Mark Olsen

Wilding's genuine curiosity about the monks' beliefs and daily routines, as well as her willingness to ask questions that sometimes make her look like a bit of a dip, gives the film a homespun honesty and sincerity that make it a surprisingly pleasant trip.

If, for whatever reason, you do find yourself watching it, you may begin to ponder one of life's larger dilemmas: the fact that something can be done does not necessarily mean it should be done.

It's like a musical with no big numbers, or an action film withholding the explosions.

It's Lawrence who throws Runteldat (as in "run and tell that") off key, repeating an admonition about "the trials and tribulations of life" that sounds suspiciously insincere coming, as it does, from a guy smothered in diamonds.

The plot frequently resets/realigns itself in the fashion of "Lost" or "Alias," as good guys become bad guys, friends become enemies, and combatants become lovers. To portray confusion and uncertainty is one thing; to make a film this unsure of itself, wracked by its own faulty footing and reticence, is quite another.

Just because the filmmakers have their roots in the Midwest doesn't give them a pass when it comes to their stereotypical rendition of small-town people and ways, chock-a-block with sadistic cops, shotgun-toting locals, and strippers from up in Des Moines.

A disappointing hodgepodge that fails to tie up its conflicting strands of family drama and suspense thriller.

There’s not really a bogeyman in The Orphanage and not much blood; just insane intensity and a building sense of bad vibes.

Tamara simply doesn't cover all the bases in its drive to be both a grubby teen splatter flick and a more high-minded thriller.

Watt seems to want to say something about the role of fate and happenstance in creating connections between people, but she never quite brings the strands of her ideas together.

Going Down is woefully lacking in the comedy (or the sex for that matter), and even some of the teens look a little long in the tooth.

Pretension, in its own way, is a form of bravery. For this reason and this reason only -- the power of its own steadfast, hoity-toity convictions -- Chelsea Walls deserves a medal.

The film does, in the end, raise something of an existential dilemma: If you set out to make a new version of something you know to be bad, and you make something that is in fact bad, have you somehow succeeded?

Frankly, the story behind Manna From Heaven is a truckload more interesting than the movie itself.

Recut and reassembled at just a little over two hours, the new version of the film is a staggering and bracing object, stylistically bold and hypnotically captivating.

The film essentially grinds along in second gear. A promising debut, Dirt Boy nevertheless fails to fully deliver.

Various actors deserving of better (including Zooey Deschanel, Eddie Griffin and Lyle Lovett) suffer through the undercooked material, while love interest Eliza Dushku gamely gets through both a bikini-modeling montage and a mechanical bull ride, but none of their efforts can save this film.

Cholodenko's new film relies on easy caricature over true character such that the film fails to build emotional momentum or resonance.

When Plympton isn't indulging his manias, the film just sort of nods off, and nothing much happens -- either visually or storywise -- for what seems like ages.

What at times feels like a maniacal romp becomes just another sporadically funny, but mostly lame, piece of disposable product.

The laugh always comes first, and Myers' puppy-dog tenacity to that cast-iron tenet of low comedy, disarming and even somewhat charming in the first film, now has an air of careerist desperation about it.

Okuda creates that slightly surreal atmosphere of ghost-town emptiness that will be familiar to fans of Takeshi Miike, but he infuses it with a romantic's sense of deep yearning.

Snappy, fun and outrageously irreverent, Kiss Kiss Bang Bang is the work of someone with nothing to lose, which is only to the audience's gain.

Roaming freely between comedy (which mostly works) and drama (which mostly doesn't) before settling on trite sentimentality, the film may not be an altogether unpleasant way to pass the time, but, ultimately, the innocuous Captain Pantoja doesn't earn its stripes.

And whenever the film shifts from spunky "let's put on a show" fun to overly earnest drama, it slows to a crawl, with mawkish performances that fail to rise above the soggy material.

Chai's structure and pacing are disconcertingly slack. Missing the loose ends and ambiguities of actual conversation, the dialogue makes characters sound like they're delivering speeches rather than interacting.

Undiscovered is beaten on all counts by TV’s "Entourage" and "Unscripted" in its portrayal of the aspirational lifestyle and its end-of-the-rainbow spoils.

There is a great divide between a film about people in the throes of aimless, meandering lives and a film that is simply aimless and meandering. Smokers Only never acknowledges, let alone bridges, that gap.