Chuck Wilson

Chris Teerink's superb film documents the work of artist Sol LeWitt (1928-2007), whose legacy lies not only in past accomplishments, but in the work he left for others to complete.

The film's finale is wild and daring and so perfectly executed that it marks Wright as one of the film year's most audacious new voices.

A Quiet Place is full of fabulous, virtuoso action set pieces, but mere hours after seeing it, what I’m already flashing on the most are the ways in which each member of this family, children and adults alike, tries to carry the weight of their central burden, which isn’t fear and dread, but guilt and grief, two monsters no third act plot twist can ever quite vanquish.

Ernest & Celestine -- a contender for this year's best animated film Oscar -- is pure delight.

It Felt Like Love is brilliantly, brutally tactile.

A Prayer Before Dawn feels scarily authentic, and may be too much for some. But there are moments of grace amid the setting’s despair.

Housebound is a tad long, and its murder mystery a bit of a muddle, but that doesn’t matter. The final third is virtuoso.

The Belgian Roskam, making only his second feature film, and his first in English, displays remarkable assurance, with both the actors and the film’s very American setting. He creates an escalating sense of dread, tinged with Lehane’s brand of mordant humor.

There's no denying the overwhelming force of the giant IMAX screen, as we're reminded that each of us is the coolest special effect ever.

Maintains a reflective, bittersweet tone that's almost tactile.

The superb ensemble never plays for sympathy, and the movie isn't as depressing as it may sound. Its hushed, contemplative quality is oddly affecting.

Lowery isn't a Malick and he's certainly no Kazan, but he's his own man, and a filmmaker to watch.

While Parker and co-writer Catherine di Napoli are faithful to Melville’s plotline, they and a fully engaged supporting cast — have made the old boy's characters more quick-witted than any English Lit major would have thought possible.

The last-minute details of plot can't compete with the frightening intensity of Kiberlain's and Garcia's performances, which trace, with brilliant precision, the exhausting mix of brutality and grace inherent in the mother-daughter relationship.

While it's Dave's madly humming brain that propels the film, Davis, whose every glance is a short story in itself, makes Dana's internal crisis equally resonant.

[A] pitch-perfect, deeply affecting film.

To use a phrase from the film, The Armstrong Lie is a "myth-buster." It's wholly necessary, brilliantly executed, and a complete bummer.

[A] superb coming-of-age drama.

Both a thriller and meditation on the loss of innocence, Super Dark Times is rich with the minutiae of a bygone era...but Phillips and screenwriters Ben Collins and Luke Piotrowski press hard against the instinct for nostalgia.

This very funny, very British movie -- directed by newcomer Garth Jennings -- has sci-fi effects that are impressive yet appropriately cheesy.

Returning director Rob Minkoff (The Lion King) and screenwriter Bruce Joel Rubin (Ghost) have done a fine job of updating White's dry wit to a new age, led in no small measure by Lane, who could probably make the IRS code book sound funny.

Surprisingly smart film.

From cinematographer Corey Rich's beautifully framed footage, Wampler's wife, Elizabeth, making her directorial debut, has assembled a stirring film that's part documentary, and part promotional tool.

For these gifted directors and their fine ensemble, the notion that every life forms into a mosaic of intimate, largely unobserved details is the story most worth telling.

Reynolds, working in close harmony with cinematographer Andrew Dunn (Gosford Park), brings an infectious brio and an occasional sweeping grace to the classic trappings of Dumas.

Recognition (and compensation) proved elusive in Lamarr’s lifetime, but in this marvelous documentary, a brilliant woman — “I’m a very simple, complicated person” — finally gets her due.

Moving and vibrant Italian-language film.

It's fine stuff, beautifully played, but there's no denying that viewers will have to be patient with this 80-minute chamber piece, the first third of which feels cold and false, only to suddenly shift into unexpectedly deep emotional territory.

With sleek and informative onscreen graphics and thrilling slow-motion demonstrations of game technique, Top Spin packs a lot of information into its 80-minute running time, arguing that a great table tennis player is one part boxer, one part chess master.

This movie is only 75 minutes long, so it's too bad that Hubner rushes the finale -- too much triumph, too little emotion -- but when the grooves are this rich, all is forgiven.

By the end of this likely cult classic (only 80 minutes long), when Evie has an amphetamine-induced meltdown during her cable-access comeback show, these divas are as recognizably human as you and me, only sluttier, and with cattier one-liners.

Amusing, beautifully drawn one-hour film.

Millions is an intelligent children’s film that may prove to be a guilty pleasure for adults.

