Dennis Harvey

Considering its theme and setting, there's something very wrong with a Good that seems merely competent, uninspired and a bit old-hat.

Scary Movie 4 finds horror parody overshadowed by ho-hum groin blows, C-list celebrity cameos, slapstick child abuse, soon-to-be-forgotten hip-hop personalities, plus scatalogical and gay jokes; real laughs are few.

Though it’s handsome enough to look at, Abattoir can’t quite seem to decide just how supernatural it wants to be or how meta its horror content should play

Inspiration is running thin in comedian Margaret Cho's fourth concert film, a routine stand-up set that compares poorly to her oft-hilarious first two.

An ensemble seriocomedy that's initially loose to a fault, but gradually wins one over with its shaggy charm -- and by the close has grown more ambitious, and poignant, than initial reels lead you to expect.

A lively, plush but unconvincing potboiler cobbled from familiar pieces of better films (and TV miniseries).

While the overall feel is a bit derivative and contrived, there are nonetheless plenty of bitingly sharp lines and performance moments to keep this well-cast ensemble piece percolating along.

Outlaws & Angels trades in the lurid character psychology and crude ironies of the spaghetti Western — an idiom whose cynical worst-case-scenario view of humanity seems more acceptable to modern audiences than the good-shall-triumph faith of the traditional Hollywood western.

Cuck is powerful so long as we’re simply trapped observing Ronnie’s all-too-palpable incomprehension and childlike tantrums over his dead-end circumstances. But when those circumstances start to feel rigged, the film’s value as analysis of a hot-button social phenomenon begins to cool.

Juggles three separate time periods -- and is completely formulaic in each one.

As it episodically flirts with absurdism, black comedy, and other offbeat flavors, Level Up seems to be simply trying on different attitudes without owning them.

While the movie doesn’t work, it isn’t idiosyncratic enough even to hold attention as a misfired oddity.

This “origin story” is a somewhat mixed bag. But it’s also an earnest and well-crafted attempt at course-correction, straying from stock slasher recyclage to provide a different story that actually connects a few dots in the very tangled cinematic “Chainsaw” universe to date.

Johnson (who scripted "Grumpy Old Men") flattens out any promise so completely that the feature resembles nothing so much as a subpar "Hallmark Hall of Fame" entry.

The result is a movie that seems unaware just how generic the should-be-distinguishing details of its earnest eco-cautionary tale have turned out.

A B movie in A-grade clothing.

The Barber is a slick but ultimately underwhelming psychochiller.

There are enough formulaic elements, especially teens meeting gory deaths, to keep undiscerning viewers in their seats. But the script (co-written by Erik and sibling Carson) stumbles in its climactic revelations, with an even worse epilogue bound to send patrons out rolling their eyes in unamused disbelief.

As the celluloid universe spun from Bram Stoker’s “Dracula” continues to accrue remakes, spin-offs, addendums and miscellany, “Boys” does provide one potentially compelling footnote. But its execution feels like a missed opportunity.

Despite a stronger premise this time, “Clare” echoes the filmmaker’s prior feature in remaining on a highly worked surface — one that doesn’t illuminate people and events so much as treats them like decorative pawns in a game whose rules, as well as its casualties, ultimately feel inconsequential.

The script by Roth, Lopez, and Lopez’s frequent collaborator, Guillermo Amoedo, giddily piles crisis upon crisis, with none of the customary mercy reserved for leading characters.

A cheerfully silly action fantasy.

Synchronicity is best approached as a sort of Rubik’s cube, a series of shiny, sliding, interlocking surfaces that require dexterity to move and figure out, but contain nothing beneath of pressing value.

Thinly amusing, The Strongest Man stretches a short’s worth of potentially funny ideas to feature length, where they slowly and surely lead nowhere in particular.

Less than a home run, then, Intruders is still an efficiently engineered suspenser, with solid performances and a tight pace.

A winning look at cross-cultural romance.

After a decent if formulaic setup, the story bogs down in dull midsection intrigue, and helmer Jonathan Newman doesn’t deliver as much excitement as expected in the climactic stretch.

An amiable, fast-paced entry that should win over fans.

This middling drama has no glaring faults, but simply lacks the intended urgency.

The expected satire of religious gullibility and charlatanism proves toothless; worse, a cast of very funny people is given very little funny to do.

One Shot manages to avoid seeming an overly schematic technical stunt. The mayhem depicted isn’t always fully convincing, but it does have a certain live-wire edge.

The result is more flashy and shallow than ingenious, let alone terrifying. Yet it’s also a committed effort, one whose energy and style command some appreciation even when they overwhelm the shaky story gist.

No aspect asserts itself strongly enough for the whole to satisfy, and at times the pic’s humorless approach to cliches unintentionally borders on “MacGruber” territory.

This is a decently stylish thriller with occult elements that should satisfy viewers’ genre requirements, though few will demand a second watch (or sequel).

The full warmth and idiosyncrasy of Chabon's original is missed in an adaptation that feels more impersonally observed. But Lawson's pic, (with the director making a left turn from prior feature "Dodgeball," which he says was a money gig undertaken to hasten this dream project) is entertaining and involving enough on its own terms.

Reaching for the grandiose, it never grasps anything beyond the generic.

Rather good actors do indeed keep a straight face, as does the film overall. And Stamm’s jump scares aren’t bad, as they go. He hasn’t made a very suspenseful movie, but he’s avoided both dullness and unintentional laughs.

