Peter Travers

Gorden teases out some affecting scenes, but not enough to carry a film that promises more than it delivers.

Cage works hard to find traces of humanity in a man that God forgot, as do screenwriter Steven Conrad and director Gore Verbinski. But in the face of a character no one cares about, can audiences be faulted for asking: Why should we?

A funny and touching film that is gorgeously acted by a British cast to rival Gosford Park's.

The language is leaden, the pace glacial and the characters indecipherable. It's easier to read the actors -- they all seem eager to win an Oscar. Fat chance.

Here's the Iraq War movie for those who don't like Iraq War movies.

It's a fun ride. What's missing is the excitement of a new interpretation.

Bad Influence will do in a pinch if you're starved for intrigue. For a while, it's nasty fun watching Michael sink into depravity. Erotic and spine tingling, this thriller has undeniable allure. But Bad Influence lacks daring, moral ambiguity and the pleasures of the unexpected, the elements that might give it distinction.

Alleged family fun.

This bonbon spiked with malice is a triumph for Jaoui, who takes witty and wounding measure of the small betrayals that leave bruises on us all.

It's original, outrageous and murderous fun.

Savor their technique and the sizzling performances of Frances McDormand as an adulterous wife, Dan Hedaya as her vengeful husband and M. Emmet Walsh as a private detective from hell.

In this funny, touching and haunting film, Patel cuts through stereotypes to show the hard truths of straddling two cultures.

With the help of acting giants, Jenkins turns The Savages into a twisted, bittersweet pleasure.

Its value is unquestionable as drama and moral provocation.

Were detective Dave Starsky (Paul Michael Glaser) and his partner, Ken Hutchinson (David Soul), hot for each other when they started working undercover in Bay City?... you can watch Starsky and Hutch on the big screen and see subtext stiffen into hard and hilarious evidence.

In this haunting portrait of America as no country for old men or young, Hillcoat -- through the artistry of Mortensen and Smit-McPhee -- carries the fire of our shared humanity and lets it burn bright and true.

The only tragedy you'll face is paying good money to this swill.

It's a real charmer from a director who feels that a knockabout romantic farce doesn't have to be mindless -- take that, "America's Sweethearts."

Say this for the soundtrack, it drowns out the lousy dialogue.

Veering between sentimentality and exploitation with a few misguided stops at raunchy sex farce, Reign Over Me never finds a tone to suit its purpose.

A product that will delight car junkies and drive cinephiles to swear off film until fall.

Affleck's provocative, postmodern take on JP as half-joke, half-victim is the damnedest plunge into the dark heart of our "reality" culture since Sacha Baron Cohen invented Borat.

Forgive the airhead plot that hinges on a spaceship crash-landing in the swimming pool of a Valley-girl manicurist, played by Geena Davis. The fun comes from Temple's protean visual wit and the irresistible charm of Davis, who just won an Oscar for her role in The Accidental Tourist. The agreeably tacky Earth Girls earns points for warmth, color and high spirits.

It's gross as hell.

Never adds up to anything more substantial than shrewd observations. There's no dramatic core.

The Rain Man-Dying Young elements in Tom Sierchio’s script are pitfalls that Slater dodges with a wonderfully appealing performance. His love scenes with the dazzling Tomei have an uncommon delicacy. But it’s Tomei and Perez who give Untamed Heart its bouyant wit. Their friendship could have sustained an entire movie. It’s certainly the best part of this one.

I wanted Paquin, who deserves better than this, to call on her vampire pals from "True Blood" and yell, "sic em!" Oh wait, they're already bloodless.

It's sad to see risk-taking director Mike Figgis (Leaving Las Vegas, Hotel) do a generic thriller for a paycheck and then not even screw with the rules.

Springs surprises that entertain and provoke.

Somehow, Lucille's plight is meant to comment astutely on the civil-rights movement. Now that IS crazy.

The movie is such a chore because watching actors strain to wrap their mouths around prerecorded songs for 134 minutes is irritating and, worse, alienating.

