Marjorie Baumgarten

It just may be a movie that has difficulty transcending national borders.

The problem, ultimately, is that little of this is of any real interest. The brothers' bickering can be amusing at times but even at 76 minutes, the movie feels repetitive and overly long.

From the ad campaign, we pretty much know how things are going to turn out, and her pedestrian attempts at subplots are even more transparent than those in "Awakenings."

As suspicion shifts from passenger to passenger, the film starts to resemble a parlor-room whodunit, while logic becomes its first fatality. Fasten your seat belts before takeoff, because Non-Stop is a bumpy ride.

Episodically eventful but utterly unsuspenseful, the film is a diversion that requires little attention and satisfies the film-going needs of a wide variety of viewers.

The Judge gives the sense of resting on its casting laurels.

Paul Kirby's production design stands outs for its opulent re-creation of the golden glitz and ostentatious trappings of the Iraqi palace, but otherwise The Devil's Double belongs to filmdom's hoi polloi.

It's all well and good to run a scroll of corporate evil-doers at the end of the film as in Dick and Jane, but if these robber barons were skewered properly along the way, such heavy-handed, last-minute tactics wouldn't be necessary.

The dual bromances at the heart of his new film, however, are as unconvincing as the life-and-death action plot that propels the film.

Everything Reeves has done since always has the whiff of "Ted" about it. Party on, dudes.

Maybe Stonewall will have more value to younger viewers for whom the riots and gay marginalization in general are distant history and might be vivified by watching the film. Yet even though the film’s heart seems genuine, its structure is buttressed by falsies.

Without sizzle or thrills, The Tourist becomes as sluggish and rank as the Venice waterways.

Midway through, a character remarks as he leaves the scene of a takedown of Ronnie, "I thought this was going to be funny, but it's just kind of sad." The same thing is true about the movie as a whole.

The movie’s length forces our suspension of disbelief for at least an hour more than is comfortable and pushes mindlessness to a dangerous longevity.

The movie has its moments but it plays like a ball of confusion. Life Stinks seems to be Brooks' bid to be taken seriously and leave the fart jokes behind. And something about that stinks.

Although Love the Hard Way is saturated with a doomed romanticism that feels more fictitious than real, the actors lend the movie a potency that it would not have had otherwise.

As we find ourselves again immersed in a time of war, Trumbo's ageless story offers a useful corollary.

Ready to Wear is to filmmaking what paper dresses were to fashion -- thin, trendy, and disposable.

Would be a much better film had it not relied so heavily on a bombastic soundtrack (by James Newton Howard) for its emotional impact and spared itself some of the more overdone images of campus life.

It’s impossible to know how much of Tonto’s story is tall tale or historical fact. The tactic undercuts the film’s attempt at revisionism or at best equalizes men of all races as untrustworthy tellers of of their own history. The Lone Ranger stokes the legend but its smoke signals only add to the haze.

The well-chosen voice cast helps make this a fairly engaging tale, even though the film is riddled with a wealth of head-scratching anachronistic errors.

Brooklyn’s Finest is mo’ wrong than right.

It's amazing the filmmakers never really concern themselves with satisfying the audience's rules of engagement.

Tom Arnold and Anthony Anderson become an official comedy duo as they deliver an extraneous (and questionably funny) comedy riff, as they did in "Exit Wounds" over the film’s closing credits.

The movie's third act begins a baffling and not-very-believable character turnabout.

Amiable and proficient, this indie romantic comedy is never more or less than reliable.

Fails to create a seamless and believable web of measured performances and period color.

If you want to see a good comedy about a couple’s marital problems getting worked out through the course of a home invasion, check out "The Ref."

The actors are all charged up, too; there’s just nowhere in this script for them to go.

Julien may be a donkey-boy but it's Harmony Korine, this film's director, who is a horse's ass.

Don’t come to this documentary expecting to learn more about the girl named Malala.

Sleepless is a passable thriller, but it won’t keep you up for nights.

While Chloe may seem reminiscent of Egoyan’s outlandish thriller "Where the Truth Lies," it also calls to mind another would-be thriller about marital infidelity that starred Neeson and was utterly ludicrous: "The Other Man."

