Kirk Honeycutt

A fully believable, flesh-and-blood (albeit not human flesh and blood) romance is the beating heart of "Avatar." Cameron has never made a movie just to show off visual pyrotechnics: Every bit of technology in "Avatar" serves the greater purpose of a deeply felt love story.

Hysterically funny yet melancholy comedy.

Perhaps returning to Apocalypse Now will reinvigorate the once brilliant storyteller. Certainly, the images, colors and design still astonish. And let's hope that Apocalypse Now Redux will become the definitive version. For the movie hits home even harder now. [14 May 2001]

A ferociously entertaining film.

The best one yet.

This is one of the most wildly romantic movies in ages.

Greengrass has made not only a thoroughly fact-checked film but a film that uncontrovertibly comes from the heart.

Kill Bill-Vol. 2 puts to shame doubts entertained about aesthetic strategies or structural imbalance provoked by "Kill Bill-Vol. 1." Now that the entirety of Quentin Tarantino's epic revenge melodrama is on view, "Kill Bill" emerges as a brilliant, invigorating work, one to muse over for years to come.

One of the best film musicals in years -- exuberant, sexy and life affirming in equal measure.

Pixar again hitches top-notch storytelling to the very best in CG animation.

Not only (Kaufman's) most accessible and romantic screenplay, it's his most complete. The third act works like a charm and pulls all his themes, characters and conflicts together beautifully.

Under Eastwood's painstakingly stripped-down direction -- his filmmaking has become the cinematic equivalent of Hemingway's spare though precise prose -- the story emerges as that rarest of birds, an uplifting tragedy.

Anurag Kashyap's Black Friday is a superb and devastating piece of cinema that with justification can be compared favorably to Gillo Pontocorvo's classic "The Battle of Algiers" in its dispassionate yet sweeping journalistic inquiry into cataclysmic social and political events.

Capote represents something unique in cinema.…Most eye-catching for critics and audiences in the weeks to come will be Philip Seymour Hoffman's brilliant metamorphosis into the persona of the late author.

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

Clint Eastwood's Flags of Our Fathers does a most difficult and brave thing and does it brilliantly. It is a movie about a concept. Not just any concept but the shop-worn and often wrong-headed idea of "heroism."

The film, narrated ably by Leonardo DiCaprio, who seems to share the audience's amazement at what is appearing onscreen, is over too quickly in a mere 43 minutes. So line up and see it again.

Brad Bird and Pixar recapture the charm and winning imagination of classic Disney animation.

The film comes down to a mesmerizing portrait of a man who in any other age would perhaps be deemed nuts or useless, but in the Internet age has this mental agility to transform an idea into an empire.

No true fan of science fiction -- or, for that matter, cinema -- can help but thrill to the action, high stakes and suspense built around a very original chase movie.

Bale again brilliantly personifies all the deep traumas and misgivings of Batman's alter ego, Bruce Wayne. A bit of Hamlet is in this Batman.

The visual design of Wall-E is arguably Pixar's best. Stanton, who wrote the script with Jim Reardon from a story he concocted with Peter Docter, creates two fantastically imaginative, breathtakingly lit worlds.

The best science fiction tells stories about people in extraordinary environments or situations that serve to open up the vast, still largely unexplored terrain of the human heart. Mike Cahill's Another Earth is science fiction at its best.

A somber, often downbeat depiction of human savagery and treachery as well as of human kindness. Writer-director Anthony Minghella has meticulously crafted an intimate epic.

The cinematography and editing are as superb as the film's feline stars are photogenic and heroic.

Utterly compelling account of a true-life criminal investigation where "truth" can never be pinned down.

The stroke of genius is, of course, the film's hero -- the big, lovable bear that is the Chinese panda.

Noir never has been this dark.

Delicious slapstick, droll wit and terrific characters make Aardman's first venture in CG cartooning a great success.

Working with non-pro actors, Hammer pulls authentic performances from the trio that are at times almost too painful to witness.

This is the mother lode all action/suspense directors search for and Lee, who usually doesn't work in that genre, has hit it.

It is more sad-funny than funny-funny, but Jenkins has enough empathy and wit to realize that even the sad parts are, somehow, funny.

An eloquently shot and closely observed documentary about a poor family in modern-day Indonesia.

Demonstrating a mastery of the medium that belies his status as a first-time feature filmmaker, writer-director Ali Selim has crafted in Sweet Land a tale of pure Americana that speaks both to the immigrant experience and the nature of love.