It’s the kind of narrative leap that can make or break a film. But here it overcomplicates a narrative that should’ve better developed its basic elements, rather than lunging for a big-picture profundity it falls short of. Beautifully atmospheric to a point, handsomely produced, “Ghosts” gradually disappoints because its thematic ambitions add more clutter than depth to a story that’s most effective at its simplest.

Slick, good-looking, cluttered pic won't please fans of novelist Susan Cooper's original "The Dark Is Rising" sequence. But then, they are mostly grown-ups by now, and this very Hollywood-style adaptation of a very English book is aimed squarely at tweens.

Helmer/co-writer Doug Langway's first feature has the right basic elements for niche DVD and cable success, but its overly digressive storytelling cries out for considerable tightening.

Fans excited to see John Carpenter back in bigscreen action after nine years' absence will find limited cause for joy in The Ward, a horror opus that briskly -- maybe too briskly -- charts ghostly doings at a nuthouse.

A lot of interesting, funny performers aren’t very interesting or funny in director Kat Corio’s A Case of You.

A would-be new “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer,” it’s energetic and polished enough to avoid feeling like a rip-off — “Santa and the Ice Cream Bunny,” this is not — but there the compliments pretty much end.

At times plays as if it were aimed at children, but more often simply seems to be aiming blind at whatever genre cliche the five credited writers fix upon in any given scene.

The players are deft enough that a little more wit in the writing would have surely been well-served. (Nighy in particular makes much of relatively little.) And while briskly handled, none of the ideas here are fresh enough for Role Play to score points on narrative or character unpredictability.

David Turpin’s screenplay is adequate but slender, with rather too few complications and a foundational mythology that, when finally revealed, proves pretty skimpy itself. That doesn’t trouble O’Malley. He brings so much gloomy, lustrous visual enchantment to the tale that it feels quite bewitching while you’re watching it.

There are engaging, articulate personalities here that maintain interest through a mountain of strategizing sessions and court reversals, though helmers Ben Cotner and Ryan White strike a rote note of tele-friendly inspirational uplift while risking tedium with too much repetitious content.

One can guess how the elements here might have been alluring on the page, but helmer/co-scenarist Michael Knowles' third feature doesn't find the distinctive tone needed to make its eccentric characters less than irksome and its plot more than arbitrary.

Won't linger in the memory long, but gives pretty good action eye-candy while it's going.

Forgettable PG-13 pic will particularly strike fans of harder-edged recent horror pix as much ado about not much.

Good-looking and entertaining, if unmemorable.

This revamp (which ignores several interim direct-to-video sequels Van Damme did not participate in) is a bit shorter, a tad more stylish, and utilizes the same clichés a little less ponderously.

Tulip has the conviction as well as the artlessness of a saber-rattling speech at a political fundraising dinner, one that preaches fire and brimstone to inflame the already converted. Those seeking a more nuanced portrayal of the challenges facing the country will be less satisfied.

Smrz brings considerable gusto if not much conceptual originality to the pileup of dire crises, keeping the pace brisk and seriocomic tone variable.

Lazy Susan aims hazily between the sad-sack valentine likes of “Muriel’s Wedding” and something more satirically misanthropic, missing a target it never quite commits to in the first place.

Ass Backwards proves that no amount of comic talent can shine — or raise a chuckle — in the absence of even halfway decent material.

Strenuous and just fitfully amusing.

The film can never quite decide what it wants to be — wounded-inner-child drama, quirky comedy, quasi-thriller, all the above — and its good ideas never quite gel, or lead toward sufficient narrative revelation.

This not particularly well shot/organized feature isn't very engaging on the human level, either.

The Pact 2 simply stretches out rather than elaborating on its predecessor’s already thin premise, creating holes that are poorly patched over with false scares and unconvincing character behavior.

Religious overtones, however, could make this the rare mainstream feature that connects with the faith-based entertainment market.

Credit for being offbeat can only do so much to redeem a neither-fish-nor-fowl bore like After the Dark, whose exploitable elements go tastefully unexploited while its gestures toward profundity turn out to be playing air guitar.

A blandly cast and crafted remake of the same-titled 2004 Thai pic that itself emulated J-horror norms, which seemed a lot fresher back then.

This superficially diverting tangent is too convoluted and tonally wobbly to leave a lasting impression.

This soggy stab at neo-noir finds Italian-born writer-director Emanuele Della Valle out of her element in a pretentious meller set on the Jersey shore.

There are certainly no fresh ideas risked in this first directorial feature by voice actor-turned-scenarist David Hayter (“X-Men,” “Watchmen”), but Wolves could be worse, being as fast-paced and polished on a “B” budget as it is forgettable.

[A] solid if unmemorable true-crime drama.

Martin’s screenplay is so tricky in the plot-twist and scrambled-chronology departments, there’s little attention left to limn the character depths that might make us more invested in sussing out so many double- and triple-crosses.

It’s hectic, unsubtle, borderline cartoonish.

A serviceable youth pic that's marginally less dumb than November's urban quasi-musical "Honey."

Indonesian director Mouly Surya’s well-crafted first English-language feature is too formulaically contrived to qualify as “elevated genre” or to boast the personal stamp of her prior work. Still, it’s an entertaining, pacey action melodrama.

This slick effort is effectively creepsome until it bogs down somewhat in plot explication.

