Peter Travers

Questions: Did everyone involved in this botched thriller OD on speed? Does jimmy-legs director D.J. Caruso think if he slowed down the action we'd figure out how stupid the plot is?

Volver is Almodovar's passionate tribute to the community of women -- living and dead -- who nurtured him. Through the transformative power of his art -- carried on the wings of Alberto Iglesias' exhilarating score -- we feel their presence. You do not want to miss this one.

Like Vardalos and Corbett, who play their roles with vibrant charm, the film, directed by Joel Zwick, is heartfelt and hilarious in ways you can't fake. It's a keeper.

The vigorous young cast enhances the excitement of the flight sequences, which are spectacular. Movie rah-rah has rarely been this entertaining.

Do you really need me to tell you how scary this horror show isn't?

Rudolph, a comic force on "SNL," can speak volumes with the tilt of an eyebrow. She and Krasinski, of "The Office," are absolutely extraordinary. Ditto the film, which sneaks up and floors you.

Ferrara’s blend of toughness and lyricism turns this visionary crime film into something stylish, seductive and haunting.

This gifted writer-director isn't out to dull the masses with cinematic opium. Embedded in the visionary headtrip of A Scanner Darkly is a hotly political call to arms.

When it comes to rousing action, whip-smart laughs and moral uplift that doesn't pump sunshine up your ass, Three Kings rules.

The Cove plays like a thriller. It has the breathless pace of a "Bourne" movie, but none of the comfort of fiction. This is documentary filmmaking at its most exciting and purposeful.

The go-for-broke performances help make all this paranormal activity too much fun to care.

In "Gran Torino," Eastwood took on the moral issues that screenwriter Gary Young and first-time director Daniel Barber studiously avoid. It's the difference between riveting and repellent.

Is it the clumsy script or the switch in directors -- Beeban Kidron in for Sharon Maguire -- that has sucked out the charm of the original and replaced it with crude pratfalls and enough shag gags to stuff the next three Austin Powers movies?

Director Vadim Jean is lucky that his low-octane comedy is long on Short.

The Hughes boys blow it by burying a fine cast -- Robbie Coltrane as a cop and Ian Holm as a royal sawbones are standouts -- in stock scares, sappy romance and cliches that really are from hell.

It's "National Lampoon's Family Vacation" with soul.

It’s the old Monkees trick: If you can’t find a band, manufacture one. British director Alan Parker (Fame, Mississippi Burning) lucks out. The dozen unknowns he’s chosen — ten with no previous acting credits — make a joyful noise and rousing company. Parker, however, hasn’t made much of a movie.

Jokes dying on the lips of these easy riders are hard to stomach.

Launches the fall season with a crashing thud.

Caine has never been better, which is saying something. He puts a human face on a tragic era of history in a film that ranks with the year's finest.

Not since Julie Andrews rode an umbrella to glory in Mary Poppins has Disney given us such a real-life doll (Amy Adams).

Gondry and the gifted indie cinematographer Ellen Kuras have fun with the amateur versions of the likes of "RoboCop," "Rush Hour," "2001: A Space Odyssey," "King Kong" and "Driving Miss Daisy." These snippets are fun but frustratingly brief.

(Shelton) knows how to write pungent dialogue that covers a multitude of sins when the film goes off the rails.

Writer-director Gurinder Chadha juggles all the angles with flair and fairness. Like Nagra and Knightley, the movie is a sweetheart.

Only some bumpy, arid passages in the script keep The Others out of the master class occupied by the likes of "The Sixth Sense" and, my favorite, 1961's "The Innocents."

Has no vital signs at all, just crushing dull repetition that makes one noisy, violent scene play exactly like the last one.

Draws an electric performance from Peter Mullan.

The "Citizen Kane" of flatulence.

This PG-rated movie feels safe and constricted in a way the story never does on the page. It leaves out the deep magic of a good movie, or a good sermon: the feeling that something vital is at stake.

A kickass documentary.

Director Tim Burton finally hooks the one that got away: a script that challenges and deepens his visionary talent.