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.

What is lightly sketched in the novel, where much is left to the imagination, blossoms into full-blown, richly detailed life in the movie.

This is one helluva good movie that craves the eyeballs of as many American high schoolers as it can possibly get.

Downey plays off his own bad-boy image wonderfully. The writers give him great lines to work with and ditto that for his Girl Friday, Gwyneth Paltrow's Pepper Potts, whose own svelte lines cannot be improved on.

This is a film of terrific selectivity. By focusing on two of the few who did survive the collapse, the film achieves emotional power and an uplifting ending.

Not since Woody Allen's "Radio Days" has anyone created such a cinematic Valentine to the wonderfully imaginative medium of radio as A Prairie Home Companion.

Exquisite storytelling, acting and visuals.

The gorilla is great, the girl terrific, sets are out of this world, creatures icky as hell, and the director clearly does not believe in the word "enough."

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.

A mesmerizing, richly nuanced inquiry into Israel's revenge of the Munich massacre of its athletes.

Transformers is a wet dream for fanboys, with vehicles that whiz and whir into alien robots, spectacular sci-fi stunt chases, glistening military hardware, overheated computer software and brainy, hot girls who love Popular Mechanics.

In Changeling Eastwood continues to probe uncomfortable subjects to depict the individual and even existential struggle to do what is right.

A bold film both in its storytelling strategies and its filmmaking logistics.

To call this movie fascinating is akin to calling the Grand Canyon large.

Teaming with Depp, his long-time alter ego, Burton makes Sweeney a smoldering dark pit of fury and hate that consumes itself. With his sturdy acting and surprisingly good voice, Depp is a Sweeney Todd for the ages.

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

That rare sequel that took its time -- 23 years -- so it not only advances a story but also has something new to say.

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

This is an art film in spades.

Audiences will eat it up: This is a postmillennial spy-action movie pitched to a large international audience. You hardly need subtitles.

Haneke echoes the theme of Hitchcock's "Rear Window": Moviemaking is basically an act of voyeurism. We secretly examine people's lives in every movie. But in this one, there is a hidden camera, a movie within the movie as it were, forcing us to observe a character along side a mysterious stranger.

In a summer of remakes, reboots and sequels comes Inception, easily the most original movie idea in ages.

Joe Berlinger and Bruce Sinofsky's final film about the West Memphis Three demonstrates how the first two docs played a role in galvanizing national support to free the wrongly convicted men.

Thrillers don't get much smarter than The Interpreter.

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 filmmakers were right to believe that a live-action version of this story would have failed to achieve the universality Persepolis does.

Even a klutz could hardly make a bad movie about these compelling figures. Thankfully though, Guido Santi and Tina Mascara are superb filmmakers, fully alive in their terrific film Chris & Don: A Love Story to all the undercurrents of art, social class, sexual orientation, challenging relationships and, most especially, the touching love story at the heart of their film.

A satisfying comic gem.

"Dream" brings together so much history, sheer adventure and terrifying moments.

The movie contains priceless slapstick from Bill Murray, finely tuned performances by Murray and the beautiful Scarlett Johansson and a visual and aural design that cultivates a romantic though melancholy mood.

The film is superbly crafted, covering huge amounts of time, people and the zeitgeist without a moment of lapsed energy or inattention to detail.

Has the hallmarks of a top-notch Jewison production -- splendid performances, especially from leads Michael Caine, Tilda Swinton and Jeremy Northam, a pulse-quickening pace and production values that establish story and character within a distinct environment.

Everyone involved -- actors, crew, director Susanne Bier and screenwriter Anders Thomas Jensen in their second collaboration -- are in peak form in this unflinching look at repressed feelings and emotional devastation.

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

Infamous gives you the unique opportunity to see how two sets of filmmakers can take exactly the same story, make extremely tough though different choices in emphasis and tone and achieve brilliant movies.

Michael Moore intelligently, comically and incisively diagnoses and calls for the treatment of a sick U.S. health care system.

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

The Hours makes for a fascinating and ultimately successful stunt in its cross-cutting among the decades.

Biutiful has a strong, linear narrative drive. Nevertheless, and most of all, it's a gorgeous, melancholy tone poem about love, fatherhood and guilt.

Christian Bale plays Dieter Dengler and this is one of the actor's most complex and compelling performances.

