Rene Rodriguez

The result is one of the most visually astonishing martial-arts fantasies ever made.

It's a punchy, straight-up genre picture, a crime drama that might have once starred Charles Bronson or Steven Seagal.

By the time its open-ended conclusion rolls around, you've forgotten you're watching a "comedy." All you can see in front of you are complicated, impetuous real people -- and that's about the biggest compliment any filmmaker could hope for. [06 Feb 1997, p.5F]

The movie ultimately plays as a dead-on snapshot of the much-maligned post-Baby Boomer generation. In 10 years, Reality Bites might seem dated and irrelevant. Right now, it feels remarkably astute. [18 Feb 1994, p.G5]

Attention all geeks (and geeks at heart): Get ready for two hours of serious awesome.

Maps to the Stars is haunted by ghosts, the way the film industry is haunted by its past, and Cronenberg gradually tapers down the dark humor and starts to amp up the ugliness of these blank, superficial lives.

There's nothing "big" about Trees Lounge : Its comedy, as well as its drama, is purposely understated, culminating in a long shot that uses an actor's face to speak volumes. It has the spirit of Cassavetes in it, only it's not nearly so self-indulgent, and its emotions are so real they hurt. [25 Oct 1996, p.5G]

Like the best coming-of-age stories, I'm Not Scared (Io Non Ho Paura) is, in part, a work of horror.

The summer movie season has barely begun, and already we have its first big surprise.

Madrid, 1987 operates on a dizzying number of levels - as a romantic comedy, a sex farce, a study of culture clash, ageism and idealism - and the highest compliment you can give this ridiculously talky movie (which plays better if you speak Spanish) is that you're a little sad to see the characters go on their way once they part, probably forever.

Its lingering hangover, however, is decidedly pleasant.

The relentless pace is a big part of the fun. Who ever heard of a slow rollercoaster, anyway? You'll have to ride this one in the theater, though. It simply won't be the same at home.

Nowhere Boy is great at depicting the birth of Lennon's love for his art.

It's a strange kind of spiritual movie -- one that aims for the gut more often than the heart.

The movie moves at a relentless clip, and the characters react intelligently enough to their situation to make it crackling good entertainment -- with bite. [15 Oct 1993, p.G5]

To lump in this smart, subtle, deviously effective thriller with "The Omen" or "The Good Son" is neither fair nor entirely accurate.

You have never seen a movie quite like this one.

There's no denying the intelligence at work here, or Braff's skill at weaving off-the-wall humor and sight gags into a story that, at heart, is profoundly sad.

This is easily Bay’s best movie, the work of a filmmaker with a cracked sense of humor that he is able to share with the audience.

Delivers an even bigger sugar rush than the hit Broadway musical.

Although not quite as over-the-top visually as his Oscar-winning The Great Beauty, Youth is still spectacular, filled with tableaux (a group of people sweating silently inside a sauna, a naked man and his prostitute inside a hotel room) that juxtapose the desires and personalities of young and old without dialogue.

It's an unabashedly square picture, and proud of it. It is also a warm, funny, earnest movie, a stand-up exercise in a kind of Hollywood melodrama -- the feel-good weepie -- that has long been out of fashion.

It's a shrewd, poignant drama disguised as a comedy.

The movie also glows bright with life and hope, celebrating the innate human instinct to push onward and persevere, even in the face of incomprehensible evil.

Primer is obviously not for all tastes, but if it connects with you, prepare to be obsessed.

Lacks emotional depth and sweep -- but the movie still delivers the type of rousing, large-scale adventure that marked the best films of its kind

Although the characters are all cartoons, Ritchie still invests them with enough personality to make them stand out as real people, which is what makes RocknRolla much more involving than your typical Tarantino ripoff.

Cassel, who won a Cesar (France's equivalent to the Oscar) for his performance, invests the character with a grounding of humanity and honor that imply there are certain lines even Mesrine would never cross.

Not all of the characters in the movie get just and fair send-offs, but Virzi’s stylish picture argues that’s the price we pay when a capitalist society trains us to place our own selfish interests above everything else. It’s a rat race that ultimately has no winners.

Weiner tells a different story — a riveting portrait of a man so consumed by hubris and confidence that he is utterly blind to his failings.

Initially sounds perverted but ends up being just the opposite.

Humpday sells its admittedly far-fetched premise by illustrating how men often can't help but behave like stubborn children in the company of their friends -- even when the stakes are raised to ridiculous levels.

It's a mean, incendiary picture that, below the surface, relies on racial hatred (as in white vs. black) to propel its story. But Trespass does deliver a roller coaster ride of blazing guns, heroic machismo and bullet-riddled bodies. The unsavoriness that propels some of those thrills is simply part of the game. [26 Dec 1992, p.E4]

You come away from Mud fondly remembering those two boys, especially Ellis, who has taken his first steps toward adulthood and discovers it suits him just fine.

