAR champ who may be dumber than a box of rocks but realizes there's something up with the VW.

Chris Klein steals the film as a rival ex-nerd, now the most gorgeous guy in town, while director Roger Kumble (Cruel Intentions) cribs from the Farrelly brothers and the Three Stooges.

This scathing study of middle-class angst plays like a cross between Buñuel and Almodovar, but the satire never achieves liftoff despite the actors' best efforts.

Writer-director Wil Shriner tends to sit on almost every shot, killing any comic momentum (sequences with Luke Wilson as a dim-bulb cop are particularly witless), and ominous scenes involving cottonmouths and Rottweilers are glibly resolved.

Writer-director Rob Hardy opts for family-friendly drama but tones down the conflicts so much that none of the story lines can rival the music.

Screenwriter Akiva Goldsman (A Beautiful Mind) pelts the viewer with so many factoids and allegations about the early Catholic church, goddess worship, the Crusades, painting, cartography, and code-breaking that the movie's big revelation turns out to be neither grand nor shocking.

The script by sitcom veteran Gary David Goldberg has weaknesses--it soft-pedals bitterness, and the ending is annoyingly pat. On balance, though, this is a funny and smartly paced love story.

Thankyoubutnomoreplease.

Too archly scripted to appeal to kids and too crudely executed to win over older aficionados. The cheap-looking CGI makes the animals creepy rather than engaging, and a plot thread about a series of thefts does little more than spin the tale to feature length.

Sometimes feels like one of those "disease of the week" TV movies from the 1970s.

The screenplay is sharp and insightful, the period details ring true, and Martin is appealing as a dreamer conflicted about his homosexuality. But once the action shifts from the town to the festival, any momentum gets lost in a psychedelic haze.

Harrison Ford carries this talky, formulaic thriller by virtue of his authority, culled from years in front of the camera, but his performance can't obscure the obvious plot machinations.

The violence is minimal, and the humor is inoffensive enough for tots, but everything is damned soft--from the fuzzy backgrounds to the enemy's diluted Germanness.

Director Jon Chu (Step Up 2 the Streets) ably exploits the 3D format, constantly moving the action forward and upward. The color and music also pop, as do scene stealers Martin and Facundo Lombard, Argentine twins whose comedic talents nearly match their dizzying footwork.

Writer-director Spencer Susser and cowriter David Michod (Animal Kingdom) generate fresh hells at a surreally rapid clip but cop out with an incongruously sentimental ending.

Shana Feste's screenplay seldom rises above the level of daytime TV; the only actor who triumphs over her trite dialogue is Tim McGraw in a nonsinging role as Paltrow's husband and manager.

Bartlett and Mevoli give appealing performances, and Bell adds to the authenticity by peppering their radical clique with real-life activists.

Chan shows he still has the chops during a showdown at the Eiffel Tower, but you'd think the movie's reported budget of $140 million might have bought Tucker at least one side-splitting gag.

The comic scenes can be arch or shrill, but director Marcos Siega (Pretty Persuasion) does better when the story turns somber and the emotions feel genuine.

Almost every note in this insipid comedy is strident or false, from the child's prodigious talent for deception to the jock's chaperoning her and her classmates at a Corolle doll boutique.

Director Jacques-Remy Girerd often divides the frame into three vertical bands, each with a different color signature; this dynamic technique makes the eventual introduction of explosive action sequences seem like overkill.

Of some interest for promoting rapprochement between India and China, this is still awfully silly.

As the imperious actress (and whore) Elizabeth Barry, the unlikely object of Wilmot's affection, Samantha Morton finds the soul in a woman who's hard as nails, and Tom Hollander and Rosamund Pike also provide excellent support. The haunting score is by Michael Nyman.

As his wisecracking roomie, Smith keeps this contrived chick flick afloat, managing to steer past the kind of egregious product placement that would have capsized a less agile performer.

Tyler Perry grounds this sequel to "Why Did I Get Married?" (2007) in his trademark blend of comedy, soap opera, and down-home southern sentiment, though he lets up a little on the moral proselytizing, which aids the digestion considerably.

