Marc Mohan

Ultimately, the story can be seen as the collision of two equally uncompromising belief systems, each its own form of fundamentalism. That neither benefits from the encounter should come as no surprise to anyone with the slightest knowledge of human history.

What really separates Zatoichi from a run-of-the-mill action pic is the sense of humor -- and even more than that, the sense of fun -- that Kitano brings to it.

Director Martin Koolhoven doesn't take many narrative chances, but the somber, steely cinematography and convincing performances help to carry the day.

A kid-meets-curmudgeon comedy that transcends its formulaic skeleton thanks both to the veteran actor's charm and a smarter-than-average screenplay.

It's solidly entertaining, with Downey's roguish charm as appealing as ever.

The surprisingly thoughtful third act both introduces complexity to its portrayal of the Afghan people, and subtly reminds us that, despite Luttrell's astonishing constitution and self-surgery skills, as well as the ultimate sacrifices made by his comrades in arms, it was all for naught.

While these interviews are affecting, and the movie talks about suicide in a refreshingly straightforward manner, it's the images of these actual deaths that induce horrified gasps.

More a collection of character vignettes than a full-blown story, Garden Party nonetheless shows as much promise for its makers as it gives to its characters.

A twisty, darkly comic story of greed, betrayal and murderous misunderstandings.

Despite all the camaraderie, natural beauty and exotic weather, though, you couldn't pay me enough to live there, especially not when there's a movie like this to show me what I'm missing.

The performances, especially that of Regina Casé in the lead role, inject potent, lived-in humanity to the movie's flat political allegory.

Most of the time, Goodnight Mommy creates its air of supreme unease quietly, even subtly, but even hardened horror fans might be shocked by some of what goes down in the movie's second half.

The spirits of Huck Finn and Tom Sawyer are alive and well in the Southern-fried coming-of-age tale Mud. It's got all the ingredients.

Ordinary folks working together to triumph over incredible odds, depicted in a Disney film that doesn't overdose on sentiment? That's the real miracle.

A bit too familiar, and at times gentle to a fault.

A fascinating experiment in both filmmaking technology and narrative style, but one that can be counted a success only in limited ways.

In spite of its familiar outlines, director Rob Meyer's first feature benefits from an authentic script and performances.

Frankenweenie seems like a genuine effort to pass along this love to the next generation, and if one kid who sees it goes home and demands to watch another movie featuring a giant turtle, it will have done its job.

Perhaps the most amazing thing about this story is that it would have been lost to history had not American spelunker Chris Nicola happened across mundane relics -- buttons, shoes and the like -- while exploring the cave complex in the 1990s.

When the movie is funny, it’s very funny.

Rather like a four-hour episode of "Today": painless enough, leavening superficiality with substance, allowing you to watch and still do the laundry without missing anything vital.

Bell does a fantastic job of telling a thoroughly feminist story without being strident or didactic.

There have been plenty of mountaineering documentaries over the last few years, and Everest suffers in comparison to them simply by being a dramatization. As realistic as the effects are (and you can occasionally tell when a shot is green-screened), you're still aware on a gut level that Jason Clarke and Josh Brolin were not actually filmed at 29,000 feet above sea level.

Bettie Page Reveals All earns its title from more than the uncensored images it includes.

Director Sini Anderson compiles interviews with Hanna and her husband, Beastie Boy Adam Horovitz, as well as archival footage, into an admiring portrait of a sometimes combative figure.

Parts of “Spark” can seem like an ad for Burning Man, but the film digs deep enough into the pressures and challenges facing its organizers and attendees to be a worthy exploration of a unique phenomenon, even for those who wouldn’t be caught dead wearing just glitter and a thong in 110 degree heat.

The experience of psychological depression has been described with a variety of metaphors. William Styron called it "darkness visible," and Winston Churchill euphemized his bouts as "the black dog." In typically grandiose fashion, though, Lars von Trier tops them all.

Rosemary Clooney (that's Danny Ocean's aunt) steals the show as one half of a sister act accompanying the boys on their yuletide misadventures. The real highlight, of course, is the Irving Berlin score. [24 Dec 2004, p.39]

Binoche is her usual dependable self, bringing passion and fury to a familiar, but still compelling, character.

What Johansson does in Lucy won't win her any prizes, but it establishes her ability to carry a movie that has some ideas, however half-baked, and has nothing to do with her obvious sex appeal.

Thought-provoking, making this a solid date movie science geeks and philosophy freaks alike.

Because Whiplash is two characters in search of a plot, it ramps up the happenstance and improbability as it stumbles toward a final showdown between teacher and student that would be emotionally satisfying if it had the ring of truth.

Well, if Jordan believes he's made an excellent film, that's one thing, but the fact is it's a minor, though mostly enjoyable, one.