The result is a rare live-action Disney movie that merits comparison to its beloved feature-length cartoons.

The movie is so cheerfully, furiously relentless, its contagious silliness wears you down.

A brisk and lively cinematic Cliff's Notes of the 2005 nonfiction bestseller that made the lofty promise to reveal "the hidden side of everything."

The movie leaves you feeling angry and frustrated anyway. And justice for all? Hardly.

Will Noah anger some rigid purists and scholars because of the liberties it takes? Perhaps. But the point to take home is the message the movie leaves you with, which works regardless of your faith (or lack thereof). Humans are inherently flawed. How we deal with those defects is what truly matters.

What ensues is a love story ringed by barbed wire and etched in blood with the jagged neck of a broken beer bottle.

By film’s end, everyone has been transformed for the worst. Heli is a troubling and upsetting picture, a portrait of a broken country that seems to be beyond repair and a depiction of how violence and corruption, when left unchecked, taints saints and sinners alike, sparing no one.

The film seems simple and facile at a glance, but these characters and their dilemmas stay with you. These days, any of us could suddenly be Larry Crowne.

This long, gorgeous, occasionally maddening movie is the work of a hopeless romantic who knows there is no pain as bittersweet -- or as haunting -- as the pain of a broken heart.

A thoroughly satisfying and engaging children's picture that never forgets those kids probably didn't get to the theater by themselves.

The movie has an exhilarating energy that is never exhausting, and the filmmaker’s trademark excesses, although toned down, are still at play. The meek should be wary; for everyone else, it’s party time.

A savage, insane movie - in the best way possible.

What Sunshine State lacks in momentum, it makes up for with a Dickensian sprawl of characters -- 50 in all -- who possess the depth and humanity that has become a Sayles trademark.

Even by Miyazaki standards, Ponyo makes less narrative sense than it should, and the pat ending is a bit of a letdown.

With Moore’s formidable, Oscar-bound performance, the picture transcends the usual cliches of the genre to become something far more moving and profound.

The most dangerous evil of all -- the kind fueled by plain human greed -- lurks behind every twist of Red Rock West, proving once again it's often the simplest stories, when told with intelligence and creativity, that work best. [16 Sep 1994, p.G4]

Joy Ride is also surprisingly funny, thanks mostly to Zahn.

Feuerzeig presents an unyieldingly sympathetic but always fascinating portrait of an artist whose mental illness became inseparable from his art, with one often fueling the other.

The movie is not without its pleasures. Chief among them is Sean Connery's robust performance.

Using a semi-documentary approach, Glatzer and Westmoreland circumvent the considerable potential for sentimentality inherent in their story, instead taking a frank and direct approach to kids who, while far from hardened, are nowhere near innocent, either.

It's the cinematic equivalent of a good page-turner, and even if it's nonsense, its claws dig surprisingly deep.

Abel is a man with ideals in a world that has no use for them: If he’s going to succeed, he’s going to have to use his wits instead of bullets, and although the odds against him are formidable, watching his struggle is riveting entertainment.

In the movie’s best scene, Bisset lays into Depardieu with the rage and anger of a woman who has tolerated bad behavior for too long (there’s a fiery spontaneity to their verbal sparring that makes you wonder if the scene was improvised).

Style is the main attraction in The Limey -- it's as close to experimental filmmaking as mainstream movies get -- but the film works well when taken simply as a pure revenge drama, too.

Scott Cooper, who directed and co-wrote Out of the Furnace, empathizes with people who feel their lives have hit a dead end (his previous film, "Crazy Heart," earned Jeff Bridges an Oscar as a washed-up country singer who had given up on himself). These are difficult characters to dramatize.

The Hangover remains unrepentantly irresponsible and hilarious throughout, culminating with what could be the funniest montage ever to grace a picture's end credits. The summer's first sleeper hit has arrived.

Written and directed by James Mottern with more attention to character than to plot, Trucker is a simple, unadorned study of a loner forced by circumstance to embrace the world again -- but only on her terms.

This is a thriller that embraces stillness and silence where others prefer noise and bombast. It thrives on the hush before the explosion instead of its aftermath, and it's that eerie sense of expectation that gives the film its thick aura of suspense.

Even if the movie loses its nerve at the end, that doesn't take anything away from Washington's performance.

The best way to approach Joel and Ethan Coen's eagerly awaited True Grit is to lower your expectations, then lower them a bit more. The problem is not the movie, which is a terrific, no-nonsense, straightforward western. The surprise – or vague disappointment – is the prevailing lack of Coen-ness in the movie.