These women are smart, funny and wonderfully real, traits that one might safely attribute to Westfeldt and Juergensen, who also wrote the screenplay.

It's the cinematic equivalent of glancing up at the sky and taking a good deep breath.

A resonance that is moving beyond all measure.

Mitchell -- gives a harrowing, beautifully conceived performance, the depth and arc of which can't be fully appreciated until the film's final scene.

In their feature debut, co-writers/directors Juuso Laatio and Jukka Vidgren and co-writers Aleksi Puranen and Jari Olavi Rantala reach for absurdist comedy — the reindeer-blood accident, the projectile-vomit bit, the grave-robbing incident — with a touch so light that the general nuttiness comes to seem a central (and essential) component of Finnish rural life.

Zeiger's superb documentary about the Vietnam War era's GI protest movement is jammed with incident and anecdote and moves with nearly as much breathless momentum as the movement itself.

It's one of many references to the movie-wise, but a resonant one, for Glover's performance turns out to be shockingly emotional, drawn as daringly close to the bone -- within this story's limited thematic range -- as Anthony Perkins' work in Hitchcock's seminal film.

Yu has transferred to her superb film, the hushed awe she must have felt the day she walked into the room - and, in a sense, the mind - of this strange, singular individual.

Looks drab and doesn't take very good advantage of its New York locations, but the neurotic intensity and emotional honesty of its two leads more than make up for it.

Writer-director Christian Vincent and co-writer Étienne Comar, aided by Frot's quiet intensity, imbue Hortense's quest to pull off culinary miracles with an urgency that's almost absurdly compelling, and all the more entertaining for it.

The true mystery, Red Lights' real thrill ride -- and what seems to interest Kahn most, despite his skill at arranging the trappings of suspense -- is marriage.

Deftly mixing the visual exuberance of “Trainspotting” with the familial pathos of “Angela’s Ashes,” the gifted van Groeningen offers gleeful depictions of drinking contests and naked bicycle races that gradually give way to a sense of moral peril for young Gunther.

Captured extraordinary performances from a cast of non-actors, as well as magnificent images of a vast landscape.

Accomplished and invigorating debut feature from Colombian-born director Patricia Cardoso that took both the Audience Award and a Special Jury Prize at Sundance this year.

Mountain Patrol: Kekexili is sometimes slow going, yet it builds in power as nature begins to take its toll on the patrol, and its cumulative effects are haunting.

(Emile Hirsch) a miraculous young actor.

Wise and moving.

Powerful war satire.

To describe the novelist's final days, Bachardy opens a drawer and begins pulling out the magnificent deathbed drawings he did of Isherwood -- a fusion of art and love that's deeply moving.

For the first time in years, De Niro digs deep emotionally, perhaps because he's been stirred by the powerful work of his co-stars, including a subtle Frances McDormand and a ferocious Patti LuPone, as well as the heartbreaking (and achingly beautiful) Franco.

Vibrant cameo performances by two of our most engaging young actors—Jesse Eisenberg and Jason Ritter—along with one film legend—Tippi Hedren—transform this modest comedy into something special.

Yes, this is another faux rock documentary, but one so dramatically and visually textured that it reinvents that decidedly worn genre.

In his lovely new film, Argentine director Daniel Burman mixes reality with fiction in inventive ways.

Flamenco Flamenco is the most beautifully photographed film in recent memory. Come for the dance, stay for the light.

Beautifully acted film remains deeply intelligent and always fascinating.

Turns out to be that rarest of Hollywood creatures: a sequel that one-ups the original…These two smart, happy movie stars prove that silliness doesn’t have to be moronic.

The screenplay is built of small moments and minute details that gradually gain significance, as should be the case in a good character study.

The plotting as a whole feels fresh, as does the emphasis on women strong enough to defend themselves.

This filmed record is a musical bliss-out.

A career best for the daughter of Charlie Chaplin.

This is writer-director Hilary Birmingham's first film, and it's a lovely thing, as reserved and unfussy as its characters and, like them, full of surprises.

Writer-director Musa Syeed has conjured a drama rich with incident...but most of the turns of plot feel organic, ours to discover, as long as we're paying attention.

Although parents of small children are advised to give the film an advance look, Holes may nudge older kids toward that most ancient of after-school distractions: reading.

Kane believes in happy endings, but he makes his characters earn theirs, as each couple is forced, ever so subtly, to face its own inner nonsense. The filmmaker has divine actors at his disposal.

This horror comedy is loaded with decapitations, bodies torn in two and spewing blood, and yet, unlike the grim, torture-filled gore-fests of late, Hatchet’s mayhem is so giddily over-the-top that you end up applauding the low-budget aplomb of it all.

