Chris Kaltenbach

It forces you to fill in the blanks, then refuses to judge whether you're right or wrong. It's almost like the audience writes its own script, and everybody appreciates his or her own work.

The heartbreak comes not from watching her fail, but from realizing how easy it would be for her to succeed. If only she knew better how to try.

Dawn of the Dead may depict the end of the world as we know it, but rarely has watching doom proved such a kick.

A withering condemnation of a culture where greed is a virtue, a culture that you don't have to feel guilty for laughing at.

In a cinematic landscape where truly original ideas are rarer than floating food, recklessness like this deserves to be appreciated. Not understood, but appreciated.

Moves along with great speed and verve, and it's got just enough of a sci-fi sheen to make things interesting, if not provocative. Philosophers and true believers may be disappointed, but for movie fans, I, Robot mostly delivers the goods.

Prime serves as yet another showcase for Streep; to prove how expertly she plays a Jewish mother with a Ph.D. in psychology, just imagine Barbra Streisand in the role -- you'd have a farce only a step above slapstick. With Streep, you get a smartly observant comedy that never overplays its hand.

Electric as Elektra, Jennifer Garner does a high-powered, blade-thrusting star turn as Marvel Comics' ninja-inspired superheroine, bringing such unbridled energy and sexuality to her performance, one barely notices the movie itself.

There's pleasure to be had in a film that suggests teen life can be hard without necessarily being tragic.

The result is a passionate, enthralling film that isn't afraid to take chances - even if it sometimes should be.

The people are just a little too calculatedly quirky in Off the Map, an otherwise engaging comedy.

It's deliciously warped, deceptively smart and undeniably funny. Isn't that enough?

Reaches the highest comic heights when the show itself starts.

Don't go expecting a good time to be had. But by all means, go to revel in a movie that, for about two-thirds of its length, is Mamet at the top of his game -- intelligent, tightly crafted, densely layered.

Wilson, who has never made the film in which he convincingly played sincere, turns out to be a wise choice to play John Grogan.

The weirdly exhilarating thing about Wicker Park is the reckless abandon with which it embraces the convenience of coincidence, and then the extreme measures it takes to reassure the audience that it's not a movie about coincidence at all.

Celebrates heroes without turning them into saints.

It's impossible not to be exhilarated by the energy and determination that infuses every frame.

It's plenty thrilling, and it appeals to the flag-waving patriot in all of us.

Jack Nicholson and Diane Keaton are so good in Something's Gotta Give, it's a shame writer-director Nancy Meyers couldn't rein herself in a little more.

Wedding Crashers is unashamedly profane and, for its first two acts, very funny, a classic guilty pleasure that revels in its basest elements.

When Inside Deep Throat is over, it's tough to say which tragic moment lingers longer.

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

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.

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.

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

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

This is Ferrell's movie, and one's tolerance for it will most likely be in direct proportion to one's tolerance for its star's vanity-free fearlessness.

Alpha Dog may well go down as the most dispiriting film of 2007.

This Film Is Not Yet Rated performs a great service, though not especially well.

White throws in a dog-in-peril shot to ensure the audience's sympathies. The ploy works, perhaps too well, turning Year of the Dog less into the askew character study it wants to be than a showcase of lovable-dog shots.

Unlike so many movies directed at teens, ATL is not interested in exploiting its audience.

There's tremendous energy in How She Move, so much that the audience can't help but be swept up.

Refreshingly, the movie never wavers in the importance it places on friendship over just about anything else.

There's more than a trace of James Dean in Gosling, except that he's a rebel with a cause.

Engaging though flimsy, lively though occasionally tone-deaf, it's a movie that thrives on the strength of its affable co-stars and a sense of adventure that provides just enough brio to get audiences through some energy-sapping rough spots.

It may not advance the art form, but it's a movie with pleasures for the whole family, and nowadays that's saying something.

Comes across as more willfully clever than profound, leaving us to applaud the message while pondering why the messenger had to strain so hard to get it across.

As great as the film looks, the story, adapted from a novel by P.D. James, never quite comes into focus.

The film may not be art, but it's got a beat and you can definitely dance to it.

Things may work out predictably, but The Ultimate Gift does not yank on the heartstrings so much as pluck them gently.

Anna Faris, her deadpan comic timing still a joy to watch, returns as Cindy Campbell, one of two main holdovers from the first three movies.