There’s no one to root for in this movie, and no one whose prospects we care about. Several plot points lack coherence, and inserted flashbacks add to a sense of the film having been fused into shape in the editing room. It seems that Suicide Squad was done in by its own hand.

It’s good to see that passionate cinematic rabble-rousing does not rest solely in the hands of the left.

Cinematographer Enrique Chediak (28 Weeks Later, The Good Girl) delivers crisp images, and the climactic underwater nuclear explosions are really something to behold. But director Michael Cuesta (Kill the Messenger, L.I.E.) adds little of notice to the proceedings.

The action is neither cathartic nor supremely exhilarating. "Bullitt" on a bike this film is not.

By the time the police come knocking at the front door, Mr. Brooks has exploded from its mild-mannered start into full guignol mode, and would take a defter filmmaker than Evans to steer the tonal shift.

This rote buddy-cop action comedy is instantly forgettable. We’ve seen it all before, and worse than that, we’ve seen it done far better in films ranging from last year’s "The Heat" to Eighties classics such as "Midnight Run" and "Lethal Weapon."

Yet for all Vaughn’s attention to stylized details, I noticed a number of obvious continuity errors throughout to which Vaughn seems blind.

It's the best date-night movie to hit the screens in a while, which, considering the competition, is very faint praise.

Some of the interplay between Branagh and Dench as a refamiliarizing couple is also delightful. However, apart from fleeting pleasures, All Is True is mostly a goodie bag stuffed for Shakespeare completists.

This return to Wonderland is a dull outing, about which it can be said that Alice doesn’t live here anymore.

Paul Green seems more interested in what rock school can do for him than for the kids.

Never transcends its clichés.

Adults may discover, however, that when they get to the center of this particular world, they find no real there there.

Boasting a terrific cast, the movie is unable to parlay its abundance of comic talent into an abundance of original comedy.

Stick around through the credits for an extra closing scene that leaves the door of Heather's new home wide open for a sequel.

There is no character development or psychology manifested in any aspect of The Strangers.

It seems to me that since "Koyaanisqatsi" in 1982, for which Fricke served as the director of photography, every other film of this sort has been repetition.

Sandler has become one of our primary symbols of the modern rage-repressed American male. Let’s hope that one day he will learn to channel that rage to greater effect.

Daddy’s Home is one of those comedies that is not terribly good, but not nearly as terrible as it might have been.

A crowd-pleaser for the under-10 set judging from the preview audience’s reaction, Dunston Checks In offers a few funny scenes, one-liners, and characters, but not enough to inspire the entire film.

When you get to the end of The City of Your Final Destination, you may discover that there is no there there.

There are warm, genuine moments that endear these attractive characters and their experiences to us despite all the falderal. Feast of Love may be enough for some to keep the pangs at bay ’til the real thing comes along.

What Soul Food lacks in narrative originality and flourish it nicely makes up for with wonderful performances by a large ensemble cast.

The use of Bryan Adams as the madwoman's imagined paramour is indicative of just how mediocre this movie is.

Despite earning his bread and butter with genial comedy noted for its family-friendly language and humor, Jim Gaffigan performs laudably in this decidedly dark role.

If you shut down your brain and simply take in the wardrobe and performances by Streep and Blunt you'll have a swell time, like aimlessly flipping the pages of a fashion magazine.

Plot and character development are scarce; the film is more an abstraction than an absorption.

(Greenaway) is often described as a director whose movies "are not for everyone." The obvious retort is that neither are the Three Stooges, but at least everyone understands them.

Overall, the quality of the film has that made in America feel -- sturdy enough to last through the initial warranty period but not designed as a long-term durable good.

Watching Raimi's visual style and narrative verve flatten out into this pale reiteration of a middle-aged-male weepie is an exercise in modern horror.

A coda set in 1965 seals the film's status as a bourgeois fantasy, but fear not: Paris' student and worker riots of 1968 are only a hair's breadth away.

Terribly slight but not unpleasant, 5 Flights Up is hardly worth the climb.

