Chris Kaltenbach

Sarah Silverman says things you wouldn't expect a nice, attractive Jewish girl to say. But that's only half her appeal.

The story seems fresh and alive. They also had the good sense to cast Dunst, at 19 already one of Hollywood's finest and most consistent actresses.

The movie may be too precious for mass consumption, but its filmmakers' willingness to assume the best of their audience, combined with its Everyman origins, suggest a movie that deserves a chance.

Bland, inoffensive, formulaic and occasionally amusing - just like the animated kids' show that inspired it.

Lovely, heartfelt and unforced.

The real strength of Return to Me is Hunt, who knows just when to retreat from the film's overriding sweetness and inject a cynical moment or two.

Equal parts fantasy and cautionary tale, a film that manages to be uplifting and off-putting simultaneously -- fortunately, more the former than the latter.

An opportunity to enjoy the pure adrenaline rush that has always been the hallmark of martial-arts cinema.

Garden State is filled with characters you long to know more about, in situations to which almost anyone can relate. And that's as near a can't-miss movie formula as one can get.

The one thing most sorely missing is movie magic.

Thanks to the wonderful performances from both Korzun and Considine, there isn't a forced or dishonest moment on-screen.

A more honest version of "Summer of '42."

Offers plenty of honest, good-natured laughs in the process. That's something young and old can appreciate equally.

A delightful and exuberant bit of romantic comedy and, as a bonus, it breathes new life into a pair of '70s musical chestnuts long off our culture's radar screens.

The result is a charmer that boldly marches where lesser movies - at least since the heyday of John Hughes - fear to tread.

McConaughey and (especially) Hudson manage to make it all work, maintaining their likability even in situations where they inevitably end up acting like jerks.

Soars on the strength of strong acting and a script that stubbornly refuses to go all sappy and preachy.

Novocaine is neither funny enough to be a comedy, nor dark enough to be a true film noir. Like the drug of the title, it just kind of leaves you numb and anxious to taste the good stuff once again.

Tear-inducing feel-gooder that only a curmudgeon could find fault with.

Darren Aronofsky labors awfully hard to get across a pretty simple message in The Fountain. But his efforts are so ethereal and extreme, it's almost impossible to turn away.

Unsparing and uplifting - a wickedly difficult combination to pull off, but one that gives the film an emotional weight that's impossible to dismiss.

While the film is obviously meant as a call to arms, the very single-mindedness of the approach could work against it.

There's an honesty to the film that elevates it a cut above standard slasher fare.

The potential for action never lets up; you never know what's coming around the next corner.

Martin's script offers plenty of opportunities, but Martin the actor never takes advantage of them.

Soldini's consistently understated touch, and a poignant turn by Licia Maglietta as the confused and bemused main character, turns Bread and Tulips into a character study worth studying.

It rarely strikes the right tone and ultimately falls short of what one would expect from a collaboration between director Wim Wenders and writer Sam Shepard.

The film is the work of a visual genius who may have overextended his storytelling ability, but with fascinating results.

Paints a vivid and darkly humorous picture of a world where directors are all-powerful and vampires are real; whether you want to buy into either fantasy is up to you. I did, and had a grand old time.

It's a real shame the film gets mushy at the end. The result is an all too conventional ending on a film that should have been much better.

Rarely has combat been portrayed as beautifully as in Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Taiwanese director Ang Lee's thoughtful meditation on menace, mortality and the martial arts.

It's the rare film that trusts both its audience's intelligence and its emotions.

A quiet, heartfelt story of love and loss.

If only it had a plot mere humans could follow.

Quinceanera may be the year's most nonjudgmental film, and therein lies both its greatest strength and most naggingly troublesome weakness.

An unrelentingly dark vision that's as hard to watch as it is impossible to walk away from.

A cautionary tale, a warning not to gather all of your neurotic friends in one room - or better yet, not to have so many neurotic friends.

Bolt proves a refreshing throwback to the animated classics of yore.

It's a top-notch action film, albeit on the bloody side, complete with decisive action, mysterious characters and a nobility and sense of purpose that allows its excesses to be forgiven.

Gets the hell of war right and struggles to depict the unyielding passion of love. But the two sides make for an uneasy mix, one that not even the actors seem comfortable with.

It's like a Harlequin romance trying to pass itself off as something deeper and more profound.

Alien, even with some scene tinkering that has left this "director's cut" one minute shorter than its original release, is still one of the creepiest, scariest, most shocking films ever.

Caan is so good as a man who watches helplessly as everything he's worked for crumbles around him, that he steals the picture from both Wahlberg and Phoenix, the ostensible stars.

A pleasantly lightweight confection.

It's not hard to imagine these characters in a straight-faced Hollywood blockbuster. And that's the source of Hot Fuzz's genius, pointing out the thin line that separates convention from farce when Hollywood starts throwing its special effects around.

It's a zombie flick that moves -- no stumbling, staggering living dead here -- in an atmosphere that feels like a Gothic docudrama, and it's freaky beyond all reason.

With Anything Else, Woody Allen proves himself an old dog capable of thinking up some new tricks.

Shark Tale is "Finding Nemo" with bigger-name stars, far less heart and, the guess here is, about one-third the staying power.

There's a ton of joy in The Legend of 1900 -- but it's laid on so thick that one ends up more numbed than stirred, overcome by one too many Hallmark moments.

Retro in a refreshing sort of way, a return to those sci-fi films of the 1950s, filled with cheesy special effects and over-the-top acting, but with a gem of an idea at its core, and all done with just enough wit and inventiveness to keep audiences in the cheap seats happy.