Nair, who, in this film as in so many others, aims for the beating heart of the predictable movie moment.

Fascinating film, which tracks Éva's slowly dawning realization that she's being played for a fool, an insight that may be driving her mad.

Smart, goofy and endearing, Cho and Penn make a terrific team, and the fact that they're starring in their own movie suggests that, in the Hollywood comedy frat house, there's finally room for everyone.

Those who can forgive the director's pretensions will discover some fine filmmaking.

Grounded by strong performances by newcomers Featherston and Sloat, who pretty much have the movie to themselves, Paranormal Activity, which demands to be seen in a crowded theater, is refreshingly blood-free.

Visibly uninspired, Pacino gives a perfunctory performance -- though surely he must have looked over at Farrell and been reminded of himself 30 years ago, all jacked-up and beautiful, like a stallion at the gate.

When movie clichés are presented with rigor and feeling, they can pack a fresh punch.

Engrossing.

Grounded in the easy rhythms of daily life, this charming little film shows unexpected grit in sequences set in the white household where Lindiwe works, a place so oppressive that it suddenly seems way past time for South African movie characters - and their home audience - to experience a dose or two of Hollywood-style wish fulfillment.

Zippy, stylish fun.

Screenwriter Vincent Molina and director Fabrice Cazaneuve are wonderfully calm about the tumult of teen life.

Refreshingly quirky comedy.

A bit disjointed but also vibrant and loving.

Despite a midfilm lull of his own, Eisner stages a series of nifty action sequences, nearly all of which feature a moment of surprise, as well as gruesome wit.

Charming, animated retelling of stories from A.A. Milne’s Winnie-the-Pooh books.

What's fun is that the road to that climactic Capitol showdown is paved with one ridiculous and relentlessly edited set piece after another.

Unexpectedly gripping horror movie.

The Strangers: Prey at Night, co-written by Bertino and Ben Ketai and directed by Johannes Roberts (47 Meters Down) has a slow and rather grim first half, but then, in the home stretch, takes a welcome turn into the seriously silly.

Papa Cronenberg must be proud, but be advised: If there's a blood test in your future, book it before seeing this movie.

The new thriller Misconduct is getting kicked to the curb by its distributor, which is too bad, because director Shintaro Shimosawa's debut feature boasts an elegant visual style and a mystery plot with so many absurd twists that the film becomes enjoyable high melodrama.

The 1978 frat-house classic "Animal House," starring the late, great John Belushi, is the model for testosterone-mad comedies such as this, and while it hasn't that film's scope or finesse, Old School does have Ferrell, a man clearly in touch with his inner Belushi.

A surprisingly smart satire around the bubble-gum band that first found life in the pages of the Archie comic book series.

Stuck for years playing young women who are the idealized object of male desire (Portman and Johansson)-- flaw-free and, in Johansson's case, barely conscious -- they come alive in The Other Boleyn Girl, as if being bound up in costumer Sandy Powell's exquisite gowns has freed them from the tighter constraints of their own beauty.

When Frankie, an understudy in a small dance company, is given his chance to perform, he, and Test itself, come to life.

A smooth little comedy deserving of more studio support than it got.

[A] hokey but effective adaptation.

Formulaic but infectiously happy comedy.

Athale has a flair for guy-pal banter; here, the talk is funny and profane, silly and profound, often in the same breath.

As director, Scott Marshall displays an unsurprising flair for selling a joke, but also a fine sense of dramatic pacing and, even better, a gift for brevity, neither of which, it could be argued, are innate skills of his famous filmmaking family.

Antibodies is fairly riveting, thanks to Alvart's command of craft and tone. He's a director to watch.

These young American members of an international group that uses the combative tactics of anti-abortionists to vilify those who’re doing business with a major products-testing company were recently labeled terrorists by the FBI and put on trial. That one can’t quite decide if these charming men are heroes or villains is a mark of Johnson’s calm.

While it isn't surprising that improv gods Short and fellow SNL vet Jan Hooks, as Glick's wife, Dixie, are brilliant, who knew that perennial onscreen good girl Elizabeth Perkins, playing here a has-been bitch-diva, could be so brittle and sexy?

Unsatisfying as crime drama but haunting as a meditation on marriage.

Although the film is a tad long, Mirkin ("Romy and Michele's High School Reunion") has managed to pull off a classy, gently funny movie in which no one throws up, a rare blessing these days.

Despite the rush to get everyone from place to place, director Frank Coraci (The Wedding Singer, The Waterboy) luxuriates in colorful visual detail and gives the locals their due.