When all is said and done, director bob Fosse (Cabaret, Lenny, All That Jazz) delivers a sluggish movie that exhibits none of his usual flash and even less psychological drama.

Hesher is a muddle of inchoate feelings that never really grasps the clichés to which it raises its middle finger.

It's one of those period dramas about upper-crust Europeans in vacation resorts, which at first we think we've seen a million times before.

Director Leterrier keeps the camera moving and swooping throughout the film as if the Steadicam were another device in the magicians’ tool belt. A clear sense of space and sleight-of-hand is rarely achieved.

Provides tepid but fun entertainment.

The characters never come across as anything more than self-interested parties. It’s hard to have a rooting interest in any of their fates, and even less in the outcome of this movie.

There is also a lot of good supporting work in this movie, including the performances of Irma P Hall, Tom Bowser as Evie's clueless dad, and Bruno Kirby as Kiddie Acres' gruff impresario.

Not only is Kikujiro sweet and funny, it is, no doubt, Kitano's experimental "art film."

My conclusion is that exploitation of a child for the sake of one's career is a shameful act.

Matt Brown’s movie is a perfunctory highlight reel, featuring tepid performances and dull cinematic technique. Although the movie’s 108 minutes are hardly infinity, its duration gives the concept a run for its money.

The Killer Inside Me is hardly uninteresting, and you get the sense that everyone involved tried really hard to pull off this difficult adaptation. But it would be impossible to view The Killer Inside Me as anything but a vast miscalculation.

Salerno spends more time talking to photographers with telephoto lenses who, over the decades, laid in wait for Salinger in the hope of capturing a grainy picture, than he does talking to literary analysts and historians.

A good concept yields scattershot results in this horror-film anthology.

The storylines are as confusing (or as simple?) to the uninitiated as they were before, but that doesn't stop them from making sense to the kids.

Flightplan should have remained grounded for repairs.

As far as I'm concerned, the fact that Bergman is finally getting around to asking himself questions he now realizes he should have asked long ago is not sufficient enough premise for a movie. The answers may be news to Bergman, but the rest of us might just want to opt for divorce.

First Snow tries hard but lacks originality.

Flawed but often entertaining teen horror flick.

It's hard not to feel punk'd and trapped amid the company of jerks.

Should be applauded for finding a new angle on a tireless story, but you might want to think twice before booking passage.

Despite its authentic feel for things Western, Wild Bill misses the big picture.

The problem lies not in the plotting alone. Roth's direction does nothing to bring clarity to the story and its characters, and his blocking of the film's action scenes is downright muddled and vague.

Hook has you marveling at the nuts-and-bolts work of producers and assistant directors, but never at the intrinsic imaginativeness of the story. It's as if Spielberg calculatedly set out to make a perennial classic -- certain folly if ever there were.

When the film sticks to biographical and career background, it is on steady ground, but when it argues the case for one particular album, it becomes promotional rather than documentary material.

It would seem the purpose of this movie, if not to deify, is to define -- and in this it fails miserably.

Yo-ho-ho and a bottle of … V8? That’s what you get when you cross VeggieTales characters with a pirate yarn.

Technically, Jihad's images and assemblage seem on par for a first-time filmmaker, though the film's message is a moving plaint.

It may tell you everything you need to know about Easy Virtue to note that Hollywood hottie Jessica Biel receives top billing over veteran Brit thesps Kristin Scott Thomas and Colin Firth.

The direction by Caruso adds little to the dynamics, although the script by Dan Gilroy offers the occasional gem. Nevertheless, Two for the Money is hardly a cineplex bargain.

When a cell-phone gag is the most exciting or inventive thing in a big summer dinosaur movie, you have to wonder if the species might not be ready for extinction.

Kidman is the only refreshing thing in the movie. Otherwise, Just Go With It is an exercise in stagnation.

The Oranges has little original shading.

Although appealing to look at, Happy Feet Two is noisy, busy, and unable to spark much emotional involvement in the viewer other than fear for the characters' well-being and a touch of existential angst by way of a couple of krill.

