Jeff Baker

A tight little thriller that recalls the good old days of "Fatal Attraction" and "The Hand That Rocks the Cradle," back when suspicious packages appeared on the doorstep, no affair went unpunished, and the family dog was never safe.

OK, got it. It's a spy movie spoof, "Austin Powers" with more violence and less camp, a Bond parody that zeroes in on the Roger Moore era, when the sets and gadgets got bigger and the stories got dumber.

Everyone is in top form. Pearce, the Australian who's elevated everything from "L.A. Confidential" to "Mildred Pierce," sinks his gleaming teeth into the comic aspects of Trevor and doesn't let up. Smulders, now part of the Marvel universe, is edgy and fun. Corrigan is best of all.

It's a welcome change from a conventional birth-to-now biography, somewhere between the straight narratives of "Ray" and "Get On Up" and the fractured, Cate Blanchett-in-sunglasses, Richard Gere-on-horseback meta-fable "I'm Not There."

The rare movie that improves as it goes along, shedding its cliches and getting down to what matters.

What is special about The Good Dinosaur isn't the characters...but the backgrounds.

It's fun to watch The New Girlfriend the way it's fun to drink a glass of Champagne, and about as memorable.

The writer-director has done a lot of opera, onstage and on film, and he sure is fond of the dramatic gesture. His leading man, Poelvoorde, is not at first glance the type of guy who'd captivate two such stunning women, but this is France, and his desire and anguish is real.

Uses a deft mix of archival footage and interviews with historians and some very articulate Panther veterans.

The music they made is timeless, and Denny Tedesco deserves credit for giving them the credit they deserve and for working through the music rights issues that delayed a theatrical release for seven years.

It feels more like a retreat for all involved, a chance to kick back and bounce some ideas off each other and the surrounding mountains. Several of them stick and give Youth an emotional core that covers the bare spots. Caine and Keitel, old pros on the home stretch, deserve nothing less.

Director Douglas Tirola threads his way through a minefield of egos and grudges in his interviews and does some interesting stuff with animation in his presentation of some of the magazine pieces.

Writer-director Patrick Brice is interested only in his male characters; Alex and Kurt work out their issues while their wives serve as support or comic foils. The laughs stop about halfway through, and the 79-minute running time feels about right.

A highlight of Sunshine Superman is archival footage of Boenish attaching a homemade ladder to the side of the cliff, extending it 20 feet out into nothing, climbing out and sitting on a bicycle seat, and facing back toward the cliff with a movie camera.

Good Kill deserves credit for framing these important issues in a credible, visually challenging drama, but writer-director Andrew Niccol doesn't take his material anywhere interesting.

Laverty gives the scenes between Jimmy and Father Sheridan a sharp edge, and Ward and Norton do the rest. Ryan shot on 35mm and makes the whole movie glow.

It's overlong and sanitized but succeeds in presenting an important part of contemporary American culture to a mainstream audience.

It doesn't all work. The energy and the performances by Cannon, Parris and Hudson can't carry a movie that careens from camp to tragedy to farce without taking a breath. Several scenes could have been cut, particularly a long, dumb take on sex and the Civil War that ends with a horny old goat in Stars-and-Bars skivvies.

All Things Must Pass is a labor of love by actor Colin Hanks, a Sacramento native who grew up on the store.

Harris, crinkly and laser-eyed, has enough gravity to hang with Neeson. Their scenes together anchor a movie that gets away from itself at times and relies on the tired family-in-jeopardy final act.

The camera tricks, the pacing, and the superbly choreographed set pieces are all there, in the right order, primed and timed like a string of fireworks. But what's holding Blackhat together is a dopey, ham-fisted script that plays like it's plucked from the bottom of the James Bond slush pile.

When the reenactors start to talk, In Country gets more complicated and interesting.

The easy chemistry between Binoche and Stewart is reason enough to see Clouds of Sils Maria.

If Abrams didn't take many chances, he didn't make many mistakes, either. First, Do No Harm became Don't Mess With Success, and it worked. Show Me the Money is sure to follow.

Rather than explore and embrace the contradictions within Jobs ("he had the focus of a monk but none of the empathy" is the best he can do), Gibney puts the hammer down.

What makes The Martian work is Damon.

What Ruffalo brings is a gravelly voice, soulful eyes, and absolute commitment. He's a little aw-shucksish in a Midwestern way but never corny and with a strong backbone. You like him and wouldn't want to cross him. Frank Capra would love Ruffalo. So would Hitchcock.

Kyle Patrick Alvarez, whose previous movie was the filmed-in-Oregon "C.O.G.," stages the many torture scenes in a tight, claustrophobic way that works to heighten tension.