Marrit Ingman

A playground for Malkovich – enjoyable enough but not terribly deep.

The result is a lyrical contrast of two contiguous cultures, worlds apart in their definitions of family and love but brought together by mutual awe and basic human need.

This is your standard genre fare: Smart-a-- player gets schooled, finds love, and is redeemed in time for the final big game.

The film lacks the emotional resonance that made "Big" such a sentimental favorite with audiences of all ages.

It's got a good creative pedigree and confident execution – as well as nifty design, down to its Hammond-organ Photek soundtrack and desert chic – but this ensemble piece set in a rural mobile-home park steps off the trail into melodrama from time to time.

A charming surprise, the kind of neat little low-budget movie that seems more like a collaboration among friends than it does a corporate investment.

The script is really the heart of the problem.

The film veers toward sheer silliness at times, losing the sweetness that defines its strongest moments.

On the plus side, Costanzo is an appealing and likable young actor who carries the film easily; he gives the impression that he is thinking deeply and mildly amused.

This first dramatic feature by documentarian Evans is an important film but not necessarily a successful one.

Hallström's latest is fine but unambitious, content with what it is – an arthouse trifle for the masses.

The film is more of an old-school wartime yarn, crackling with the expected camaraderie among the hardscrabble volunteers.

This kindly and spirited film doesn't exactly break the mold of the heartwarming, humanistic boarding-school dramedy.

The movie gets goofy from time to time -- as when payola arrives in a vintage "Clash of the Titans lunchbox -- but the filmmakers and cast have the style and the swagger to back it up.

Garçon Stupide is interesting enough to merit an audience broader than its intended niche, though it isn't perfect.

Yaar has enough heart to redeem its cruder moments, and it turns out to be quite a little charmer.

If you like the character – his tooty yellow Mini, his busily working beetlebrows, his tendency to point and grunt and eat shellfish whole – then you will be rewarded with 90 minutes of such.

Pretty to look at, tamely racy, and fairly fluffy, despite its two-hour running time.

The real shame in the storytelling is that the people in this film are interesting and inspiring enough to warrant a real film about them.

Never mind the fact that romantic comedies about gay African-American and Latino men aren't exactly plentiful, let alone ones this good-natured.

The film’s resolution is more implied than complete.

With its wonderful veteran cast, its heart on its sleeve, and a love for the landscape that suffuses its technique, Don't Come Knocking is a peculiar but rewarding escape.

It's got practically everything you could stuff in front of a camera, with the possible exception of Rip Taylor throwing confetti. Dancing transvestites? Check. Elephants? Check.

Stuck somewhere between melodrama and the flat tone of an "issues"-oriented television miniseries.

There's a place in life for movies like this – goofy and lowbrow but never truly icky; the good guys are lovable losers and the bad guys have frosted feathered hair and unitards with inflatable codpieces.

When it's on, it's really, really on. But when it's not, it feels like it's struggling to find its style, just as Jerome is.

Can someone dial down Cuba Gooding Jr. a few notches? He's so hyperactive during this MTV Films production - which is comedically indistinguishable from "Sister Act," but with more marketable music - that his Vegas-showgirl drag act in the dreadful "Boat Trip" looks like Bressonian minimalism by contrast.

It's a soggy drama said to be inspired by actual events – too serious to be trashy, too trashy to be serious.