Nathan Rabin

It boldly subverts stereotypes and challenges conventional wisdom by presenting affable Korean and Indian antiheroes who are just as sex-crazed, irresponsible, mischief-prone, and chemically altered as their white counterparts.

Parkland finds a new angle on an exhaustively chronicled and debated subject by focussing on the grim practicalities of the situation.

During his clumsiest moments, Davis' fondness for provocation rises to the surface, which is unfortunate, since it weakens the impact of his many salient points about how American men are socialized to be warriors.

Undemanding, upscale, and agreeable enough in a low-key kind of way. It's a film of subtle, ingratiating charm rather than explosive revelations.

The film is ostensibly about sex and swinging, but in depicting the complex boundaries of the sexual fringe, it ends up saying a lot about the joys and frustrations of maintaining any relationship.

The astonishing visual poetry of Step Into Liquid's best surfing footage nearly compensates for the mindless boosterism of Brown's constant narration and the often comically banal observations of the film's largely homogeneous master surfers.

Dealin’ With Idiots is at its strongest when it forgets about plot and character development altogether (which is most of the time) and gives itself over to the laid-back pleasure of improvisation among veteran professionals finding and exploring a good groove together.

To its credit and sometimes detriment, Grand Piano keeps a frothing-at-the-mouth level of insane melodrama going for 75 minutes, aided by Wood’s sweaty, terrified performance, a screenplay rich in ridiculous contrivances, and a swooping camera that never stands still.

Like his makeshift societies, Garland's tantalizing set-ups tend to unravel in unsatisfying ways.

In the end, Tower Heist isn't a black Ocean's Eleven or a bold leap forward for feature-film distribution, just a passable piece of commercial entertainment that falls closer to product than art.

Fatboy nearly succeeds in spite of itself, thanks to Pegg, who makes a character who does some detestable things seem strangely likeable.

Thile has the charisma, presence, and emotional transparency of a great documentary subject, but How To Grow A Band maintains a respectable distance from its subject that ultimately doesn't work in its favor.

Keeping Mum never really gets going, and it inches to the finish line like a narcoleptic turtle.

By recounting Abbas' ordeal as an endless inarticulate monologue, The Prisoner reduces it to a dull anecdote--timely and relevant, perhaps, but an anecdote all the same.

Night Of The Creeps has all the ingredients of a top-notch cult movie, yet Dekker too often ends up recycling clichés rather than subverting or spoofing them.

Notorious suffers from biopic-itis, that regrettable tendency to reduce complicated lives to a greatest-hits assemblage of melodramatic highs and agonizing lows.

In spite of some punchy scenes, crackling dialogue, and fine performances, Broken City is hopelessly overmatched. It has Academy Award dreams, but a detective-show heart.

Sex Drive offers a limp variation on a hoary old teen-film trope.

Perfume is ultimately an unmistakable failure, but there's a strange majesty to its epic overreaching. It can be faulted for many things, but not for lacking the courage of its convictions.

Rambo works best as a pure action movie devoted to delivering the cheapest kicks imaginable--and to a much lesser extent, to bringing attention to human-rights violations and genocide in Asia.

Like its protagonist, Management is dopey and impractical, but strangely winning all the same.

Dancy’s character has difficulty processing information and dealing with emotion, but even he could probably see through this schmaltz.

Gyllenhaal and Peña's relationship, a sort of heterosexual love affair, is depicted with a sense of tenderness and care that does not extend to the cartoonish villains that dominate the film's lackluster final act.

A sports movie like every other, but the excellent, lived-in performances of Cube and Palmer make it a mildly affecting.