A low-pulse thriller that evaporates from memory with the last credit.

Cheerfully embracing his status as cult B-movie genre megastar even as he sends it up, Bruce Campbell's sophomore directorial excursion, My Name is Bruce, is a big in-joke of definite if limited appeal.

As absorbing as much of this material is, the lengthy feature does not feel definitive: It commits the typical music-doc sin of devoting nearly all its time to a celebrated first professional decade, then hastily skimming past all events since.

The result is a watchable, albeit unsatisfying, vehicle for two stars who’ve now made a pair of movies together in which their skills constitute the main attraction, yet who aren’t particularly well-served by either film.

A colorful, lurid and ultimately so-what look at obnoxious personalities careening down their own road to ruin.

Sometimes succeeds, but mostly comes off as a vanity project for writer-star Brent Gorski.

Benefits from blend of live actors with computer-generated effects and backgrounds. Feature doesn't add up to much more than an enjoyable novelty.

The "Hostel" similarities may strike some as too close for comfort, not only in plot outline but also in general mix of xenophobia, sexploitation, sadism and gore.

Evan M. Wiener’s screenplay throws in too many disparate elements without developing any of them very effectively, while Grau’s direction is slick but unable to provide the tension or consistency needed.

The results are, in artistic terms, a modest success. In commercial terms, it’s a dicier prospect — viewers expecting the kind of bigger-budget spectacle that typically ensues when a screen teenager stumbles into sci-fi situations may be befuddled by what’s primarily a medium-scaled road trip drama with thriller elements … and a very special ray gun.

The short running time means there’s nary a dull moment, but also that no new (or even old) ideas get explored in more than drive-by fashion, the occasion pause for gore aside.

“Camera” scores more points for an intriguing premise than for its execution, which grows more muddled conceptually as the horror elements grow more prominent. Still, this is an accomplished effort that holds full attention while you’re watching it, even if it leaves a few too many questions dangling at the end.

A pat, hollow exercises with few tricks (or treats) up its sleeve.

A walk on the "dark side" that moves far more slowly than limited character insight requires.

Its central theme being the struggle between Christianity and homophobia -- though what's onscreen is far too vanilla in both content and execution to spark much enthusiasm.

Flashbacks within flashbacks exhaust viewer patience in this snarky mix of crime, action and sadism.

Rob Zombie truly loves horror movies. But he still hasn’t made a good one, and “31” is a perfect encapsulation of the reasons why: It’s a fanboy’s highlight reel of homages, without any of the credibility or context that made most of the films he’s inspired by so fine.

The gap between good intentions and effective follow-through is maybe the distinguishing characteristic of this latest “Amityville” movie, which takes itself with admirable seriousness, yet in the end can’t itself be taken very seriously.

While the 1984 film has aged, its now-familiar jolts still pack more punch than this pic's recycled ones, which sometimes register so tepidly as to cause snickers.

Never mind the inherent titular redundancy: The Last Exorcism Part II is a generally effective sequel to the 2010 sleeper that injected at least a little new life into the heavily taxed found-footage-horror subgenre.

The comedy's broad perfs, predictable story beats and pro but characterless packaging have a smallscreen feel.

Will Wernick’s film not only fails to use that format in clever or suspenseful ways, it blows the basics of maintaining plausibility and viewer interest.

It's not exactly good, but it's not bad, and far from boring.

This tepid comedy-drama is, lamentably, aptly titled.

This upmarket slasher is a well-produced but slow-moving thriller that never quite roars to life.

Nobody — not even viewers willing to settle for good, unclean B-movie fun — is done any favors by something as crude as (re)Assignment, which gracelessly mashes together hardboiled crime-melodrama cliches and an unintentionally funny “Oh no! I’m a chick now!!” gender-change narrative hook.

A romantic comedy that treads familiar "Green Card" terrain with considerable charm if no great style or originality.

This action spectacular seems hellbent on containing every possible marketable genre element, with no concern for whether they cohere or cancel one another out.

There's a great deal of on-the-nose talk here about faith, rationality, sin and so forth. But Chapman's sincerity is undercut by the crudely melodramatic explanations of why his principals believe as they do.

A technically competent but painfully broad dramedy about a larcenous mother-and-son duo in the Midwest. This gender-flipped, latter-day "Paper Moon" lacks that film's judicious restraint, among other things, alternating hick Americana cartoonishness with maudlin appeals to the tear ducts.

A mean-spirited farce whose strenuous bad taste seldom translates into actual laughs.

Offers diverting date-night fare for open-minded heterosexual couples and swingers, though its superiority (artistic or otherwise) to actual porn is debatable.

It’s basic action entertainment of a somewhat old-fashioned ilk, giving viewers exactly what they expect in a borderline-hokey yet satisfying way.

Recycles familiar ideas, with just enough droll wit to score as a nifty normal-folk-doing-stupid-deadly-things comedy a la "Fargo."

Ultimately it seems a message movie not quite willing to deliver any clear message, as well as a genre film shy about admitting as much. It’s too melodramatic to be taken as gritty realism, yet not suspenseful enough to work as a straight thriller.

A disastrous stab at contemporary farce.

The three director-producers’ inability to come up with stronger narrative or thematic organization makes “It’s Better to Jump” play like the professionally polished side product of a vacation stay.