The movie ultimately turns out to be less about sex than it is about the point in a friendship where two people decide they will both be better off if they part ways.

Because Kitano also wrote and directed the movie, Zatoichi also features all kinds of beguiling, if admittedly bizarre, subplots and forays into nonsequitur territory.

If Ray fails to present a genuine portrait of a complex man's essence, it does leave you with an even greater sense of awe for Charles' accomplishments, both in his personal and public lives.

The most ingenious thing about the movie is how it plays to diehards and neophytes alike. Every Simpsons character gets at least a fleeting appearance (and occasionally, director David Silverstein uses the widescreen format to cram in as many of them into one shot as he can).

It's big, exciting, ambitious, and it makes you cry in all the right places.

With a steely, unblinking resolve, Downfall stares into the abyss, but does not pretend to comprehend it.

Gosling continues to prove he may the best actor of his generation. His performance in The Ides of March, following his comedic turn in "Crazy, Stupid Love" and his portrayal of a stoic loner in "Drive," proves this actor is capable of practically anything.

Catching Fire is a work of thoughtful, emotionally engaging sci-fi — everything that its predecessor The Hunger Games was not.

By focusing on his two young protagonists, Chang is able to explore the cultural differences between China and the rest of the world, resulting in sequences that are alternately humorous and eye-opening

This is a small, intimate movie bound to get lost in the holiday shuffle, but its pleasures are worth seeking out.

An uncommonly playful fright machine -- a fun house factory of scares.

The Neon Demon is a voluptuous provocation, a stylish free-fall down a gonzo rabbit hole that is as entrancing as it is maddening. Here is a rarity in this season of summer movie doldrums: A film that is guaranteed to elicit strong reactions.

A sparkling exercise in movie cool.

Love makes us do all kinds of crazy things, but in Crazy Love, crazy seems too mild a word.

The Broken Circle Breakdown manages to pull off a small miracle, using joyous music and tenderness to tell a tragic story that moves you but doesn’t depress you.

Shaped just like the murder-mystery its title promises, the documentary Who Killed the Electric Car? introduces us to the victim, then rounds up the suspects most likely responsible for its demise.

De Palma never achieved the box-office and Oscar glory of his contemporaries (Steven Spielberg, George Lucas, Francis Ford Coppola, Martin Scorsese), but this documentary is a testament to a talent that merits a place at their table.

That’s one of the great accomplishments of Ascher’s film: Intercutting his interviews with fictional recreations of what the subjects are describing allows you to see a version of what they saw, and you don’t need to believe any of it for The Nightmare to give you a major case of the creeps.

A funny and constantly surprising exercise in comic tension.

Reminiscent of Showgirls minus the sex, nudity, sleaze, bad acting and horrible dancing, Burlesque is a typical A Star is Born story.

A joyful romp, devoid of the tiresome pop-culture references.

What makes Whatever Works so enjoyable, aside from the unusually high number of effective one-liners the script contains (this is Allen's funniest movie since Mighty Aphrodite), are its supporting characters.

Black Book takes a brave, if odd, approach to a WWII historical drama, but one thing is certain: No one in the theater will be bored.

Often grim, but never nihilistic: Even at its darkest, Dizdar gives the movie an optimistic bounce. The movie is often shockingly funny, too.

Guaranteed to beguile anyone who can remember the joy -- and agony -- of anticipating the first time.

Exhausting at times, frustrating in others, Magnolia is mostly just exhilarating, the product of a raw, vibrant talent finding his footing in an adult world -- and unafraid to make mistakes.

There are a few surprises lurking in Cloverfield, and director Matt Reeves has an uncanny ability to time his jolts and scare when you least expect it.

For anyone interested in the art of comedy, it's a veritable primer on the vagaries of humor.

The movie asks tough, unflinching questions about America's responsibility to maintain world peace -- and the price we are willing to pay in order to accomplish that. Timely stuff, indeed.

The most amazing magic yet for the wildly popular franchise: It is genuinely engrossing.

Doesn't sugarcoat the painful realities of Alzheimer's or the difficult decisions faced by relatives of its victims, but by film's end, its clear-eyed melancholy winds up feeling strangely uplifting.

The movie is funny and scary and touching in all the ways the best children's pictures are, but it is also fast and compact, running a perfectly paced 93 minutes (including credits).

Hunt gives this funny, touching movie its soul, and the actors elevate the material into something more resonant and memorable than the story promises.

A brazen stunt that pays off. Writer-director Michel Hazanavicius, simultaneously channeling "Singin' in the Rain" and "A Star is Born," tells a story about 1920s Hollywood made in the style of that era.

For all its cross-cultural hijinks, Japanese Story winds up as a tale about the fragility of human beings and the lasting strength of the bonds we form during times of crisis.