Spicing up the entire package is a screenplay by Canet and Philippe Lefebvre that bristles with wit and energy.

The final episode of George Lucas' cinematic epic "Star Wars" ends the six-movie series on such a high note that one feels like yelling out, "Rewind!" Yes, rewind through more than 13 hours of bravery, treachery, new worlds, odd creatures and human frailty.

Now Eastwood turns on a dime and tackles not just his first war movie but two war movies of considerable scope and complexity. If he doesn't nail everything perfectly, he nevertheless has created a vivid memorial to the courage on both sides of this battle and created an awareness in the public consciousness at a most opportune moment about how war feels to those lost in its fog.

Doillon never lets his characters slide into cliche. They act and react from a wealth of contradictory impulses and long-standing prejudices in this masterful tale of frustrated desire.

What this strange yet strangely beguiling film does is capture one of pop culture's great entertainers in the feverish grips of pure creativity.

All the movie's playfulness rubs off on the actors. Scenes crackle with life. The chemistry among all the actors is terrific.

A glorious new addition to martial-arts cinema.

The hundreds of animation artists on this three-year project made enormous contributions to the final film. There is not an off-kilter moment nor awkward effect in the entire movie.

This is a marvelous family story, tapping into all sorts of childhood dreams and nightmares involving Mommy, monsters and heroic youngsters. Selick's imaginative sets and puppets are in perfect pitch with Gaiman's fantasy.

It's refreshing to witness a superhero with doubts. Maguire and Dunst again display the depth of talent they bring to these roles by injecting such everydayness into larger-than-life characters.

It's an extraordinary film.

The value of this film, not just to moviegoers today but to future generations, is simply enormous.

Whatever one's opinion of Johnston's art, this is documentary filmmaking at its finest.

Salt moves ever forward -- pushing, pushing, pushing its heroine to greater feats every minute. It doesn't stop for martinis, either shaken or stirred, or any other detours. The movie is lean and muscular, looking for action even in situations where a little sleight of hand might have done the trick.

The movie gathers momentum with a steady, assured pace, accumulating incidents, characters, secrets and lies until the rush of events is absolutely transfixing. Cinema can sometimes rival the novel in compulsive intensity and Sarah's Key is one such example.

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.

The period sets, costumes and cinematography all superbly recreate the brutal era, grand illusions and everyday suffering of the Poles under both the Nazis and the Soviets.

The details are what matters, and thanks to a cast of all-star British elders and a mischievous sense of humor, the filmmakers bring those details to vivid life.

A fine dramatic comedy with fresh characters, witty dialogue and a keen interest in how relationships must have developed among frontier folks, tyrannical ranchers, no-nonsense lawmen and -- oh, yes -- the complicated women on that frontier.

Beautifully acted and written so its themes are touched upon glancingly rather than with full force.

The film is a deft, graceful and often poignant story of a woman's quest to find her own identity and a spiritual sanctuary that will give her life hope and meaning.

The film achieves its power through a careful gathering of crucial details, in wordless glances, cruelties of nature and of man and the relentless determination to gain the promised land.

"Kings" covers familiar territory but does so with ruthless efficiency, intense performances and a densely packed plot designed to highlight the moral issues that most concern Ayer and Ellroy.

His (Fernando Meirelles) impressionistic, guerilla style of filmmaking works surprisingly well in capturing the hypnotic urgency of le Carre's fiction. And his viewpoint is less British and more Third World.

A really terrific, intensely focused documentary on a fascinating personality.

It took three films, but The Twilight Saga finally nails just the right tone in Eclipse, a film that neatly balances the teenage operatic passions from Stephenie Meyer's novels with the movies' supernatural trappings.

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

With strong visuals and even stronger emotions, Rachid Bouchareb's Days of Glory makes a powerful war film about a particularly unique subject.

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.

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

Kim Ki-duk keeps dialogue to a minimum and actions simple in what is virtually a two-character piece. Humor arrives organically, often resulting in hearty laughs.

Fulfills the requirements of grand-scale moviemaking while serving as a timely reminder that in the conflict between Christianity and Islam it was the Christians who picked the first fight.

In the revisionist Marie Antoinette, writer-director Sofia Coppola and actress Kirsten Dunst take a remote and no doubt misunderstood historical figure, the controversial and often despised Queen of France at the time of the French Revolution, and brings her into sharp focus as a living, breathing human being with flaws, foibles, passions, intelligence and warm affections.

