Rene Rodriguez

It's impossible not to shake the feeling that we've been here before, and the movie never does convince you that a return trip was entirely necessary.

You'd be hard pressed to find a more routine, more shamelessly by-the- numbers flick than this one. Predictability? In the case of Nowhere to Run, everything feels recycled -- even the title. [21 Jan 1993, p.F5]

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

Never feels like anything more than a Saturday morning cartoon pumped up to big-screen dimensions.

Planet of the Apes is never quite boring -- the movie is constantly giving you something new to look at -- but it's still a disappointingly dull and underplotted ride.

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

The movie is quick and breezy for its first half-hour, then seems to grind down to a deadened pace: The actors' routines lose their freshness, and the nonexistent story line becomes apparent. The jokes get worse, too. Fortunately, at 80 minutes, the film is too brief to drag. [21 April 1992, p.E7]

One of the most rewarding and engaging movies of the year. Don't miss it.

Often makes for a compelling comedy-drama about family ties. It's only when the cancer takes center stage that the movie feels like a wash.

Does the movie bear any relation to the video game? Not much. Do the dinosaur effects steal Jurassic Park's thunder? Keep dreaming. Will kids want to see it? Depends on how big Nintendo fans they are. Super Mario Bros. is like watching somebody else play a video game: It's flashy, colorful and wholly uninvolving. [29 May 1993, p.5]

The more hellish the story gets, the sillier and less involving the movie becomes.

It's a testament to their performances -- and the spirit of this surprisingly raunchy, decidedly R-rated comedy -- that by the end credits, you've grown to like them a little bit. You just wouldn't want to live with them.

You never really get the sense Zhang is taking the movie seriously, so you can't either. A Woman, a Gun and a Noodle Shop proves that American filmmakers aren't the only ones who can bungle remakes of foreign movies.

It's not every movie that makes you wish Vin Diesel would run in and start blowing up stuff.

The Wrestler presents a fascinating peek at the workings of the pro wrestling industry (the tenderness and humor the athletes share backstage is the complete opposite of the ferocity they display in the ring).

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.

Mother and Child is good when it takes a harsh, unsparing look at lament and the burdens we carry throughout our lives. Then it goes for your tear ducts, and we're suddenly stranded in Lifetime TV territory.

Freejack is among the most incoherent sci-fi action films we've seen in a while, despite the credentials of producer- screenwriter Ronald Shusett, who brought us Total Recall and Alien. [24 Jan 1992, p.G5]

There's a mean little Hollywood satire squirreled away within Hollywood Ending, but you have to look hard to find it.

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

At heart, The Ghost and the Darkness is essentially Jaws with paws -- at one point, you can see the lions' silhouettes circling under a sea of roiling dry grass. It has all the requisite elements for a sweeping, old-fashioned jungle adventure -- except the adventure. [11 Oct 1996, p.6G]

Bad enough to earn a rare spot on my hallowed list of ''The Worst Movies I've Ever Seen,'' An American Carol is testament that the country's culture wars are raging just as strongly within Hollywood as anywhere else.

Neither as good nor as bad as you'd hoped it would be: It's just a mediocre exploitation picture with an inspired premise (succinctly spelled out by its title), loads of gratuitous gore, a dash of equally gratuitous nudity and enough inanities to make you wonder if Ed Wood rose from the grave to serve as a creative consultant on the project.

The third -- and thinnest and weakest and least funny -- installment in Ice Cube's popular Friday series.

The movie is all moist grime and seedy atmosphere, and it's certainly something to look at: It's beautifully lurid. But it's an empty, unengaging movie, and by the end, it has become ridiculous, too.

Feels like a cobbled collection of ideas and conceits rather than a stand-alone story.

There are moments in the punishing drama Once Were Warriors that are supremely difficult to watch, but you can't tear your eyes away. Once these characters -- a violence-prone Maori family living in contemporary New Zealand -- get hold of you, you're in for the long haul. [09 Feb 1995, p.1G]

Jingle All the Way is at its best when piling on the slapstick, which director Brian Levant ( The Flintstones ) wisely does often. [22 Nov 1996, p.6G]

Befitting a story about marriage, adultery and murder, all the characters in Married Life are constantly lying to each other. Sometimes they even lie to the audience.