There's little drama or sense of progression in the movie until the bombshell hits, and then it just whimpers along for another half-hour until the end.

Misfires on so many levels that we have to wonder if there is more than one meaning to this story's wild boars.

As delivered by the politically inclined international filmmaker Costa-Gavras ("Z," "The Music Box"), Mad City's oversimplification of the ethical issues is bound to annoy those with any first-hand knowledge of the news dissemination process and disappoint others who've come for the promise of a city whipped into a "mad as hell" frenzy.

What should have turned out as a terrific movie about the crime of spousal abuse has instead received the equivalent of a ham-handed molestation by director Mundhra.

It’s distinguishing the trickle from the treacle that becomes the problem.

Solid 007 entertainment -- not as bad as some of the recent Bonds but not as spunky as some of the series' originals.

My Cousin Rachel 2017 retreads du Maurier’s luscious mix of Gothic trappings and psychological mystery, but it’s a wan concoction that’s never fully convincing or engaging.

The gifted veterans, Redgrave and Stamp, manage to imbue their characters with personalities and physical bearings that transcend the stereotypical. But there’s little else that separates a film like this from the sing-your-heart-out self-actualizations of a teen show like "Glee."

Likely to be remembered more for its method of manufacture and release than for any inherent qualities of its own. It will also become one of the many fascinating footnotes in the always provocative career of Steven Soderbergh.

Opus is an attack on media mouthpieces and mindless sycophants, but its barbs only scratch the surface before the inevitable mayhem takes over.

There’s a difference between being transgressive and offensive, and that, in a nutshell (or roasted chestnut), is the difference between Bad Santa and Bad Santa 2.

The actors are all good, although not much rapport is conveyed, despite one hot sex scene.

Though there is plenty of razzle-dazzle onscreen, Nine is unlikely to ignite many sparks among viewers.

All in all, though, this Brazilian import is a small curiosity, intriguing more for its failures than its accomplishments.

Nicole Kidman, as good as she is, is given little to do in a one-note role, but fares better than Julianna Margulies who appears merely in a one-scene role. Kevin Hart’s huge number of fans may push this film to early box-office success but eventually they are likely to toss it into the untouchable pile.

Never breaks out of its dullsville rut.

The film's voice talent is good, as are the characterizations. However, the film's computer animation leaves much to be desired.

Former New Jersey Gov. Jim McGreevey and Outrage argue that the closet suffocates decency and happiness, and the film ends with a freeze-frame of the now-popular folk hero Harvey Milk. However, were we to give up our right to self-denial, I contend that America would cease to be a land of freedom.

Colorful and a passable drama, one that highlights the difficulties of cross-cultural love affairs and the exoticism of the Third World.

The performance are uniformly wonderful, making Sommersby solidly entertaining though never engrossing.

Despite employing every cliché in the sports-movie handbook, Goal! The Dream Begins tells a reasonably engaging story.

Terrific performances can't save this preposterous film from itself, but they do make it more bearable to watch.

For better or worse, the film plays like an extended TV episode, jumping from each character’s story arc to the next, rarely lingering longer than the time it takes to land a few low-bro love jabs before moving on to the next scene.

Despite the weak performances and the scattershot screenplay, the film is visually terrific.

The melodramatic film has numerous light and comical touches, and the performances are uniformly good. The film's pace, however, has the consistency of molasses, and there's hardly a scene that wouldn't be improved by judicial trimming.

There's a nice little story here about the intermingling of cultures, but it rarely gets beyond the obvious clichés.

Kings is a confusing and far-fetched story in which good intentions outweigh good storytelling.

This documentary is as soothing and edifying as watching a video loop of the Yuletide log.

The Tango Lesson is ponderously scripted and stiffly acted, and though the narrative causes the characters to skip continents and languages (the story bounces from Paris to Buenos Aires to London and back) little of the passion that drives this story is conveyed.

Watts is in nearly every frame of the movie, so if you're a fan (and you should be) that's the reason to see this.

Looks mostly like the same-old, same-old.