With its hypnotic pacing, blatantly nonsynchronous sound, clunky robot costumes, and graphic but unconvincing violence, the movie falls flatly between camp and art-house pretension.

The insipid gags fail to exploit Murphy's gift for physical humor, Elizabeth Banks and Gabrielle Union are merely decorative, and Ed Helms (The Office), playing a character called #2, looks appropriately constipated.

This romantic drama by director Mike Newell preserves the odd playfulness of Gabriel Garcia Marquez's international best seller but sacrifices its eroticism and intricate nonlinear plotting.

Mixing horror and comedy while minimizing the gore, writer-director Paul Weitz (About a Boy) serves up a witty adventure fantasy with a tasty dollop of schadenfreude.

Paul Bartel's "Death Race 2000" is a beloved camp item, but this slick, loud, violent remake is pitched at the video game crowd.

Based on the novel by T.D. Jakes, this is a queasy mix of comedy, melodrama, and self-help spirituality; it's meant to be uplifting, but its profamily message is undercut by its virulently misogynistic treatment of the realtor and her mother (Jenifer Lewis), both too shrewish and controlling to be believed.

In this lavish adaptation of Lisa See's novel, the complex chronologies of the parallel narratives are skillfully handled by director Wayne Wang, which makes his reliance on unbridled sentimentality all the more irritating.

Hovers just this side of "Ghost Whisperer" kitsch but remains compulsively watchable thanks to its smart ensemble cast

After a sluggish half hour, this well-crafted adventure kicks into high gear and never lets up.

Bloated with visual effects, this sequel to the 2006 hit starts off slowly, reintroducing the original characters.

Early scenes of mayhem and destruction are marred by subpar special effects; those in the final reel are spectacular, but there's a long wait for them because the movie is so maddeningly, portentously slow.

Director Paul Morrison forfeits any meaningful statement about art for a pedestrian coming-out story, based in part on Dali's unreliable, self-aggrandizing memoirs.

Smarter than its predecessor, the movie aims for the "High School Musical" market.

This heist comedy has a hackneyed introduction, and its feel-good ending lacks credibility, but the big, funny chunk in the middle marks writer-director-producer David E. Talbert as a talent to watch.

Watching this thriller is like drinking milk that's about to turn: it looks OK but smells a little dodgy.

The movie is essentially a pastiche, as musty as a flea market.

Allen Coulter (Hollywoodland) directed this morose and sluggish drama, which gets more mileage from Pattinson's anguished profile than from Will Fetters's thunderously overwritten screenplay.

Loosely adapted from Alex Flinn's young-adult novel, this "Beauty and the Beast" update is a pallid, formulaic teen romance that might have benefited from a little snark.

The high school is so sanitized that there are no drugs, cutthroat competition, or--inconceivably for a theatrical milieu--no gay students.

The movie relies on the notion that postponing sex heightens arousal, but its lovers aren't any better matched post-coitus than they were before.

Live-action stars take a backseat to CGI chipmunks in this uneven family comedy.

Jeff Wadlow directed this exploitation flick, which seems designed for students on spring break.

To call this Kevin James comedy fatuous might be misinterpreted as an attack on the star's girth--so how about inane, tepid, lazy, puerile, phony, and unfunny?

This bloated 2006 historical epic flatlines early and never regains a pulse.

This video sequel to the gay comedy "Eating Out" (2004) is funnier, lighter, and faster paced.

In this uneven Disney comedy Adam Sandler tones down his arrested-development persona, trading crass humor for warm fuzzies.

Pretentious and dull, this Uruguayan exercise in magical realism takes place during the annual carnival in Montevideo.

The families' hopes for a tasteful, upscale wedding are sabotaged by warring egos and low-rent, walking-stereotype relatives.

Horror fans may be disappointed by this handsome exorcism drama, which aspires to the serious religious feeling of William Friedkin's "The Exorcist" but delivers little of its shock or gore.

Williams's overacting, Russell's pinched melancholy, and Highmore's unflagging chirpiness would be trying enough on their own, but the convoluted story, with its pileup of obstacles and coincidences, makes this sophomore effort by director Kirsten Sheridan (Disco Pigs) an exercise in dissonance.