Until the last 15 minutes, What Lies Beneath is a well-paced maze that earns every gasp from its audience.

Extreme Measures, a new medical thriller with Hugh Grant and Gene Hackman as doctors with differing views on medical ethics, is an episode of "Beauty and the Beast" grafted onto an episode of "ER" as directed by Alfred Hitchcock.

Probably the most sweet-spirited sex comedy ever made. It's pretty funny, too.

The images here are graphic and disturbing. But Miike somehow manages to stop just short of disgusting.

The Bread, My Sweet is not for the cynical, who will doubtlessly find themselves gasping for air before the film's over and demanding a reality check of anyone who actually likes it. Their loss.

Long on style and technique, short on substance and plot.

Elf tries so hard to be a holiday classic, to be a sweet-natured, charming little piece of holiday gloss, it's tempting to declare it so and simply go with it.

A remarkable film about a remarkable man who's lived the kind of life usually reserved for adventure novels and pulp fiction.

Sure, this movie is proudly profane, but it's also funny.

The perfect film for anyone who finds the Keystone Cops a little too understated and I mean that as a compliment.

Should make comic modern-day fanboys happy, what with its dark undertones, its beat-it-to-a-pulp action and its sly winks at comic greats past and present. Everyone else, including fans of Will Eisner's original Spirit, may find themselves wondering what all the fuss is about.

Stuck On You is proof that sweet and funny don't always make for the best mix.

In this day of overstuffed action flicks and dumbed-down "comedies," (Snow Day) is kinda refreshing.

Truth is, one can probably tell as much about Jackson Pollock the man by looking at his paintings than by watching this movie.

In the end, there's enough movie magic in The Prestige to keep you guessing, even after the film's over.

This is a marvelous film, a look at the strange, exasperatingly labyrinthine process of adolescence and the diverse ways people find to deal with it.

Nothing is as it seems in State of Play, a crackerjack political thriller in which no individual, profession or institution gets away clean.

It's a shame his (Foxx) performance isn't surrounded by a better film.

Abandon tags Katie Holmes as a talented actor with surprising range and vast, untapped potential - so much, in fact, that watching her, one can almost overlook the film's many flaws. Almost.

In less accomplished hands, Black Book could have been a hopeless mishmash. But Verhoeven proves a sure-handed storyteller, which might come as a surprise, as well as a terrific visual stylist, which shouldn't.

Viewers impressed by the fairly standard martial-arts action of "Crouching Tiger" will really be wowed after seeing this film.

Isn't nearly the landmark comedy it thinks it is, but its quirkiness should appeal to the highbrow funny bone in all of us.

For a documentary about a music festival, Soul Power doesn't include nearly enough music.

The year's most unsettling movie experience - and in this case, that's a very good thing.

Sort of feel-good lesson kids will enjoy and parents should welcome.

With an all-star cast maintaining an amiable tone throughout, the result is a movie in which everyone should see themselves for at least a few minutes (and wish they were that young, that beautiful and that well-off).

The Beautiful Country is not a happy film by any means, but it does offer a fragile hope, that beauty exists at the end of every journey, if only one has the strength to finish the trip.

Best advice: Just sit back and watch Freeman anyway. The man's a cinematic treasure.

The real hero here is Ghobadi, whose love and respect for the culture in which he was raised shines through every frame.

Baadasssss is about feeling pain and frustration, about having a sense of purpose that overwhelms everything else, about great cost and great risk, the pain of isolation and the intoxicating effect of fighting against the odds.

But the fine performances of all three leads rise above the cliches, giving the film a sense of reality that both impresses and inspires.

While Bresson's insistence on juxtaposing brute force with sublime grace isn't subtle, it is effective.

Russian Dolls never resorts to sitcom moments as it explores the transformation of friendship into love. All the characters here are believably appealing and refreshingly three-dimensional, and the situations they find themselves in have the ring of truth. You leave this film wanting to know these people, wanting the best for them.

Offers a welcome perspective, reminding us that extremism in the name of a values system is nothing new -- not even on these shores.

Anyone who isn't charmed by the idea of a Beetle crossing the finish line first is either chronically churlish or isn't trying.

Ben Affleck and Gwyneth Paltrow are so immensely appealing, and their chemistry together is so unforced, that their presence alone makes a movie worth seeing. Thankfully, Bounce has even more going for it.

Latifah's performance and the film's gentle heart should prove enough to win over even the most churlish.

Star Maps is the work of a talented group of young actors and filmmakers anxious to try as much as they can and see what works. Not all of it does.

A celebration of movie-studio ohana that should warm the hearts of moviegoers everywhere.

Isn't perfect, but it's fun, and Tim Allen shines

Both a condemnation of torture as a political tool and a tribute to the bravery that exists within everyone.

Chaos, in miring itself in the inequities (not to mention obscenities) of male-dominated culture, is after greater truths.

Looming large over all this is Jackson, who glowers and growls and acts the hero better than any actor out there.

There's a persistent innocence to this movie that will work wonders on all but the most churlish.

One of the year's most unsettling -- and perhaps most illuminating -- films.

This is not a great film by any means, too filled with stock characters in stock situations for such praise. But if offers screen time for some fine young actresses, and addresses its story to an audience of teen girls who deserve something to identify with.

A film that immerses its audience in the Indian culture while telling a universally appealing story of grace under pressure.

Whenever its noble aims miss, Bruce Willis saves it.