The acting is better than Ivy deserves. Barrymore is surprisingly good, bringing the right amount of sexuality and mischief to her performance without coming across as ridiculous. It's tough for someone known mostly as a child actor to break into more adult roles, but she pulls it off. [04 Jun 1992, p.F3]

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.

Turns out to be far more interesting for grown-ups (the movie is probably too long, and too much, for little kids anyway).

Down in the Valley becomes increasingly harder to believe as it goes along, with people behaving in ways that strain credibility.

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.

For those who can tough it out -- and not everyone will -- Hunger is a searing experience. Just don't expect to have much of an appetite when it's over.

A handsome, sincere, well-meaning bore.

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.

If not exactly epic, the movie is certainly the biggest and most complex of Rodriguez's Mariachi trilogy, which began in "El Mariachi" and continued in "Desperado."

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.

Plays like a colorful but inert timekiller that you might tolerate while dozing off in front of the TV, but only because you are too sleepy to reach for the remote control.

There are three or four big laughs scattered throughout The Pink Panther 2, along with a smattering of decent chuckles. But all those moments combined account for maybe five minutes of screen time, which leaves you with another hour and a half of movie to sit through.

The remarkable Hoop Dreams proves that even at its best, Hollywood can't match the drama of everyday life. This rich and insightful documentary, which traces five years in the lives of two Chicago inner-city kids, is more compelling than anything a pack of scriptwriters could ever concoct. [21 Oct 1994, p.G5]

Ferrell's shtick never grows tiresome, because it's constantly changing.

Misses out on just about everything that made the original work, most notably Falk and Arkin, whose odd-couple pairing was the foundation on which the entire movie rested.

It's the kind of movie for which the phrase ''you've never seen anything like it before'' was invented. The question is whether anyone would want to.

Alice in Wonderland is curiously devoid of metaphors and allegories about a young woman on the cusp of adulthood, about to be engaged by arrangement to a loathsome toad of a man she can barely stomach. The lack of psychological subtext is hugely disappointing.

There's very little in The Chorus you haven't seen before, but the movie's depth of sentiment -- especially its profound humanism -- makes it worth experiencing again.

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

Despite its flaws, Sleepy Hollow stays with you, the dark beauty of its images powerful enough to invade your dreams.

So superficial and formulaic that even Garner's mega-watt grin can't completely save it.

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.

For a movie whose characters are so preoccupied with immortality, Troy is curiously forgettable.

What makes it the best movie of the year -- is its insight into human behavior.

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.

Lee remains a superb entertainer -- like Oliver Stone, he's incapable of ever being boring -- but in She Hate Me, he comes dangerously close to seeming trivial, a crank-for-crank's-sake.

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.

Certainly diverting and, in Thurman, it also has a knockout of a performance.

Even if you're willing to overlook the preposterous plot holes in its premise, Accepted pushes its luck in its final half-hour.

Formidably stupid.

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.

Jeanne Dielman is not for all tastes. But for those with the necessary patience, it is a game-changing masterpiece. [11 Sep 2009, p.G18]

Costner does things he hasn't done in years: He's funny and playful; he laughs and cracks jokes; and he doesn't look like he's carrying the weight of the universe on his shoulders.

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

Hard Target is pretty much a bust from every conceivable aspect, except the visual -- it looks terrific, and one sequence, a shoot-out on the streets of New Orleans between Van Damme and a progressively larger number of bad guys, comes close to capturing the trademark frenzied, exhilarating feel of Woo's previous work. [20 Aug 1993, p.5]

Beautifully textured and layered movie.

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]

Lives or dies by your ability to buy the sight of Anthony Hopkins and Nicole Kidman snuggling in bed and enjoying hot, torrid sex. This may seem like a superficial approach to such a lofty, serious movie, but it is an insurmountable problem.

The plot lines all eventually fold into one another to form a well-rounded picture of a family struggling to gain a foothold in a foreign culture, though writer-director Miguel Arteta settles for a disappointingly conventional finale. Still, Star Maps has enough poetic grit and offbeat, unexpected humor to make Arteta a director worth watching. [22 Aug 1997, p.9G]

Beautifully crafted, intricately plotted and obviously a labor of love. It is also a mess.

