Kirk Honeycutt

A real audience pleaser, so long as that audience is mentally agile and adult, for it comes at you from odd angles and features three distinct story lines and 10 main characters.

Julia Roberts marches through Erin Brockovich like a force of nature. Granted, the movie gives her all of the best lines — to say nothing of its most eye-catching wardrobe. But the actress seizes the film's eponymous role with fire-in-her-eyes possessiveness and injects the character with all the energy and drive she can muster.

A wonderfully vivid and engaging theatrical experience.

Unlike his songs, the film holds something back. It goes deep into a life filled with as much trouble and pain as triumph and accomplishment but never quite gets at the root of who Ray is.

This time, tedium sets in early and never loosens its grip. The gags are obvious, predictable and dull.

A biographical documentary doesn't get any better than this.

Downey and Monaghan are wonderful at playing characters that compensate for the harshness of their past with flippant swaggers.

This is resolutely a film of the imagination. As with all films in Malick's slim body of work, its imagery, haunting sounds and pastoral mood trump narrative.

Sticking to one joke in an unconscionably long film makes for a very stale, witless and repetitive comedy.

Turning away from his highly entertaining epics "Hero" and "House of Flying Daggers," Zhang Yimou goes for utter simplicity in Riding Alone for Thousands of Miles, a film of much distilled wit and wisdom.

Might be too realistic for its own good: The film takes perhaps a little too much glee in its abilities to manufacture mayhem. That being said, the ride is extraordinary.

Eyre does a fine job overseeing performances by a terrific cast that rings true until female hysteria takes over the final act. But in tone and theme, the film has all the hallmarks of playwright-screenwriter Marber's stark, uncompromising misanthropy, if not misogyny.

Dabis, a Palestinian-American, has thoroughly re-energized the genre with refreshing wit, honest emotions, incisive observations and a perfect cast.

Director Jean-Francois Richet shows a career in crime with pulse-pounding moments of pure cinema, then lets you decide what to make of this homicidal sociopath.

Ghobadi always uses non-pro actors but you would never know. In fact, professionals wouldn't do theses roles justice since the recruited performers are partly playing themselves and partly playing people Ghobadi has known since he was a boy.

This is an art film in spades.

Actors dominate with finely nuanced performances where every scene feels dramatically right.

A respectable and at times an exciting film that should appeal to males of all ages, history buffs and -- yes, it's inevitable -- patriots.

Director Bryan Singer positions this new film as a sequel to Donner's film, and his Superman -- played with winning fortitude by newcomer Brandon Routh -- is less a Man of Steel than a Man of Heart.

Most entertaining comic drama with a great turn by Jamie Bell.

The film has a winning combination for all sorts of platforms as the story is highly intriguing and the music speaks, or rather sings, for itself.

A superb portrait of a father and son disguised as a docu about Haskell Wexler.

Standard-issue superhero movie -- except that writer-director Guillermo del Toro, taking his cue from "Hellboy" comic book creator Mike Mignola, brings a wicked sense of humor to this particular monster mash.

A delightful though wafer-thin starring vehicle for one of our finest actresses, Annette Bening.

Reiser has written his characters with an indelible sweetness and vulnerability, which allows the cast to deliver performances with some depth.

It's all a bit bizarre. One soldier tellingly calls it "one big reality TV show," and the movie never makes clear whether such training does any good.

A high school romp that turns a stale genre upside down with sly wit and sharp satire.

A vigorous, fast-paced tale that entwines plot with character and psychology set against an incredibly exotic backdrop.

How she (Dunham) made her movie is more impressive or at least unique than the actual story she chooses to tell.

The decision to approach Johnny's life as a love story causes Mangold to neglect the development of Johnny's music.

Switching into a dramatic gear, Woody Allen surprises but often struggles in this dark morality tale.

Despicable doesn't measure up to Pixar at its best. Nonetheless, it's funny, clever and warmly animated with memorable characters.

"Phoenix" might go down as the problematic film, full of plot but little fun.

While nothing truly new or shocking emerges, the film does bring clarity and compassion to its depiction of an act that baffles, angers and sickens people the world over.

The filmmaker made the film on his family's tobacco farm so perhaps his own memories may filter through those of his fictional characters. Or maybe they're not fictional at all. Jess + Moss is, to put it mildly, open to interpretation.

The movie is amusing and clever but only skin deep. It lacks the acidity and rage of a satire such as "Network."

Could develop a cult following. But it is hard to envision repeat viewings or any great number of people willing, even vicariously, to undergo the couple's ordeal.

The film does get claustrophobic. It never quite achieves the balance between a two-character study and a larger world, as did "The Man on the Train." The film also could do with a bit more humor, most of which is supplied by the sagacious shrink.

Stiller manages his movie nicely so that all actors get their share of the comic spotlight. Seldom does an ensemble comedy not contain a single weak character or performance as does this one.

Red Eye has a devilish charm. It pulls just about every nail-biting, edge-of-your-seat trick imaginable, yet gets away with it through what is, admittedly, a clever and original gimmick.

