M. E. Russell

The process of Farrell figuring out his divine purpose finally gets so convoluted and schmaltzy, it feels less like "destiny" and more like "cruel cosmic joke."

The movie is a septic tank of vapid noir posturing, bad narration, bizarre pacing, cartoonishly hot femme fatales and ineptly staged slapstick.

To be fair, Rudd and Bell are cute and funny in their scenes together, and Rudd salvages a few laughs with his deadpan line readings.

For every gag that flies there are at least one-and-a-half that don't.

Boring and fundamentally silly.

The movie's a fish-out-of-water romantic-comedy thriller that forgets to be romantic, comedic or thrilling.

Is there anything more depressing than when middlebrow filmmakers decide to remake bona fide classics that did not, under any circumstances, need to be remade?

Norbit might have worked if it had fully committed to being over the top or made Rasputia the lead character and found the human inside the cartoon. Instead, the movie doesn't give us anyone to care about.

A few bodies pile up. Surprisingly little sex is had. And given that Catherine's true nature was revealed at the end of the first "Basic," the mystery seems superfluous.

Fonda, playing grandmother to this clan of narcissists, is the only one who keeps her dignity. She's funny and low-key and deserves better comeback material than this and "Monster-in-Law." The other two actresses are humiliated.

Although it contains crime and absurdity, it's not thrilling or funny and the title doesn't refer to a gun.

I still kind of find myself admiring the actor, and the film. Love Guru is insane and self-indulgent but also fully committed, and there's a surprising undercurrent of earnestness to its philosophy portions.

At what point does The Condemned turn from a stupid-fun action movie into something unpleasant and hypocritical?

Spoiler alert: It can leave you feeling kind of empty and sad! It's pretty, icky and boring all at once, and feels like nothing so much as an unusually depressing Ban du Soleil commercial.