All this is conveyed in the remarkable performance of Ronan, an Oscar nominee for Atonement. She and Tucci -- magnificent as a man of uncontrollable impulses -- help Jackson cut a path to a humanity that supersedes life and death.

Gadgets abound, especially a Lotus sports car that transforms into a submarine. But the scene-stealer is 7'2" Richard Kiel as Jaws, a shark-eating man with steel teeth.

Christensen is the only jolt of excitement in this turgid soap opera.

It's a movie as timely as it is thrilling to watch.

Memo to Beyoncé Knowles: You were so good as Etta James in "Cadillac Records," so why'd you go spoil everything with a rank cheeseball thriller that buries you in clichés and won't even help you dig yourself out?

The most shocking thing here is the fact that Peter Chelsom directed it. His 1995 movie, "Funny Bones," is a genuinely transgressive piece of dark comedy. I can't detect a trace of Chelsom in Hannah Montana, which means he won't have to wear a blonde wig to hide his shame.

The film never musters the intimate feel the gifted director brought to such early films as "Raise the Red Dragon" and "Ju Dou." You cheer his accomplishment in Hero without ever feeling close to it.

The Big Lebowski is the best movie ever set mostly in a bowling alley.

McConaughey, despite alarmingly orange makeup, does justice to the role, a hard-drinking, shipwreck- hunting senator's son with a 007 way with the ladies.

Hero heads for the high ground of the dark, sorrowful comedies of Preston Sturges (Hail the Conquering Hero) and Frank Capra (Meet John Doe). Credit the film then for having a goal, even though it loses sight of it with disturbing rapidity.

Mullan errs by making all the sisters dragon ladies. Still, the film gets to you; it's a powerhouse.

Offers action in the Arnold Schwarzenegger style. Well, not right away.

Dogfight doesn’t sum up an era; it merely romanticizes it. What could have been an incisive movie about alienation deteriorates into a conventional romance.

A crowd pleaser that spices a tired formula with genuine feeling.

I'm guessing it's the pressure of an idiot script by Gary Scott Thompson and understandably clueless direction from Jon Avnet that forces Pacino to ham it up so vigorously that you want to garnish him with cloves and a slice of pineapple.

Karmel delivers feminist fun even a guy can get.

Stylish entertainment and smartass fun when director John Dahl ("The Last Seduction") plays his strong suit (a gifted cast) instead of his weakest (a derivative plot).

Should have been a fun update on the 1967 Brit farce. Director/co-writer Ramis comes on too strong with the camper trickery.

In story terms, Dinosaur lays an egg.

Turitz keeps it comic and romantic in just the right doses. Looking for a fun date flick? You found it.

The 'roo doesn't talk, except in a dream sequence…I'm dying here.

Paris Is Burning catches the sadly hollow spectacle with acuity, wit and intelligence.

LaGravenese may be unsteady at the helm, but his film insinuates like a torch song that keeps messing with your head.

There's something pernicious about a toxic mix of sitcom and snickering sex jokes getting packaged and effectively sold as wholesome fun for the family.

Recoing gives a performance that won't soon be forgotten. Neither will Time Out. It's a great movie.

Here's a shrieking bore of a horror flick.

Brosnan, on a roll with this film and "The Ghost Writer," vividly etches the emotional fissures in a man coming apart. The Greatest takes a piece out of you.

Though the film has an evocative look reminiscent of Matthew Brady’s period photographs, Zwick has stuffed the actors’ mouths with numbing bombast. Glory is a shame.

This gifted clown has found the right vehicle for his souped-up silliness. Carrey is the ultimate party dude, and like the masked man says, this party is smokin'.

Pulls off thrilling stunts that will leave you a sweaty-palmed mess. It's top-tier movie escapism.

What The Replacements does have is energy.

Schumacher's method is to use a lighter touch, to stay closer to the cartoon that Bob Kane created for DC Comics in 1939 and to temper Burton's nightmare world with an accessible, brightly colored TV palette.

It's fun to see Sean Penn portray a playboy, like Bogart in "Casablanca," who hides his true heart behind a layer of cynicism.