The film has a very good idea in using a single soldier’s perspective to explore how tension and boredom can lead to such extreme misconduct, but it doesn’t go far enough, in the end leaving a disgraceful chapter just dimly illuminated in psychological terms.

The overly finished language and theatrical intensity levels that might be potently effective onstage lose any pretense of naturalism under the camera’s unblinking gaze.

Offers plenty of splat with its slapstick. But this strenuous zombie yukfest is no more sophisticated than its nail-on-head title -- making it a joke no smarter than the movies it riffs on.

The script unfortunately suffers from its own case of arrested development, barely getting out of the gate before stalling, and never building enough laughs or narrative impetus to justify feature length.

Misses with its blowhard treatment of a silly, obvious script. Results might hazard "Battlefield Earth" comparison if new pic were a tad more fun.

While not particularly inspired, memorable or suspenseful, the action here is impressively scaled, from a tank plunging off a bridge to helicopter stunts and all that diving activity. It may have been a bad investment, but technically first-rate American Renegades does put its considerable budgetary resources right up there onscreen.

It's crude, sexist, ear-splittingly loud and a helluva lotta fun for anyone suffering from past or present testosterone overload.

The picture's creepiness factor is sufficient to rate this a notch above genre average.

Rote character writing, voicing and animation devalue the more impressive design elements of Joe Pearson’s long-aborning project.

Contrastingly notable for their absence are emotional depth, narrative cogency or non-scatological humor — lacks that much ultra-violence and a surprising amount of sexual content can only distract from so much over such a long, bombastic, shallow course.

Harold's thriller does have an attention-getting plot hook, but piles on too many narrative gimmicks to maintain suspense or credibility.

This first feature for videogame designer/writer Christian Cantamessa has an intriguing premise and two capable stars, none of which is utilized as memorably as one might hope.

Though never outright dull, A Haunting in Cawdor manages to provide few incidents of genuine interest while leaving potentially rewarding character and thematic elements unexplored.

The leads are given the thankless task of maintaining grim poker faces through scene after scene of high contrivance and cliche-ridden dialogue.

Helmer Michael Polish and his spouse-star, Kate Bosworth, were reportedly attracted to the project for the change-of-pace role it afforded her. But even beyond its sketchy screenplay, the pic’s main problem is that Bosworth lacks the villainous authority required to make Mike Le and Amy Kolquist’s tricky if undercooked screenplay work.

The lead actors are solid as usual, but you can feel them all knocking their heads against the low ceiling of material that’s afraid to take any risks — playing it so safe that the film ends up lacking anything in the way of real personality, scares or plot surprises.

Given the abysmal quality of recent spoof pics, it's saying something that Superhero Movie provides a fairly steady stream of midsized laughs -- and even the 40% or so of gags that just lie there aren't actively painful.

Lacking the knockout lead perfs or more whimsical tone that might have transcended script's dubious logic, pic comes off as a so-so theatrical stunt delivered via the wrong medium.

Lautner’s earnest turn, as well as those of familiar TV faces Johnson (“Bates Motel,” “The Shield”) and Zimmer (“Entourage,” “UnReal”), are hamstrung by writing that demands a certain emotional urgency while providing the performers little opportunity for surprise or nuance.

Kim’s film is a slick concoction that affords moderate guilty-pleasure fun for a while, though it goes on too long to diminishing effect.

Minimally funny comedy feels like a Disney Channel pic that got boosted to theatrical after Lohan scored a hit opposite Jamie Lee Curtis in the "Freaky Friday" remake.

Pleasant enough overall, if also somewhat gratingly old-fashioned.

The results don’t feel disjointed so much as oddly undernourished and a bit toothless for what’s intended as a bold (mostly) comic expose.

A nail in the coffin if not the heart of teen comedies.

A generically conceived horror thriller distinguished only by its belief that more hysteria equals a more frightening movie.

Jared Leto gained some 70 pounds. Seemingly following his lead, the pic itself is heavy, lethargic, and exasperating.

That this mashup of too many familiar action-thriller elements doesn’t emerge a generic mess is a credit to all involved. That it’s passably entertaining but also instantly forgettable comes as less of a surprise.

Unremarkable but competent in stylistic terms, with good use of Philadelphia locations, sharp casting and the requisite marketable hip-hop soundtrack adding up to a fun genre package.

Though interviews here are primarily with former camp followers and pic was made by one, overall perspective is just critical enough to satisfy both New Age types and curious skeptics.

Equal parts gory mayhem, convoluted mystery and rote romance, none of which gel together very well.

The script has some familiar, vaguely disapproving things to say about latchkey kids (both the teen leads are under-supervised by workaholic or absent parents), depersonalizing technology, and the pursuit of fatuous social-media fame. But there’s not much real suspense stirred here by a premise that straddles recent found-footage thrillers and “Rear Window.”

Nothing feels fresh here — not even Christopher Plummer hamming it up as a crusty-coot grandpa — and Philip Martin’s routinely polished direction only underscores the cliche-composting of Richard D’Ovidio’s script.

Another theater adaptation that remains stuck to the boards, despite the considerable talent and energy on tap..... equal parts diverting and strained, most likely to please the same niche audiences who have given the material a modest stage shelf life for the last quarter-century.

Real suspense and shocks are MIA in a movie that’s eventful but lacks the atmospherics needed to be scary.

Newcomers will find this adapted tale’s fantasy logic arbitrary, its plot convoluted, and the sum effect wildly unconvincing without being nearly so fun.

