Lawrence Van Gelder

The movie only really comes alive when the music plays and people sing and dance.

Short on suspense, routine in its action and monotonous in its performances.

Throughout this lame film, directed by Stephen Kessler and written by Elisa Bell, situations are developed -- complicated directions to a hotel room, Clark clinging to the face of Hoover Dam, Ellen the object of Mr. Newton's seductive charm -- and left to wither without a payoff.

Special effects in which the actors appear repeatedly in black outline and occasionally distorted perspective; and an assortment of tricks (rearing up on hind wheels, blushing and blinking his lights) that possesses a somewhat limited power to captivate...Reluctant adults marched off to "Herbie" by tiny press gangs may take what consolation they can from the scenery, featuring France and Monaco.

Mr. Beesley, an Oklahoma City native who has been following and filming the Flaming Lips for 15 years, is far too close to his subject to offer a critical perspective, but he achieves a level of intimacy with the band members that most rock documentary directors can only dream of.

Here's the lowdown on the latest chapter in Mortal Kombat: deadly dull.

With its heavy symbolism and awkward, lurching pace, A Hole in One leaves viewers with little more than the vague conviction - which I think I already had going in - that falling in love is better than an ice pick to the brain.

Mysterious, poetic and allusive, The Werckmeister Harmonies beckons filmgoers who complain of the vapidity of Hollywood movie making and yearn for a film to ponder and debate.

Theresa Russell is terrific as Angela's slatternly but loving mother, but her character disappears abruptly midway through the movie.

The Devil's Rejects is a trompe l'oeil experiment in deliberately retro filmmaking. It looks sensational, but there is a curious emptiness at its core.

In the end the elaborate gimmickry of Inspector Gadget cannot conceal its very ordinary storytelling.

An intriguing and entertaining introduction to Johnson through his varied art; the mystery surrounding his death, which may have been his final performance piece, and the reminiscences of contemporaries.

Poverty, capable of stunting lives, can also blight films. A case in point is the earnest and heartfelt but undernourished and plodding Off the Hook.

An earnest study in despair.

The law of averages demands that every once in a while a movie must come along starring young nonprofessional actors who aren't very good. That's unfortunately the case in 15.

Notable chiefly for its eye-catching urban backgrounds and an eclectic score that ranges from jazz and country to classical and choral.

Memo to Shaquille O'Neal: Don't give up your night job.

A quintessential Renny Harlin film: a big, dumb, loud action movie.

More focused on surface than true revelation.

The pleasures are familiar, but not the least bit inspired.

Film Geek has a likable premise, an unusual setting in downtown Portland, Ore., and a pleasantly homemade indie feel. Unfortunately, Scotty Pelk, as written by James Westby and played by Mr. Malkasian, is actually so irritating, so genuinely hard to take, that like the rest of the characters in this semiautobiographical movie, we soon find ourselves itching to get away from him.

The kind of movie most independent films strive in vain to be: a small, beautifully faceted gem.

Most of the principal female characters are either sexually voracious, sexually promiscuous, pregnant out of wedlock or angrily bent on revenge.

Combines old-fashioned boys' adventure with a heavy-handed modern lecture on parenthood. The film possesses a decent heart but suffers from a simple mind.

Suffers from clumsy exposition and uneven acting, except in the case of Eddie T. Robinson.

There's not much sense to the plot. But the film makers' blunderbuss approach to humor, with visual and verbal jokes coming in profusion and scattering high and low, guarantees that just about every funnybone is bound to be hit, some more than once.

Brigham City, like "God's Army," may proselytize for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, but Brigham City is also an example of concise, skillful filmmaking.

Serious, competent and unsurprising debut film.