The filmmakers capture enough of the book's essence -- and the power of its knockout, transcendent ending -- to more than justify the movie's existence.

Nolan, who has become an assured, stylish filmmaker in the span of only a few films, keeps the complicated plot spinning.

A mature, insightful and extremely well-acted study of a boy at a crossroads in his life, and a doomed, tortured man who, consciously or not, longs for some kind of redemption, before it's too late.

Ratner is canny enough to close the movie with a devilish tease that will send the Lambs faithful out with a delirious smile. What Red Dragon won't do is haunt your nightmares. Who could have guessed Hannibal Lecter would ever become such a crack-up?

If I hadn't seen the original, I might have gone ga-ga over Reeves' version. But even with the shock of novelty gone, the film still draws you into its chilly, demonic heart.

The Wave builds up a nice bit of genuine tension and hits some surprisingly dark notes.

You may not remember The Crazies in a month, but you'll have a grand time watching it.

It's almost startling to see a film that believes in itself and its characters so deeply.

One of the chief pleasures of My Week with Marilyn - which should not be approached as anything other than fluffy entertainment - is watching Williams bring to life Monroe's inner demons and her movie-star allure with equal aplomb. By the time the film's book-ending closing musical number comes around (That Old Black Magic), the illusion is astounding and complete.

Swinton single-handedly carries The Deep End past its nagging ambiguities.

Precious without ever being cloying, All the Real Girls is a wise, delicate and immensely touching romance.

A high-wire act of storytelling, tone and old-fashioned chutzpah.

Jackson's dazzling vision turns the story into a real movie-movie -- one that, unlike too many fantasy films today, is genuinely transporting.

Although the movie never so much as flirts with melodrama, there is still a bittersweet undercurrent.

La Promesse (The Promise) makes filmmaking look easy. The movie is deceptively simple, a tight little drama about guilt and conscience in which the creators' strings are completely invisible. It's fine storytelling in its purest form. [31 Jan. 1997, p.27G]

This lively, infuriating and occasionally moving film certainly leaves you thinking, and there isn't a dead spot in it. That's the mark of a real filmmaker, not just a muckraker.

It is to director Tykwer's credit that, although you never come close to understanding Jean-Baptiste, you don't turn your nose up at him, either.

Don Jon is nominally a love triangle between a woman, a man and his laptop, but the movie is much more thoughtful and substantial than that, and it takes a compassionate and humane approach to all of its characters, even when they’re at their most despicable.

By turns endearing and hilarious, Lilo & Stitch is proof the folks at Disney should break their own rules more often.

The movie is wild, but not in the ways that you expect, and it’s also surprisingly chaste — you think you see a lot more than you actually do.

Shower is also a comedy -- but it's the movie's melancholy streak that is its strongest asset.

Shot in the style of a documentary, which lends the movie an aura of utter realism, Maria Full of Grace derives an unsettling power from the clinical details of Maria's ordeal.

For this last chapter, the filmmakers play things relatively straight, resulting in the best Shrek movie to date.

A crackling crime drama assembled from a scrap heap of hoary cliches, Takers proves that everything old can sometimes really be new again.

There is nothing in this surprisingly funny, exciting film that feels like homework, and Branagh even dares to end the film on, if not quite a cliffhanger, then a daring "To Be Continued" note.

In its last half-hour, A Bigger Splash becomes a specific kind of story, and it’s not as pleasurable or strange as what preceded it.

An uncommonly intense and frightening experience, The Conjuring is the first genuinely scary release in ages by a major studio that features practically no violence and spills only a bit of blood.

Focusing on the contestants who make the initial cut -- two men and two women -- the film can't resist wringing some American Idol-style suspense from speculation about who the eventual victor will be. But the movie also leaves no doubt as to who the real winners are.

Rush is the kind of Hollywood studio production that has sadly become all too rare — a smart, exciting, R-rated entertainment for grown-ups that quickens your pulse and puts on a great show without ever insulting your intelligence.

In The Shape of Things, love doesn't just hurt: It bites, and bites deep.

May not reinvent the wheel, but its expertly delivered thrills would hit the spot at any time of year.

It's the overriding spirit of the movie that forms its greatest appeal: Here's a movie that isn't intent on conquering the world but simply entertaining you for a breezy 90 minutes.

This is a quiet, powerful film about the lengths we'll go to for the sake of the people we love - and the depths we'll sink to for the sake of the ones we hate.

Bug has an uncompromising, anything-goes daring: Friedkin, 71, has nothing to lose at this point, and he has made this low-budget, brazenly over-the-top picture strictly on his own terms.

This is the sort of small, intimate movie that, if it had been made on a low budget by independent actors, would be celebrated to the skies.

Dark, grim and exciting entertainment.

A manic and at times surprising comedy that has more imagination and creativity than all the Transformers pictures combined.