Writer/director Emmanuel Finkiel tries very hard to adapt Duras’ modernist storytelling tactics to Memoir of War and, at times, even succeeds in translating the author’s opaque blurring of the objective and the subjective.

Viewers approaching Tim and Eric's comedy for the first time will probably be baffled by their popularity and success. Their Billion Dollar Movie will not win new converts, and their stretched-out routines demonstrate the old saw about less sometimes being more.

Merry witticisms collide with empty clichés, leaving these characters with little trace of realism.

The Five Senses, despite its good performances, is like looking through a filmmaker's sketchbook: strong outlines but little substance.

A well-told tale that uses minimal dialogue, striking imagery, and vivid violence to weave a depressing portrait of obsessive love and a no-win battle of wills.

Reeks of a filmmaker who latched on to sure-fire subject matter, but then became lost once his character morphed into a person.

This hodgepodge of little stories about the members of a college football team contending for a championship is flaccid seasonal fare that will do all right its first few weeks at the box office amongst those starved for gridiron action but will fade from memory long before the Rose Bowl parade ends.

Unfortunately, there's little more than formula in Ichaso's El Cantante.

In between all the laughs and tears, it becomes painfully obvious that there's not a whole lot of story here to prop up the constant emotional yanking.

Never a filmmaker known for his subtlety, The Single Moms Club turns out to be one of Perry’s most distinctive efforts.

In its rush to push hot buttons, Disclosure neglected some essentials of good storytelling.

The result, although more sexually provocative, is not nearly as gratifying as was his (Ziad Doueiri) breakthrough film.

The parade has now moved on and Freeheld seems more like a footnote than a groundswell.

The film aims to be a cautionary tale, but it doesn’t seem that the filmmakers have absorbed the lesson.

An attempt to infuse some girl power into their mash-up of cheeky horror films and teen-angst movies. The result is more mash than smash as Jennifer’s Body squanders its initial good will by failing to deliver the goods on either score.

The latticework of social meaning that makes up Crossing Over is ultimately a flimsy structure that pays lip service to liberal values while only occasionally inventing anything of dramatic significance.

If only the movie that encases this character were as sharp and distinctive as Harriet.

The film’s accumulation of unnecessary complications, bad visual choices, one completely superfluous character (LaBeouf), and tonally inappropriate quips makes us distractedly ponder the limits of human rather than artificial intelligence.

This latest Saturday Night Live movie spin-off is a whole lot better than it has to be, but consider the past standards Tommy Boy has to live up to.

The Hunchback of Notre Dame ultimately misses its target, as it's more likely to find acceptance with an older-than-average Disney crowd.

Do not count on Office Christmas Party to deliver a contact high. Yes, there are laughs to be had, but not the off-the-charts merriment promised by the title and the film’s expert cast of comic actors.

While celebrating the lushly romantic, it also tweaks the tradition so that Sleepless in Seattle ends up something akin to a feature-length Taster's Choice commercial.

Visually, The Jacket has a lot of flash, but it hardly compensates for the fuzzy story.

A confusing jumble of historical drama and modern social essay that only serves to cloud the whole field of Jane Austen studies.

Joseph Fiennes smolders as young Luther, but it’s a performance that makes you wish instead that his older brother Ralph -– an actor who is one of the greatest at being able to portray inner torture and anguish -– were playing the part.

Margaret definitely has many elements for a successful drama. It's unfortunate that no one was able to shape them into a functional movie.

It has a classic Hitchcock scenario in which a man is mistaken for a murderer, but the film lacks humor and suspense. Even the great cast is unable to make much headway with this torpid thriller.

When I ask myself what it is that these women in the movie want, I come up with bubkes.

Bettany exudes an intensity that lays the groundwork for an interesting character, but Priest hasn't a prayer of creating anything more subtle than the giant cross tattooed on his face.

This story about two death-obsessed teens is twee and precious instead of genuine and candid.

It’s delightful to see these acting pros hamming it up in this movie. They look as though they’re having a blast. The same can’t be said for the audience.

Shaky science fiction shacks up with a corny redemption tale.

Once you've seen it all once I bet you'll wish you were watching "Groundhog Day" -- again.