What it does have is the laughs.

Blethyn's performance belongs in another movie, not this bipolar comedy-drama.

It's a thrill ride not to be missed.

What makes RV work are some genuinely funny bits (one of which is not an overlong sequence in which Bob has trouble emptying the R.V.'s toilet) that should ring especially true to any parent forced to cajole a recalcitrant child into having a good time.

A derivative little tale with enough good intentions to recommend it, but not enough substance to embrace it.

If the movie were as funny as it is well-meaning, this would be one for the ages.

The emotions seem genuine enough, even if Sandler is not a talented-enough actor to always pull them all off.

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

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.

The one thing most sorely missing is movie magic.

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.

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.

If only it had a plot mere humans could follow.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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

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).

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

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

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

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.

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

In the end, viewers are left with a nagging feeling that this was a long way to go for the incongruous pleasure of watching 20th-century method acting on a 17th-century stage.

There's a subtlety to Crimson Gold that deserves applause.

Best when DeVito plays off the supporting cast surrounding him.

If nothing else, it may make one appreciate the cartoon even more.

Huckabees boasts an impressive cast, and every one of them is fun to watch. But there's a strong sense that no one really knows what's going on here.

Turns into an amusing showcase for two of Hollywood's most appealing young actors.

New York Minute isn't High Art, but it is highly entertaining, especially if you're a member of its target audience.

The best thing about 13 Going on 30 is that an ever-game Jennifer Garner is cheerfully convincing as a 13-year-old in a 30-year-old body. The worst thing is the feeling we've seen this movie before, done better.

The New Guy doesn't have a new idea in its head, but it trods over the old ground with such wit and heart that its lack of originality can be overlooked, if not entirely forgiven.

Undeniably charming -- a dog movie that's more lovable mutt than stately pedigree.

Simply twiddling with the fine-tuning on the central character is not enough to warrant remaking a film. Both Glover and Willard deserve better.

A film as clever and embracingly ribald as this shouldn't have to resort to cliche in the end; director Nigel Cole should have kept his girls in Britain and kept the mood light.

Heaven is so determined to be poetic and beautiful, it comes across as forced and didactic, a lesson in relative morality whose storyline doesn't so much flow as lurch from one stretch to another.

Partially financed by the liberal Move On.org, speaks most eloquently when it lets Fox News do the talking.

Paid In Full's performances - especially by the always-engaging Phifer -- are strong, its message worthwhile and its sincerity doubtless.

The action is thrilling enough.

Lighthearted fluff, not piercing drama. Still, a little shot of reality -- or at least an acknowledgement of same -- could have done this film wonders.

Although some clever touches are clearly directed at adults -- much of the film's humor is quite likely to go under your head. [20 Nov 1998]

Spirit lacks that essential emotional resonance, and suffers because of it.

More of a sales pitch than a movie.

Goes to such great lengths to show the greatness of its Navy diver hero that it neglects to add much depth to his character - or the story.

Humorous but much too predictable send-up of reality TV and the sheer banality of it all.

Great book, great cast, average film: Les Miserables is all pedigree, no passion.

Taken together, the sum of so many parts is too schizophrenic to be wholeheartedly embraced -- the movie is played for parody, but with a veneer of respectability that leaves the whole endeavor betwixt and between.

It's a tough slog, but worth seeing once. [08 Nov 2008, p.4C]

This would be an excellent movie from a first-time filmmaker, but from one of America's premiere directors, it's a disappointment.

Characters are manipulated and lives made whole in ways both satisfying and unexpected.

A pleasant little confection that leaves behind the sneaking suspicion it should have amounted to so much more.

A great cast can't quite pull City by the Sea out of the drink.

Like the particular brand of music Dewey espouses, this is a movie more concerned with exploiting rock than understanding it.

Those not familiar with Proust will doubtless feel lost. Unlike the printed word, film does not offer the chance to pause and reflect, or go back and re-read a passage.

About as good as the genre gets.

Unwaveringly predictable.

The Cell is eye candy - but it could give your brain a bad case of indigestion.

It doesn't take a genius IQ to figure out the movie's final twist far in advance, leaving the attentive viewer to wonder only about how Shyamalan will pull it off and to hope the movie doesn't turn silly.

When it sticks to the subject, the movie is sad and affecting.

