Connie Ogle

August: Osage County is easier to watch on screen, and maybe for that we should be grateful.

It's a disappointing chapter in what until now has been a highly entertaining, even thought-provoking series.

The misery is there, all right, in every woozy, spaced-out shot of Hoffman clutching his gas-soaked rag. But in the end, do we really care?

Gripping family drama keeps Swimming Upstream from going under.

Pirate Radio does what it sets out to do. It rocks.

The Reader doesn't do enough to explore the guilt and betrayal the adult Michael feels over the acts of his elders.

Stoker is the sort of stylish, cerebral movie that engages your brain instead of your emotions, and yet you’re never less than intrigued by the breathtaking visual artistry of this slow-burn thriller.

Unfortunately even a clogging Timberlake can't stop the movie's march to a conveniently happy ending. Nor can he block the flow of psychobabble. It's enough to make any fan beg: Play ball. Please.

The film isn't much of a character study; too many of its secondary characters are stereotypes, and it never fully engages our emotions the way "Schindler's List" or "The Pianist" did.

Made with an unerring visual dazzle -- its dark corners are shadowy, deep and melancholy, its brilliant seascapes the sparkling embodiment of why we must all find a reason to carry on.

Hits the parallels between love and hip-hop a little too hard when the message is relatively easy to grasp: Don't sell out: not your art, not your heart. If only music business executives were listening.

Anything but light on its feet. It lumbers instead of dazzles, drags where it should feint and jab.

Despite its exciting moments, the film is too long.

Norton isn't the first guy who comes to mind when you think ''period piece,'' but he's starred in two such films this year (in addition to The Painted Veil, he stars in "The Illusionist"), and he is terrific in both.

The Safety of Objects doesn't carry the power of Ang Lee's "The Ice Storm," a similarly themed work about WASPS in crisis. Objects is too artificial, clunky with too many preposterous situations.

The dance numbers grow tiresome after a while, and director/screenwriter Ramon Salazar throws in so many calculated oddities that it's impossible for anyone to become too attached to his characters.

Prime may have its unlikely moments, but overall its heart is winningly untraditional and in exactly the right place.

In the end, a sports movie is only as good as the adrenalin rush it provides in the climactic match, and there, finally, Glory Road hits on all cylinders with nonstop action and a powerful emotional impact.

As it is, Gemma Bovery is as dry as day-old bread: Not inedible, but why bother with it if you can find something fresher?

The problem -- aside from the fact that one of the best things about Foer's story is its irreverent, intricate, just-maybe-brilliant writing -- is what Schreiber has decided to cut.

Gervais' wickedly sly concept lingers quite awhile after the final chuckle. And that's the truth.

The film paints a fairly realistic portrait of four people bound by blood but -- like all of us -- all too capable of underestimating each other.

It aims -- successfully -- to make you think and feel.

Garner may be a study in butt-kicking intensity on TV's Alias, but here, she's an engaging comic performer who more than carries her share of what is essentially an unoriginal, mostly average film.

Fey is a good fit with the material, and her co-stars are all solid, including Billy Bob Thornton as a laconic general; Martin Freeman as a boozy, charming Scottish journalist; Alfred Molina as a local politician with a crush on Kim; and Christopher Abbott (Girls) as Kim’s fixer and translator (he tries to keep her out of trouble).

Smart People tastes as fake as a Wal-Mart corn dog. Besides, it doesn't even know the work is Faerie Queen, not ''Fairie.'' Somewhere, Edmund Spenser is turning in his grave. You don't even have to be smart to know that.

Albert Nobbs is not a movie about gender politics; it's about trusting in the fundamental goodness of others and accepting one's need for companionship, and the way in which Close slowly reveals Albert's closed-off heart is poignant and often surprisingly funny, though never in a mocking way.

The Help will make you laugh, yes, but it can also break your heart. In the dog days of August moviegoing, that's a powerful recommendation.