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.

Lacks the one element that the filmmakers were most desperately aiming for: A genuine sense of fun.

Jam-packed with plot and characters, Thunderheart nonetheless drags along from scene to scene, never building any momentum or cumulative dramatic effect. It's a dull, muddled whodunit, an exploration of the relationship between Native Americans and white Americans and a tale of soul-searching by an uninteresting character. And none of it works. [3 Apr 1992, p.G13]

It's beautiful to look at, but there's little there to savor.

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.

Rousing, exhilarating entertainment.

A feverish pipe dream of a movie, fueled by an unbridled artistic imagination that serves as evidence of mad genius at work. [30 Dec 1996, p.1C]

Terrifyingly dull movie.

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.

It's Amy Poehler and Will Arnett, as a rival brother-sister skating team who are a little too intimate for comfort, who seem to be giving it their all. If only the movie had been about them.

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

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.

Daughters of the Dust is as concerned with grand and universal emotions as it is with its "story." Daughters is an enlightening and sublimely lyrical film. [27 June 1992, p.E5]

Best of all, though, is Seann William Scott as the profoundly annoying, profoundly vulgar Stifler.

This delicate, transporting movie, which keeps dialogue to a minimum to tell its story primarily through images, is also a triumph of sheer cinematic craft that mirrors its characters' contemplative natures while extolling the virtues of lives simply led.

14-year-old Noah Fleiss gives a performance that's every bit as astonishing as Haley Joel Osment's work in "The Sixth Sense."

It's all very "Cuckoo's Nest," but in a glib, facile way, and it leaves K-PAX adrift in its fuzzy, New-Agey orbit.

Enemy at the Gates will pique your interest in the Battle of Stalingrad, but it leaves that interest sadly unsated.

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.

For all its ambition, Daredevil can't overcome the fact that at its colorful center lies a perfect blank in a bad suit.

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

Falls far short of the sweep, complexity and passion it seeks.

So I Married an Axe Murderer is a clumsy mishmash of Saturday Night Live sketches and a rambling comic-thriller plot that wastes the promise of twisted laughs presented by its '50s B-movie title. [30 July 1993, p.G7]

The story's third-act detour into tragedy is predictable and unwelcome, providing a resolution that is too pat and familiar to be moving.

The movie, while no big deal, makes for much more entertaining viewing than other highly touted vehicles currently fighting for your moviegoing dollars. [25 Apr 1994, p.C2]

At least the special effects in Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen are remarkable: You never tire of the endless variations of robots Bay and his computer-generated effects crew come up with.

The Cable Guy might not please fans looking only for Carrey's usual shtick, but from here, it looks like a step toward adulthood. [14 June 1996, p.5G]

I Am Love is a bold and thrilling masterpiece -- the introduction of a major talent to the world's stage.

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

As absorbing as much of it is, Unbreakable winds up as a mild disappointment. But it leaves no question the hype around Shyamalan is well-deserved: This guy has a huge career ahead of him.

The best thing you can say about Just a Kiss is that it isn't every romantic comedy that throws in suicide, bondage and a plane crash in between all the bed hopping.

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.

Mr. Jones is an even bigger disappointment when you consider it's directed by Mike Figgis (Internal Affairs, Liebestraum), who has shown talent for off-kilter thrillers. Saddled with a routine and unimaginative script here, he indulges in well-worn cliches, including setting his big scene between Gere and Olin against a thunderstorm (which inadvertently drowns out part of Olin's dialogue). [9 Oct 1993, p.G4]

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.

If Soderbergh set out to make a galvanizing conversation piece, he has certainly succeeded. But this cold, occasionally dull movie practically defies you to embrace it.

The moral of Irreversible -- time destroys everything -- isn't nearly as profound as writer-director Gaspar Noé seems to think it is, which is why some critics have already dismissed the movie as the facile, misogynistic posturings of a provocateur.

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 Hunted is so openly, defiantly derivative of 1982's "First Blood," you figure there has to be a copyright lawsuit brewing right this very minute.

The movie, elegantly shot by Rodrigo Prieto, is sleek and brisk, using split-screens and graphics to help uninformed viewers grasp the basics of the corporate shenanigans the characters pull on each other.