The film isn't as concerned with terrifying you as it is with showing you a good time, culminating with an over-the-top climax that is simultaneously utterly ridiculous and enjoyable.

Elysium, the second movie from writer-director Neill Blomkamp, isn’t quite as inventive or fresh as his knockout debut, 2009’s "District 9." But the new picture is cut from the same cloth — furiously exciting sci-fi, carefully considered and loaded with allegories and social commentary.

For those with the patience to latch onto Van Sant's slow, methodical groove. It's worth trying.

More sour than sweet, but Steers knows that, even in a cruel, unsentimental world, there is room for forgiveness and hope. Just don't expect a hug.

Blue Caprice only spends a few minutes reenacting their crime — the movie shows us exactly how they did it in just a couple of scenes — because the facts of the case aren’t the movie’s focus. Instead, this lyrical, frightening film is a portrait of a man consumed by self-hatred who decided to take it out on the world.

So thoroughly absorbing while it's unfolding that later, when you play the movie back in your head, it's surprising to realize how ordinary it is. That's a testament to Nolan's talent: He's able to make even the hoariest clichés feel fresh.

The movie's utter lack of predictability helps to keep you engaged, even if some of the plot turns are a bit baffling, and the unusual depth and complexity of the characters -- the eponymous heroine in particular -- give the picture its unusual, scalding power. You've never met a mother quite like this one.

Corben has done an impressive amount of journalistic research that will be of particular interest to South Florida audiences. Every time you think Miami couldn't possibly get any weirder, it does.

May prove too dark to make the list of Schwarzenegger's biggest hits. But the movie suggests the actor still has a lot to offer -- and he's willing to take some chances, too. Welcome back, Arnold.

Grim, relentless and immensely satisfying, The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 2 sends out the dystopian sci-fi franchise on a feel-bad high. Readers of Suzanne Collins’ source novel, who already know what’s coming, will be pleased by the movie’s merciless fidelity to the source material (or perhaps, considering the book is the least popular in the trilogy, will just be annoyed all over again).

Like "The King’s Speech" or "Shakespeare in Love," The Theory of Everything sometimes feels a bit too polished and precise, leaving no room for ambiguity and always staying easy to digest, like elegant pap.

Could there possibly be anything left to gain from yet another adaptation of Charles Dickens' tale about crabby old Ebenezer Scrooge and his life-changing encounter with three ghosts on Christmas Eve? In the case of Disney's A Christmas Carol, the answer is a surprising, resounding yes -- at least so far as the IMAX 3D version goes.

Light on plot but heavy on observation: Wang concentrates on exploring the unseen ways in which mother and daughter rely on each other.

This charmingly modest and entertaining film feels warmly human, and its virtues will remain in your memory days after you've seen it. [02 Sep 1994, p.G4]

The movie kicks off with a wonderful setpiece that shows off Spielberg’s ability to tell a story primarily through visuals — is there any other filmmaker working today better at this?

Frida, the kaleidoscopic drama based on the life of the Mexican painter/feminist/icon Frida Kahlo, was directed by Julie Taymor, which is the movie's first blessing.

Yes, Pineapple Express is exceedingly crude, but it's never mean or lewd, and for all the drugs and gore in it, the movie is also strangely, unrelentingly sweet, even when its characters are bleeding to death.

Everyone in the movie is a buffoon or a dolt. No one is redeemable. The humor comes at the expense of the characters: You're always laughing at them, never with them. The Coens have never seemed this disdainful, this mocking, of their fellow man.

The movie is filled with graphic sex scenes that leave nothing to the imagination — this film would make even John Waters blush — but there’s more at work here than shock value and sensationalism.

Chungking Express is really a sly and perceptive examination of the effects of urban alienation on romance -- specifically in its scarily dense and overdeveloped setting of dazzling Hong Kong. Chungking Express meanders at times and occasionally annoys (you won't want to listen to California Dreaming ever again), but the movie is all of one mood, and it leaves you craving more. [29 Mar 1996, p.21G]

Despite its serious subject matter, North Country is a crowd-pleaser at heart.

Succeeds where so many other recent horror pictures have failed: It consistently scares you silly.

The House I Live In is a work of journalism, not propaganda: Jarecki has done his research and leaves it to you to decide what to make of it.

The movie, which is as low-key and subdued as Tewfiq himself, is something of a marvel: a precious work of minimalism that, instead of disappearing into itself the way so many small-scale comedies do, grows before your eyes into something profound and profoundly affecting.

Using a buzzy, unnerving score by Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross, Citizenfour makes you share the same sense of shock and paranoia as Snowden spews damning information that implicates the White House in transgressions that extend beyond our borders into other countries.