Spade goes sweet and gooey. This is nucking futs.

My advice, in the face of such hallucinatory brilliance, is that you hang on.

This putrid dish marks a new low for director Roland Joffe.

Unique and unforgettable.

Girl 6 is shameless stuff -- pompous, sentimental and attitudinizing. To swat the Spikeman with his own symbol, the film feels like he phoned it in.

The good news first: Keith Richards totally rocks it playing pirate daddy to Johnny Depp's Capt. Jack Sparrow. The deep rumble of his voice and those hooded eyes that narrowly open like the creaky gates of hell make him what the rest of this three-peat is not: authentically scary...So what's the bad news? Richards is onscreen for barely two minutes.

Fellowship is the real deal, a movie epic that pops your eyes out, piles on thrills and fun, and yet stays intimately attuned to character.

A knockout of a comedy that keeps you laughing constantly. It's also killer smart, lacing combustible action with explosive gags.

I can see why Fast and Furious might be a smash as audiences look for escape from a broken economy. All those wheelies and power slides are designed to obliterate thought, not provoke it. Talk about a movie for its time.

Still, even Disney and a PG rating can't bury Burton's subversive wit. Like Carroll, he's a master at dressing up psychic wounds in fantasy.

Mike Nichols' haunting, hypnotic Closer vibrates with eroticism, bruising laughs and dynamite performances from four attractive actors doing decidedly unattractive things.

George has been criticized for simplifying a complex story into an African "Schindler's List." But despite flaws in execution, this is a film of rare courage and imperishable heart.

John Q. is as fake as that tear, an exploitative mess trying to pass as social activism.

The film leaps off the screen with a thrilling immediacy.

A world-class charmer that could even seduce the Academy when it hands out the first official animation Oscar next year.

Curtis ladles sugar over the eager-to-please Love Actually to make it go down easy, forgetting that sometimes it just makes you gag.

It's one for the time capsule.

Towne defines Pre not by the freak car accident that killed him but by his willful need to keep on pushing. It’s Pre’s defiant spirit that makes Without Limits something worth cheering.

The battle, expertly shot by Dean Semler, captures the chaos of guerrilla warfare paralleled in "Black Hawk Down" and gives the film a scarring documentary realism.

Sadly, Lumet's skill at bringing out the juice in actors isn't enough to save the film from overkill.

It's not so bad that it's good. It's so bland that it's boring. Not even worth a hissss.

Sometimes a shamelessly stoopid, proudly profane R-rated comedy is all you want out of life. Role Models more than fills the bill. It's killer funny.

An emotional wipeout.

Up is a breathtaking ride into the realm of pure imagination.

In this painfully funny and touching look at the vanities and insecurities that a mother (Brenda Blethyn) can pass on to her daughters in the name of love, writer-director Nicole Holofcener ("Walking and Talking") does a chick flick right.

This Brooks is a comedian who forgets the golden rule of "know your audience." He thinks he'll get his laughs if he keeps doing the same act with better lighting.

Take a swig of this moonshine. There's magic in it.

The real evil in this flick isn't Blackheart (Wes Bentley), the devil's son, it's the soul-sucking devil of modern cinema: Hollywood formula.

It's Knightley who makes The Duchess a royal treat.

Fierce, funny and moving, The Class graduates with honors. It's unmissable.

You'll thrill to the action, savor the tasty dialogue and laugh like bloody hell.

With Pfeiffer, 50, radiating uncommon beauty, grace and feeling, Frears uncovers a fragile story's grieving heart.

Van Sant, following "Gerry" and the superb "Elephant," is on the same elliptical quest. His journey is labored but undeniably hypnotic.

The list goes on with moments historic and hilarious from the likes of Gene Kelly, Fred Astaire, Cyd Charisse, Arlene Dahl, Ann Miller, Jimmy Durante and even Elvis. That’s more than entertainment, that’s pure gold.

Funny but perilously slight.