The movie is supremely entertaining -- and often hilarious.

Campos, a cinematic disciple of Stanley Kubrick and latter-period Gus Van Sant, opts to let the movie do the talking for him. The fact that this is a film of few words only adds to its hypnotic, relentless pull.

A perfectly adequate horror romp, but it's hard to imagine anyone remembering it five years from now.

Inadvertently does with the civil rights movement exactly what Banderas set out not to do: trivializes it.

Enjoyably preposterous, old-guys-are-cool-too plot.

This is the most vibrant, exciting and invigorating movie-movie of the year.

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

You Again is at its funniest in the early scenes, when everyone is pretending all is well beneath forced smiles and plotting eyes.

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.

We Were Soldiers feels strangely irrelevant -- a well-acted, well-crafted and inconsequential visit to woefully familiar territory.

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 finished film has been tinkered with and tweaked so thoroughly that it borders on the incomprehensible.

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.

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.

A biopic that is as messy as the life it details.

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.

It's another portrait of amoral, hedonistic youth gone awry, a la Larry Clark's "Bully", and it is alternately engrossing and ridiculous, often in the span of one scene to the next.

Amid such a strong cast hitting all the right notes, Caruso looks wan, though he's not bad enough to sink the movie. [21 Apr 1995, p.5G]

The movie is bouncy and zesty, its energy unflagging, and some of the big numbers are heavily tinged with Bollywood. Conceptually, it should have been a trip.

Owing to a supremely engaging cast, The Client turns out to be stand-up Hollywood entertainment. Grisham's uninspired storyline can't ruin the efforts of two of the industry's best actors at the top of their form. [20 July 1994, p.E2]

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.

Where "Seven" seemed to radiate diabolical evil, Saw just radiates idiocy.

Profoundly hopeful and optimistic film.

Murderball invokes fascination toward its protagonists, because it views them with the same confidence and acceptance they view themselves.

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.

Loud and frantic and filled with all sorts of business, but it's also empty and inert, a creative exercise that would have played better as a 30-minute short.

The frustratingly uneven comedy Tropic Thunder has moments of full-on, bust-a-gut hilarity, along with long stretches where you can hear the crickets chirping in the theater.

Irritating when it should be amusing, dumb when it should be zany, flat when it should be snappy.

This is an eerie, inventively mounted movie: It's a shivery fun time, filled with dark corners, deserted hallways and sudden apparitions. But it never manages to genuinely rattle you.

Another joyless, brain-numbing adventure through lackluster Indiana Jones territory.

The most daring thing about Adam, the story of a young man with Asperger's syndrome, is that there isn't a scene in which someone stops to explain exactly what Asperger's IS.

Up in the Air is also optimistic about the perpetual themes that preoccupy so many movies that endure the test of time: Life is better with company. And everybody needs a co-pilot.

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.

Bandits isn't much more than a pleasant dawdle, one made extra-likable by Thornton and Blanchett, whose ace performances keep the film zipping along even at its most predictable.

The movie is a bauble, but it's an enjoyably weird and original one, and it is anchored by Black's constantly amusing performance.

There's plenty in Tokyo Decadence to titillate, and plenty to shock, too, and that should be enough to motivate some people into seeing it. The movie is never pornographic, though those who don't get out much are bound to be offended. There are also some interesting observations on Japanese culture put forth by Ai's various clients, though she remains an uninteresting cipher. Despite Murakami's best efforts, the things you'll remember most about Tokyo Decadence are the naughty bits. [23 Aug 1993, p.C5]

If you're going to make a heist picture, then at least have the decency to make the heist itself interesting. Otherwise, do like Tarantino did in "Reservoir Dogs" and just skip it altogether.

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

Everyone up on the screen appears to be having so much fun, you wish the movie found a way to let you into the party.

One of the most pessimistic movies about love Hollywood has ever made, a star-studded, glossy anti-date movie.

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.

The movie never approaches the level of screwball fun its cast seems capable of. But the curiosity of seeing Arnie grunt and groan with labor pains is hard to resist. [23 Nov 1994, p.E2]

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.

It's lifted from pretty much every movie or TV show you've ever seen about police corruption, only not done as well.