May be a good showcase for James Franco, who's in every scene, but it's a disappointing choice for director Justin Lin.

True to series form, plot is nearly indiscernible, but this fourth installment in the sci-fi/horror/action franchise created by writer-director Paul W.S. Anderson is the sleekest so far, thanks to 3D and star Milla Jovovich's body-hugging catsuit.

Andy and Larry Wachowski barrel through this adaptation of the 60s animated series, hoping perhaps that no one will notice the story is as flat as roadkill.

The humor's vulgar and the plot feeble, but this is a cut above the gross-out comedies aimed at male teens, and its heroine and her gal pals keep the high jinks amiable.

The little heroes and their families are surprisingly ugly, with faces resembling skulls, and the colors are so faded and muddy the movie feels tired and bungled.

Absolutely nothing funny happens during their drive to Georgetown for an interview, even with Donny Osmond along for the ride.

Producers Michael Bay and Steven Spielberg deploy an arsenal of noisy special effects to demonstrate the invaders' high-tech superiority, which makes Olyphant's inability to breach an Internet firewall look pretty silly.

Amiable screwball comedy.

Costars John Cleese, Jean Reno, Alfred Molina, Andy Garcia, and Jeremy Irons look either bored or desperate, gasping for laughs in an airless screenplay.

The story unfolds briskly in the polished mode of a classic horror movie, then tanks after a plot twist at the midpoint alters the mood and slows the pace. Jim Sheridan (My Left Foot, In the Name of the Father) directed an ill-conceived screenplay that could have worked only as camp.

The special effects are better and the dialogue slightly more humorous than in the first movie, but the anti-Arab subtext is repugnant.

So clinically detached it borders on absurd.

Grating romantic comedy.

Director Alexandre Aja (Haute Tension, The Hills Have Eyes) keeps the suspense tight for most of the movie, only to fritter it away in an overblown ending.

Earns points for its set and sound design, eerily desaturated color palette, able cast, and one really good special effect. Sadly, the movie just doesn't deliver chills.

Writers Jon Lucas and Scott Moore steal from the best, gleefully cribbing from "A Christmas Carol" to fashion a screenplay with heart and sharp one-liners.

Wahlberg turns in one of his worst performances ever, but then he's saddled with preposterous scenes.

There's a discernible lack of enthusiasm from almost everyone involved, and Duff, who's gone from wholesome to haggard in two short years, is flat-out scary.

Overblown and stupefyingly dull.

Jack Black is the title character in this thin adaptation of the Jonathan Swift classic.

The resulting mix of hagiography and war epic is so muddled that characters keep addressing each other by their first names, the better to tell them apart.

The dialogue is often grating, and some of the situations are distastefully cute, although John Carroll Lynch (Fargo) has a strong supporting turn as a grief workshop client.

Years on the Hannah Montana TV series have not adequately prepared Miley Cyrus for screen acting.

It loses steam once the wraiths become fully visible: they're just not scary enough.

Even likable star Zach Braff can't salvage this clunker.

Platinum-selling singer Usher is one hell of a clotheshorse, but he's too amiable to be convincing as a leading man--not that anyone is particularly believable in this feeble comedy.

Horror maestro Christophe Gans ("Brotherhood of the Wolf") directed this feature, worth seeing for the zombie nurses who gyrate like a Bob Fosse chorus line before slicing each other to ribbons.

For a movie about the undead, this lacks any supernatural chills, and by the time its obligatory final showdown arrives, it seems as hollow as the terra cotta soldiers brought to life by CGI.

Playing a competitive schemer not unlike her "Desperate Housewives" character, Parker doesn't generate much heat, while Rudd is squandered in a bland role.

Among the other characters are an African-American TV writer (Kali Hawk) who hates black people and a widower (Erik Palladino) who stumbles onto a kidnapping case. The latter development provides the film with a denouement that's dramatically valid if overly neat.

"Soppy" doesn't begin to describe this 2004 drama by Quentin Lee.