Musical Chairs is about overcoming impossible odds and never giving up and chasing your dreams – all that afterschool-special stuff - but it's also charming and upbeat, and it's stuffed with great, vibrant, insanely catchy music. No Bee Gees, though.

Here is a crime drama that punches you in the gut, full on, and dares you not to blink.

A very complicated movie. It is also pretty wonderful.

One gigantic pile of cornball clichés, but there's no denying the movie works you over anyway.

This is more of an exercise in experiential cinema, as well as a blistering critique of a society that drives its poorest to unimaginable acts for mere survival.

There's nothing in Bounce you haven't seen before, but the movie is surprisingly unsentimental, the Paltrow factor cannot be denied.

Scorsese has crafted a luxurious entertainment that goes down like a flute of sparkling, silky champagne.

The strained, strange relationship between father and son ultimately becomes the emotional center of The Clan, culminating with an astonishing closing shot guaranteed to induce startled gasps. It’s a great, jarring moment that is the work of a filmmaker clearly in love with his craft — and a flavor for the darker side of human nature.

There's a terrible beauty to the work of Larry Clark, the controversial photographer turned filmmaker, that transcends chic nihilism.

Corbijn makes the familiar strange, focusing on details other filmmakers would gloss over.

Compared to manipulative tearjerkers like "Pay It Forward" or "Men of Honor," Billy Elliot is a model of restraint, one that earns its warmth the hard way -- by making us care about the people who are going through familiar steps.

This Is the End is a marvelously sustained, high-wire goof – a movie so nutty and daring, so crazy and out-there, that it feels like a low-budget independent except with big stars and a sizable budget.

Craven ("Scream," "Nightmare on Elm Street") is already a legend in horror film circles, but this is the first time he has tried his hand at a slick, relatively bloodless suspense-thriller, and the genre suits him.

The first of this summer's would-be blockbusters that deserves to be a hit.

Every time Riding Giants starts feeling a little too insidery for casual viewers, along comes another, even bigger wave, daring these puny mortals to conquer it.

Buoyed by a superlative soundtrack, ATL plays a familiar song about growing up, but hits notes that sound brand new.

There are no "Crying Game" switcharoos or "Sixth Sense" plot twists in store here. But knowing too much about Catfish beforehand ruins the experience.

The sci-fi thriller Repo Men gets off to a sluggish start. But wait. You have to give the movie time to find its groove and establish its premise.

The fact that Garland manages to cram in speculative ideas about the perils of a society that relies too heavily on technology is a bonus. In Ex Machina, love hurts, big time, for man and machine alike.

Unlike last year's "Coco Before Chanel," in which Audrey Tautou played a warmer, kinder spirit, Mouglais presents her character as steely and unbending, a woman who has built her empire on her terms and refuses to abdicate the slightest control on her life.

Unexpectedly funny, leisurely paced and oblivious to the demands of its genre, Inside Man has a loose, playful vibe that's at odds with its grave life-and-death scenario.

Baghead will disappoint gore hounds or anyone looking for an extreme horror experience -- this is more of a comedy-drama than anything else.

The casting is the key to the success of this absolutely hilarious crowd-pleaser.

Tangled packs old-fashioned Disney magic as endless as Rapunzel's locks.

A fascinating record of how the movie fell apart, piece by piece, with everything short of a natural disaster conspiring against the filmmaker.

Where Planet Terror is all hollow, self-conscious homage, Death Proof is the work of a director striving to make something original while remaining true to the movies that influenced him. It is also, once it gets going, terrific, sensational fun -- precisely the vibe Grindhouse aims for, but only sporadically attains.

This is a dark and shivery story about motherhood, a common subject for horror movies, but one that’s rarely treated with such intelligence or seriousness of intent.

If The Score isn't quite in the same league as the classic "Rififi" or even "Thief," its single-mindedness still makes for a refreshing change from the preposterous bloat of most contemporary action movies.

The Visitor is a small movie, but its emotions could not be writ any larger.

A perfectly cast Keanu Reeves pokes deadpan fun at himself in the role of Justin's New Age dentist, who hypnotizes the kid and encourages him to find his inner ''power animal.'' And Vince Vaughn, in a rare straight turn, is excellent as Justin's high school teacher.

Never becomes cloying, because although Agresti does not lose sight of the great sadness at the center of his tale, he resists the temptation to overplay its bigger moments.

What distinguishes The Orphanage are some spare but fiendishly well-placed shocks that give the film an extra sense of danger: You can't take comfort with this one assuming you know what lurks around each corner, because you don't. Trust me.

Tilda Swinton is the star of We Need to Talk About Kevin, and her performance is so complex and volcanic and transfixing that all of the film's flaws melt away.