If Dreamcatcher ultimately feels like an unwieldy pastiche, at least it's never boring.

Worst of all is the movie's finale, a noble attempt to avoid an overly-pat conclusion that strays too far in the opposite direction.

Extreme Measures is a medical thriller with two personalities. At times, it's a drama about doctors with God complexes and a moral debate on questions such as, "If you had to kill one person to cure cancer, would you?"...Other times, it's a mystery about nefarious scientists, missing corpses and foot chases in the bowels of New York's subways...Neither side really works, though for a while the movie engrosses anyway. Even when you know you're being manipulated, Extreme Measures intrigues you in a Coma kind of way, because it initially preys on the same fears as that earlier thriller: vulnerability in hospitals at the hands of evil doctors...Then the mystery starts to unravel, and so does the movie. [27 Sept 1996, p.5G]

Emits a fishy odor, like a recruitment film for an obscure cult you'd rather stay away from.

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.

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.

The result leaves the movie feeling like a one-note take on a complex subject.

Everything about this excruciatingly dull, talky film screams made-for-network-TV: The I'm-only-here-for-a-paycheck performances by famous actors; the Crate and Barrel catalog mise-en-scene; the syrupy, heartwarming score that lays the pathos on so thickly you gag on it.

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

That broad range of subject matter is indicative of the messy, meandering structure of the movie. But if Moore fails to tie this unwieldy movie into a lucid thesis, at least every tangent he chases down has its own payoff.

Deja Vu becomes increasingly sillier.

It's an understatement to say that The Ring is not your ordinary horror film. And never forget to rewind.

Sarandon blends into the background, having practically nothing to do except stand around and wring her hands as the two men in her life battle it out in a passive-aggressive war. It's enough to make her want to run off with Thelma.

The worst kind of sequel -- the kind that exists only to give you more-more-more of what you liked the first time around, without ever justifying its own existence. This lavish, superbly designed film goes on for an exhausting 2½ hours.

The dumbest, most risible retelling ever made of the exploits of legendary bank robber Jesse James.

Gas -- the hot air variety -- is exactly what Driven is made of.

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.

Intrigues mainly for its spare style and brittle, sweat-soaked performances.

There's no denying the movie's visceral impact: It's too bad, though, that Jakubowicz isn't aiming for anything other than sensation.

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

There's nothing here that hasn't been done before, and better, in any given "Halloween" or "Friday the 13th" sequel.

Fast Food Nation would have benefited from a longer running time -- the movie often feels like it's missing big chunks of plot -- but Linklater's cautionary message gets through.

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.

Generic but breezily entertaining.

With a light, sometimes hilarious touch, Look at Me deflates the pretensions and self-obsessed nature of a group of wealthy Parisian literati, but its observations about the effects of fame and success and our natural desire to fan them as high as they can go, apply to anyone within range of reality-TV culture.

Too much of Lords of Dogtown still feels conventional and sugar-coated.

Surprisingly enjoyable.

Like every war before it, the U.S. invasion of Iraq has generated its share of movies. But The Hurt Locker is the first of them that can properly be called a masterpiece.

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.

Even if you don't buy the ending, however, High Tension makes for ghoulish, sick fun, and Aja, who is already at work on a remake of Wes Craven's The Hills Have Eyes, clearly takes this horror stuff very seriously. The genre can always use a few more like him.

Van Sant's refusal to delve into his subject in anything but an abstract way renders the movie pointless and frustrating -- a lyrical, lovely tone poem, signifying little.

Flyboys is so schematic and contrived, you can anticipate exactly what scene is going to come next, and who will be the next to die in combat, once you latch onto the structure of the script, which has all the inventiveness and ingenuity of a flow chart.

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.

The Dreamers argues that life must be lived, not dreamt. But it also remembers the confounding pleasures of dreaming with your eyes wide open.

The scattershot nature of the script, which feels as if it had been made up on the spot, leaves the actors looking like they're enjoying some private joke not shared with the audience. Self-indulgent does not even begin to describe it.

Miller has crafted some intriguing, complex characters and stranded them in a muddled story that doesn't know quite what to do with them.