The result may not make for a great adventure, but it's sure a fun ride.

The soundtrack is guaranteed to send chills where they'll be most effective, and the ultimate resolution is a real shocker. While it doesn't explain away everything that's happened, it comes deliciously close.

A comedy that doesn't work if you think about it too much. Cut it some slack, however, and you just might have a good time.

Connie and Carla is a good-hearted comedy that missteps by trying to become a moralistic one.

Brimming with values that should serve its young audience well: altruism, friendship, self-sacrifice, responsibility.

A grade-B rumination on what a nasty guy the devil can be.

The cinematic equivalent of a beautifully wrapped gift box with nothing inside.

It fails to dig beneath that surface picture and offer up anything in the way of explanation or motivation.

Come Undone would have benefited immensely from less constricted performances from Elkaim and Rideau, both of whom go through the film determined not to crack a smile.

Some might find the whole thing exhilarating, but exhausting is more the word that comes to this man's mind.

There's enough here to keep the movie light and avoid the curse of interminableness. Will there be enough to warrant a third Scooby-Doo film? Must we find out?

Yes, the movie asks hard questions, but it would be better - or at least more honest - if it weren't so insistent that everyone arrive at the same answer.

The movie's already peaked, even before the opening credits.

Would have been better served if Carrera had spent a little more energy developing his story and less on emphasizing his message.

True, John Ford and John Wayne did this stuff a lot better back in the day, but they're not around anymore. John Singleton is, and it's nice to see someone caring enough to keep the tradition alive.

It's considerably flawed. It has a middle that's padded, a look that could use a few more light bulbs, a protagonist who never earns our sympathy, and an audio mix that leans much too heavily on the bass, often making it impossible to understand what's being said.

There's an awful lot of kinetic energy to Chopper, and the violence is portrayed as graphically as imaginable.

Stars Juliette Binoche and Jean Reno give Jet Lag everything they've got. Too bad the movie doesn't better reward their effort.

Even a full week after seeing it, I'm still influenced enough by the film's many enchantments not to be overly concerned with its flaws.

Blue Crush is such a blast to look at, it seems a shame to talk about its formulaic plot, cliched dialogue and absolute predictability.

The Punisher punishes. That's what he does, and that's all this movie does.

A working-class drama that has its heart in the right place but undercuts itself by stacking the deck, letting its main character off too lightly and being overly impressed with its own profundity.

Instead of a sweeping epic, this adaptation of a novel by Elizabeth Bowen is much quieter, a work perhaps too understated and stereotypical for its own good.

It would be nice to say that Bruce is hilarious, rather than merely (and fitfully) funny; certainly, the premise suggests laughs more consistent and outlandish than are present here.

Misfires by constantly tossing out liberal feel-goodisms.

While it displays its share of quirky charm, off-kilter characters and outlandish situations, this is really the first film where you can feel the Coens straining to keep up with themselves.

Surprisingly funny, a deep-down-good-hearted take on that oldest of comedy conventions, the ill-prepared rube caught up in a situation that somehow never gets the best of him.

For all Quek's insistence that she was seeking to ennoble women by helping them gain control over their sexuality, Lewis' film shows that all Quek really wanted was be famous.

Delivers an unexpected sweetness.

The actors here are uniformly excellent, and the story has a definite lightweight charm.

Laura's histrionics sometimes seem forced, and Hines has to struggle to be the heel the screenplay sometimes asks him to be.

Akin to being force-fed sugary confections from a bottomless bowl. At first the idea seems just grand, but after a while, all you want to do is scream, "Enough!"

The biggest problem with Jersey Girl may not be exactly its fault; what is up there on the screen is cute and funny and heartfelt, even if it is unflinchingly formulaic.

Has an unerring capacity for going soft whenever a hard edge is called for.

I'm Not Scared presents an interesting picture of youthful innocence challenged, but not a truthful one

As a narrative, it has serious problems -- holes so gaping that they're all but unavoidable.

Doesn't match the impact of its predecessor, which both revived and reimagined the zombie-film genre.

Anderson sees her subject as little more than a game-show contestant. One suspects the real Evelyn Ryan deserved far better.

Scores some serious points for its dance moves but does a lousy job of remembering there's a lot more to this big old world than moving your feet.