At first it's a kick to watch Clint Eastwood play Steve Everett, a horn-dog newsman...Is Clint being Clinton-esque? Even if he's not, these scenes are the liveliest part of this dog-tired movie.

I laughed once or twice during this flat and fatuous farce, mainly because director and co-writer Greg Coolidge lifted a lot of it from "Office Space."

Bateman doesn't make a false move, and a stellar Charlize Theron springs her own bolts from the blue as Ray's wife. As for Smith, he's on fire. There's nothing like a star shining on his highest beams. You follow him anywhere.

Eating can be one dangerous business. Don't take another bite till you see Robert Kenner's Food, Inc., an essential, indelible documentary that is scarier than anything in the last five Saw horror shows.

P.S., adapted from Helen Schulman's novel, is Linney's show, and she makes it hilarious and haunting.

Here is the jaw-dropping, eye-popping, heart-stopping movie epic we've been waiting for all year.

Bana is magnificent in the role.

Whenever Zucker stops piling on battle scenes as if he were directing Braveheart, his film casts a romantic spell.

Political satire is so rare that it's a shame to watch the reliable Ralph Fiennes and Donald Sutherland lend their talents to one that is blind to its own incompetence.

It's not a pretty picture, but it is a pretty funny one when Gene Hackman shows up as William B. Tensy, a Palm Beach tobacco tycoon.

Stick with it for Miller’s gutsy tour de force and the kick of watching Buscemi, as actor and filmmaker, turn an experiment into a mesmerizing battle of wills.

Filming this mess in North Carolina (strike three).

The only people likely to get a kick out of Gigli -- the first screen teaming of Ben Affleck and Jennifer Lopez -- are Madonna and her director hubby Guy Ritchie. Finally there's a movie as jaw-droppingly awful as their "Swept Away."

An Education is remarkable for the traps it doesn't fall into. Jenny, for all her naive impulses, isn't a victim.

What's good? A mesmeric, bottle-blond Christopher Walken as Max Zorin, hellbent on global domination as a product of Nazi experiments, Grace Jones' zowie star at his henchman, and Duran Duran's title song. Otherwise, I'm out.

Though the movie ups the TV ante on nudity, language and violence, Lynch's control falters. But if inspiration is lacking, talent is not.

What starts as freshly spun cotton candy ends as something pink, sticky and indigestible. You leave the theater wanting to puke it up.

If looks were everything, director Baz Luhrmann's epic salute to his native land would be the movie of the year. But, crikey, a padded script bloated with subplots and shameless sentimentality can wear you down.

There's no way to take your eyes off it.

McTeer and Brown make magic ina film that is wonderfully funny, touching and vital.

Promises a road movie of blissful comic romance and delivers a series of dramatic dead ends.

The Gift delivers the lurid goods as a scary, sexy, twist-a-minute whodunit.

It's a perversely comic movie ride into the wild blue of crime and punishment.

You'll end up entertained if you forgive the cliches and let Petersen grab you with the visuals.

A two-hour search for a pulse... A miscalculation from a prodigious talent who has forgotten that you squeeze the life out of romance when you don't give it space to breathe.

Grand Canyon is most gripping when Kasdan shows people waking up to the world and finding that they need more than bromides.

Broken Lizard does it with a shit-faced integrity that's worth a salute.

The heart of Jackass - the adolescent drive to bash body and soul into the symbolic brick wall of maturity - remains pure.

Chicago, based on Bob Fosse's Broadway smash, kills.

That generous half star rating I tacked onto this comedy abomination is all for Paris Hilton. Come on, it takes guts (or gross dim-wittedness) to appear on screen again after "House of Wax."

Gibson's acting has deepened. Too bad his comeback vehicle springs so many leaks.

Hot Tub Time Machine should have been better than this. It could have been poignant.

A strong, stinging film, alive with conflicts that defy glib resolutions.

The House of Mirth is not one of those teacup and doily movies; it's harsh and disturbing. Davies does superlatively right by Wharton. There's blood on the walls.

Slim pickings.

Dracula may stay undead in the new millennium, but there's not a sign of life - oh, that bloodless acting - in this sorry mess.