Beyond de rigueur jump scares, Mary has little real atmosphere or suspense, and that is at least partly due to the fact that its supernatural force is so generically ill-defined.

In the end, Silent Hill degenerates into an overblown replay of all those "Twilight Zone" and Stephen King stories in which outsiders stumble upon a time-warped location from which there's no escape.

The diversity of visual tactics, characters, settings and incidents keep this shaggy-dog tale consistently diverting.

There’s more repetition and ponderousness than compelling intrigue in the end result here.

Julio Medem’s film is a smiling-through-tears saga whose generally tasteful execution can’t ultimately salvage a whopping load of maudlin contrivance, all designed to burnish the halo around St. Penelope.

Bombastically dumb new chiller that probably would have been called "Killer App" if that title hadn't already been used several times.

Nick Cassavetes’ slick adaptation certainly maintains the book’s mix of lurid incident and pontificating pretentiousness — albeit without the kind of intensity that might have made this far-fetched story credible, or the atmospheric style that might’ve pulled it off as a fevered nightmare à la David Lynch instead.

Its humor and sentimentality equally labored, this by-the-numbers picture will look better, albeit still not good, as a latenight cable or streaming time-killer.

Although it’s being marketed as a horror film, The Curse of Downers Grove turns out to be something else — a messy hash of teen soap opera, stalker thriller and whatnot whose titular, possibly supernatural aspect is basically irrelevant.

This generic horror meller would be most at home debuting on Syfy -- perhaps double-billed with "Pinata: Survival Island."

This overlong tale spends most of its nearly two hours as a somewhat draggy, talky mystery before finally deciding to be a thriller, with credibility lacking throughout.

Ensemble is sharp, although Adams and Dave Foley (as an obnoxious gallery owner) make more caricatured impressions.

Mead’s six Vampire Academy books (there’s also an ongoing spinoff series, “Bloodlines”) are relatively brainy and complex within their young-adult subgenre, but their virtues have been reduced to a derivative hash here.

While competently made, Dark Summer makes no effort to lend its characters any psychological complexity, or even much distinguishing personality. Nor are the proceedings very scary.

Munch's usual stylishness and casual storytelling tenor lend persuasion to this curious drama about two brothers, both teen music idols, who demonstrate an incestuous attraction.

Dylan Dog isn't a terrible movie, just one that feels like a tepid mishmash of secondhand concepts, never developing a distinctive atmosphere or unique personality of its own.

This reinvention’s contrastingly elegant yet dislocated revenge-slash-love story is no slam dunk. But neither is it an unwatchable dud.

It’s a slick film that’s forgettable at best, annoyingly broad and unfunny at worst.

Even the weakest "Desperate Housewives" episode packs more heat than this tepid romantic comedy-fantasy, whose basic plot gimmick has been done as far back as "The Ghost and Mrs. Muir."

The wait for laughs lasts the entire length of Waiting ..., first feature from writer-director Rob McKittrick that aims to be a "Clerks"-type comedy set in a chain restaurant but ends up somewhere below a "Porky's" sequel.

Blue Iguana strains to be antic in every joint, from gimmicky editorial and camera choices to a soundtrack cluttered with early ’80s New Wave tracks by the B-52’s, Violent Femmes, Only Ones — great stuff, but they can’t get a party started that’s already flatlined.

Even by its genre’s comfort-food standards, this movie feels blandly circumscribed, almost child-proofed, as if any sharper reality or wit might be harmful to the intended audience.

Sometimes spare to a fault (especially scriptwise), low-key effort nonetheless holds attention with its naturalistic, nonsensationalized approach.

Its essential contrivance works against the earnest emotions it’s aiming for.

An unstable -- if mostly painless -- mix of low comedy, stabs at higher silliness, and schmaltz.

This slick exercise about a housewife whose spouse might or might not be dead is effective until a downright maudlin close.

At best routinely assembled -- at worst barely competent. The slapstick is labored, and the bigger setpieces flat.

A starry cast and glossier production values simply work against the black-and-white original's strengths in this stillborn thriller about a deadly game of chance.

This uninspired detour into impersonally commercial English-language terrain for Bosnian director Danis Tanovic (an Oscar winner for 2001’s “No Man’s Land”) should provide Patterson’s fans and undemanding miscellaneous viewers with an acceptably slick if not-particularly-suspenseful crime potboiler for home viewing.

Stitching together a quilt of stories involving disparate Angelenos in the mode of "Magnolia" and "Short Cuts" and myriad other crisscrossers, this somber drama is well crafted and watchable but lacks the distinctive story content, style and standout performances to become more than a serviceable reboot of familiar ideas.

A sub-Tennessee Williams potboiler triangle between restless sexpot, impotent husband, and hunky handyman ever-so-slowly congeals into a lumpy gumbo of thriller elements in Grand Isle.

With its general tone of inspirational uplift that’s too often spelled out in dialogue rather than felt, The Great Alaskan Race bears the same relation to “faith-based entertainment” that it does to action-adventure cinema: It gestures in that direction, yet doesn’t actually make the commitment.

The thing-a-ma-jigs have it out with the whatch-a-ma-call-its -- as several humans scurry and scream between -- in Alien Vs. Predator, the kind of two-for-one dogfight (last repped by "Freddy Vs. Jason") that usually does more to bury a franchise than revive it.