This debut feature from writer-director Shonali Bose has a powerful finale, in which the filmmaker uses imaginative camera angles and a vibrant sound design to re-create the turmoil and terror of the riots.

Undeniably precious, it may make some viewers fidgety, but others will find that the reflective melancholy that overcomes both director and cast (all superb) is a sweet contagion.

Despite its sci-fi hook, Movement and Location turns out to be a surprisingly resonant film about how impossible it is for most people — no matter their cosmic time zone — to carve out a life that's emotionally honest.

First-time director Anahí Berneri, who wrote this involving, if slow-moving, film with Pablo Pérez (based on Pérez’s own diaries), doesn't shy away from the whippings, rope work and carefully calibrated humiliation that make up a good night of dungeon play. Yet A Year Without Love isn't a sex movie (so don’t expect one), but a studied examination of how one man folds jarring events into the everyday fabric of his life.

This is the first Broadway-sourced movie musical in umpteen years, and you should see it, because the score is gorgeous.

The British music-video director Peter Care (making his feature debut) and screenwriters Jeff Stockwell and Michael Petroni have retained much of the wry, teen-wise dialogue from the late Chris Fuhrman's cult-hit novel, while giving his story arc a fuller, more rounded shape.

First-time director Wayne Blair and screenwriters Keith Thompson and Tony Briggs, adapting Briggs’ stage play, don’t shy away from the era’s social complexities, but they keep their eye on the ball, which in this case is the sweet pull of soul tune harmony.

The jewel in this well-rounded collection of gay-themed shorts is Alan Brown's "O Beautiful."

There are some decent shootouts, but the movie's strongest assets are the soulful performances Danish director Kasper Barfoed, making his American debut, draws from Cusack and Akerman.

Thanks to Ashton's brilliant, career-defining performance, we're made to see that the only thing worse than doing evil deeds is being nice enough to feel guilty about them.

The film is being sold as a comedy, and it is amusing. Secretly, though, it's a romance, with Merchant's roving camera discerning the tempestuous love triangle at the heart of Naipaul's novel.

In this lovely film, writer-director Khientse Norbu (The Cup) shifts smoothly between a kind of Buddhist "The Postman Always Rings Twice" and depicting the bonds that form among Dondup and his companions.

A remake of the 2003 Korean horror film "A Tale of Two Sisters," The Uninvited is a Hand That Rocks the Cradle–type thriller that's been dressed up as a horror movie.

In this entertaining documentary, the coolest kids in town sing the praises of cartoonist Gahan Wilson, whose work is a brilliant fusion of the personal and the political.

As with most of Toback's films, there are Big Ideas being bandied about that never quite coalesce, a failing that, this time at least, mirrors his hero's own hyped-out search for meaning.

Always amusing, if never screamingly funny.

Director Chuck Russell ("The Mask") keeps the computer effects to a minimum, emphasizing instead the essential ingredients of a Saturday-afternoon serial, namely, venom-tipped arrows, pissed-off cobras and a buxom babe.

Slow-starting but ultimately invigorating debut film by Craig Highberger.

Tucci and the English-born Eve make a riveting team, and although the film's final twist undercuts all that has come before, Some Velvet Morning is provocation of the most artful kind.

A film free of political fury, but full of activist optimism, this tame but heartfelt documentary is a fine companion piece to a day at the science museum.

With a deft hand, Pray juxtaposes a history of Heizer's revolutionary career as a "negative space" sculptor with an insider's view of the insanely complex planning it took to move the two-story monolith.

The imperfect yet affecting new film Beautiful Boy, based on memoirs by the real-life Nic and David, examines addiction and its effects on one family. But it’s also a meditation on memory and the difficulty of reconciling the happiness of the past with a present that’s become too sad to bear.

Zoe is lively and an astonishing athlete, but it's Jeannie who gives this film resonance.

This is one of the few treatments of the macabre in animation that is authentically unnerving, rather than merely gross or campy.

Madea's a riot, but what makes this richer, more textured follow-up to "Diary of a Mad Black Woman" so fascinating is the way Perry - a first-time director adapting his own hit play - shifts on a dime from a silly fart joke scene to one of intense, Sirkian melodrama.

Gradually, and with a kind of inquisitive generosity, the filmmaker's scope expands to take in Casim's parents and two sisters, whose public shame and private despair at having the only son move in with a “goree” - a white girl - is made palpably, wrenchingly real.

While it can't have been easy to find action points for a drama about vocabulary drills, Atchison comes up with a steady stream of plot-propelling business, including Akeelah's flair for jump rope, a skill that serves her beautifully in a clinch moment.