Don Roos's script for Single White Female, from the 1990 potboiler SWF Seeks Same, by John Lutz, is as empty as a hack's head. Schroeder goes through the motions — the movie is elegantly made — but this synthetic Hollywood package panders shamelessly to the baser instincts.

The movie can be enjoyed for the hell-raising hooey it is.

While the first movie steadily tighened its vise, the second loosens its grip through strained acting and incoherent plotting.

Watching Haneke's film is, aptly enough, a challenge and a punishment. But watching Huppert, a great actress tearing into a landmark role, is riveting.

Is it that scary? Yes. Will it reduce you to quivering jelly? Oh, my, yes! Does it bust the bonds of the Godzilla formula to fuse fright with feeling? Better believe it, dudes.

Undeniably thrilling and troubling...Dazzling, era-defining.

There's no telling how the unflatteringly photographed Applegate delivers a comic line on the big screen, because Tara Ison and Neil Landau haven't written her any. And it's painful to see pros like Joanna Cassidy and John Getz stuck in this sewage. Director Stephen Herek does what you'd expect from the man who gave us Critters and Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure, i.e., grinds out the film equivalent of processed cheese.

It's Sagnier, a young Bardot, who lifts the movie, and Rampling, 58, who gives it nuance, not to mention a nude scene that shows off a body Demi Moore would envy. These two make it seductive fun to be fooled.

This riveting film qualifies as the anti-crowd-pleaser -- but Penn makes it unthinkable to turn away.

Based on a play by Athol Fugard, Tsotsi is South Africa's entry in this year's Oscar race for Best Foreign-Language Film. This remarkable movie means to shake you, and boy does it ever.

Michael Douglas digs deep and delivers one of his best performances in Wonder Boys -- a comic dazzler of roguish wit and touching gravity that is driven by characters, not jokes.

Catherine O'Hara is comic perfection as Marilyn Hack.

If Singleton, 25, stumbles, it is over ambition and not the complacency of a new Hollywood hotshot riding a trend.

One for the time capsule.

Talk about your pious frauds. I've got a better way to show your disgust for Internet scum: Don't see Untraceable.

Near the end of this smart, speedy romantic farce, the comic engine hits a wall and sputters. Until then, this Coen brothers film -- easily their silliest -- is fueled by a screwball fizz that keeps the laughs popping.

Kidman gives the most emotionally bruising performance of her career in Dogville, a movie that never met a cliche it didn't stomp on.

Guilty-pleasure movies should not be underestimated. I had a scary-fun-house blast at Zombieland, in which studly Woody Harrelson, nerdy Jesse Eisenberg, sexy Emma Stone and sunshiny Abigail Breslin roam a near-dead world kicking zombie ass.

Branching out in a bold new direction, Stallone is quietly devastating. James Mangold has directed Cop Land from his own ardent, audacious script, and despite some draggy, overdeliberate moments, it's the strongest piece of material to come Stallone's way since he invented himself as Rocky 21 years ago.

There's no script to speak of, just two appealing actors volleying comic-romantic cliches at each other.

A warmly hilarious movie about family members and their secret hearts.

Director Susan Seidelman takes aim at the box office with the team of movie queen Meryl Streep and TV slob queen Roseanne Barr. She misfires. Streep gets all the jokes, and Barr, looking stranded, plays it straight. Worse, nobody’s bothered to write them a big scene together. But for a while you can see the possibilities.

The film falls short; only Peet goes the whole nine yards.

Affleck and Hall make this unlikely love story palpably moving. And Renner (The Hurt Locker) is dynamite - he radiates ferocity and feeling.

It's a kick to watch Denzel Washington do a movie just for the hot, sexy fun of it.

It's a kick to see the adorably sexy Barrymore back in relaxed form again after the "Duplex" debacle and that calamitous "Charlie's Angels" sequel. Right now, she's the closest thing to sunshine you'll find at the movies.

Alexander breaks the key rule that makes movies move: Show, don't tell.