You have to feel a certain sympathy for a project as cursed as this one, but there’s no denying that Jane’s gun barely grazes its target.

Many are the times the viewer stares disbelievingly at the screen, furious with Murray for not asking follow-up questions or simply refusing to see the need to prove the veracity of the story.

Director Siri has a stylish eye that makes this film resemble a film noir outing, but the script (by Doug Richardson) is at first routine before growing increasingly outlandish.

If it's a good heist movie you're after, there are surely better ways to go than with this limp caper.

Coppola never manages to get his themes to coalesce into anything terribly coherent.

A mildly diverting comedy but has little of real substance to recommend it.

Across-the-board, the kids are extremely adorable to watch (not an easy thing to pull off) and will appeal to the other kids in the audience who might identify with them and see the story from the kids’ point of view. But looking at this film from any other perspective, will give you brain rot.

Stuff the cork back in: This wine movie was sold before its time.

Not even this sprightly cast can buck the privileged sense of entitlement that bedevils this movie. Don’t count on the impish humor that Simon Pegg has unleashed so successfully in other movies to save the day.

The problem lies with the unimaginative story premise and the quip/reverse quip dialogue that just may be better-suited to half-hour television shows than this nearly 2½-hour movie feature.

Collateral Beauty is ultimately as mushy a movie as the phrase itself, whose definition is never fully explained by the script. It’s another example of something sounding good but meaning little.

Sex may, indeed, be all in the mind, but Romance fails to score in the mind's eye.

In the wake of the debacle known as Showgirls, Striptease has had to fight to establish its separate identity and credentials. In retrospect, it appears to have been wasted energy.

"Avatar’s" Worthington is adept at playing a tortured soul, but his American accent and dramatic range are both wanting in this movie.

Delivers sinister atmosphere but few shocks.

Despite an A-list cast and director, it's astonishing how bad this movie is.

Breaks down before it gets out of the driveway.

Even though it’s fair to say that Pixels is on steadier ground than most of Sandler’s recent comedies, the film is nevertheless flat-footed and grows tedious after the first hour.

Even at 82 minutes in length, Superstar feels uncomfortably stretched.

The rescuing of our public schools is a national necessity. I just don't know that we are aiding that cause by sending out oversimplified and dogmatic messages about not backing down.

The title, The Last Song, may be wishful thinking for some, but the best they can probably hope for is the close of the era of Hannah Montana movies.

There's no getting around this dumb script that's just too silly for words.

This is a bad movie, but one that awakens your senses every so often with flashes of originality and abundant self-belief.

The interfacing of the two-dimensional and three-dimensional characters is so shabbily accomplished that it makes you start noticing all the other technical glitches in the work.

Christian filmmaking has entered a new phase in which its creators have discovered how to soft-pedal their message under wraps of a conventional story.

Mother’s Day, the movie, feels as contrived and inauthentic as the holiday itself.

Each of the characters is dull and boorish instead of witty and urbane.

This Italian import may have greater resonance for the men of Casanova's native land than it does internationally, but it definitely hits on truths infrequently addressed in the movies.

Creating plot from lyrics, in this case, leads to heavy-handed literalism and limited creativity. The wall of music is amusing for a while, but grows into a loud, wearying assault long before the movie's two hours are up.

It’s mildly entertaining while also masking criminal deceptions as romantic foreplay. Yet this remake has little of the real-life sizzle that Hawn and Russell added to the story.

The Mighty Ducks may satisfy the Pee Wee hockey players in your household but the rest of you may be turned off by the simplified penance and redemption formula.

There are moments here in which Shore actually behaves like a recognizable human being with some semblance of feelings, emotions and conscience. Happily, his acting skills are adequate to the task.

Although the original Red Dawn was far-fetched, the remake offers little but vicarious thrills.

The religious charlatans who are the primary characters in Don Verdean are ripe for comic deflation, but the film’s unsteady tone has no discernible target.

Spotlessly dull.

The film lacks any undercurrent of believability.

Posey and Sheen appear to have a blast playing oversized characters so obnoxious that it's obvious they belong together.