The fact that the film isn’t quite boring is about the most one can say for it.

None of this is particularly credible, let alone memorable, but it’s all executed with sufficient energy and humor to make for an enjoyable night’s entertainment.

When not serving up sentimental contrivance, Shirin in Love is just tepidly cute, with wan comic situations and lines that provide little opportunity for a game-enough cast.

This turgid fantasy thriller, boasting scant thrills or imagination, douses a mystic time-travel concept with soap operatic hand-wringing to mawkishly unconvincing effect.

The script has been written compactly if without great imagination by Nicolas Aaron Mezzanatto, and directed likewise by actor-turned-helmer Donowho, whose work here reps an uptick from his prior, mostly B-grade horror features.

When crises start occurring at the halfway mark, they pile on too quickly to underwhelming effect, sacrificing credibility for excitement that never really materializes.

Utterly routine futuristic horror-thriller The Colony substitutes the term “ferals” for plain old zombies (the modern, fast-moving kind), and that’s about it for originality.

It's a picture that's akin to a terrarium of plastic flowers -- gaudily decorative, but airless and lifeless.

Mature in terms of production polish and pro performances, writer-director Rob Margolies' feature debut, Lifelines (until recently called "Wherever You Are"), stumbles in a familiar way: It crams in so many family dysfunctions and plot crises in search of cathartic impact that credibility is stretched to the breaking point.

Rude, heavily contrived, pretty funny, just remotely connected to real-world youth life.

A relatively pain-free, if brain-free, diversion.

Timlin bears a good-enough resemblance, and gives as much of a rounded performance as she can. But this conception provides no insight into any real HRC, past or present, and seems trite even as a fictionalized act of hostility toward whatever she represents to the filmmakers. Which is, in a word, murky.

[A] rather sleazy time-killer.

Does get slightly better as it goes along.

Given his writer-producer credits on good-to-great recent sitcoms ("My Name Is Earl," "Arrested Development," "Grounded for Life"), one might expect more situational wit, or at least some snappy patter, from Brian Copeland's first bigscreen script. Instead, the humor rests primarily on slapstick wipeouts that have no physical consequence.

Resourceful and energetic, All the Devil’s Men is better than it might have been. But it’s still not very good.

Unlike the vast majority of rude bigscreen comedies these days, "Prison" may actually improve with repeat viewings, since its best aspects are offhand enough to be missed the first time around.

There’s a big twist at the end, but like everything else here, it aims for a shock effect that the film is simply too clumsy and psychologically far-fetched to pull off.

The relative restraint of keeping any supernatural creatures and most violence just offscreen works well to maintain suspense. It’s too bad Beck and Woods didn’t exercise equal caution in the dialogue department.

An exercise in canned cuteness, Because I Said So pushes its normally appealing stars, Diane Keaton and Mandy Moore, over the edge of sitcom hysteria.

Though the film ultimately hinges on a “forbidden” Muslim-Christian romance, almost nothing is made of the enormous hurdles that would be present in this time and place.

Eye candy without much to offer the brain or emotions, Hell Fest is a competently crafted slasher film rendered instantly forgettable by its disinterest in character, plot, and motivation, let alone original ideas.

Ensuing action is tamely PG-13 in terms of graphic violence. Despite competent performances and packaging, dialogue and situations in Aimee Lagos’ script are too routine to create much excitement.

Those hoping for either a sizzling -- or an unintentionally hilarious -- good time will be disappointed by this inexplicably dull sequel.

The track record of SNL-drawn movies is dire ("It's Pat," "Stuart Saves His Family," "Blues Brothers 2000"), and this one stands just a peg higher, as an amiable, if flyweight, di-version.

Alan White’s polished but pedestrian pic mines little real suspense and few surprises from a formulaic script.

Has a whole new director, cast and crew, with slightly higher production polish and more familiar faces onscreen. Nonetheless, it's consistent with its predecessor as a somewhat awkward translation of Ayn Rand's 1957 novel to our current era, handled with bland telepic-style competency.

Solidly pro in overall packaging yet cliched, pedestrian and indistinct in specific contributions, this thriller never finds (let alone raises) its own pulse.

All this sounds like a surefire recipe for knowing, trashy fun, but something got burnt in the oven.

A cut above most youth-skewed sex comedies of late, with bouncy execution and an unsophisticated but positive gender-sensitivity message elevating a so-so script.

Likely lack of much critical enthusiasm or positive word-of-mouth will induce quick theatrical falloff, with better news likely down the line for rental merchants.

This dumb, derivative teen slasher movie would be uninspiring coming from any writer-director, let alone one with several genre classics under his belt.

By-the-numbers slasher picture Smiley starts by borrowing the key concept of "Candyman," ends with a denouement heavily indebted to "Scream," and stuffs its middle with a dismayingly high quotient of lazy false scares.

Ultimately there’s an intriguing arc here that rewards patience.

The fact that none of this usually-surefire mindless stimulus is remotely inspired — let alone that the plot feels like a barely-there afterthought — turns so much cheerful sound and fury into near-senseless din.

This offbeat effort proves more admirable for its ambition than anything else, as the uneasy mix of satire, allegory, grittiness and redemption never quite jells.

For those who enjoy fashion-model-looking twentysomethings yelling at each other in bathrooms while doing too much cocaine, voila! Heaven is a place called London.