While Driving Lessons' writer-director, Jeremy Brock, sticks to the all-too-familiar template of such tales, he's given Walters her best role since "Educating Rita." Hamming it up with the precision of a master, she makes this somewhat plodding film a pleasure, as does young Grint.

With the supremely gifted Rudd as his point man, Peretz is often ruthless in depicting Americans abroad as deluded cretins; by film’s end, however, he finds their optimism useful for re-firing the defeated hearts of his characters, even the hope-leery French ones.

This Is Martin Bonner isn't exciting, but it's also never dull.

Avenged is an action-horror mash-up that's very silly, quite gruesome, and a whole lot of fun.

This is a small, funny movie drawn from the radical notion that a love born of late-night lust can survive the glaring light of day.

Ardant gives in this film the performance of her life, lip-synching to the voice of the real Callas.

Having built his cast from friends and family, the director is left with some stilted acting, but that's easily outweighed by the film's infectious enthusiasm.

All of this looks great on the giant IMAX screen -- most things do -- but the filmmakers can't shake the sense that this is an inflated TV special.

Writer-director Richard Day, whose debut feature, the drag comedy Girls Will Be Girls, was shamefully neglected by critics and audiences alike, proves again that he's the new master of the catty one-liner, and he's also becoming a striking visual stylist.

Wordplay offers a running tutorial in how crosswords are created - lessons that are enhanced by the onscreen graphics of designer Brian Oakes, which, come tournament time, allow moviegoers to see the clues and grids the contestants are working on, theoretically allowing us to solve the puzzles along with them.

Watching this interesting, well-acted debut feature from writer-director Russell Brown, one begins to reason that what Nathan and Maggie have in common, besides desire, is a need for a partner who's not completely kind.

Date and Switch isn't a gay movie. It's a zippy, happy, buddy flick.

Unlocked feels like a 1970s-style conspiracy thriller, which makes it a perfect fit for the 76-year-old Apted, whose wonderfully varied career includes the James Bond flick, The World Is Not Enough.

Deep Blue runs just shy of 90 minutes, and this pathetic landlubber of a movie critic must confess to growing restless here and there, an example of how quickly awestruck wonder can turn to apathy.

Kinky Boots is diverting, but it's only worth shouting about thanks to Ejiofor' quietly subversive take on what has become a stock movie character.

A vibrant color scheme and the deliciously evil cackle of Christopher Plummer elevate this kid-friendly animated adventure from Canada.

Unexpectedly moving documentary.

A passionately told tale.

Maybe Brosnan is so shockingly good in this film because Kinnear gives him the sounding board and safety net that the actor never had in his sadly solitary spy-flick duties.

Wright is a find, while Rowe may surprise those who dismissed him as a Brad Pitt look-alike when he first came to attention in "Billy’s Hollywood Screen Kiss." Here, Rowe displays new authority and confidence, as if lately he’s been looking in the mirror and seeing himself, rather than that other, more famous blond.

The purest of horror films.

In movies, the young are forever being taken back in time by the old, but what sets apart this low-energy yet ambitious debut feature by writer-director Rodney Evans is the complexity of the questions that journey raises.

Director Ryûhei Kitamura (The Midnight Meat Train) is too talented for material this retro-junky, but he and screenwriter David Cohen keep the action coming hard and fast.

Karen Black gives her sharpest performance in years as Bambi LeBleau, a roadside-dive karaoke hostess who invites the kids back to her house for a night of booze and lounge classics.

A film we hereby proclaim the finest fertility comedy ever made, in the faint hope that another will not be attempted.

Mahieux, who is superb, methodically paint Peppino as a man for whom solitude is torture.

Has surprising depth and charm, descriptors never before ascribed to a movie starring Ashton Kutcher.

The filmmaking is actually quite polished, and Ribisi is fascinating to watch -- his fluttery weirdness has never seemed more grounded and resonant, turning Gray's self-destructive egoism into near tragedy.

The Summit is at its most powerful when the filmmakers simply tell the tale, which gradually develops the unsettling suspense of a horror movie, with K2 cast as the implacable killer.

Audiences are destined to debate the film's final scenes, where Hanley piles on plot twists, leading to a coda that turns a creepily ambiguous story about God and the terrifying power of paternal love into something closer to an X-File.

Mercifully free of excess mania, sexual innuendo and fart jokes, this sweet-natured comedy, ably directed by John Whitesell (Malibu's Most Wanted), has some nice bits of business.

