Ernest Hardy

Though the film covers familiar queer-cinema ground, Latter Days' finely observed truths about the painful costs of being yourself make even the contrivance of its happy ending forgivable.

Atrocious bit of by-the-numbers screen filler. And anyone who easily lapses into sugar comas is advised to stay far, far away.

Directed by Garner, Craigslist Joe is sweet, moving, and frustrating.

It’s amusing, but it also eventually becomes tedious, like a comedy sketch that milks a good joke just a little too long.

It's when adults with whitewashed notions of childhood get hold of a camera that kiddie fare - like this uninspired effort from writer-director Eric Hendershoot - goes limp.

There's satiric comedy to be mined from the conflicting messages society still sends about pregnancy, motherhood, and women's worth, but the script isn't smart enough to explore them.

The latest installment in the "Boys Life" series has just as many hits as misses -- more misses, actually -- but the high points easily stand alongside past triumphs.

The audience for this film would be those people who like their cinematic fare pre-digested and painfully familiar.

Afailed attempt at a hipster screwball comedy. Very failed.

Slick, polished to perfection, derivative and stripped of any of the real quirks or idiosyncrasies that make a romantic comedy fly.

There's not a single surprise or moment of dramatic tension in Uncle Nino, which has already proved itself a hit as a self-distributed film in the Midwest.

Pandering, stiffly acted and brimming with awkward (if progressive) political posturing, Rock's films attempt to filter old Hollywood formula through a hip-hop sensibility.

Especially disappointing that Lemmons, who in "Eve's Bayou" gave us insightful glimpses into the emotional world of black adults, has lost her balance, elevating formula over revelation.

Tim eventually evolves out of smugness, but unfortunately, the film merely trades it for sappiness. Fischer, meanwhile, imbues Janice with a wounded soulfulness that cuts right through the clichés. The less said about a hideously wigged Topher Grace as a smarmy self-help author, the better.

The film lacks a pulse. There's sound and fury, but the result is more drizzle than tempest.

The Animal is tailor-made for last-resort Friday-night rentals.

There's no real story and that would be fine, if Rogers and screenwriter Adam Herz could keep from pretending otherwise.

Obvious in its observations, predictable in its conclusions, and a little dull in the telling.

A movie that’s full of sound, fury and unintentional camp -- and is still bafflingly inert.

Reiss guides the film with a firm hand, ratcheting up the tension and ably guiding his actors. It's his protagonists that undo the film, making it a chore to sit through.

It's not really original stuff, and there are few genuine surprises, but Painter skillfully layers visual details and off-the-cuff dialogue into a smart, condescension-free piece on small towns and the complicated lives they contain. The standout here is the always-wonderful Seymour (Hotel Rwanda, Birth).

Lukewarm melodrama disappoints.

What keeps Maze humming is Hackl's firm sense of narrative tension. He knows character and dialogue are icing in films like this, so it's taut pacing, editing, and sound design that are crucial. (The actors are all fine, playing everything straight, sans irony.) The final showdown is ludicrous and thrilling -- as it should be.

Doesn't live up to its genre-crossing, parodic ambitions.

In showing how some men derive primal, perverse senses of pleasure and power from their brutality, how small men make themselves feel large and invincible, the film distills the roots of terror (political, cultural, religious) to truths that are tragically evergreen.

A decently acted, often drolly funny, tautly directed thriller that proves to be a Russian doll of motivations, coincidences, and plot-twists; it would have been more satisfying if it weren't so unnecessarily convoluted.

The problem is, director Robert Lee King has a hard time sustaining the aimed-for camp tone, and while there are a few well-spaced giggles to be had, the movie sputters more than it soars for most of its 95 minutes.

The result is at once a woefully overfamiliar bashing of Hollywood superficiality and a seemingly unwitting paean to the self-absorbed enlightenment that passes among industry folk for personal growth.