To be honest, I started hearing things, too. Just when Jones was delivering an inexcusably sappy speech about baseball being "a symbol of all that was once good in America," I heard the words "If he keeps talking, I'm walking."

Buffy isn't heinous, just disposable. As a friend tells Buffy while she eyes a fashion purchase, "It's so five minutes ago."

What nearly saves the movie, besides the Rasmussen eye candy, is Paris itself, shot in shimmering black-and-white by the gifted Thierry Arbogast. Talk is cheap here, and often inane, but as a silent film, Angel-A could have been magic.

There's more killer suspense and shocking intimacy in this one-of-a-kind documentary than you'll find in a dozen thrillers. You'll laugh hard and cry too.

There's no arguing that Cuba Gooding Jr. is trying to do right by the mentally disabled James Robert Kennedy.

What I can't figure is why anyone would want to release this tripe in theaters just when Fanning has nearly lived it down. They ain't no friends of mine, or any other moviegoer.

A movie about death that stubbornly refuses to come to life.

The film's major sin of omission: the music.

For anyone professing true movie love, there's no resisting it.

Fanaticism is Dannelly's target, not faith. That's what makes his film a keeper: It sticks with you.

A rip-roaring action adventure.

Documentarian Alexandra Lipsitz believes that air-guitar competitions are worth a whole feature-length movie. She's wrong, of course. But the fun lasts longer than you might think.

The melancholy attached to the impermanence of life and love suffuses this film, making it memorably haunting and hypnotic.

What I can’t figure out is how director Peter Hyams can remake a 1956 movie from the great Fritz Lang and not learn anything about suspense, pacing and storytelling in the process. This movie is beyond boring. You could stay warm for two hours by striking a match to the wooden acting.

Aiming for the heartfelt hilarity of "Superbad," I Love You, Beth Cooper is just super bad.

I lost it just watching Corky show off such memorabilia as "My Dinner With Andre" action figures and a "Remains of the Day" lunch box. Priceless.

Rogen and Heigl step up to the plate with a tougher task from Coach Apatow: Nail every laugh and the emotions underlying them. No worries. They knock it out of the park.

It's the no-bull performances that hold back the flood of banalities. Robbins and Freeman connect with the bruised souls of Andy and Red to create something undeniably powerful and moving.

A sappy big-screen version of TV's "CSI."

The jokes are hit-and-miss. But Stone is one sassy babe and a breakout star who nails every zinger and brings genuine warmth to her scenes with her parents, played by the priceless Patricia Clarkson and Stanley Tucci. You mean girls can eat it.

You won't see more explosive acting this year.

Jarmusch makes it a feast that plays like a haunting concept album.

Whatever qualms you might have about romanticizing mental illness, the misguided Benny and Joon thinks it's just darling.

Pfeiffer is a knockout; she’s the sexiest presence in movies today and an exceptional comic and dramatic actress, to boot.

Why We Fight deserves high praise for making it that much tougher to wear blinders.

Thanks to the clever, caring touch of director Ismail Merchant, working from a script by Caryl Phillips, this steadily engrossing film captures the book's bracing humor and humanity.

Goldthwait's movie, shot on video that makes it look dragged through puppy poop, is an unholy mess. But it also possesses a quick wit and an endearing tenderness toward Amy as honesty wrecks her life. It's sweet, doggone it.

The movie stays alert to the dreams and disappointments of four average people on an emotional roller coaster. It's a sublimely acted movie, hilarious and heartfelt.

It's a revamped Cinderella story with power as the aphrodisiac, and Douglas and Bening play it to the classy hilt. The courtship scenes in the film's lighter, more deft first half have the bounce of a moonstruck fable.

What this Robin Hood lacks in fun it makes up for in epic sweep.

A lighter-than-air comedy than runs on pure fizz.

Shot five years ago by director Michael Ritchie. No release until now. Uh-oh. Disaster? Pretty much.

There I sit, suffering total numbness of body and brain, no longer having to wonder what it might be like to be buried alive in gooey marshmallow.

Day-Lewis is smashing as the man caught between his emotions and the social ethic. Not since Olivier in "Wuthering Heights" has an actor matched piercing intelligence with such imposing good looks and physical grace.