Peterson and her longtime writing partner, John Paragon, as well as director Sam Irvin, clearly worship the Poe-inspired Roger Corman/Vincent Price films of the 1960s, so of course there’s a pit and a pendulum in that dungeon, but who’d have expected it to be so beautifully designed?

The road-trip drama Who's Driving Doug is earnest but not overly sweet — a blessing for a film with built-in sentimentality traps.

Though engaging from beginning to end, be warned that this is also harrowing, utterly depressing stuff.

[A] slow-moving yet soulful documentary.

Clichéd though it may be, this movie was clearly made with love.

West delivers the emotional goods when tragedy strikes in the final reel. If 17-year-old pop star Moore isn't a skilled actress, she's at least unassuming.

Despite the success of these action sequences, Annaud and his ultraserious cast are so determined (admirably) to keep war from seeming romantic that we are never quite pulled into the movie.

You can be sure that his victims die shirtless, and are as dumb as the hetero dimwits who fell prey to Jason or Freddy, but what you might not expect is that this queer-slanted slasher flick is actually pretty good.

The need to tell a story and the desire not to collide in Live Cargo, the narratively uneven but visually exquisite debut feature from writer-director Logan Sandler.

With a dream cast that also includes Patricia Clarkson and, in a cameo, a tattooed George Clooney, fullness of narrative may not have struck the filmmakers as key, and their film feels slight, as if it were an extended short, albeit one made by the smartest kids in class.

The film gains power in the final third...one wishes Thompson had chosen to view the great artist's lives through the eyes of the women who loved (and tolerated) them

Although, in the end, this is basically just a moss-strewn remake of his 1997 hit, "I Know What You Did Last Summer," director Jim Gillespie appears invigorated, sending his capable young cast into a series of nicely staged suspense sequences.

Formulaic but refreshingly low-key weepie.

The Story of Luke is a charming little film in need of a bit more grit.

Saving Shiloh takes place in 2005, but in its setting and sensibility, it feels like 1930s Walton's Mountain.

Dark House is one nutty horror movie, but what's crazier still is how well it works — until it doesn't.

Dead Before Dawn's best jokes are grounded in the warm, believable camaraderie between Casper and his friends, but Mullen is less confident with crowds. The zemon-horde attack scenes are a visual jumble.

Kirk Douglas turns 83 this very week, and surely the fact that he's pulled a rabbit out of the hat at this late date deserves a deep bow.

Vardalos is a pleasing mix of Elaine May and Bonnie Hunt; in other words, she's not a sex kitten, but she's funny and smart.

Hellion offers Paul his most adult screen role so far, and he's very fine, but the movie belongs to Wiggins, a newcomer whose innate gifts are a perfect echo of Paul's.

If the screenwriters never satisfactorily reconcile these charming misfits with the unsettling fact that they're also bomb planters, albeit clumsy ones, they make up for it with smart, character-driven dialogue that's brought to life by an equally sharp ensemble.

Mitchell's unwillingness to define the parameters of the specter haunting Jay leads to a finale that's muddled and confusing, and definitely not scary.

[An] uneven but intriguing found-footage horror flick.

A well-made but emotionally scattered film whose hero gives his heart only to the dog.

[Webber's] performance is crazy good, and so emotionally charged that viewers may be forgiving of a finale overloaded with silly twists.

Never-hilarious but often-quite-amusing film.

Marshall isn't exactly a cinematic poet, but he does a fine job delineating each individual dog's personality, as well as the shifting hierarchy of power within the pack, which is why it's so exasperating that he and first-time screenwriter Dave Digillo are forever cutting away to dull Jerry and his stateside quest for rescue-mission funds.

That decade-spanning finale allows the three leads to age onscreen and demonstrate their impressive range, particularly Liu.

Much meaner remake, starring Ryan Reynolds (quite good).

Ganem and her talented co-stars work hard, but Riedel's pacing is always a beat or two behind their mad energy, making for a film that's enormously appealing, but not quite addicting.

Meandering.

An overlong but deeply felt film.

The all-Polynesian cast, many of whom developed this material as part of a theater troupe called "The Naked Samoans," bring so much energy and glee to the telling that one can only smile and hope they all profit wildly from the American remake that's reportedly in the works.

To their credit, screenwriter Dianne Houston and director Liz Friedlander (both making their feature debuts) go relatively easy on the urban-life clichés and instead stick tight to dance class.

A spirited re-creation of the series that once ruled Saturday mornings.

Refreshingly laid-back romantic comedy.

For his first feature in 15 years, Spanish filmmaker Eloy de la Iglesia has made a witty, unsentimental class comedy.

Despite his obvious passion, Long never fully ties together the human and animal footage, and so the film feels disjointed, as if two different documentaries are being fused into one.