Whenever Just Friends threatens to become a total drag, Faris bops onscreen for some serious comic business - either saving the film, or making things worse by pointing out what could have been.

Instead of heightening the intrigue in this psychological thriller, the labored twists and out-of-leftfield turns will leave audiences more weary than wary.

The movie has its moments, and some are undeniably affecting. But even those seem artificial, relying far too much on our familiarity with and fondness for the film's stars.

Nacho Libre enhances Hess' reputation as a gifted filmmaker and suggests there's more to Black than manic dementia. Both director and actor, however, need to find projects better-suited to their respective (and often impressive) talents.

The pleasures of this slight caper film are strictly small-screen, as three talented actresses walk through quaint roles before they hurry on to the next project.

The final resolution is silly by just about any standard. A little grounding in reality and a larger effort to avoid the trite could have made Everyone's Hero fun and inspirational for everybody, not just the very young.

Garry Marshall, old pro that he is, couldn't be more endearing as the grandfather, struggling gamely to make things right.

A film not nearly as intriguing as it should have been, centering on a death that isn't nearly as intricately fascinating as the filmmakers think. Exacerbating the problem is a cast of actors who seem too self-consciously playacting.

Features lots of cool dialogue but doesn't provide much of a movie in which to showcase it.

The movie lives and dies on the energy of stepping.

Cameron Crowe crams at least three movies' worth of plotlines into Elizabethtown, and gives short shrift to all of them.

Besides offering the giddy pleasure of seeing Mia Farrow play a demonic nanny, there's not much to the film that a repeat viewing of its earlier incarnation couldn't provide.

Even a superstar needs to surround himself with better material than this.

The Sentinel moves quickly and never becomes a bore. It does become something of a cartoon, though, which proves a major letdown for a movie that aims for something far more intelligent.

The film ultimately is a letdown, leaving too many questions unanswered and ending in a gesture that doesn't really solve anything.

Other than portraying Mary as an overwhelmed teenager, mystified that God has chosen her to be the mother of his child, it doesn't offer anything that hasn't been playing out in grade-school pageants for decades.

All this might be forgivable if Just My Luck had a little more substance, but it never moves beyond the single joke of its premise.

The pleasures of Ocean's Thirteen are so slight as to be eminently forgettable. Most of the "twists" in the plot are of the ho-hum variety; it's not that one sees them coming, but that they don't amount to much when they show up.

A low-level hoot.

The sad truth is that the film squanders almost all of its inspiration in the first 20 minutes or so.

The whole movie is too predictable, its conflicts either forced or simplistic.

With Diary of the Dead, Romero goes back to the beginning, only this time the amateurish look is calculated and the resulting film far less effective - if only because a handful of filmmakers have beaten him to the punch.

There's a funny premise at the core of Are We Done Yet? Too bad the movie doesn't do much with it.

Heartstrings are pulled mercilessly in Dreamer.

The movie finally comes to life when Liu turns up.

There's a self-loathing at the center of Friends with Money that makes it a tad unpalatable, as well as a sameness, a dependence on cliche, that makes it seem trite.

Too bad it shortchanges the music and fails to provide much evidence for Wilson's appeal.

It's easy to be offensive in a movie; it's much harder to be funny. Which is why Scary Movie emerges as such a waste; when you're so good at the latter, why keep falling back on the former?

Let's just say this is a perfect film for penguin lovers who also are devoted members of the Green party - and leave it at that.

Neither Grimm comes across as especially interesting to watch, and neither does anything in the movie offer much to get excited about.

As it is, Hoot doesn't accomplish anything a picture book of the Everglades and a few well-chosen Jimmy Buffett tunes wouldn't do better.

Just don't think about what's going on, and you should be OK.

It wasn't shot in Annapolis and doesn't have an original thought in its head. Other than that, Annapolis is a fine film.

Next may be the silliest movie of 2007.

This is harmless fun for the holiday season, but Tim Allen doesn't give movie the punch it needs.

Everything about this film is drenched in adrenaline.

Graeme Obree was a champion bicycler who, by all accounts, rarely took the easy way out. Too bad this movie version of his life doesn't follow suit.

The end result is more a lecture than a film; audiences may come away understanding what went on, but for most, the emotional connection will be lacking.

There's not a moment in Against the Ropes where you forget this is perky Meg Ryan up onscreen, talking trashy and acting tough.

