Hazel-Dawn Dumpert

And like, the movie's got all these bright colors and shit, so it's not some fuckin' boring art film, and the new wave soundtrack is awesome.

The result is a fast-paced, brilliantly edited indictment that's as hard to turn away from as it is infuriating to watch. The irony, of course, is that Greenwald deploys the tricks of the trade every bit as knowingly as the evil geniuses at Fox.

Strangely drab.

Lovely ensemble piece.

A kind of folktale, rooted in poignant personal experience.

Nettelbeck's storytelling grace, however, only highlights her clumsy script, which drags the viewer through an all-too-predictable menu of catharsis and romance that can overpower the film’s subtler, more complex flavors.

It requires nothing more of a viewer than quiet complaisance, which is rewarded in turn by pleasant scenery, a few mild laughs, and the dependably involving presence of Weaver and, especially, Neuwirth.

Poignant portrait.

Rozema seems determined to defrill the Austen trend and charge it with a fiercer sort of femininity.

Both visually and emotionally, a panoramic picture; Mehta wields a master's hand as she weaves together vistas of urban and pastoral India with thoughts on the nature of man as it keeps cycling out in the specifics of history.

Paula Gray wrote the script (it was her UCLA senior thesis), and if there are gooey spots, there's also nicely turned, lived-in dialogue and a gentle affection for all her characters.

Dean Parisot's direction of the funny, affectionately satirical script by David Howard and Robert Gordon is crisp and assured.

The lack of cohesion and conviction is disconcerting, and it allows the movie to veer dangerously close to exploitation. Its subjects -- and its viewers -- deserve more.

Heartwarming here relies less on forced air than on Petter Næss’ delicate, clever direction -- and a wonderful, imaginative script by Axel Hellstenius.

The result is a carefully wrought, historically grounded and thoroughly absorbing look at a quintessential American experience.

The film is never less than lovely to gaze upon, shot in saturated colors, richly appointed in period trappings and peopled only by the very beautiful. But it is also, by its end, too silly to take seriously.

If Sayles had maneuvered these stories and performances into even a shade more sentimentality or gravitas, the weight would have collapsed them like a house of cards. As it is, they breathe easily, delicately into each other.

A work of top-shelf schlock.

Miraculous photography.

Startlingly affecting -- What emerges is a picture of an illness that causes enormous suffering but whose origins and treatment continue to elude even those doctors who pay attention to it.

Tavernier's documentary about the famed Paris Opera Ballet is itself a graceful thing, a fleet-footed yet substantial examination of what it means to devote one's life to the art of dance.

Never really gets across the essence of who the band members are and why they inspire such fidelity.

Enlightenment Guaranteed is a parable of alienation and rediscovery told with such affection, insight and visual elegance, it could never be taken as preachy or stern.

Stettner's vision of both women lacks fullness, relying on stereotypes of feminine strength and vulnerability.

Me Without You is at its truest and most affecting when it steps back from the gig gling, bitching and nail biting to reveal how the compulsion to control and appropriate can be born of simple love and admiration.

If there's anyone to credit for The Butterfly's eventual triumph over the inherent fatuousness of the material, it's the great Serrault and his tiny leading lady, who matches her elder nearly line for line and look for look.

If director Scott Elliott falters, it's only in the spots where he tries to comment on her (Alice's) persecution without being complicit in it.

Breaks in the film's otherwise smooth continuum, however, are bridged by Hutchins' soulful performance, and by Chaiken's excellent feel for the grace notes and steady tempo of native New York life, the sacredness of female friendship, and the precarious balance between love for oneself and for others.