At its best, there's nothing gushy about Dennis Quaid's portrayal of Morris, and more than anything it's his beautifully modulated reserve that holds this film in emotional check.

A hit in Denmark, this impressive debut feature from writer-director Anders Thom as Jensen is decidedly offbeat, with Jensen contrasting moments of brutal violence with the emerging gentleness of Torkild and his friends.

Accomplished yet uneven feature.

In her charming debut feature, writer-director Alice Wu works hard to sidestep both pathos and antic comedy, an admirable ambition that makes for a relentlessly low-key film that nonetheless builds to a third act rich in surprising turns of character.

Unfortunately, two separate screenwriting teams...send Cody away from kid-resonant environs and off to exotic locales, culminating in an overproduced mountain-lair finale.

For most of its running time, Diving Normal doesn't work, and then it does, which makes it both maddening and memorable.

Director James Wong and co-writer Glen Morgan seem, in this film's creaky first third, to be working on automatic pilot, but they gradually cut loose, staging one imaginative and gleefully gruesome death after another.

Adam & Steve is uneven, but it's a relief to see a gay romance that isn't about ab-perfect 20-year-olds, and which features lovers played by two long out-of-the-closet actors. Wonder of wonders.

On the surface, this coming-of-age tale feels slight and unremarkable, yet the director's final close-up of Frankie packs a punch -- a testament to the power of a gifted young actress happily lost inside her first big role.

It’s a good story, and Uekrongtham, making his feature debut, captures the camaraderie of camp life and the subsequent matches with the panache of a veteran studio hand, but the insights into Toom's psyche never extend past the fun he has applying powder and eyeliner.

The director's work is suitably unnerving, but leaves one feeling beaten senseless by reel two. When the hero's well-earned moment of clarity finally arrives, most will likely be too numbed out to care, despite the best efforts of Brody, an actor too vividly alive to be wasting his time playing dead.

If the characterizations are perfunctory, the performances give them unexpected weight.

[A] slightly uneven yet deeply affecting documentary.

There's lots of half-naked flesh on display, and an enticing sense of hot action afoot (especially between the two gay guys), but the directors seem timid about sex, and really, what's the point of being Spanish if you're afraid to show the good stuff?

How nice to see a new comic lead (Ferguson) with the confidence not to hog the screen.

Filled with the kind of frank, nonsensational sensuality that eludes American filmmakers, this movie proves again that the most interesting cinema about teenage life -- gay and otherwise -- is being made far from our provincial shores.

Intriguing yet muddled thriller.

She is known as one of the great muses, yet director Bruce Beresford, Wynter and screenwriter Marilyn Levy are never clear if this is by design or chance.

The dialogue and voice-over narration (by Gordon) are homily-heavy, and the staging sometimes awkward. The prison extras in particular are often left to stare blankly at the gut-wrenching action before them, with many, including Sutherland, looking awfully fit for men who've been starving for years.

Stuck with flat material and a star more adept at responding to humor than generating it, director Stephen Herek, in a vain attempt to generate laughs, enlists Cedric the Entertainer, as a convict-turned-preacher.

Gerber has a sharp cast at hand -- All work furiously, yet the director, with his fake backdrops and stately pacing, never settles on a consistent tone. Surely the novel had more bite.

In Griggs's eyes, they're all fools. Only old Ronnie, dearly departed though he may be, is worthy of reverence.

Silly and pretentious would-be romance.

As producer, writer and star of his first movie, Ray Jahangard gets points for confidence and nerve, but at the end of the day, it must be said that not everyone is meant to work in the movies.

Has no stylistic flair and little forward momentum, yet nearly every scene contains an amusing bit of business, much of it off to the side of the main action.

A debut film that's more well-intentioned than funny.

The final meet felt eternal to me, but little girls may love it all, and even if they don't, they're almost sure to practice their handstands when they get home.

Bettauer means for Arthur and Joe's adventures to be a fable about empathy and hope, but her tone shifts awkwardly between silly and ponderous.

The film takes on unexpected weight when Christian cops to his intense personal loneliness. That's not the stuff of high comedy, but it's brave and, in these days of rah-rah, everyone's-in-love gay media, rather refreshing.

Throughout, Sullivan and Braun shine, making for a match so sexy and appealing that it's a shame Swain avoids their love life, an approach that doesn't exactly advance gay liberation -- or cinema.

At its best, this uneven film by writer-director Dave Boyle suggests that going a bit nuts is a good thing for the rigid paterfamilias.

It's all pure hokum, perfect for a Shirley MacLaine remake, but it's lovely to see Lafont carrying a film so effortlessly.