The Last Mimzy displays a gentle touch and the best of intentions. But the film's message never quite becomes clear; what, exactly, are young minds supposed to take away from this film?

Plot-wise, this is strictly paint-by-numbers stuff.

Like watching a 90-minute game of the video game Asteroids - all bang and no buck.

Most of the fun to be had with Thr3e is to spot the movies from which it cribs. Beyond that, what one has is a conventional psychological thriller that cheats too often and depends on actors determined to play only one note.

The original Rocky would have found a way to ground that encounter in reality, to engender honest emotion and give audiences an Everyman hero both noble and believable. This film is too busy worshiping its hero to bother.

One gets the feeling Kaufman was so intent on putting fury and fanaticism on-screen, he forgot about having it serve any greater purpose. Which makes Quills the film equivalent of one of de Sade's novels: artifice, without art.

This is a movie about guns blazing, men punching, speedometers straining and explosions exploding. On all those levels, it succeeds just fine - which makes for a great amusement-park ride, but perhaps not much of a movie.

Godsend is two-thirds of a good movie, with a final third that's just downright awful. So much wasted potential only makes the whole thing that much more painful.

It's mindless, which is rarely true of French cinema, dull, which is rarely true of Hong Kong films, and portentous, which shouldn't be true of any film about a man-eating dog.

Unabashedly sentimental and just as unabashedly cliched.

Rebound is determinedly lightweight fare that shamelessly resorts to every crowd-pleasing cliche it can think of to wring sympathy and laughs from its audience. To say it succeeds is not meant as a compliment.

It's unfortunate that none of the principal actors is able to convey the passion the characters are supposed to have for each other.

While I have no problem with slackers making me laugh, when they start preaching, that's when my ears close and my eyes roll.

The out-of-control plot doesn't unfold gracefully or organically; it simply speeds along with no regard for anything other then getting to the next plot twist.

The bad guys just seem like a bunch of X-Games rejects, and Blart's ingenuity proves way more effective than it has any right to be.

Despite stellar work from the cast, the movie seems as emotionally distant from its audience as its characters are from each other.

Unfortunately, whenever Beautiful threatens to work as parody, it veers uncomfortably into pop psychology.

It's a sad day for film lovers when the best thing that can be said about a Western is that it's pleasant.

See it to be reminded (if you need further reminding) of this actress' remarkable range. Otherwise, take a pass.

Almost sinks under the weight of too many red herrings, but is rescued by a skewed sense of reality and pervasive sense of dread that should keep audiences from dwelling on them.

The movie annoyingly waits until the end to reveal the names of those experts who have been doing all the talking; it would have been nice to know these folks' qualifications first.

When the women are onscreen and their relationship is on display, Head Over Heels trips merrily along. But every time the focus shifts to Prinze, the film suffers from a bad case of fallen arches.

It should come as no surprise that the dogs are as cute as caninely possible. But is it conceivable that, once you've seen 101 adorable dogs, 102 seems redundant?

Bullock is so good, working hard to pull off the transition from grief-stricken wife and mother to reluctant time traveler, you want to pull for her. So it's possible - not easy, but possible - to overlook the script's inconsistencies.

Even in a world where stupidity mixed with cliche is all too often mistaken for humor, this movie barely meets expectations.

Should sell its soul for a joke.

There's much more than a little Stifler here. Still, there's a recklessness to the character, as well as Scott's performance, that almost engenders respect; he's so determinedly unregenerate, so outrageously lewd, so unrelentingly grating, one almost looks forward to seeing just how far he'll go.

Arthur and the Invisibles tries way too hard.

Outside of a strong (and largely misused) cast and an abundance of moody atmosphere, there's precious little to recommend this exploitative mess.

Still, it's hard not to long for the Pooh stories of old, those endearingly anarchic little tales that captured the wonder of a child's world without ever once condescending to it.

To its credit, Heartbreakers lives up to expectations. Almost.

Girls Will Be Girls thinks watching outrageous people acting outrageously is its own reward. It isn't.

Benefits from an amiable chemistry between Harrelson and Banderas, and Davidovich always makes a good tough-as-nails dame with more smarts than any man will give her credit for.

When Crews is onscreen, White Chicks is a film that fears nothing and no one. When he's not, it's a film too tentative and soft-hearted to scale the farcical heights to which it aspires.