Allen turns the character into a tour de force that unleashes an unexpected comedy about compassion and self-loathing.

Fugitive Pieces has a sharp, devastating story to tell.

Whether meaning to or not, Devor and his accomplished crew expand our concept of the documentary film, which relegates this documentary to art houses, not porn theaters.

Electrifying and alarming film.

Rock solid performances by up-and-coming German actress Julia Jentsch as Sophie and Alexander Held ("Downfall") as Mohr along with an excellent cast of supporting players insure that no one mistakes this for a lifeless docu-drama.

A compelling and illuminating story of four people who form an unlikely and momentary friendship of considerable depth.

A fascinating, mythological western.

Sustains itself through terrific forward momentum and two glorious star turns by gifted actresses Frances McDormand and Amy Adams.

So don't tell Spurlock he can't have his cake and eat it too. In Greatest Movie, he gleefully accepts his sponsorships on camera just to show you how wrong this all is.

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.

Actors blossom under Frears' direction. There is no false moment or off-key note in this movie.

The writing is often clever and the overall production playful and intelligent.

The cast sparkles especially Simon Baker, a sturdy leading-man type, who is primed to break through any day now, and Paz Vega, already a star in Latin market.

Provides Steve Carell and Juliette Binoche with comic roles that fit them like designer threads.

Sunshine is its own creature, taking inspiration from classic science fiction films but insisting on a gritty reality that much improves on past space adventures.

Now Batmanglij and Marling deliver another terrific and engrossing venture into speculative fiction, Sound of My Voice.

The film grabs at historical facts, mangles them into a plot worthy of a John le Carré spy novel and takes the viewer on a breathtaking ride through ye olde London.

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.

A riveting tale of survival and how even war cannot diminish a child's indomitable spirit.

This is an accomplished suspense-action piece that touches on universal themes of brotherhood, exile, love and honor.

In Paranoid Park, Gus Van Sant enters the world of high school kids just as he did in "Elephant," achieving this time a much sharper, more focused portrait of how these rapidly maturing young people act, think, speak and behave.

The film feels contained — its design, visual effects and cinematography all in the right balance and proportion. Spider-Man is the hero, and not some element in the filmmaking process.

The film lets you get caught up in the excitement of this religion and the addictive nature of those stadium lights. Berg and cinematographer Tobias Schliessler get up close to the action, catching the hits and miscues in all their violent urgency.

This creature feature is exhilarating fun, a richly designed and often quite funny re-exploration of the movie past.

A naturalistic drama rich in psychology and attention to details. There's no glamour here, but one false move by anyone can result in death, so tension fills nearly every scene.

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.

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

Scott has an eye -- and it's a very good one -- for sieges of castles, charging horsemen, hand-to-hand combat, glistening swords arcing through the air and deadly arrows whistling toward helpless targets.

The movie takes on the quality of a first-rate detective story.

A stunning documentary that not only beautifully elucidates a nearly forgotten incident but touches on crucial themes involving isolation, sanity, self-worth, impossible dreams, the nature of heroism and limits of human endurance.

It perhaps started with "The Queen," continued with "Young Victoria" and now achieves the most intimate glimpse inside the royal camp to date with The King's Speech.

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

Marks Disney's rediscovery of a strong narrative loaded with vibrant characters and mind-bending, hilarious situations.

The film is a genuinely gripping tale about international terrorism that hopscotches across three continents.

A crackling good suspense thriller.

Has a demented sense of humor, and the cleverness of its taut narrative structure and misanthropic characterizations constantly surprises a viewer. The movie does what you wish more first-time features would do: tell a story economically with first-rate actors and no hint of self-consciousness.

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.

A newcomer to film, Michaletos grew up on a farm with cheetahs, so he can act natural around the animals while making this Huck Finn-like character more than credible.

The movie rolls merrily along with slapstick action and whimsical characters.

David Yates, in his go at the helm, throws the emphasis on the gathering storm clouds even as Harry and his fellow wizardry students make further discoveries involving the opposite sex.

The film never quite pins the chef down about any of this but in his menu introduction to the staff or off-hand remarks to long-time colleagues you begin to understand the mindset. "The more bewilderment, the better," he declares. He is not joking.

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

One of the finest costume dramas in a long while.

A tough, compelling, must-see movie.

The film hits another comic mother lode in the byplay between Black and Cusack.

