M. E. Russell

If you're willing to have your patience tested, Twohy and his cast reward it.

It should be noted that Walk Hard is aimed at a fairly specific sort of movie subgenre -- it's practically an extended "SNL" sketch -- and it doesn't produce belly laughs so much as steady smiles of recognition over how accurately it's nailing its target. But it really nails that target.

You see, in "Jesus Is Magic," Sarah Silverman plays "Sarah," a self-absorbed Jewish American Princess who also happens to be casually, cluelessly racist.

But as the story takes some surprising turns, it works like a slow infection: Patient audience members may find themselves awakening to the story in much the same way the characters awaken to their own capacities for tenderness.

I cared enough about these characters to follow "Exorcism" to tense and occasionally goofy places, even if the setup proved a bit stronger than the payoff.

The movie's as casual as its lead characters' approach to changing history; it's also lewdly and frequently laugh-out-loud hilarious -- especially if you wasted any of your youth watching a certain brand of '80s comedy schlock on HBO at 2 a.m.

An extremely weird and frustrating viewing experience. I think it's that way because Eastwood, 78, can't be bothered to wrangle the vast material into a tighter shape.

In "Upside" Allen's marble face acts as the pressure-cooker lid on a hilarious hissy fit.

The film suffers slightly from diminishing returns -- its first third is by far its scariest -- but it's still a bold, artful take on a popular horror idea.

With his periodic porn-star mustache, shaggy hair and reckless demeanor, the movie Stander embodies a certain brand of brooding outlaw cool that feels increasingly rare.

By gilding the lily so shamelessly, Ewing and Grady guarantee they'll preach only to the converted.

It manages the weird feat of making a flock of sheep bounding across a meadow seem vaguely menacing.

This may be the best work we've seen from either actor, which is saying something.

Mullan makes the journey more than worthwhile, but don't go in expecting profundity.

Seraphim isn't totally satisfying, even if you're prepared for an arty Western. It's pokey and odd in a distant, slightly self-conscious way.

Ends up being one of those heartbreaking movies that gets off to a promising start but never quite creaks to life, despite everyone's obvious best efforts.

C.S.A. has a love-it-or-hate-it bite that probably will lead to a few passionate post-screening discussions.

To my thinking, this splendid low-key bummer of a ghost story was eventually undermined by the film's increasing reliance on shock-scares, in which something suddenly and noisily jumps into the frame, over and over and over.

A sort of anti-date movie, a smart but deeply cynical study in failure, with our sense of loss growing in direct proportion to the characters' romantic hopes.

If I believed in the concept of "guilty pleasures," I'd classify "Centurion" as one, but I think I maybe just kind of enjoyed it.

There is something, well, awesome about watching these vivid young women realize that music isn't always made on computers as they give their bands cool names like the Ready and get onstage after five days and ferociously sing earnest lyrics they wrote themselves.

This isn't a crime comedy, exactly. It's a slightly absurd, minimalist noir, in the ZIP code of "Blood Simple" and "Fargo."

Unfortunately, the film loses its merciless rage toward the end, devolving into a stock and broadly comic thriller about unpleasant people you never quite get to know.

There's a potentially innovative teen comedy in here somewhere, but it's surrounded by one that's much duller.

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.

It's all mildly uplifting in the way of an unchallenging sermon.

"Fast Five" and Fast & Furious 6 -- the newest, nearly-as-much-dumb-fun sequel -- play more like "The Avengers" than they don't.

The surprisingly funny Role Models does three things extremely well. It gives killer roles to comic actors frequently stuck in ensembles. It directs hilariously harsh words at children and lets the children direct even harsher words back at the adults. And it's oddly determined to give a fair shake to fans of both medieval role-playing and the band Kiss.