Young Cyrus is undeniably cute, and some of her songs are as catchy as the law allows - especially "Hoedown Throwdown," But asked to anchor a full-length movie, she simply doesn't have the chops to pull it off.

Gets credit for avoiding the easy path. Too bad the path it chooses doesn't lead us anywhere we want to be taken.

Moonlight Mile leavens the mood occasionally, but it cheapens things by insisting that everybody onscreen and in the audience leavethe theater smiling.

Is there anyone out there who hasn't seen this movie a dozen times before? Maybe even as recently as last week, since it's basically the same story line as the funnier, if less heartfelt, "Four Christmases."

What the film needs is more heart, humor and maybe some honest-to-goodness humility, not energy. And unfortunately, that's about all Gooding seems able to bring to it.

The strong young cast keeps the film from being a total waste.

There are moments, heaven forgive me, that left me chuckling. Not to mention eternally grateful that it's these guys doing this stuff, and not me.

Gracie is painfully earnest, which might be OK were it not also painfully trite, painfully cliched and painfully formulaic.

Too much about the game and not enough about the town, the players and everything else.

Fans should be satisfied, but it's hard to imagine anyone else will be much interested in TMNT.

In its own B-film, let's-make-them-jump-out-of-their-seats way, Bats is quite the hoot.

Determinedly genial and relentlessly bland.

The setup is bad even by slasher-film standards: poorly acted, atrociously written and unimaginatively directed. But once Freddy and Jason have at it, the movie takes on a recklessly kinetic energy that finally delivers on its title's promise.

It's obvious and stereotypical. It's leaden and unconvincing. It's not nearly as outrageous as it thinks it is.

Unapologetically cliched and determinedly upbeat (even when it shouldn't be).

The Mexican is its own worst enemy, consistently undermining its best efforts. The result is an over-long series of quirks, a film that's far less than the sum of its often amusing and ingenious parts.

The latest in a line of quirky, feel-good British comedies, Greenfingers fits right into the breezily entertaining mold but doesn't expand it.

Puerile, offensive, degrading, dumb, pointless, insipid and may just well be a harbinger for the end of Western civilization as we know it. But I laughed. Sorry.

Thank goodness for Davy Crockett; without him, the Alamo could have proven the blandest heroic siege in movie history.

Relentless in its crudity, so indiscriminate in its pursuit of tasteless laughs, so pure in its determination to offend, one almost has to admire it. It's even funny. Sometimes.

The cinematic equivalent of a careless foot fault.

You get the film's message, that mankind does not react well when challenged by unpleasantness it can't explain away, within the first 15 minutes -- leaving more than 100 minutes to ponderously belabor the point.

Lane gives the film her best shot; she's pretty much the only reason to see it. There's an intelligence mixed with ferocity that makes her performance compelling, far-more-so than anything else in the film.

Short on details and long on extreme, unflattering close-ups.

Save for Jesus' skin color, which he shares with some of his fellow Jews, little about the story is re-imagined or re-evaluated.

Children should enjoy Jungle Book 2 just fine. Adults will wonder why anyone bothered.

Chicken Little is relentlessly cute. That's the good news, and those who consider the word cute anathema may want to look for entertainment elsewhere.

If only all this wonderful talent wasn't in service to a story that pushes credulity beyond the breaking point, perilously close to the realm of farce. Too many coincidences, too much convenient timing, too little honest plot development.

This military courtroom drama is full of questions, but woefully short of answers.

Put simply, Mona Lisa Smile is too much of a stacked deck -- a movie too concerned with ensuring that audiences feel a certain way to risk anything like nuance or interpretation.

All that artistry is surrounded by a hackish, paint-by-numbers storyline that makes the time between dance numbers seem endless.

Unable to embrace the world he's seeking to depict, Cherot is left with a lifeless shell, a movie so preoccupied with being noble that it forgets to be interesting. The problem with G is not that it's unbelievable, it's just boring.

The story is a comic-book tale at its most basic level.

Go to enjoy the technical expertise, and take a first-grader (and not a particularly savvy one) along to find something of value in everything else.

Ella Enchanted is one cute movie.

Though lovingly crafted and beautifully photographed, the movie does little to make Jones seem compelling, or even all that good.

The result is a film that plays like a creaking melodrama, with good guys and bad guys and precious little in between.