Joe Williams

With this unfunny fourth installment, the "Ice Age" franchise has skidded so far into kiddie land that adults who tread there risk extinction.

At the confluence of altered states and state-sanctioned violence, this drug-fueled thriller is Stone's most successfully provocative picture since "JFK."

The film is constructed from four flimsy vignettes that are artlessly overlapped.

Not just a reboot - it's a rejuvenation. From the first image of sensory awakening to the final acceptance of adult responsibility, it pulses with the warm blood of a very human hero.

Although there's a skeletal story, A Cat in Paris evokes a mood instead of a moral. Like a cat nap, it gives us a brief, refreshing dream with little to remember.

Pine and the always-watchable Banks make the best of a bad screenplay, but People Like Us gives us nothing that we can relate to.

It's guilty of some sleight-of-hand hokum, but in pulling the rug from under the norm, Magic Mike turns a trick.

Like a train, I Wish is slow to build momentum, then it carries us away in a wondrous rush.

With elements of a musical, a melodrama and a multicultural romance, Where Do We Go Now? is as hard to define as the crossroads region where it's set. But even without a clear signal, it sometimes seems miraculous.

Eccentric enough to get mistaken for an uplifting fantasy, but it's Plaza who belongs in the penthouse.

If the world were really coming to an end, we'd spend it with Knightley and tell her tag-along friend that there's not enough food for a 50-year-old virgin.

Just misses living up to its name.

A blast, the best action movie of the summer.

Like "Gone, Baby, Gone," the French film Polisse succeeds by shifting the focus from the victims to the vigilant protectors.

Mostly the movie is about process and perspective. Through the documentary lens, Richter's enigmatic paintings speak to us.

In matters of personal taste, there is no right or wrong, so if erasing brain cells is your idea of a good time, That's My Boy could be your cup of turpentine.

The only edge in the movie is represented by Russell Brand, who actually lived the lifestyle, but he's muzzled by a bad Liverpool accent and a gay subplot that's as insincere as the swaggering anthems by fatuous hacks like Foreigner, Starship and Journey.

The best film of the year and perhaps the purest love story in cinematic history.

As a sex-education comedy, Hysteria is flaccid, forced and unfunny.

Surviving Progress reiterates arguments made in movies such as "An Inconvenient Truth" and "Inside Job," it marshals minds such as Jane Goodall and Stephen Hawking, and it utilizes artful imagery reminiscent of films such as "Koyaanisqatsi" and "Up the Yangtze."

The real stars here are Scott's behind-the-curtain crew, who fill every frame with tech-savvy details and take the sets to another dimension with immersive 3-D imagery.

Until a devastatingly effective finale, Monsieur Lazhar is an exercise in delicacy, carried by Fallag's gentle performance and a fine cast of kid actors.

It's the kind of movie that inspires word-of-mouth recommendations by speaking the international language of culture clash.

Goodbye First Love is like a postcard from a lost Eden, a painfully pure oasis where we're not allowed to linger.

It still has cool creatures and 1960s set design, and the 3-D is the best of the season, but if you try to remember the story or jokes, you'll find that you've been hit by a neuralyzer beam.

Among recent documentaries, First Position soars to the head of the class.

This thriller is both skillfully familiar and chillingly strange.

Proficient director Peter Berg ("Hancock") keeps the noise so deafening we can't think about how preposterous it all is.