Keep your eyes on Garfield - he's shatteringly good, the soul of a film that might otherwise be without one. The Social Network is the movie of the year. But Fincher and Sorkin triumph by taking it further. Lacing their scathing wit with an aching sadness, they define the dark irony of the past decade.

What saves Point Break from wipeout is Kathryn Bigelow's direction. Though the film lacks the formal beauty and allure of her Near Dark and Blue Steel, Bigelow keeps the action percolating in high style.

In ninety-three tight, terrifically exciting minutes, Clooney makes integrity look mighty sexy.

Bell explodes onscreen in a performance that cuts to the heart without sham tearjerking. Look for Billy to blast off.

The first Young Guns, in 1988, was an endurance test for all but those who think ogling young actors in tight britches is a fascinating way to spend two hours. Though it seems impossible, the sequel is even more excruciating.

Undeniably affecting, but you leave it wanting more.

Edward Norton is at his best here, chalking up another boundary-stretching performance this year in the wake of the unfairly overlooked "Down in the Valley."

Ah-nuld’s swollen belly is the joke — the only one — but director Ivan Reitman (Dave) takes it for a few deft spins.

All praise to acting dynamo Robert Downey Jr., who brings so much creative juice to the party that Iron Man achieves instant liftoff.

Even sex can't save a film that produces instant narcolepsy.

Brutal, sexy, built to thrill and minus a scintilla of redeeming social value, the movie -- based on a series of comic books by Mark Millar and J.G. Jones -- explodes like summer fireworks.

Knoxville and his boys seem to be saying goodbye. To which I can't help thinking, fondly, it's time.

Despite Joan Cusack, whose comic spark earns the film its only star, Raising Helen is like tumbling into chick-flick hell.

How the hell can you take an SNL skit that runs 90 seconds and stretch it to a 90-minute feature? Sounds excruciating. But MacGruber breaks the jinx by putting the skit in the context of a 1980s action movie and creating its own brand of explosive lunacy.

Following "Derailed," this comic turd makes it two strikes for Jennifer Aniston. She looks great, but her acting is board-stiff.

Hoff-man and Broderick manage an affecting reconciliation, and Connery remains a peerless charmer. Still, there’s no telling what drew these three to such trite material. It’s like hiring the Rolling Stones and forcing them to sing Barry Manilow.

The final effect is stunning, but also sadly impersonal.

The real horror here is watching Sandra Bullock drop her big Miss Congeniality smile to A-C-T! She does this by not smiling. What happened to the range she showed in "Crash" and "Infamous?"

Brosnan, in his fourth time up at the Bond bat, hits this one out of the park.

A film of wounding power. It stays with you.

The Wachowskis have put together a mix of culture, kung fu, sci-fi and speculation, that makes them the warped wonders they are. When the film ends with a "To Be Continued," the hooks are in for The Matrix Revolutions on November 5th. Maybe I've been programmed to say it, but I am so there.

Props to Kutcher for going to surprising, painful places. There's something haunted in his portrayal that hits hard and sticks.

Unhappy with what Oliver Stone did to Jim Morrison and the Doors in his 1991 biopic? Here’s the doc for you.

When Leguizamo lets go, this cautious crowd pleaser of a film takes on a defiant shine that shows just where the rest of Wong went wrong.

If you have to ask why this sucks, you deserve to waste your money. Why not also check out "Like Mike," "Juwanna Man" and "Hey Arnold! The Movie"?

This is more than a movie, it's a privilege.

Until Richard Wenk's script drives the characters into a brick wall of pukey sentiment, it's a wild ride.

Whether or not Casino meets your expectations, it delivers the rush you only get from an audacious gamble.

With lyrical intelligence and scrappy wit, Coppola creates a luscious world to get lost in. It's a pleasure.

Fulton and Pepe have created an extraordinary document. Hilarious and heartbreaking.

Get ready to be knocked for a loop.

Any resemblance between this Bad Lieutenant and the 1992 Abel Ferrara landmark is purely in the head of the dude who thought up the title.