Not to be mistaken for a serious treatment of religious fervor or clerical corruption, The Monk is instead a knowingly over-the-top bit of gothic nuttiness.

The result is a solid film, but one that remains more interesting than intense.

The overall thrust of the story -- that downtrodden folks in desperate circumstances have the capacity for goodness -- is one too rarely seen.

Despite all this hokum, Quartet is amusing and heartwarming.

Like its 2010 predecessor, it's one of the most gorgeous computer-animated kids' films you'll come across, and one of the few that uses 3-D smartly and effectively.

Most of the time, though, it's a confusing mishmash featuring a fine actor too willfully operating outside his comfort zone.

When it's not lapsing into disease-of-the-week prose, Adam presents a credible account of the challenges inherent in this misunderstood and often-ridiculed condition.

Sweet Land brushes against the true spirit of American independent cinema.

The overall effect of the movie is to make you wish there were a statute of limitations on how long maladjusted adults are allowed to blame their parents before it's OK to holler, "Get over it, people!"

There's an inherent contradiction at the film's core: this sexually explicit motion picture, seemingly made by and for altered consciousnesses, is all about how an innocent newcomer falls prey to gin, sex, and television.

The domestic and romantic turmoil all gets resolved a bit too neatly to seem realistic, but realism isn't the goal; this is comfort food, plain and simple, and achieves its modest goals in nearly effortless fashion.

At its core, the story is a Mars vs. Venus case study.

Director Jim deSeve has done an excellent job of providing both historical and personal perspective on a topic that provokes heated emotional reactions.

Despite the solid performances (Roberta Maxwell as Jude's mother is the exception), the one-note intensity wears you down, until a shocking coda wraps things up. It turns out that being trapped in a bathroom together is nothing compared to being trapped in a marriage, or a nearly two-hour movie, with a crazy person.

Disco scholars convincingly analyze lyrics and fashions as presenting bold expressions of sexuality and democratic hedonism, while Kastner doesn't skimp on the vintage clips, which range from unintentionally hilarious to surprisingly impressive.

Although it treads water for the final fifteen or so minutes, the movie is brisk and engaging enough that it still doesn't feel overlong.

Home is like when someone gets you a birthday present by just clicking on an item from your Amazon wish list. It's well-made, suitable, and appreciated, but there wasn't really any thought put into it.

Without a more coherent perspective, the movie remains a collection of genuinely scary scenes and not much more.

It does assemble a compelling collage from the experiences of several real-life witnesses to the event and its aftermath.

What this alteration says about societal trends of the past three decades is open to debate, but the change is a tiny hint that earnest fidelity to the source was not a top priority.

The real star is Attah, a Ghanaian street kid plucked from obscurity, who imbues Agu with just the right mix of terror, brutality and the last remaining vestiges of boyish innocence.

If your tolerance for envelope-pushing crudeness and deadpan delirium allows it, this crass comedy might be just what the gastroenterologist ordered.

The clichés at its core make Metalhead something less than a full-bore, head-banging triumph. But it does perform the service of reminding us that even Judas Priest is capable of saving souls, and any film that features a cross-generational dance-off to Megadeth's "Symphony of Destruction" can't be all bad.

The central figure in The Attack is the very picture of a tolerant, integrated future for the Mideast. When a horrific blast kills 17 people and sends dozens of wounded to his hospital, he's elbow-deep trying to save the victims, even the one who refuses help from an Arab.

The rhetorically stacked deck, and some unconvincing third-act plot twists, get in the way of this movie's efforts to reach the cinematic promised land of true greatness.

With a deft touch that veers from wry, absurd humor to appalled outrage, the Italian journalist and satirist Pierfrancesco Diliberto makes a noteworthy film debut with The Mafia Kills Only in the Summer.

As in many of Smith's earlier movies, the moments of ostensibly genuine emotion aren't nearly as convincing as the moments of juvenile obscenity and quasi-homophobia.

David Ayer's film is a gory, muddy, downbeat tale of war's hellishness and the fraternal bond between those stuck in the middle of it. It's also, like "Ryan," full of tense, grippingly staged action scenes that capture moments of pure adrenaline, and it's the tension between those two impulses that makes "Fury" fascinating and ultimately flawed.

While the subject matter is certainly American enough, it seems possible the original had a bit more depth.

Once things get going, and especially when Moore takes center stage, "Maps" becomes more involving, sometimes queasily funny, and even, almost despite itself, a tiny bit moving. Hooray for Hollywood, indeed.

Convincing performances from Hemingway and the charmingly crabby Johnson and an unhurried pace ensure that Baker's film achieves its modest goals.

It proves the power of a good story, both to entertain us and to allow us to process unpleasant truths.