It's staged like something straight out of King Kong with the look of an old 1930s Universal horror movie where the lightning flashes strobe across the undulating coils of tubing in the mad scientist's laboratory. There's a lot of really ugly violence in Ricochet, the kind of images and thoughts that just make you feel scummy to be involved with, no matter how passively.

In contrast to its great title, Mad Hot Ballroom is anything but: Let’s just say I was not spellbound.

Although the plot is pretty bare-bones, it’s propped up by plenty of gratuitous dialogue and imagery that do nothing to further the story.

The movie makes use of every avian pun possible, a pattern that becomes quickly monotonous and predictable, if not contagious.

Sirens, is unable to rise above its intrinsic prurience.

Hardly lives up to its name -- bedeviled is more like it.

What the movie ultimately demonstrates is that the sum total is less than the individual parts when you add together Rocky, the Terminator, Indiana Jones, Mad Max, Blade, Zorro, Hercules, and the Transporter.

Fortunately, Brian Cox delivers a bravura performance that keeps things watchable, if not always dramatically truthful.

Writer/director Damien Lay’s screenplay has some head-scratchers in addition to its flat dialogue, but it’s clear that the airplanes rather than the characters are his real passion. Unfortunately, his film never takes flight.

Moog is an inventor's movie all the way.

Deathbed scenes and colonoscopy humor, Bible quotations and Maury Povich "Who Is the Real Baby Daddy" episodes: All cohabit with equal relevance in the world of Tyler Perry.

The laziness is what irks me most about Blended. Everything from the re-teaming of the two stars and their "Wedding Singer" director, Frank Coraci, reeks of moviemaking by checklist.

This comedy has a few genuine laughs, but The Bronze never even comes close to making it to qualifiers.

Phenomenon flails about in a search for direction: inspirational drama, romance, social study, government intrigue- nothing fits or is explored very deeply.

How the devastating story of the senseless murder of a 14-year-old could be stripped of emotion is a feat in itself, though one of dubious achievement.

The kindest thing that might be said of this Eighties nostalgia trip is that its formulaic plot and overall mirthlessness are meant as mimetic tributes to that blasted decade.

Arthur overextends its welcome and relies too much on prop comedy.

Ultimately sinks under the weight of its good intentions. It’s like watching Univision or Telemundo on the big screen.

Although I'm generally a fan of movies that choose to star girls (of any age) as their lead subjects, Judy Moody and the Not Bummer Summer simply strikes the same whiny chord over and over.

Somewhere between conception and execution the movie turned sour and most of the cuteness was replaced with venom and malice.

The kind of film that will be suitable for all-ages entertainment once the family runs out of conversation after devouring all the turkey, but it's unlikely to expand its audience beyond these captives.

The comedy is often harsh and cruel.

The lesson learned from The Tale of Despereaux is that an overabundance of vocal talent does not a good cartoon make.

When this stereotype masquerades as a storyline, it needs to have a unique spin or radical narrative disruption for it to stand out from all the other self-made movies about white male artists with girl problems and self-worth issues. In Stereo is not the movie that stands out from the rest.

Seeing what St. Andrews’ greens must have looked like in their native days before all golf courses became zealously manicured is refreshing. The film’s action, however, is rarely filmed in a way that highlights the action, and the story’s biographical elements lack dimension and drama.

What begins as a cute idea grows annoyingly sentimental before it is through.

Much more "Splish" than "Splash."

The movie's suspense derives from figuring out how wide the evil net has been cast. But in terms of suspense, this Net is full of holes.

When a human joke like Tony Robbins is the only one who comes away from your movie smelling like a rose, there's a real problem in Farrellyland.

Seems more like an amateur revue, perfectly all right for what it is, but not meant to be seen beyond an audience of friends and family.

Images seem to be grafted into the film that have little to do with the actual story.

Could have used a touch of Madea’s down-home, self-reliant wisdom to spice up the marital doldrums of these four buppie couples.

Aloft’s characters exude a certain impregnability, and the story’s structure only further distances us from them.