More problematic is "Inside Out," starring Jason Gould, who also wrote and directed, based on his own experiences as the son of Barbra Streisand and Elliott Gould.

Posey and Rudd are the real deal, so it's almost sad when Priscilla and Jack are left hanging in the final act, their issues unresolved. It's as if the filmmakers lost their nerve when it came time to write the kind of intimate, revealing conversation that can make a sex toy unnecessary.

The finale goes on and on, but the movie is nicely photographed (by John Bailey) and duly empowering, and should please the vast teen-girl audience for which it's intended.

While some may bail early, those who stay to the end are likely to dwell on Zahedi's unwavering (some would say unrelenting) belief in his own artistry, as well as the film's many funny, quotable lines.

If none of it is particularly original or insightful, it's nonetheless executed with skill and economy.

Only Chris Klein, as the lovesick live-in boyfriend of Becky's sister, is given anything like an active emotional arc to play, and he runs with it so beautifully that he steals the movie.

More amiable than laugh-out-loud funny, the film pokes along, buoyed by the motel's bright Hawaiian color scheme, and a moonlit desert finale that's awfully pretty.

In this lively romantic comedy from Canada, actors Wendy Crewson and Joe Cobden give off sparks -- in bed and out.

Rose Marie was — and is — a fabulous talent, but this off-kilter documentary doesn’t completely make the case.

Rich in lovingly assembled silent-film clips, as well as in intimate views of the magnificent Mole, this impassioned yet somewhat too precious fable from writer-director Davide Ferrario feels calculated to make a cineaste swoon, and yet . . . it never quite does.

Generating gore-free unease through sound effects and scary faces is the specialty of director Takashi Shimizu, who helmed the original series (known in Japan as Ju-On). He creates some unsettling moments here, particularly a well-staged scene involving a body under the sheets and a man in a shower, but the evil ghost itself is a predictable, one-trick pony.

Making his directorial debut, Dunstan displays a knack for building suspense. And yet, weirdly, amidst all the requisite blood spray, one senses a reluctance on the filmmaker’s part to linger lovingly over the pierced skins and protruding entrails of the killer’s various victims.

A thriller whose storytelling ingredients are so familiar that one could watch it with the sound off and still know what's going on.

While the final revelation is laughably absurd, DeNiro and Fanning are so far inside their roles that one can't giggle for long.

For this viewer, the climactic scooter-gang rumble, heavy on plot twists and empowerment speeches, felt eternal, but for many, the happy silliness of the film's first half should carry the day.

In supporting roles, Ellen Barkin and Marisa Tomei are marvelously light-footed.

Wisely, the filmmakers don't try to reform the real rich-bitch divas -- some cultural icons are beyond redemption.

Peet and Poor make strong impressions in smaller roles, but then again, edgy and sexy is easier to make compelling than decent and nice.

The movie's saving grace is newcomer Goode, who has what they used to call smoldering good looks, and who can, not so incidentally, actually act.

Promising yet problematic.

Pinned down and smelling death, the men grow into fully realized human beings, which makes for some fine performances, but doesn't exactly propel this epic, richly detailed film forward. The battle, when it finally comes, is brief, admirably non-gory and rather dull.

Disappointing that the film's modern-day race sequences -- which follow quick glimpses of computer-run car factories and pit-crew practice sessions -- fail to excite the senses.

Director Richard Loncraine (Richard III) moves things right along, but during the final tennis match, his pacing is undone by sports-movie convention, particularly the witless color commentary offered by tennis legends John McEnroe and Chris Evert.

A movie with a premise and an ad campaign promising sexual outrageousness, Sleeping Dogs Lie turns out to be rather tame.

The movie's first hour is well-done, but realism and insight go out the window as soon as Samir crosses the U.S. border.

The flashbacks are wittily gothic, and the present-day murder scenes have the absurdist, chain-reaction intricacy of the "Final Destination" deaths.

If Tass had found a way to include more playfulness, her film would be more endearing. Instead, she accents the easy bathos of David Parker's script, from the problems of the shrill, cliched neighbors to a finale that plays like a movie of the week.

actor-turned-director Kevin Bacon (Sedgwick's husband) can't seem to decide if he's making a film about a loving eccentric or a sociopath.

Leitman has unearthed a terrific collection of vintage footage - yet, as if doubtful about holding our interest, she skims too quickly over the historical background.

But, in the end, it may be that man against sand isn't as thrilling as it was back in the day.

Watermark is a documentary filled with images both beautiful and wrenching, yet the film as a whole is a disappointment.