Filled with conspiracies, intrigue and the suggestion that modern-day society is purposely designed to drive us a little nuts, The Manchurian Candidate is a paranoid fantasy for our time.

The performances are all terrific - Stillman gets his actors to latch onto his absurdist vibe, then gives them wonderfully rich dialogue to play with.

Point Blank is as disposable as a feature-length episode of TV's 24: The movie is all adrenaline and excitement, and it doesn't really stay with you. Just try to tear your eyes away while you're watching it, though.

Oliver Stone tried encapsulating Alexander's life into one movie, only to discover the task was impossible. Bodrov knows better, using Mongol -- the first of an intended trilogy -- to center on Genghis Khan's formative years.

A straightforward, earnest, sentimental picture: It's all the things you'd think a Sept. 11 movie directed by Oliver Stone would never be.

The movie is more interested in making viewers consider its disenfranchised protagonists from a fresh perspective. The fact that the film accomplishes this without a trace of gooey sentimentality is a small miracle.

Hacksaw Ridge may be too syrupy for cynical tastes and too brutal for the timid.

Bitter, brittle, condescending and petty, the titular character of Margot at the Wedding, fabulously played by Nicole Kidman, is a successful short story writer who resents other people's happiness.

Despite its downbeat theme, A Single Man is ultimately optimistic about the human capability to gradually make peace with seemingly insurmountable pain and tragedy.

Milks Carter's story for maximum "inspirational" value, and at times the movie skirts dangerously close to afterschool-special territory.

Despite the efforts of the cast (Byrne and Murphy are particularly good), you rarely feel a thing for any of them, but I don't think you're really supposed to, anyway. The characters in Sunshine tackle thorny ethical questions and debate the sanctity of life on their way to the sun, but the movie is really about the voyage, not the voyagers. Enjoy the sights.

An uncommonly polished and sophisticated superhero movie.

Surprisingly enjoyable.

As for getting close to Wintour -- or even explaining the unfathomable mystery that can be haute couture -- the film comes up empty.

The documentary Mad Hot Ballroom is packed from start to finish with adorable kids doing cute things: Rarely has a movie, fictional or not, had this much awwwww factor.

The combination of youthful irreverence and military indoctrination is jarring.

The Savages is ultimately about two siblings, both around 40, in the midst of learning it's never too late to start embracing life, no matter how rotten a hand you were dealt in the past.

But there are so many beautiful, tender moments in In America -- that it's easy to forgive Sheridan's manipulative ploys.

Grandly entertaining documentary.

As usual, Brooks displays an uncanny knack for mining the universal elements of his characters' situations. Many scenes in the movie ring so familiar, you'd think he had been spying on your visits home. [10 Jan 1997, p.4G]

In Logan, the clawed mutant Wolverine finally gets to slash through the constraints of a kid-friendly PG-13 rating, and the result is bloody, vicious fun. The squeamish will avert their eyes, and young children should not be allowed anywhere near this movie, no matter how many X-Men action figures they own.

Efron makes you believe he’s capable of anything. Neighbors is rude, brazen and merrily offensive, and the movie mines the homoerotic undertones of fraternities to fine (if lowbrow) comic effect. But Efron, of all people, gives the film a curious edge.

Never crosses over into meanness, and even the most satirical character has a moment of empathy.

Through Tautou's performance, Coco Before Chanel reveals the formation of an artist.

Survives its surface annoyances because Lynch's script also has ambition, heart and something to say other than love conquers all.

Essentially, You Don't Mess With the Zohan isn't all that different in tone and sensibility from Sandler's previous films, but he's really trying in this one, and the effort pays off.

Midnight in Paris initially seems like a departure for Allen, but the prevailing theme blends right in with the rest of his canon.

This bruising, harrowing movie would be impossible to sit through without at least a hint of light at the end of its astonishingly dark tunnel.

Might have been unbearable if Linklater hadn't filled it with so much self-deprecating humor, undercutting the pretentiousness whenever it threatens to become too thick.

Some of the creations these chefs produce defy belief (and make you wish you could jump into the screen to have a taste).

Beguilingly odd.

Gets everything right.

Only a very stony heart could resist its pull.

It's a fantastic special effect because it doesn't look like a special effect: The movie sells the illusion that the suit could maybe, possibly, exist.

The more preposterous Out of Time gets, the more enjoyable the movie becomes.

Bold and intrepid film buffs: The gauntlet has been thrown. Here's something you don't see every day - thank goodness.

None-too-subtly implies Murrow could easily be talking about the present day.

Lowery has a lyrical style of storytelling that is delicate and subtle yet suffused with emotion and atmosphere. It’s gentle and pointed at the same time. Ain’t Them Bodies Saints wafts over you like a dream, leaving behind a lovely, melancholy trace that hurts.