Keep your eye on Kidman, whose kinky, kittenish performance turns unexpected emotional corners that pull you up short.

Paradis sizzles in a star-making role that gleams like one of Gabor's blades. She's a spellbinder.

Graham, back in the porn territory she aced in “Boogie Nights,” steals the show. In the winter doldrums, you don't kick at a movie that puts a smile on your face.

Distressingly shallow.

Just because a movie is freakin' preposterous doesn't mean it can't be diabolical fun. Case in point: Fracture.

Rea and Davidson are incomparably good in an exceptional film that is by turns darkly funny and deeply affecting. Though Jordan's control sometimes falters, it's a small price to pay for his daring.

Carell shows a whole new side to his talents.

Colossal entertainment -- the eye-popping, mind-bending, kick-out-the-jams thrill ride of summer and probably the year.

Simplicity -- four-square, not sappy -- is rare in film. James C. Strouse had it in his script for Lonesome Jim. As writer and first-time director, he gives Grace Is Gonethe quiet power to sneak up and floor you.

Pointed and hilarious.

A funny and touching date movie that dares to celebrate decency.

If "Pulp Fiction" impregnated "The Usual Suspects," the spawn would look a lot like Lucky Number Slevin. Great genes, but you keep wondering when the kid is going to grow up and find an identity of his own.

By the end of the film, the cliché of everybody getting along is reduced to both sides working together in the ultimate monument to capitalism: a mall. Some message.

The movie crawls hypnotically into the skin of this global assassin and astonishes you with its brazenly violent and sexual audacity.

The Saint leaves star Val Kilmer and director Phillip Noyce (Patriot Games) fighting to enliven an exhausted character.

As long as Green is onscreen, which is not nearly enough, Road Trip is easy to get revved up about.

Hit-and-mostly-miss.

One of the best movies of the year and by far the most entertaining.

The movie's soul is with Huffman. Speaking in a low voice, her posture as stiff as her vocabulary, her eyes a pool of sadness and hope, she turns this small, resonant film into a cry from the heart.

Far from being exploitive, the effect is inspiring: This is the best of us.

Peet is always worth watching, but the role does her no favors, and the script, involving a kidnapping and a surprise cameo by Neil Diamond - you heard me - smacks of desperation beyond saving.

Tries for deadpan laughs but is merely lifeless.

That Linklater pulls off the innovative feat with hypnotic assurance is nothing short of amazing.

Francis Coppola's revision of his 1983 film of S.E. Hinton's best seller The Outsiders is funny, touching and revelatory, with twenty-two minutes of added footage and a new soundtrack featuring Elvis Presley. [Review of re-release]

Buscemi makes this pathetic and potentially lethal shutterbug a figure of surprising humor and compassion.

It would be easy and convenient to dismiss Irreversible as blatant sensationalism. But Noe's bruising film is too artfully crafted to write off as exploitation.

The gripping, seat- clutching suspense in this baby will pin you to your seat.

Exciting and then some, Face/Off blends the director's supercharged images of balletic brutality and spiritual catharsis with an off-the-wall humor that allows John Travolta and Nicolas Cage to really let it rip.

In the year's richest, most complex and ultimately most heartbreaking film, Inarritu invites us to get past the babble of modern civilization and start listening to each other.

A dull, dumb and unforgivably dated thriller, free of thrills and any kind of perfection.

Cage and Caruso strike sparks in this riveting piece of pulp fiction, but it’s that first Kiss you’ll remember.

We Own the Night is defiantly, refreshingly unhip.

Maguire and Dunst keep Spider-Man on a high with their sweet-sexy yearning, spinning a web of dazzle and delicacy that might just restore the good name of movie escapism.

It's wickedly amusing for a little bit -- Robbins and Hurt really get into it -- but ultimately the film becomes what it's fighting: just noise.

A different kind of love story: an honest one that takes a piece out of you.

Jammed with story threads that don’t cohere, Cirque commits the cardinal sin for a vampire movie: It’s bloodless.