A mediocre ensemble comedy-drama that's not particularly funny, involving or even nostalgic.

Without the songs, the underdeveloped bisexual triangle would seem shapeless. Even with the music, the film is a poorly crafted grab-bag of ideas barely elaborated upon enough to sustain a 20-minute short.

Eating Out: All You Can Eat somewhat departs from the series' gay spin on the raunchy teen sex comedy in favor of semi-sincere romantic comedy -- after a crass and abysmal first stretch, that is.

This decent if derivative scare machine should benefit from a lack of genre competition.

Bringing absolutely no fresh angles to a time-tested formula that's seemed particularly overworked of late.

Those involved got to spend weeks at a Bora Bora luxury resort; all we get is this not lousy but unmemorable tropical-vacation comedy.

Enough to keep pic entertaining, though not enough to ultimately make it more than a routine genre effort.

Isn't an embarrassment. Rather, it's an acceptably executed, thoroughly routine time-killer.

Rates a notch below the KISS-centric "Detroit Rock City" and a couple above Jerry Springer's "Ringmaster" -- in other words, closer to stupid-fun than stupid-toxic.

Michael Polish’s film gamely tries to compensate for unspectacular production values with a lot of action — but its staging is pedestrian at best. Alexander Vesha’s script never convinces, and the competent actors fail to spark, despite Sylvester Stallone’s presence as a reluctantly reunited former colleague.

Picture aims for nonstop thrill ride, but for all its brainless brawn, it has plenty of stops and few real thrills.

Celestine Prophecy demands all skepticism be left in the lobby. That's a leap few may be willing to take -- few beyond those millions who bought the book, that is.

Slick but derivative and forgettable on all levels.

It's an easy watch that nonetheless consistently feels like a grazing blow rather than a knockout.

This crude, shrill day in the life of three ill-matched Manhattan women will prove as irksome to most viewers as it is to the protags.

Vanquish isn’t bad so much as inert — nothing here is convincing, tense, kinetic, outrageous, or silly enough to give the movie even fleeting life. The script is so by-the-numbers, the performers can hardly hide their disinterest, a feeling soon to be shared by viewers

This anything-goes exercise isn't dull -- one just wishes the outrageousness were more consistently funny.

It doesn’t strike an assertively comic tone either, resulting in a superficially colorful but hollow pile of contrivances that are neither clever nor convincing enough to achieve more than time-passing diversion.

A few minutes of good snowboarding footage -- all in the first reel, alas -- after which it's strictly downhill, bunny-slope style.

Fans of the original will no doubt tune expecting more high-grade guilty-pleasure fun, only to get way too much of a no-longer-very-good thing instead.

If the film had a loopier or more fable-styled atmosphere, the concept might have seemed easier to swallow. But Fleming treats Stephen Zotnowski’s script with a glossy literalism that doesn’t do it or the actors any favors.

Affectionate spoof merits appreciation as a not-so-dumb salute to another era's ultra-dumb genre conventions.

Only those scared of being bored to death need fear Locker 13, an omnibus of horror stories that could hardly be more tame, talky and tepid, both individually and as a whole.

There are some unintentional laughs to be had from this hectic, silly, defiantly un-scary mashup of stock “cabin in the woods” and alien-invasion formulae. But that dubious plus won’t be enough to soften the scorn of horror fans who plunk down hard cash for this feeble, somewhat amateurish if enthusiastic retread.

The four-years-in-the-making, badly recycled (not to mention awful) sequel might stain the honor of the Lampoon label if it hadn't already produced several even worse films.

Sparing no maudlin contrivance in a quest to jerk tears that remain stubbornly dry, this hokum is slickly executed by producer Mark Williams in his feature directorial debut. But the result never rises above polished plastic, formulaic, and pedestrian.

A rote, overstuffed compilation of genre cliches with pedestrian handling of action elements and frequent notes of maudlin contrivance.

Goosed by a couple gratuitous interludes of gory amateur surgery, the movie is eventful, with a high body count. But there’s never the baseline authenticity of atmosphere or character depth that might make so much action meaningful, or even particularly exciting.

In style and content, Sarah Jessica Parker starrer is the kind of earnest, talky, modestly scaled social-issue pic that seems predestined for the smallscreen.

Much of this makes little sense, but it's hard to care.

Not bad enough to qualify as a memorable dud, multinational production nonetheless misses mark on every level.

Too bad this shrilly tuned comedy doesn't demand more than clock-punching effort from everyone involved.

This is an unconscionably lazy piece of work, the kind of movie that makes you marvel how people will put months of work into creating a feature film whose script seems to have been written in a few hours’ uninspired haste.

Looking good but lacking much in the way of personality or gray matter -- rather like its characters -- Valentine is a straightforward slasher pic that's acceptably scary until a weak finale.

A simple misfire rather than a world-class fiasco. This misguided attempt to remake Lina Wertmuller's corrosive 1974 satire as a wistful romance is only unintentionally funny in the last reel.

Just when you think this nothing-burger can’t get any more exasperating, it spends a full 10 post-fadeout minutes on final credits.

Bad in ways that sometimes provoke a disbelieving guffaw, but more often stir pained embarrassment.

An inauspicious feature debut for director Harv Glazer and all three scenarists, the "Big"-meets-breakdancing comedy will be kickin' it to ancillary by swimsuit season.