Challenges audiences with an unrelieved portrait of self-destruction and horrific violence. American movies don't get much grimmer than this.

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

The movie makes an excellent primer about the world of stock car racing for fans and nonfans alike. In 48 fast minutes, the Simon Wincer-directed film gives you a genuine sense of this particular sport, its rigorous demands and the fan base that supports it with such wildly enthusiastic devotion.

The guy really goes all out in these performances.

Simply lets the sinfully gorgeous music and emotions sweep over an audience.

Kevin Spacey, both as star and director, has created a hugely entertaining, highly empathetic portrait of a man for whom music was literally the thing that kept him alive.

As with the Bourne films, Gilroy has a knack for creating strong characters and situations that resonate with tension. It may be formula, but the guy is a solid chemist as he crafts excellent set-ups and payoffs.

It's workmanlike and engrossing, but what sticks in the mind are Frank and Richie, not what anybody does.

An engaging sports movie about the greatest racehorse ever and his female owner who literally bets the farm on his supremacy.

Stiller performs a good balancing act not only with his many jobs on this movie but also in keeping the big picture firmly in mind. It's not always easy to be both silly and smart, but Stiller for the most part pulls it off.

Like a juicy steak served to a man suffering on a diet of micro-greens and tofu, Runaway Jury will be devoured by fans of movie melodramas.

Catch Me If You Can represents a distinct change of pace for director Steven Spielberg. This is a lighter movie than he has made in a long while, and you sense his relief that nothing much is at stake.

"Iron Man" has more wit and style, but Hulk is a neat thrill ride with an intelligent script by Zak Penn and smart, well-paced direction by the French director of "The Transporter" series, Louis Leterrier.

The film's great gift, though, is Romaner. Unbelievably, this is the first film for the Bavarian stage actress. She fully inhabits the role of this complex personality whose passion for love and art collides with her role of wife and mother.

While "Exorcism" focused on a murder-trial battle between the priest and a prosecutor, Schmid's film beautifully details the behavior, events and socio-religious pressures that lead to the decision to perform such an extreme ritual.

This 3-D Imax film puts you at eye level with awesome creatures that look like alien beasts from deep space.

In a summer of remakes, sequels and movies swollen with effects, The Terminal stands out as a strikingly original comedy.

Lo Cascio and Boni inhabit their roles with keen intellectual and emotional vigor.

Liman outfits the film with spy-thriller packaging worthy of his "The Bourne Identity," so the film probably will attract above-average coin and possibly awards attention.

New wave Bollywood at its best, a Hindi-language film from a Mumbai studio that shows the influence of American and foreign films.

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

Robert Downey Jr. and Jamie Foxx are on fire in the lead roles: They're both charismatic as hell without sacrificing any of the emotional honesty necessary for you to believe that these movie stars are a scruffy reporter and a mentally ill musician.

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

Blind Shaft, a well-acted and well-produced film, is a quiet though searing indictment of contemporary China.

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

In American Me, Edward James Olmos has achieved several important goals, but one outweighs the rest: he has made a film that will scare the hell out of any inner-city youth not already lost to the hopelessness of gangs, drugs and prison. [9 Mar 1992]

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

Jessica Biel has great fun with the American adventuress, while Kristin Scott Thomas is truly scary as her nemesis and mother-in-law.

Jones displays a firm hand at the helm -- you sense that he is well within his comfort zone in this environment -- and performances including his own are lively and convincing.

The guy knows how to make a heart-pounding movie; he just happens to be a cinematic sadist.

Riveting.

Unfolds in a scrupulously accurate historical adventure story that depicts the world of Jesus' birth with an exciting you-are-there verisimilitude.

Easily one of the most dynamic cinematic portraits of that decaying, vibrant, impossible city ever made; it treats the city itself as a character.

Christian Slater and Selma Blair head a solid cast that Harvey Kahn directs with cool efficiency as the tension steadily rises with every passing minute.

Arguably the most conventional documentary made by Errol Morris and, perhaps equally surprising, it displays sympathy toward its subject.

A greater argument for music education in our secondary school curriculum can't be made than Mark Landsman's doc about a Texas high school funk band that tore up the music scene from 1968 to 1977.

A nature documentary that captures the ferocity and heroism of nature.

Few films have so poignantly portrayed a father's relationships with his sons as The Boys Are Back.