One-word reaction: bravo.

Lawrence forgoes his knack for verbal comedy and replaces it with crude nonstop mugging.

The time shifting raises questions the movie never answers, but it's hard not to enjoy the ride.

Malick and cinematographer Emmanuel Lubezki -- a grandmaster at blending color and natural light -- craft a tone poem that may throw some audiences through its use of interior monologues.

Looks and flows great, dripping with the 1940s crime-thriller atmosphere that James Ellroy described in his 1987 novel. On other levels -- plot (overstuffed), suspense (muted), acting (Hilary Swank as a femme fatale? Please!), posing (Scarlett Johansson plays dress-up as a mini Lana Turner), sex (it's all before and after) -- the movie is a bust.

Director Antoine Fuqua (Training Day) can stage action, but he can't save a trivializing, reactionary script featuring a Hollywood star (read America) as a global savior.

The Lookout is Frank's show. He's crafted a haunting and hypnotic film that transcends pulp by creating characters that get under your skin.

Quick and the Dead plays like a crazed compilation of highlights from famous westerns. Raimi finds the right look but misses the heartbeat. You leave the film dazed instead of dazzled, as if an expert marksman had drawn his gun only to shoot himself in the foot.

After all the hype, the movie of Dick Tracy turns out to be a great big beautiful bore.

In Portman's dynamic performance you can see strength and vulnerability warring for Anne's soul. In this bedroom view of history, it's that image that sticks.

The Crucible, despite some damaging cuts to the text, is a seductively exciting film that crackles with visual energy, passionate provocation and incendiary acting.

Claireece "Precious" Jones, played by Gabourey Sidibe, 24, in an astounding debut that brims with grit and amazing grace.

It's the stunning location photography of camera ace Elliot Davis that provides what the movie itself lacks: authenticity.

A riveting and indispensable record of the war in Iraq because it comes from the men who lived it.

There's a strong movie in this life, but writer-director Leon Ichaso ("Sugar Hill") hasn't found it.

Lynch takes us on a journey of shattering understatement -- a remarkable accomplishment.

The boldness of director Danny DeVito's violent epic is matched by Nicholson's astonishing physical and vocal transformation into Jimmy Hoffa.

You don’t expect director Ron Howard and producer Brian Grazer — partners on such benign jokefests as Splash! and Parenthood — to catch the mad-dog anarchy of the newsroom. But they nail it...What’s missing is the bite.

What can I tell you? It works. Private Parts is a comic firecracker with a surprising human touch.

Missing is a sense of the interior life behind the smiling face that Selena showed the world.

Hardwicke whips up a frenzy of crazy-cool board action, with Alva choreographing the stunts. Even when the slippery-slope-of-success cliches halt the film's momentum, the ready-to-rock actors rev it up again.

Shane Black creates a movie that is defiantly smartass and too cool for the room. I couldn't have liked it more.

No denying the relevance of the tale.

Ephron, try as she might, can't give her codified champagne spin to a Resnick script that all too quickly runs out of fizz.

The gifted Myers lets his once and (I hope) future shag king get lost in an elephantine Hollywood franchise. The first time was the charm, baby.

Director Wolfgang Petersen puts such a fresh spin on the familiar that it all works like gangbusters.

Doesn't deliver an ounce of charm.

Downey makes something lively, sexy and moving out of a role that's just a thin concept. But the movie feels like it's still in the darkroom.

Limbo is vital personal filmmaking from a world-class practitioner of the art.

Sandra Bullock and Ben Affleck as star-crossed lovers, is the cinematic equivalent of Styrofoam: a weightless romantic comedy of synthetic feelings.

The women's characters are as well drawn as the men's in a splendidly acted film that captures the confusion of love in ways that are ardent, affecting and wonderfully funny.

Too limp to deliver.

A mesmerizing erotic odyssey.

There are times when The Good Girl is so low-key it damn near flatlines. Luckily, White creates compelling characters with a few deft brush strokes. The actors fill in the rest.