The actors are outstanding, illuminating four different views of loneliness. But it's Camara's tour-de-force performance that anchors the film, that shocks and unnerves us.

Joel and Ethan Coen's adaptation of Cormac McCarthy's 2005 novel is an indisputably great movie, at this point the year's very best.

Despite the lofty tone of his literary, artistic and metaphysical allusions, Greenaway is working the same streets of human depravity as John Waters; he's just more pretentious about it. At best, Greenaway's film is a provocative and diabolically funny foray into the roots of passion and cruelty. At worst, the symbolic bric-a-brac gets so thick you lose sight of the characters.

Anderson orchestrates a comic romance like no other. The effect is intoxicating. Sandler and the movie will knock you for a loop.

As an action fix to hold you before the summer explosions start, you could do worse than The Losers. It’s no more than an efficient time-killer.

Director Gregory Hoblit ("Primal Fear") is merely arranging cliches in new patterns until the surprise ending blows enough pro-military fervor up the audience's ass to make Colin Powell call a halt.

Without jerking tears or reducing the acid content of his wit, Baumbach's humane movie gets under your skin.

Fair Game, written and directed by men, allows model Cindy Crawford to make her screen debut as Miami lawyer Kate McQueen.

It is also Nicholson at his bravest and riskiest. By banking his fires and staying alert to the smallest details, he delivers a monumental performance that blasts your expectations and batters your heart.

Gone Baby Gone is full of dark secrets, and how they unravel will keep you glued.

May lack the mythic pow of the 1984 original and the visionary thrill of T2, but it's a potent popcorn movie that digs in its hooks and doesn't let go until an ending that ODs on apocalyptic hoo-ha.

This is a film in which ideas resonate as well as action. Gandalf’s words to Pippin about death have a muscular poetry.

Using Staunton's face as his canvas, Leigh crafts a powerfully moving film that is unmissable and unforgettable.

Altman orchestrates Dr. T's odyssey with the precision, heart and lively wit of a virtuoso.

Give the girls a cheer, but remember: "Bring It On" is still the poo, Missy. Take a big whiff.

A mesmerizing film spinning from hilarity to heartbreak.

Shot in the West Bank, the film radiates authenticity. Even when he plays the action like a thriller, Abu-Assad is in search of a deeper truth.

A ragtag charmer. You will laugh.

Putridly written, directed and acted.

Pedro Almodovar's transfixing tragicomedy -- the best foreign movie of the year -- is also the best showcase for actresses in ages.

Broken Arrow delivers the hippest action fun around. Travolta's "Dr. Strangelove" exit will blow you away. Ditto the movie.

Unabashedly hokey, but would you want it any other way? In an era of cynical junk (did anyone say “Bad Boys II”?), Ross restores the good name of crowd-pleasing.

There’s a secondhand feel to the way this gangster movie delivers the goods. Carlito’s Way is haunted by a ghost from De Palma and Pacino’s past — Scarface.

The film's problems lie with the lack of spark between a wired Dunst and a bland Bloom, and the meltdown of Drew's mother (Susan Sarandon), who grieves by tap-dancing.

In Guncrazy, Davis delivers pow entertainment with a twist: It matters.

You'd get more of a jolt from Angela Lansbury on "Murder, She Wrote" and more intellectual stimulation from a cozy game of Clue.

Lin is a talent to watch. There's a sting to this film that gets to you.

Lacks the active verb it promises. It defines blah.

It's no mystery that the target audience for this G-rated bubblegum fantasy is tweens, parents of tweens and the occasional pervert. They'll be so pleased. Anything for the rest of humanity? Not so much.

The result is a failed and lifeless experiment in which everything goes wrong.

DeMented is Waters the way we like him--spiked with laughs and served with a twist.

You will laugh yourself silly.

The explosive V for Vendetta is powered by ideas that are not computer-generated. It's something rare in Teflon Hollywood: a movie that sticks with you.

Director Gillian Armstrong turns Sebastian Faulks' pungent novel about World War II into a soporific.