Here's a film about kids and for kids that has not lost touch with what it is like to actually be a kid.

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

Cage is brilliant.

Women's roles and the eternal fight to expand their rights in Iranian society get a light, hugely entertaining treatment in Jafar Panahi's Offsides.

Yelchin delivers one of those performances that pop eyes... It's a breakthrough role.

Cody's dialogue has a definite rhythm and Reitman directs his actors to deliver the words in the rapid-fire precision of a '30s screwball comedy. Indeed all scenes develop a rhythm and inner logic that bring the movie to often startling revelations and insights.

A likable mix of laughs and wacky action sequences.

Here is a film about Japan made by Americans, shot mostly in the U.S. and, of course, in English. Once you accept these compromises in the name of international filmmaking, none is a real deterrent to enjoying this lush period film.

What a relief to escape the series' increasing bondage to high-tech gimmicks in favor of intrigue and suspense featuring richly nuanced characters and women who think the body's sexiest organ is the brain.

A fanciful and melancholy portrait of exiled Russian poet Joseph Brodsky.

The key to its success lies in the determination by everyone involved to play the damn thing straight. Even the slightest goofiness, the tiniest touch of camp, and the whole thing would blow sky high. But it doesn't.

The movie features a great finish, where three movies' worth of subplots and characters dovetail into a breathtaking climax and final confrontation that is positively soul satisfying.

An engrossing, highly intelligent reimagining of the legend of Arthur.

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

If there is a disappointment, it is this: The anticipation may have exceeded the realization. It's a damn good commercial movie, but it is not the film that will revive the musical or win over the world.

A pitch-perfect ensemble comedy that burrows deep into the mind-set of white, upper middle-class Angelenos, anxious to strike the right balance among career, family, love life and money but never quite pulling it off.

In retelling the still-astonishing story of the political career of Eliot Spitzer, a shooting star whose spectacular crash might forever obscure his accomplishments, Oscar-winning documentarian Alex Gibney has all the ingredients for a potboiler: greed, corruption, sex, power, overweening ambition and jaw-dropping hubris.

A prime example of a solid romantic comedy.

The film never is less than intriguing, right from its tour de force opening sequence, and often full of insights into why people long for answers, sometimes with great urgency.

Life in a Day is an experimental project driven by the Internet at its best, where connectivity among the planet's population has become a reality.

A wonderfully vivid and engaging theatrical experience.

It's entertaining with a crafty mixture of action, humor and drama.

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.

The madness of Holocaust survivors is here played mainly for dark comedy. The film's dazzling central performance in a mental institute finds Jeff Goldblum in the role of his career.

Hugely satisfying entertainment that will attract a broad spectrum of audiences around the world. Zwick fully exploits the star power at his disposal, pairing off Cruise and Japanese star Ken Watanabe as two larger-than-life warriors.

Brooks is solidly in charge of this feel-good fairy tale as he gets terrific performances from everyone including two super-talented child actors.

Christopher Rouse's rapid-fire editing nervously stitches the stunts, chases, fights and confrontations together. It's a remarkable film.

It's all here: the ingenious, obscenity-laced language, the double crosses that turn into triple crosses, the swaggering characters so in love with themselves. GottaLove RocknRolla!

The weapon wielded by Cohen and Charles is crudeness. People today, especially those in public life, can disguise prejudice in coded language and soft tones. Bigotry is ever so polite now. So the filmmakers mean to drag the beast out into the sunlight of brilliant satire and let everyone see the rotting, stinking, foul thing for what it is. When you laugh at something that is bad, it loses much of its power.

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.

This animated all-penguin musical is terrific fun.

While a bit unwieldy at nearly three hours and at times slow going, the film is absolutely fascinating for anyone who shares De Niro's passions.

For all the work that went into the whimsical creatures and painterly palette, the voice actors more or less steal the show.

Painfully funny satire of British and American bureaucrats in the days leading up to the Iraq War.

The result is an insightful, exuberant, probing, long-winded and even exhausting look at what it takes for a performer to have a life in the theater.

The film deliberately works against most cinematic expectations.

Blanchett gets everything right -- the accent, her German dialogue, the weary sexuality (deliberately reminiscent of Marlene Dietrich) and the amorality her character has embraced.

In this film, everything comes down to the acting. Chris Cooper, one of our finest screen actors, gets inside the mysterious traitor. Ryan Phillippe has just the right gung-ho determination tempered with a touch of naivete as O'Neill. Meanwhile, Laura Linney nails the role of a career agent.

