Bill Gallo

There's so much EFFORT here to convince us of the switcheroo (already one of Hollywood's oldest ploys) that we soon weary of it.

The World's Fastest Indian is not likely to be regarded as some kind of masterpiece--far from it--but Hopkins once more keeps our ears open and our eyes fixed on the screen.

Parents wishing to protect their beloved daughters from cliché overload might do well to withhold the old allowance money for a couple of weeks -- until the inevitable bout of Mandymoviemania subsides.

More well-meant than well-made, the movie is ethnically accurate (sometimes, you smother in the marinara), but its forced sensitivity can get abrasive, and the drama is full of false notes.

In this beautifully devious, exceptionally well-made entertainment, Mr. John Frankenheimer does it all, and more, with the assurance of an old master.

In the end, the filmmakers strike a bad bargain between action and myth: In their obvious attempt to shoo everyone into the tent--romantic and roughneck alike--they don't serve either end of the spectrum very well.

Villain? Great. Verdict? Average.

Yet another version of the conscience-stricken white soldier Kevin Costner played in "Dances With Wolves" and the Indian killer-turned-noble warrior Tom Cruise gave us in "The Last Samurai."

The low-wattage thrills, lukewarm jokes and unconvincing caricatures we encounter in The Big Bounce simply don't generate that kind of excitement.

Damon looks like a kid lost in the wrong neighborhood, and his acting manners underscore that impression--everything is a bit too fine, too neat...An intermittently interesting, intermittently foolish film.

Suffice it to say that Cruise never seems right in this part--never as treacherous as he should be, nor as mysteriously tortured. Foxx has his moments, but there's no room for his trademark humor, and we can never quite get our minds around the idea that the hit man has beguiled the cabbie.

As usual, Hollywood hitmeister Bay is more interested in blowing stuff up than in addressing deep questions like the morality of science and the false myths of civilization, and these explosions go on for over two hours.

What a shame to squander the dramatic riches of Jones's life on third-rate caricature and paint-by-numbers storytelling.

Shades of "House of Sand and Fog," without the compelling drama.

As another exposé of stubbornness, petty opportunism, and greed, there's some residual value in the story of two unappealing characters.

Here's a fervent, G-rated version of contemporary life in which the divine overcomes the earthly and miracles are commonplace. It's aimed squarely at the emerging Christian market.

The dumbed-down movie version of Frances Mayes' best-selling travel memoir Under the Tuscan Sun is a virtual case study of Hollywood's irrepressible urge to lower the bar in the hopes of upping the take.

By all accounts, Marsh has absorbed classic crazy-killer thrillers like "Psycho," "The Night of the Hunter" and "Badlands," but The King isn't likely to join such esteemed company.

The movie's not great, but Mom might like it.

This plodding mediocrity displays none of the flair or the compelling trickery that enlivened its 2002 prototype.

This romantic tragedy has the measured gentility of the M.I. classics, but its sheen of crass melodrama is startling, and its many metaphors run amok in a tangle.

Director Thomas Carter (no relation to Ken) relies on processed emotion and stock characters, and not even the inevitable Big Game excites us very much.

It's a workmanlike adventure yarn, intermittently reverent to the canon but not very inspired, and it must be said that Banderas is starting to show signs of wear.

In the end, Stevie is a relentlessly messy, sometimes trying picture of family dysfunction, official neglect and personal tragedy, a disturbing redneck soap opera about real people and real consequences in which the protagonist--like the filmmaker--often proves to be as unlikable as he is sympathetic.

Carrey and the Farrellys are equal-opportunity offenders.

Competently if unremarkably directed by Englishwoman Clare Kilner, should prove compelling enough to Moore's huge legion of fans.

This is a Tom Cruise vehicle, pure and simple, and that means it's destined to be the biggest chunk of guilty white-boy wish fulfillment since Kevin Costner got down with the Sioux in "Dances With Wolves." In fact, the parallels are all but plagiaristic.

This badly muddled adaptation of a complex novel chases after Guterson's many skeins and themes with no unifying principle in mind.