Kasdan has inexplicably reduced flesh-and-blood characters to cartoons.

With this kind of epic ineptitude -- hell, the flick is set in the year 3000 -- you go for "worst of the millennium."

Kingsley creates an unforgettable monster. Acting rarely gets this hypnotically explosive.

Something lazy, slow, shallow, stupid, amateurish, unfunny, unsuspenseful, uninformed, unspeakably dull and witlessly written, directed and acted (the special effects suck, too).

Allen has never crafted anything as fiercely funny as this comedy of coming apart; it’s a groundbreaking film, full of sublime performances alert to the violence done in the name of love.

The movie will wipe you out. Schnabel's previous two films (Basquiat, Before Night Falls) also focused on artists. But this is his best film yet, a high-wire act of visual daring and unquenchable spirit.

I only wish this richly imaginative movie had stayed truer to the dark heart of its visuals.

Offers dumb fun without apology.

Depending on your reaction to the cinematic outrages perpetrated by Danish director Lars von Trier (remember Dogville?), you might want to add or subtract two stars from the halfway (half-assed?) rating I just gave Antichrist.

No crime film in years boasts a cooler vibe than Michael Mann's dazzling Collateral.

Darroussin is killer good and director Cedric Kahn turns Georges Simenon's seminal novel into a darkly comic spellbinder that pins you to your seat.

John waters and Kathleen Turner bring out the sicko best in each other in Serial Mom. It’s a killingly funny spoof of crime and nonpunishment that couldn’t have come at a better time for us or them.

Romantic yearning hasn't looked this sexy onscreen in years.

For starters, it blows. Madonna continues to mistake a knack for striking poses with the interpretive skill of a real actor.

To shine in a turd like this shows Brody has the stuff that -- damn the Oscar jinx -- makes an actor last.

A triumph of acting, writing and directing that defies glib description...the kind of artful defiance that Hollywood is usually too timid to deliver: a jolting comedy that makes you laugh till it hurts.

Mamet -- crafts tangy, well-seasoned dialogue that a good cast can feast on. And this cast is prime.

This you-are-there spellbinder is a master director shining his light on the best rock band on the planet.

Chainsaw is produced by Michael Bay (Bad Boys I and II), which explains its soullessness. But nothing explains the flaw in this bad boy: How can a movie scare you when you’ve seen it all before?

If you've had it with all that feel-good holiday sludge, hook up with the combustibly nasty Bad Santa. It could become a Christmas perennial for Scrooges of all ages.

The first big-studio movie released in 2009 has a damn fine chance of being the worst. Bride Wars isn't just chick-flick hell for guys, it should numb the skulls of moviegoers of all sexes and ages.

Douglas never makes a false move, delivering a tour de force in human weakness.

Nothing new here except model-turned-actress Bellucci. To call her noteworthy would be an understatement.

If you're looking for a crime story that sizzles with action, sex and the visceral jolt of life on the edge, Miami Vice is the one.

The actors, especially Binoche, do their damnedest to bring urgency to their roles. But despite Minghella's admirable attempt to tackle major themes on an intimate scale, the film goes down like weak tea. There's no kick in it.

A comedy so devoid of wit and point that not mentioning the other actors trapped in this rathole would be an act of charity.

There is no wrong time to flush this turd. The only bright spot comes during the outtakes over the final credits.

For all its fancy pedigree, the spellbinding Dancer in the Dark aims right for the heart and aces its target.

A hand-me-down cast? Far from it. Masterson and Stoltz possess talent and charm to spare... Wonderful aspires to be little more than the hot-and- happening teen flick of the moment. At that it succeeds.

A hot-wired crime thriller that captures Thompson's flair for hard action, malicious wit and fevered eroticism.

Forget Oscar, Ocean's Eleven is the coolest damned thing around.

Director Ron Howard has turned Peter Morgan's stage success into a grabber of a movie laced with tension, stinging wit and potent human drama.

The best of what's onscreen is a mesmerizing mind-teaser.

Doing his own singing (an uncanny imitation), Spacey is a marvel.

Logue hits every note of humor and heart in his breakthrough role. Don't miss him. He's that good.

