Joe Leydon

Engaging lead performances and snatches of witty repartee help lubricate the creaky plot mechanics in Weather Girl, a lightly amusing but thoroughly predictable dramedy.

Boasting strong performances by Jeff Bridges and Justin Timberlake.

Sensationally exuberant, imaginatively crafted and intoxicatingly clever.

A tickle-and-tease teen sex comedy that plays like a late-night channel-surf through soft-core sitcoms, "American Pie" wannabes and '80s Brat Pack romances.

Maggio has cobbled together a modestly diverting, effectively atmospheric but blatantly derivative crime drama sprinkled with a few joltingly nasty plot twists.

Luis Guzmán and Edgar Garcia give the project much more than it ever gives them, sustaining audience interest and generating mild amusement more or less through sheer force of will as they amble through a threadbare plot.

Frothy, funny and formulaic, 27 Dresses is a pleasantly predictable romantic comedy that sees Katherine Heigl following “Knocked Up” with smooth moves at the wheel of her first starring vehicle.

Connor and co-director Michael Worth allow Fort McCoy to proceed at an unhurried pace, giving Stoltz ample opportunity to subtly convey undercurrents of guilt and anger percolating beneath his character’s affable exterior.

A pleasingly retro recycling of "The Love Bug."

A genially amusing ensemble farce that doesn't quite achieve enough momentum for liftoff.

Very much in the tradition of "Slap Shot," George Roy Hill's raucously funny and foul-mouthed 1977 laffer about the misadventures of a minor-league hockey team, Semi-Pro scores big laughs with the rowdy play-by-play of hard-luck hoopsters struggling for professional survival.

A sci-fi thriller as generic as its title, Alien Abduction generates only low-voltage shocks.

An extremely enjoyable neo-screwball comedy about attractive opposites on the road.

Francophile film buffs and obsessive deconstructionists might be amused, but less indulgent auds will find derivative pic artificial and mannered.

Amiably slapdash docu about The Comedians of Comedy tour mixes on-stage performances, backstage bull sessions and downtime tomfoolery to generally satisfying and frequently hilarious effect.

Well-cast relationship comedy-drama is played too broadly in the early going, but gradually settles into a more appealing groove as a glossy date-movie.

Simply isn't funny or frightening enough to expand its appeal beyond core fan base.

Manages to amuse as a cleverly concocted hybrid of conventional romantic comedy and mistaken-identity farce.

There is a great deal more style than substance here. The special effects experts and the other members of the technical crew do their considerable best to give their various hacking sequences the look of warp-speed sci-fi fantasy.

Warm-hearted but clear-eyed indie effort richly repays audience patience during deliberately paced and provocatively allusive early scenes with a cumulative emotional impact that is immensely satisfying.

Squeaky-clean, family-friendly opus.

An engaging crazy-quit of comedy.

Agreeably amusing but unduly extended, Matru ki Bijlee ka Mandola suggests what might have resulted had Rodgers and Hammerstein lived long enough to attempt a Broadway musical about the Occupy Wall Street movement.

It may be tempting, and not entirely inaccurate, to describe Christopher Smith’s Detour as “Sliding Doors” reimagined by Quentin Tarantino, but this cleverly twisty neo-noir thriller turns out to be more substantial and surprising than such logline shorthand might suggest.

Too mild-mannered and fuzzily focused for its own good.

Lightweight but likable romantic comedy about two mismatched gay singletons who are, of course, made for each other.

A solidly crafted piece of work that, despite its leisurely pacing, manages to infuse a respectable amount of fresh vigor into clichés and conventions common to shoot-’em-ups set during the post-Civil War era.

Indie effort evidences more energy than wit, and spends too much time on set-up before a slam-bang pay-off.