Horror film buffs like to giggle as much as scream but there're no giggles here.

The technical barrage of visual and digital effects, quick cuts and strobe lighting does produce something akin to the sensation of playing a video game. So why, one wonders, don't potential viewers simply play one instead of watching this pale imitation?

The most damning account of the failure of the criminal justice system in America anyone is ever likely to see.

A delight, brimming with colorful, elastic characters and bountiful wit.

It's a long movie that feels short: It grabs you in early scenes, intense though low-key before all hell breaks loose, then keeps you riveted to its mostly male characters.

The story presents a moral morass involving betrayal, illicit sex, hypocrisy and a crime, yet the film feels tidy. Only one punch gets thrown, and you sense the perpetrator regrets his action immediately. It is all very British.

Where the film falters is Jonze and novelist Dave Eggers' adaptation, which fails to invest this world with strong emotions.

The movie observes and dramatizes, yet seeks no overriding social moral.

The movie never really gets below that surface. It sticks to the mean streets of Los Angeles without much introspection or analysis. But those surfaces are slick and beguiling.

In her brave first feature, Bosnian writer-director Jasmila Zbanic tackles the theme of war's aftermath.

Only Diaz shows spark because the actress knows how to simultaneously play nice and be a nasty character, thereby gaining audience sympathy. Everyone else hits one note, and it isn't nice.

The greatest failure of the film, written by David Wolstencroft, is its inability to enter into the lives of the Rwandans, Tutsi and Hutu alike. The movie never moves beyond the tragic facts to show us the human face of either victims or perpetrators. All we get are white people shaking their heads and cursing Western governments.

You learn as much as you need to know to understand Gehry's architectural process and to appreciate his enormous contribution to modern art and architecture. Which is not a bad thing. Just sketchy.

A complex and often compelling melodrama, at times almost verging on soap opera.

Part One, at least, is a French "Bonnie and Clyde."

Very entertainingly takes us into the world of stuntwomen.

For Christopher Nolan to turn Batman Begins into such a smart, gritty, brooding, visceral experience is astonishing. Truly, Batman does begin again.

Too narrowly focused.

The two most hilarious characters, played by Spain's two most famous actors, Javier Bardem and Penelope Cruz, are nothing if not cliches about tempestuous Latin lovers. But, boy, does Allen have fun with those cliches.

The film lacks the juice promised by the teaming of such extraordinary filmmakers with a cast as large as a Hooverville encampment.

Superbly made and winningly acted by Brad Pitt in his most impressive outing to date.

The new "Freaky" plays the obvious gags in ways both surprising and imaginative.

The movie so successfully raises the emotional and psychological stakes in the first half that not all audiences may like the film's reversion to con-artist form in the second. The con itself is preposterous and full of holes when we think back after the movie.

Like many lab experiments, this melodramatic hybrid makes for an unstable fusion. Only someone as talented as Almodóvar could have mixed such elements without blowing up an entire movie.

Riveting.

Electrifying and alarming film.

The film is nothing if not provocative.

Peter's lightning-fast script and Loncraine's steady direction steer this road picture to the sunny side of the street.

A stunning virtuoso performance by director, cast and crew. This movie knocks you out with an astonishing blend of hyper-realism, visual complexity and powerful themes.

Harrelson goes full bore from the opening scene and there are no scenes he is not in. But the effect is wearying rather than exhilarating.

Pure's lively and colorful cinematic style turns a "downer" story about grim lives and desperation into a powerful love story.

The film is by no means terrible -- its two hours and 32 minutes running time races by -- but those things we think of as being Tarantino-esque, the long stretches of wickedly funny dialogue, the humor in the violence and outsized characters strutting across the screen, are largely missing.

In "Virginia Woolf," George and Martha are locked into a symbiotic, disturbingly needy relationship that absolutely feed off their acidic battles. But for Revolutionary Road's Frank and April Wheeler, you wonder: Why don't they just get a divorce?

It's simply old-school stunts and movie magic.

The movie is fun, with plenty of intrigue and suspense that will have audiences clutching at their arm rests.

The film is unusual in that it is a co-production with the Chinese. Whatever difficulties this imposed on the Western filmmakers, the reward is a period film that feel authentic to its time and place.

A satisfying comic gem.

The film penetrates the myth and mythos surrounding Wilson, making his works more accessible and open to those of us who sometimes puzzle over the methods and meanings in his cerebral, psychologically complex expressionism. The film should engender an art house following in sophisticated urban venues before its HBO broadcast.

This attractive cast may help get an audience, but they will surely puzzle over such a downward-spiraling story that lacks inner logic.

The two key roles are wonderfully cast with Owen Wilson and Vince Vaughn and the gross-but-not-too-gross humor will score with young moviegoers. But Wedding Crashers is still a letdown. The film never quite lives up to the promise of its premise.

An unconvincing psychosexual drama that tries to reconfigure the classic romantic triangle but winds up looking like a preposterous pretzel.