For a supernatural thriller that spends so much time on material that is neither supernatural nor thrilling, there’s not nearly enough effort put into credible, complex character writing, leaving the cast only so much ability to fill in the gaps.

A catchy but irrelevant title is the first of many problems with Excuse Me for Living, which throws together a lot of superficially flashy elements that never gel in any organic way.

A cheaper, cheesier sequel that's worse than its predecessor on every level (save being a half-hour shorter) and takes no special advantage of the stereoscopic process.

It’s bad enough that the film doesn’t have the smarts to actually satirize its inspirational source. But bizarrely, it doesn’t really send up slasher tropes, either, while lacking the skillset to take play them seriously.

The greasepaint-by-numbers terror is often so laughably rote, not to mention so poorly written and acted, that some viewers will find considerable entertainment value here — albeit very little of the intentional kind.

Hapless, laughless movie.

Disappointing in every aspect.

Stridently dumb action thriller.

Reasonably slick but empty, Eloise is no “Session 9” as far as haunted-former-mental-hospital horrors go. Heck, it’s not even a “Grave Encounters 2.”

Whether this is a good or bad thing depends on just how much 14-year-old boy you've got in ya.

It’s the rare kind of sprawling, costly hot mess that achieves instant camp gratification other fiascos must wait decades to ripen toward.

Obvious and exploitative even by low-bar youthpic standards.

Pic's nastiness is so insistent, one-dimensional and excessive it risks self-parody.

As willfully lowbrow dumb fun goes, it’s pretty painless.

Vehicle for Dana Carvey as a chameleonic crime-fighting imbecile is noisy, colorful and fart-gag-filled enough to amuse undiscriminating auds under the age of 10.

The Final Project does feel like a student film, though not in a way that benefits its own found-footage conceit.

Yet the overall look, though derivative ("The Matrix," "Blade Runner," "Waterworld," etc.), rates as Battlefield's one non-guilty pleasure.

The humor misfires painfully even when it just tries to be charming.

It’s hard to imagine anyone, however, having a “Eureka!” experience watching these lame movies, this latest least of all.

Fangs aside, it sticks with the same basic menu of T&A and lowbrow humor.

It’s very hard to satirize things that are already inherently ridiculous, and mockumentary Reality Queen! has the misfortune of being even more vacuous — not to mention less funny — than the empty-calorie celebrities it parodies.

“Grizzly II” never finds a rhythm — not even a giddily camp one.

Paris Hilton has already ushered a remarkable three features into the Internet Movie Database's "Bottom 100." The Hottie and the Nottie will make it an even four.

Six just wants to shock, though his imagination is so primitive that the effort is strained and a bit pathetic. Initially abrasive, the whole enterprise grows simply tedious well before the now-epically-scaled titular phenom is unveiled in the prison yard.

Inexplicably mixing lamer-than-lame "bad taste" comedy with yea worse traumatized-assault-victim histrionics, pic's only entertainment value lies in viewer weighing whether pic is primarily a.) offensive b.) amateurish c.) pathetic or d.) a cry for help.

Provides scant entertainment value, intentional or otherwise.

Justin Lo is -- in descending order of competence -- producer, director, editor, writer and star of debut feature The Conrad Boys. He should've hired a better actor for the lead, but then this low-budget indie would lack its vanity project raison d'etre.

Dull casting and cliche-ridden writing drain everyone of vividness.

A non-pandering crowd-pleaser whose character quirks and small stabs at poignancy feel refreshingly earned.

While refraining from excess melodrama or overt preachiness, pic makes no secret of its dismay at this chapter in American history.

Grim in theme yet seldom effective or convincing in execution.

Acreditable mix of character study and thriller elements, Tim Hunter's The Maker skirts but manages to elude several current genre traps - particularly those cliches surrounding both angstful-teen dramas and hip neo-noirs.

Even in a more fluid package, this mix of camp comedy and bathos would seem artificial.

There's nothing remotely original about Freshmen, but this somewhat formulaic comedy-drama about four college newbies has a lot of charm and sincerity going for it.

Scheide's feature never quite seizes the potential for full-on "Stepfather" thrills or "Serial Mom"-style black comedy, leaving pic diverting but too mild.

Has stubborn charm, suggesting onward-and-upward career prospects for helmer/coscenarist Remi Lange.

Co-produced by the subject's church, this fine feature takes its cue from Malcolm's personality, treating material in a refreshingly earnest, straightforward terms sans flash or preachiness.

There are potentially funny ideas, but the barely-there script, performances and direction go for a deadpan tenor that's not supported by much actual wit.

With Mariel Hemingway a credible Sapphic Stallone, this passable action trash should satisfy as fun original programming for gay-targeted Here! cable net.

Writer-director Nancy Kissam's inexplicably named feature feels a tad Frankensteinian, sewing second-hand ideas together most inorganically.

While the black-white-and-red-clad duo's mystique survives intact, there's some backstage insight.

This mix of tepid hospital intrigue plus underdeveloped cultural/relationship conflicts feels like a routine TV episode stretched to feature length, with little dramatic urgency or cinematic style to render its good intentions compelling.

Yields few surprises, compensating with de rigueur false scares, unmemorable deaths and the kind of improbably exaggerated gore.

Macabre if uneven Louisiana-shot horror-meller should divert genre fans in various territories.

The kind of willfully obscure, excessively stylized exercise that's bound to exasperate most viewers while enthralling a few.