Gene Seymour

Goes into a tailspin after its impressive setup. Its dramatic tactics become so tangled and diffuse that, by the end, you get the feeling that everything gets tied up too hastily.

Lays thick, goopy layers of uplift on what should be lighter on the heart and stomach.

A dismal pastiche of threadbare plot devices and not-so-comic interludes.

They (Brooks and Douglas) are so out of sync with each other that they seem to be looking for different movies to take their acts, though neither makes you want to see those hypothetical films. Not even as an option to this one.

Even the movie finds itself asking when it'll end. Not soon enough.

Those 24-and-unders who are looking for their own "Caddyshack" to adopt as a generational signpost may have to keep looking.

An unintentional parody of every teen movie made in the last five years. Which can be the only rational explanation for making such a mess all over the screen.

Despite the occasional topical reference to President Bush and Sen. Clinton, this movie is, like, so eight years ago, it isn't funny.

So how then do you duplicate a magic aura from 30 years ago? You don't.

Where the first "Jeepers Creepers" came across like a dark, wacky dream, the inevitable Jeepers Creepers 2 seems more like a franchise under construction.

When the outtakes at the end don't make you laugh, what does that tell you about the movie that preceded them?

A knucklehead operation, all glands and attitude with no heart or brains.

Skip it. Just fill in the blanks and you too can brew the same bland, goopy mixture, right down to such clunker lines as "There is a Santa Claus, Ma. He just doesn't come to Brooklyn anymore."

But what little humor there is in the movie becomes subservient to the grisly violence, gratuitous cruelty and ugly car chases.

Low comedy doesn't get any lower than Love Stinks.

Every generation is entitled to its dopey, sticky junk and, deep into the winter blahs, they don't get stickier or dopier than Snow Dogs.

Stay as far away from Just My Luck as you can.

The gags, almost all of which involve the passage of gases and liquids, move at a fast-enough clip to keep you awake throughout. For which this review expresses a sorrow as profound as the sympathy it feels for all the actors.

Shows less human dimension than the new Wallace and Gromit movie.

Gadget instead ends up as another mindless, noisy thrill ride that gorges its audience on bright effects and leaves it queasy from overconsumption.

Let's hope -- shall we? -- that the "true story" that allegedly "inspired" All the Queen's Men was a lot funnier and more deftly enacted than what's been cobbled together here.

Like a dinner-theater version of the "Alien" movies without the good grooming.

So TV-movie-of-the-week that you wonder throughout why you can't use a remote to find a decent ballgame.

There is plenty of nasty patter and aimless jokes about hard-core sex, soft-core drugs, dog feces and flatulence to keep you occupied while you wait, in vain, for any reason to laugh out loud.

Struggles awkwardly to bring a twist or two to its hoary class-conscious story line, aiming for a subtlety in character development that's smothered by excessive kitsch and kink.

You won't feel anything. Period. Oh, maybe bored or disoriented by the inside jargon and alien references that will be comprehensible only if you happen to have played the computer game on which Wing Commander is based. [12 March 1999, Calendar, p.F-10]

You'd like to think such bankruptcy of imagination means we've seen the last of these subterranean creeps. But you know they'll be back soon to collect their royalties from the gore hounds who apparently don't care how dull or warmed over the accompanying package.