Naughty and nice is a killer-hard combo to pull off. Stick with Rogen and Banks. They rock it.

Daybreakers, despite the star presence of Ethan Hawke and Willem Dafoe, is a B movie, with all the disreputable low rent, lowbrow pleasures that implies. I'll take that over pompous any day.

Thou wilt be dazzled.

As the film stopped counting back in years and switched to months, I panicked that it would slog on to weeks, hours and seconds before reaching its inevitable end. I was wrong. About A Lot Like Love leaving you wanting a lot less, I am right.

Explosive entertainment.

The show belongs to Geoffrey Rush in a note-perfect performance as Harry Pendel, the tailor.

With Apocalypse Now Redux — one for the ages when it comes to the moral battles of war — Coppola has reached the finish line at last. It smells like victory.

This Nacho leaves your palate longing for more spice and less rancid cheese.

How do I hate Armageddon? Let me count the ways.

Whitaker is on fire, and as long as he's onscreen, King keeps you riveted.

[Kalvert] best serves the movie by simply focusing on DiCaprio, who communicates the spirit and blunt truth of the diaries even when the movie keeps trying to soften the blow.

Painfully flat gross-out comedy.

Bugsy is less an indictment of the dark side than a black-comic look at our continuing fascination with it. Even when this powerhouse entertainment trips on its ambitions, you can't shake it off.

This riveting film is marred by compromises -- such as a switch of assassins to create an unpersuasive upbeat ending -- that keep it in the shadow of its predecessor.

Westfeldt and Juergensen are smart, sexy knockouts, finding just the right mix of fun and tenderness in their writing and performances.

Whenever the drama drifts into soap opera, the actors restore the balance.

Superman returns with a bang. Singer tarnishes his hero's halo with just enough sexual longing and self-doubt to make him riveting and relatable. That "S" on his suit has a whole new meaning: He's a Soul man.

With it's dynamite performances, strafing wit and dramatic provocation, The Insider offers Mann at his best -- blood up, unsanitized and unbowed.

Gives us good reason to believe that January really is the month Hollywood studios use to bury their cheesiest mistakes.

There should be a place in hell for hacks who turn out derivative terror trash and then pretend they're doing an important investigative piece on Vatican corruption.

Lazin's remarkable achievement is to catch Tupac in the act of discovering himself. It's something to see.

Roger Moore already seems winded in his second outing as Bond. And the film's comedic approach to martial arts justly rankles true 007 afficionados. Compensation comes in the form of Christopher Lee's delicious take on evil as Scaramanga and Herve Villechaize's verve as Nick Nack, Scaramanga's dwarf manservant.

The acting is dynamite, notably by Dillon and Newton in their shocking second encounter. Despite its preachy moments, the film is a knockout.

It's only when the film attempts to express its ideas in spoken English that logic dissolves into a muddle that would test the most rabid Dylanologist.

The climax, in which all the characters link arms in a dance and sing, could serve as a textbook illustration of forced gaiety. Much Ado is much askew.

This is crap as we know it, a 113 minute package of romcom suck.

Any flaws in execution pale against those moments when the film brings history to vital life.

It's "The Exorcist" warmed over.

The pickings are slim for scares this Halloween season (Ghost Ship, Below), so The Ring wins first prize by default.

Rude, crude and hilarious, whether he's hitting on Joanne or brokering the sale of Soviet weapons through Israel and Islamic Pakistan, Hoffman is the film's sparking live wire.

It's early in the year, but I defy any 2008 comedy to be as stupid, slack and sexless as Fool's Gold. And I'm counting Paris Hilton's appalling "The Hottie and the Nottie," which is marginally better.

Depp swans through this swashbuckler with a scene-stealing gusto unseen since Marlon Brando in "Mutiny on the Bounty." He's comic dynamite, but this plodding, repetitive bore should walk the plank for timidly refusing to light his fuse.

Righteous Kill, a.k.a. The Al and Bob Show, is a cop flick with all the drama of "Law and Order: AARP." This movie defines drag-ass.