Trainwreck doesn't try to reinvent the wheel so much as rotate the tires of comedy.

This movie about a great woman and a great man ends up merely good.

While Shepard just does his grim, weathered, Sam Shepard shtick, and Hall seems oddly miscast as the tense, prickly Dale, Johnson's easy, gritty charm is a much-needed buffer between their colliding obsessions.

Sarah's story is harrowing and powerfully told, as she valiantly attempts to escape and return home with the key to free her brother. Director Gilles Paquet-Brenner doesn't stint on depicting the indignities and violence inflicted even on children, and Mayance's performance is exceptionally strong.

Being a fairly faithful adaptation, this version also has a lot of that other stuff about the hypocrisy of civilized life, the truthfulness of natural splendor and so forth.

Spielberg manages to give us a Lincoln for our times, inspiringly heroic but demonstrably human.

Even more impressive is young Tequan Richmond (TV’s “Everybody Hates Chris”) as the quiet, intense Malvo, a kid so desperate for a father figure in his life that he becomes putty in the hands of a killer.

The languid, observational style of director Julia Loktev will frustrate those expecting stuff to, like, happen more, but it has its real rewards.

Purists may still quail at the little bit of anthropomorphism going on, but it seems a small price to pay to broaden the audience for a family film that seeks to do more than just entertain.

There's a certain bravery in Brandon's full embrace of the themes of Cronenberg père, who may be returning the favor with his next film, the Hollywood satire "Maps to the Stars."

Though it's well-cast and convincingly captures the look and feel of its era, the film loses steam as Accio's story meanders to a predictable conclusion.

There’s plenty of fun to be had, but in the long term, American Hustle may be remembered more for its superficial pleasures than the depth of its impact. Kind of like the 1970s.

Should satisfy its 8- to 12-year-old target demographic.

By today's standards the sexuality is fairly discreet, the color cinematography is brilliant and the sense of absurdity marks this as one of Meyer's bust, er, best, efforts. [22 Oct 2004, p.39]

Eventually the chemistry between Collette and Church wins out, and Lucky Them makes for a diverting, if forgettable, romantic comedy.

LaBeouf is likable and grounded, two things you need from the lead in a film like this, although his female co-stars seem to have been cast based on how well their Maxim covers would sell.

Joe works better as a study of character and environment than as the thriller it tries to become in its final act.

With a predictable and borderline manipulative plot, Tsotsi depends on strong performances for its impact, and its cast delivers.

At its more abstract moments, it's a treat for the eye and the soul.

The movie's centerpiece and peak is the operation itself, which Reichardt depicts with the pulse-pounding patience of a classic heist sequence like that in "Rififi."

Three potent performances readily compensate for the familiar plot.

The bickering lovers are generally likable, as are her quintessentially and hilariously Gallic parents (played by Delpy's real mom and dad).

With gadgets, girls and globe-trotting held to a minimum, Skyfall, could, for long stretches, be mistaken for just another 21st-century thriller, albeit a well-made and intelligent one.

The result calls to mind “Lord of the Flies” and “Children of Men,” even if the film’s second half is much less compelling than its first.

There's nothing earth-shaking here, but a chance to see one of cinema's great movie stars in a tailor-made role that pleasantly subverts her icy image is always welcome.

As I sat slavishly (and needlessly) through the entire end credit roll, it was hard to muster anything more fervent than "Yeah, it was pretty good." Even a clean, white hate would have somehow been more satisfying.

For at least three-fourths of its running time, The Concert is predictable, soft-edged and unremarkable. Then the titular performance, of Tchaikovsky's Violin Concerto, begins, and the music elicits the emotional response the rest of the film has been striving for the whole time. It's enough to almost make the whole thing worthwhile.

Blood Ties not only convincingly recreates its era, it seems like it could have been made then.

In Morvern Callar, the subject matter may be morbid and unappealing, but the director handles it with a visual poetry and an eye for hidden beauty that marks a filmmaker of the first order.

The real revelation is Lou Ferrigno, in his first non-Hulk-related big-screen role since 2002. OK, so he plays himself.

Mostly it's about taxes -- namely, the argument that the Federal Income Tax, enacted in 1913, is unconstitutional and has been ruled as such by the Supreme Court, and that no law exists today requiring Americans to pay it.

Moncrieff's story remains fresh despite the familiarity of its general outline. This is mostly due to the skilled performances she elicits; even when the unfolding events have been seen many times before, watching human beings react realistically never gets old.

Director Jan Hrebejk and screenwriter Petr Jarchovsky ("Divided We Fall," "Up and Down") have crafted another well-observed tale, one with no heroes or villains, just people trying to make something of the situations in which they find themselves. And, with a nicely ambiguous ending, it's drama enough.