It seems nothing is left out, and the movie makes us begin to feel as though we've witnessed every swing the man ever swung.

The film feels about as genuine and spontaneous as its evident lip-synching.

There's an interesting story here, but Joffe never firmly wraps his arms around it.

Unlike its multifaceted director, the film never stretches its boundaries.

Learn from the Evers family: The Haunted Mansion is not worth the detour.

As cold and unseemly as that stiff found in the shower.

There is a new definition of the term, "critic-proof movie," and it goes by the name Pokémon: The First Movie.

Despite the filmmakers' efforts to humanize Wilson, however, Bill W. still dabbles in hagiography, valorizing the man while also painting him as a reluctant hero.

It's all rather clumsy and routine.

Pleasant but dull formula film.

The revelation of Little Ashes turns out to be none of the leading men but rather Gatell, a riveting actress cast as the girlfriend who is mystified by Lorca’s lack of sexual interest in her.

A hackneyed police story, rife with clichés, implausibilities, and weak performances.

Not even the always reliable talents of McKean and Lynch can help pull this comedy out of its ironic slump.

Lacks the bite that can equal the Bruckheimer bark.

The film squanders any potential it had to be a revealing look into female intimacy and instead uses broad-scale melodramatic strokes.

Bratz is way too long.

The kind of movie that gives "chick flicks" a bad reputation.

Molina and Weaver, who, most of the time, perform brilliantly, move through Abduction as if on autopilot.

An awful lot of good talent has been squandered in this by-the-numbers film.

Have we such short memories that we have already forgotten last year's feeble "Johnson Family Vacation?"

Davies and Affleck are affecting and engaging as the callow young men on the verge of independent adulthood. One wishes that we had seen more of their personal drama instead of Going All the Way's myopic male gauntlet of shrews and Jews.

Linda Blair finds herself locked-up in this women-in-prison cheez fest. The warden has a hot tub in his office and Stella Stevens cracks the whip.

Duigan has the makings of a good yarn, but instead of trusting the story and his characters, he becomes fatally bogged down in trying to make statements.

Everybody’s Fine – a movie about the lies grown children tell their parents – is, ironically, one of the most disingenuous movies to come out of Hollywood in a while.

The special effects feature the most up-to-the-minute flash and dazzle that the Industrial Light and Magic gang has to offer -- but it plays like someone forgot to plug in the power cord; in other words, no sparks or electricity.

If there were any brooms in Disney's new Sorcerer's Apprentice they would have to be used to sweep this tired dreck to the curb.

With Filth and Wisdom, the Material Girl has now spliced the title of film writer and director into her list of accomplishments, but the result is, well, immaterial.

Burlesque bumps and grinds. And then it continues to grind and grind and grind.

Even if some of its history and buckles are askew, the film is still an original take on a Christian redemption story.

My favorite line from the movie: "The god---- truth won't fit in your brain." How's that for cheap gimmicks for getting out of having to make a movie make sense?

Fathers' Day offers little in the way of comic relief.

Despite a title change from "The Boat That Rocked" to Pirate Radio, this British import exudes about as much outlaw swagger as Tom DeLay in a dance competition.

I wish that movies, like scholastic football, could be judged on a "no pass, no play" basis.

Perelman eases the transitions between the past and the present with echoing phrases and situations, but they all seem rather pat and contrived. Does he really think that repeated refrains from the Zombies oldie, "She's Not There," won't be a dead (so to speak) giveaway?

Not even the rich and nuanced performances of stage veterans Smith, Gambon, and Birkin can save this British period drama from languishing amid the story's unfocused longings and unrealistic musings.

All this would be fine if the script by Forrest Smith had more wit and fewer clichés, or the direction by former makeup artist Abascal had more inventiveness.

The Monkey's Mask is filmed with an eye toward an arthouse sheen, although Lang's dramatic pacing is sluggish and dull.

Lovitz is occasionally amusing, especially in his creative attempts to get through to his pupils, although his style of slow-take humor is a grave mismatch for this kind of frenzied comedy.

Without better material, Bullock’s talents will remain undercover.