The Doom Generation is Araki's boldest -- and best -- movie yet, his most blatantly offensive, his most sexually explicit and by far his bloodiest. [17 Nov 1995, p.6G]

Phillips keeps the movie funny and riotous without glamorizing his characters’ misdeeds. The film is a comedy, but it’s never trivial, and the filmmakers don’t let the government’s participation in what transpired slip by unnoticed.

Director Kevin Macdonald, an accomplished maker of documentaries making his feature-film debut, gives The Last King of Scotland the pace and crackle of a thriller, albeit a thriller with substance.

What a grand and dazzling route Coppola takes.

Duigan instead relies on a light, whimsical touch, with just a dab of fantasy and much beautiful imagery. The result has the feel and texture of a bewitching, richly gratifying dream. [11 March 1994, p.5]

That's what The Sandlot repeatedly does: Confound your expectations. It's a charming and hilarious flick for kids (boys in particular will eat it up) that feels remarkably fresh, even during its occasional foray into cliche land. [7 Apr 1993, p.E1]

Smith's funniest, sharpest and most polished movie to date. It also is his most mature and emotionally engaging picture, even if it happens to contain one of the grossest sight gags I've ever encountered in a mainstream Hollywood film.

Borrowing its title from a mix tape Cobain compiled as a teenager, the film, made with the cooperation of his widow, family and former bandmates, remains compelling and moving no matter how familiar you already are with the singer’s story.

A wonderfully rumpled, loose comedy about the paralyzing fear of failure.

Despite moments of intense suspense and glints of bizarre horror, Tom at the Farm is ultimately a psychological thriller.

What distinguishes Spider-Man from most other comic book movies is that the film is at its most engaging when its hero is out of costume.

It's a breezy, homespun, relaxing thing...watching this laid-back picture feels, oddly enough, like a vacation from movies.

Margin Call doesn't demonize its characters, nor does it absolve them of their sins. The movie simply shows, without judgment or anger, how our economic crisis came to be.

By film's end, Leconte has made you believe these disparate men inhabit the same soul: The chasm between them is a matter of paths not taken.

A mean and exceedingly well-made little B-picture, but the questions it raises are far too complex to answer with a simple gunshot.

Lurking just beneath Water's serene, storybook surface is an unmissable, defiant passion.

Although there are several stretches in the movie in which Seidl seems to be repeating himself, the director is carefully building toward a knock-out final scene in which the inscrutable, often annoying Anna becomes beautifully, poignantly human in front of our eyes, like magic.

Escape from Tomorrow is more of an experimental film than a traditional narrative, but intrepid viewers — or anyone who has ever visited a Disney park — will enjoy getting lost in this dark house of happy horrors.

The most horrific -- and heartbreaking -- scene of any movie thus far this year comes at the climax of The Cove.

What makes the picture sail past its flaws is its earnest understanding of the desperation that drives people to regain control of their lives -- and the profound courage required to attempt it.

By giving the hero's inner plight so many dimensions, Superman Returns brings a richer, grander perspective to a seminal character without changing his essence. It's a profoundly personal take on a universal icon, made by a filmmaker who continues to improve with each movie.

In a simple, direct manner, Gunner Palace reminds you that the thousands of faceless, nameless troops in Iraq are still there after you switch off CNN.

It's all speed, movement and blood -- lots and lots of blood.

Watching this essentially good but misguided kid slide into a hopeless future is both transfixing and heartbreaking.

Scary? Yes, in spots. Gratuitously gory? You bet. But, first and foremost, Zombieland is a comedy.

Don’t expect Hitchcock or De Palma here — Reichardt is much too low-key and modest for such crowd-pleasing pyrotechnics — but one long, sustained shot near the end seems to suggest that people who are convinced they are doing the right thing are capable of great evil.

It's an uncommonly optimistic meditation on death and lament, befitting a filmmaker whose movies (Jerry Maguire, Singles, Say Anything), no matter their subject matter, always double as a celebration of life.

One of the amazing things about Volver is that Almodóvar once again manages to make a preposterous, overloaded plot seem sublime and organic: It's his profound empathy for his characters and their very human dilemmas and flaws that allows him to fling them into all sorts of odd places without ever losing sight of them as people.

The movie doesn't quite achieve the transcendent effect it reaches for, saddled with an ending that fails to live up to our expectations. But the experience of watching Babel is undeniably riveting: Even if the film doesn't really lead anywhere, you still can't take your eyes off it.

As the movie breathlessly cuts back and forth from a boisterous wedding celebration to a high-stakes soccer match, even the grumpy cynics will have been won over.

A big, boisterous action-comedy - a funny, exciting and intentionally goofy summer movie that just happens to arrive in the middle of January.

Has a crackling, almost farcical pace, even though its subject matter could not be more serious or complex.