It's caustic, irreverent, constantly amusing and a tiny bit rude. Not a lot, though. This isn't the "Beavis and Butt-Head" or "South Park" movie. It's almost -- dare I say it -- charming.

In watching this film, it's best not to worry much about the film's fidelity to history but rather simply lean back and enjoy one great jam session on film.

Reunites one of the best voice casts ever for an animated film to create a shrewd entertainment that again successfully aims its jokes at various age groups.

The always surprising Coen brothers have finally made a very serious movie with A Serious Man. It's about God, man's place in the world and the meaning of life, so naturally it's one of their funnier movies.

A documentary about autism that's nearly perfect in doing what an advocacy documentary should do: show rather than tell, entertain rather than preach.

Hits on all cylinders -- a smart blend of acting, direction, editing, design, costumes and effects.

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

Singer has crafted a fine film. One just wishes for greater details -- and a different ending.

At the heart of the film is a powerful performance by the beautiful and most promising Hao Lei as its tempestuous, complex heroine.

The film is nothing if not provocative.

The vigor and pace is electric, and the movie features three showy performances by Kristen Stewart, Dakota Fanning and Michael Shannon.

Amusing dark English comedy produces its share of chuckles.

Good Neighbors is a film of acquired taste. If one is willing to accept humor in a movie about a serial killer, if one likes a thriller than emphasizes character over thrills, if one is susceptible to a cast of characters that includes three cats, then the movie has found its very selective target audience.

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.

The loggerhead turtle's journey is indeed incredible. But you would rather the narration, delivered intelligently by Miranda Richardson, didn't feel a need to remind you of this fact so frequently.

A "soft" epic, a film touching on childhood fantasies with sturdy, unwavering characters driven to evil or good. More "Harry Potter," in other words, than "Beowulf."

For a man apparently making his first film, Woolard carries the movie like a pro. Cross your fingers that this is no fluke, for this guy could be a real comer.

A high-wire act that almost slips as it edges perilously closer and closer to the edge of improbability. But it never does.

Director Robert Zemeckis not only deploys 21st century movie technology at its finest to turn the heroic poem into a vibrant, nerve-tingling piece of pop culture, but his film actually makes sense of Beowulf. In Zemeckis' hands, it's an intriguing look at a hero as a flawed human being.

A thoughtful and reflective love story about the impact of time on true love.

If you're going to make a weepy, there's no reason you can't make it with intelligence and insight as the makers of My Sister's Keeper have done.

Women will love this, and men won't mind the eye candy either, so it looks like this Screen Gems release can't help becoming a hit.

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.

His heart -- and musical soul -- is in the right place, but the film makes you at times uncomfortable with black and Southern stereotypes that may hinder some from fully enjoying an otherwise benign and cheerful tall tale of the Saturday night when rock came to rural Alabama.

Arguably Eastwood's most ambitious film since his multi-Oscar winner, "Unforgiven." But it lacks the power and depth of that film's dynamic script by David Webb Peoples.

Stripped for action without a moment wasted on unnecessary dialogue, exposition or nuances.

A sprightly musical revue built around Cole Porter songs and a few biographical tidbits culled from his extraordinary life.

Documentaries have been coming down on humanity so hard in recent years -- from "An Inconvenient Truth" to the latest Oscar winner, "Inside Job" -- that it's refreshing to bask in a bit of optimism coming from a nonfictional film.

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.

Joel and Ethan Coen clearly are in a prankish mood, knocking out a minor piece of silliness with all the trappings of an A-list studio movie.

Zokkomon gives Indian youngsters not only their first super hero but, even more tantalizing, he is a young boy "terrorizing" susceptible adults in a small village to the increasingly delight of the town's children.

How To Live Forever is less about how to delay or defeat death than a film about what gives life meaning.

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.

This is a minor film from a master, which is disappointing, but nevertheless it has its charms, most notably in the acting by a cast of stage and screen veterans.

Hopkins' performance flat-out works.

Hoffman emerges as a confident film director with visual flair and, no surprise, a remarkable ability to maximize his fellow actors' work.

Edward Burns' best riff yet on guys trying to sort out their feelings about women.

The issue of sexual politics so dominates the story that it's a relief when an emotional showdown involves family rather than workplace issues. Not so surprisingly, these are the movie's best scenes.