Glenn Whipp

Jang and screenwriter Park Sang-yeon recognize the situation's senselessness but can't resist ramping up the melodrama and celebrating the heroism of the battle-fatigued soldiers. These contradictory impulses, combined with the film's undercooked characters, make The Front Line a war movie not quite worth engaging.

Abduction is just the third movie John Singleton has directed in the past decade, and it contains neither the passion nor the competence of his two previous genre efforts - "2 Fast 2 Furious" and "Four Brothers."

That there is little difference in tone between the end credits gag reel and the previous 100 minutes represents a triumph of consistency that Burt Reynolds, even in his heyday, never achieved.

The road trip provides some spectacular images, but it's the two protagonists that hold the most interest. Their reactions are unpredictable; their insights, illuminating and often quite funny.

That Soul Surfer rates as a giant leap for this team speaks well about the conviction the movie's actors bring to the material as well as the respect afforded the Hamiltons and their faith.

Farewell offers intrigue, simmering tension.

The animals are impossibly adorable, but never threaten to upset the film's delicate balance between magic and a more sobering reality. It's a fairy tale in the best tradition.

Director Elizabeth Allen coaxes fine performances from her cast young and old, stumbling only when relying too heavily on musical cues (Katrina & the Waves' "Walking on Sunshine" needs to be permanently retired) and in the film's awkward CGI flights of imaginative fancy. Other than that, the movie is, to quote its young heroine, "terrifical."

Wilson's amiable vocal work keeps the predictability from becoming too grating.

As for the movie itself, it is better than the original "Cats & Dogs." But so is a rabies shot.

The girl world found in crass comedies such as You Again, movies that reduce women to sad clichés and a uniform level of bad behavior that would appall the cast members of "Jersey Shore."