A marvel of delicacy and humor.

Want your skin to crawl? This one's for you.

There's no disguising the fact that Shrek the Third has come down with a bad case of sequelitis. You know the symptoms: Lots of razzle-dazzle to distract from the hole at the center of the story. You know, the place where fresh ideas should be.

Call it the black "Scarface" or "the Harlem Godfather" or just one hell of an exciting movie.

Wayne Kramer, who co-wrote the scrappy script with Frank Hannah, makes a potent directing debut and strikes gold with the cast.

Funny as hell.

Big, loud and lurid, but no less entertaining for that.

Tim Burton's Nightmare Before Christmas restores originality and daring to the Halloween genre. This dazzling mix of fun and fright also explodes the notion that animation is kid stuff. The history-making stop-motion animation in this $20 million charmer transcends age. It's 74 minutes of timeless movie magic.

Chases so many ideas that it threatens to spin out of control. But with our multiplexes stuffed with toxic Hollywood formula, it's a gift to find a ballsy movie that thinks it can do anything, and damn near does.

The plot is flimsy, but director Mark Waters (Freaky Friday) trusts Fey's tart dialogue to carry the day. Wise man. Fey subverts formula to find comic gold. She's a brash new voice in movie comedy. Boy, do we need her now.

Judge is in the business of social satire, and his laughs can sting, but his movie is a comic salute to free enterprise. And, boy, do we need it now.

The cliched script by Carol Heikkinen plays like "Dawson's Creek" in toeshoes.

What these guys do for revenge during one hellish day in the Big Apple makes the panic room look like Barney's toy box. The film itself goes off the deep end way before the end credits.

Smith wins our hearts without losing his dignity, as Chris suits up for success by day and fights off despair by night. The role needs gravity, smarts, charm, humor and a soul that's not synthetic. Smith brings it. He's the real deal.

Unique and unmissable.

This funny and touching movie depends on two can-do actresses to scrub past the biohazard of noxious clichés that threaten to intrude. Adams and Blunt get the job done.

Don't ask whether or not you should take The Day After Tomorrow seriously. Don't take it at all.

It's big, loud, ludicrous and edited into visual incomprehension. But pity the fool who lets that stand in the way of enjoying The A-Team.

Brought to the screen awkwardly but ardently by Mamet-actor supreme Joe Mantegna in his feature-directing debut.

Wilson is flat-out hilarious, playing this cowboy like a surfer dude zapped back in time.

In substance and style, the movie is more than a few tears short of Jordan's "The Crying Game." But Murphy is an actor to watch. Even in heels.

Deliberate, demanding and character-driven, Michael Clayton flies in the face of what sells at the multiplex. I couldn't have liked it more.

Diapers, even from three babies, can't stink worse than this.

An adventure that never met a cliche it couldn't saddle, mount and ride for a butt-numbing two hours and sixteen minutes.

You don't have to feel guilty for lapping up this froth. Just don't expect nourishment.

This engrossing blend of humor and heartbreak only hints at the causes, from betrayal to child abuse, of this family's dysfunction. Hang on. Attention is richly rewarded.

Ron Hagen’s camera work captures the delirium of carnage that drives out rational thought. Ignore the prudes who think you shouldn’t make films about things that scare you. It’s a first line of defense. This Aussie Reservoir Dogs opens up a brutal world that needs to be understood.

The last days of guilt-free glitz had consequences for more than two white chicks and their boyfriends, and Stillman shows how with delicious malice and unexpected compassion.

In a summer of clones, Harvard Man is something rare and riveting: a wild ride that relies on more than special effects.

Foster is electrifying as ego and id clash and the movie fires up with genuine provocation.

Film critics have been asked to say as little as possible about M. Night Shyamalan's new scare film about the perils of messing with Mother Nature. Fair enough. But I will say this: It's not happening.

Crass manipulation can clean up at the box office, so do your part: Nail this flick as a bottom feeder and pay the bad word forward to three others.

Ever since "True Blood" glamoured me, Twilight seems even more sexless and toothless. I prefer my undead with a little life in them.