I don't blame you for backing off a movie that focuses on a suicidal teen who learns warm life lessons by spending five days in a Brooklyn hospital's psych ward. Stop worrying. It's Kind of a Funny Story, based on Ned Vizzini's semiautobiographical novel, breaks the jinx.

It's comic, touching and a visual knockout.

The film belongs to Phoenix ("To Die For"), who is terrific. He has the gift, shared with his late brother, River, of conveying emotions without pushing them at you. The delicacy of his scenes with Tyler lets you enjoy the film for what it truly is: a heartbreaker.

A rapturous masterwork.

The film is just two people talking, but director Jim Simpson finds its grieving heart.

Best consumed with pizza and lots of brewskis, Joe Carnahan's Smokin' Aces is shamelessly and unapologetically a guy movie. It's lewd, crude and loaded with shootouts and hot lesbo action.

Then the aliens show up, chased by Morgan Freeman as a nut-job Army colonel, and the movie degenerates into a sorry, silly, gory, punishingly overlong creature feature.

Demolition Man is sleek and empty as well as brutal and pointless.

It’s a savagely funny ride fueled by Araki’s insight and blunt compassion.

If it's hip to be square, then this racehorse movie is the ultimate in cornball cool.

From the Emeralds doing "Acapella" to Davi himself taking the lead on "So Much in Love," The Dukes is damn near impossible to resist.

Writer-director Olivier Assayas crafts a near perfect blend of humor and heartbreak, a lyrical masterwork that measures loss in terms practical and evanescent.

McTeer and the transporting music hold you in thrall.

This mumbo-jumbo plays like The X Files on Prozac. No wonder the actors look narcotized.

Gere gives 'em the old razzle-dazzle with his roguish charm and sharp comic timing. The surprise is the unexpected feeling he brings to this challenging role.

This new take on horror is more of the bloody same.

The film's sound design, sampling Beethoven and Nino Rota, among others, links up with visual miracles performed by Rain Kathy Li and Wong Kar-Wai's noted cinematographer, Christopher Doyle (In the Mood for Love), to take us inside Alex's head. The result, a defiant slap at slick Hollywood formula, is mesmerizing.

Johnson doesn't resemble, much less embody, Lennon, but he does catch his distinctive glint of mischief tinged with pain. Duff and Scott Thomas are both exceptional, revealing how John's relationship with these two clashing sisters marked his character.

Burton uses the summer's most explosively entertaining movie to lead us back into the liberating darkness of dreams.

A subversively entertaining documentary.

By any fair standard, this lushly produced film is a long, bumpy ride to a major letdown.

Bird has crafted a film -- one of the year's best -- that doesn't ring cartoonish, it rings true.

At times director Lasse Hallstrom lets the film slip into an upscale version of Brett Butler’s Grace Under Fire sitcom. Even when melodrama threatens, Roberts’ steadying, sharply observed performance keeps things touchingly real. Khouri’s script has the buoyant wit to deal with Grace’s anger without turning her into a lethal avenger.

Listening to the kids talk is a treat in itself, but watching them strut their stuff in the final competition is enough to make you stand up and cheer.

There's more suspense in watching Brando, who has trouble with physical exertion, get on and off a bar stool than the robbery itself. Still, Brando -- his eyes alive with mischief --is the life of the movie.

The movie, from the 1992 best seller by Olivia Goldsmith, isn't deathless art. But as pure entertainment, this witty revenge romp is sinfully satisfying.

The irony is that Affleck's battering at the hands of fame has prepped him beautifully to play Reeves.

No go. Marshall deserved better than this misbegotten tribute.

As ever, Freeman delivers miracles; he's as good as it gets.

Don't hammer this film for trying to get inside the head of Mark David Chapman before he shot John Lennon outside the rock legend's New York apartment on December 8th, 1980. Hammer it instead for failing to do so with any depth or insight.

Thornton gets inside the coach's skin. It's a subtle, soulful performance in a movie that otherwise goes for the jugular.

