Lou Lumenick

It would be a crime in itself to reveal the surprises of Nine Queens, which provides two solid hours of corking entertainment.

A grim, challenging movie that will amply reward audiences willing to go along with its ride into the dark depths of its characters' souls.

A dumb, by-the-numbers children's movie.

In an era when documentaries are looking more and more glossy, it's almost refreshing to see the austere approach taken by veteran Frederick Wiseman.

Though it preserves the terrific lead performance of Richard Griffiths - best known to film audiences as Harry Potter's evil stepfather - The History Boys is essentially filmed theater, with minimal, and usually clumsy, attempts to take the action out of the classroom.

Remarkably apolitical, considering that it comes from the director of the Bush-bashing "The Road to Guantanamo."

If ever a movie could be charged with imperiling the morals of a minor, it's probably Sleepover, a sleazy, PG-rated sex comedy that's apparently aimed at 8- to 10-year-old girls.

This movie depicts an unlikely intersection of sports and leadership in ways that manage to be inspiring and insightful without ever becoming schmaltzy or preachy.

At heart, The Italian is a Dickensian tale that paints a vivid portrait of post-Glasnost Russia en route to a four-handkerchief ending.

A very shallow, very glossy 2½-hour travelogue starring a miscast Julia Roberts as a spoiled, self-centered divorcée who decides to get away from it all.

This is noir on steroids, cartoonishly ultra-violent and drawing inspiration from Mickey Spillane novels and E.C. comics of the '50s.

There are also food scenes that will whet your appetite. But somehow a satisfying climax never makes it out of the oven.

Comes as close to perfect as any movie I've seen lately.

A fun ride of a sci-fi thriller with terrific romantic chemistry between Jake Gyllenhaal and Michelle Monaghan.

The animation, supervised by director Timothy Bjorkland, is deliberately crude, but it complements the wacky story line just as well as the excellent musical numbers, one of which is a spot-on homage/parody of Sondheim.

Though it's being dumped in the wastelands in February, Breach is better than many of the pack of so-called prestige movies that were released at the end of last year.

A yawn-provoking little farm melodrama.

Delightfully quirky.

A gorgeously photographed and less intermittently fascinating 2 1/2-hour film.

Doesn't quite live up to the promise of its opening sequence, but it's still an audacious offering during a season of brain-dead blockbusters.

On several levels, this film is a real-life horror story that puts most Hollywood movies to shame.

Classic shipboard romantic dramedy involving a condemned prisoner (William Powell) who hooks up with a dying woman (Kay Francis). Excellent support by Frank McHugh and Aline MacMahon as a pair of con artists. [31 Jan 2010, p.6]

Unusual and utterly disarming documentary.

Its portrait of adolescence seems so authentic that it puts most Hollywood products to shame.

What is Inland Empire - which Lynch is understandably distributing himself - about? What is it trying to say? If you figure that out, let me know.

South African director Gavin Hood (“X-Men Origins: Wolverine’’) pulls off some really tricky tonal shifts.

As someone who has never completed a crossword puzzle, I was surprised how engaged I was by Wordplay.

The plot contortions that very slowly unfold under Michael Radford's arthritic direction in Flawless are not much more entertaining.