This volcanically funny and seriously scary look at America's obsession with guns is meant to shake us up good. And it does.

The script that Nicholas Klein has conjured from Bono's idea is a quicksand that sucks down a solid cast.

The plot only slows a film that works best as a feast of sight and sound.

Transformers 2 has a shot at the title Worst Movie of the Decade.

Throbs with action, suspense and a seductive rhythm all its own.

With Melinda and Melinda he's (Allen) not just going through the motions. He's saying the game isn't over before you laugh till it hurts.

Through haunting home movies, Mina's diaries and interviews with Mike, a raw, riveting portrait emerges of what a child sees in his parents' relationship and what lies beneath.

It's love with tragic complications, and director Luis Mandoki drags the torture out for two-plus hours.

Payback is a brutally entertaining crime drama that should have been a little more brutal and a little less entertaining.

The film is a distinct pleasure.

This third hunk of Pie is a worn-out gross-out, a remnant of a genre that now seems so five minutes ago.

It's Coogan's breakthrough star performance that holds it all together. He's sensational.

The pleasure of this unique film comes in watching superb actors dine on Mamet's pungent language like the feast it is.

Under the astute direction of Danny DeVito, who does a sly turn as Oliver's attorney, this acid-dipped epic of revenge is killingly funny and dramatically daring.

It's risky making an action picture that breaks its violent stride to emphasize the difficulties of living up to preconceived ideas of masculinity. But it's that risk that makes Black Rain distinctive. By refusing to beat its Eastern and Western protagonists into comic-book pulp, the movie pays them, and the audience, a rare compliment.

You can see most of the plugs in the trailer. As most fans of the early, better Bond films know, the only life left in the series is in the gadgets....As for humor, Brosnan can deaden a double-entendre faster than he can change outfits.

Schrader is out there again, testing the limits of audience tolerance. Good for him. Buoyed by his questing spirit and Dafoe's mesmerizing performance, Light Sleeper might just keep you up nights.

Gosford Park abounds in scenes to savor. It's a feast, and one of Altman's best.

They are all victims of a script of such colossal banality and gross stupidity that smiles freeze on their faces, leaving them looking trapped and desperate, much like the audience.

Subversive and diabolically funny.

If you see one Minnesota movie this year, make it "Fargo." This botch job should be stamped direct to video.

Witherspoon has nailed it before, notably in "Election," but her portrayal of June is astounding in its vitality and richness.

McGrath's script is faithful: fierce when it needs to be and devilishly funny.

Scenes with Burns crackle with the toxic energy that makes Confidence a game worth playing.

Meryl Streep can do anything: sing, dance, do splits, act her heart out. She (almost) saves this clumsy, overwrought film version of the Abba musical that's been running on stages from Broadway to Barcelona since 1999.

August keeps a discreet distance from the harsher realities, making The Best Intentions must viewing only if you find diluted Bergman better than no Bergman at all.

Watson and Everett, both superb, bring ferocity and feeling to their roles. But the one you won't forget is Wilkinson (In the Bedroom) in a towering performance of grace and grit that deserves to put him on Oscar's shortlist. Good show.

Harris offers an adrenalin rush of energy and talent. Her artfully stylized, explosively funny film also manages to be deeply moving without jerking easy tears.

But Stone has found in Cruise the ideal actor to anchor the movie with simplicity and strength. Together they do more than show what happened to Kovic. Their fervent, consistently gripping film shows why it still urgently matters.

The pleasures of this endeavor, directed with a keen eye for detail by Pieter Jan Brugge, come from what the actors bring to the material.

Besides the in jokes, the animation and the Alan Menken score supply enough glorious entertainment to hold even brats and cynics in thrall.

You might think there's no downside to a movie that peeks up the skirts of babes in micro-minis, but writer-director Angela Robinson's dimwitted satire is libido-killing proof to the contrary.

Abort! Abort! It's that time of year when Hollywood releases movies it should never have made in the first place.