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]

The longest and talkiest installment in the blockbuster Pirates trilogy, At World's End doesn't even have the decency to provide a good action sequence until more than two hours in.

At least LaBeouf makes for a likable hero. He's got the same kind of easy, natural charisma as Will Smith -- who, come to think of it, starred in another techno-paranoia thriller, "Enemy of the State," that Eagle Eye strongly resembles.

A curiously inert and talky action picture about good-looking mutants on the run from bad (but equally good-looking) ones, Push wastes a decent idea and stylish direction on a script that's much more Ingmar Bergman than Stan Lee.

It's just as boring and dumb as it sounds. This is the kind of movie that uses a shot of a bare butt as a punch line, and thinks having Encino Man's Brendan Fraser do a walk-on re- enaction of that movie's frog-eating scene is a clever cameo. As if. And Shore needs to freshen up his act: You can only act like a buffoon for so long before people start thinking of you as one. Remember Andrew Dice Clay? [2 July 1993, p.G5]

A stale pastiche of crime-caper dramas that goes through all the usual reversals, betrayals and triple-crosses with a sense of weary obligation.

Depends on one's ability to accept Sandler in the part: For me, the casting felt too much like a stunt, a filmmaker's compromise to get his intimate, uncommercial script green-lit.

Georgia Rule is so artificial, it feels like more of a flow chart than a slice of life.

By the end, Turtles Can Fly becomes a lyrical and heartbreaking reminder of the human toll of war.

Monumentally silly thriller.

What's missing is originality and story and inventiveness.

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

The Ruins is, with one major caveat, about as good an adaptation of Scott Smith's bestselling novel as Hollywood was ever going to make.

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.

There's never a question which side the movie is rooting for during the trial, and the light tone trivializes what might have been a much more intriguing exploration of the American legal system.

Like the type of music it celebrates, Rock Star is just a lot of posing, adding up to very little.

Although it is technically a sequel, Before Sunset stands perfectly well on its own. In fact, the new movie plays better if you haven't seen the original for a while, so its details have grown appropriately fuzzy.

Unlike much of Roberts' previous work, it's a movie about characters, not high concept, and it requires her to do more than make cute faces and flash her dazzling grin. [4 Aug 1995, p.4G]

Ultimately, Bad Boys is too slick for its own good; all gorgeous photography and little story. It's like a two-hour-plus music video. But it probably will be a hit. Lawrence and Smith are hot, and if the Beverly Hills Cop formula worked with one comedian, it should certainly work with two. [7 April 1995, p.5G]

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.

Even though Howard captures the texture, the personalities, and the often-breakneck pace of a big city newsroom, the movie feels oddly light and feathery. In its last third, it briefly threatens to become a biting dark satire before settling on a disappointingly conventional path. Still, there's an awful lot of star power at work here, some of it hard to resist. The Paper is old-fashioned Hollywood entertainment: flashy, breezy, and not at all challenging. [25 March 1994, p.5]

If Ghost in the Machine isn't the stupidest thriller of the year, it certainly holds the pole position in the race for that honor. The film combines computer hacking, virtual reality and serial murder into a plot so preposterous, so incredibly ridiculous, you keep watching just to see what the filmmakers will dare to do next. [31 Dec 1993, p.G5]

A visually thrilling experience.

Plot? There is no plot. You want plot, go read "War and Peace."

Sporadically engrossing in a pulpy kind of way.

Director Scott Marshall and screenwriter Mark Zakarin pander to Jewish viewers the way Andy Garcia's "The Lost City" panders to Cuban Americans.

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.

Makes for a compelling comedy-drama about family ties. It's only when the cancer takes center stage that the movie feels like a wash.

Unfortunately, disappointingly dull, a lumbering Bore-us-saurus of a movie.

The 6th Day gets a lot of mileage out of Schwarzenegger, who once seemed incapable of playing anything other than a cartoon but is becoming more and more of a "real" person with age.

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.

The movie is a lowbrow showcase for an equally lowbrow comedian, and how much of it you can endure depends entirely on how you feel about Kattan.

This is easily one of the silliest, most preposterous thrillers ever made, and the only reason it didn't go straight to video has to be that it stars Pacino.

Waltz With Bashir isn't only a harrowing anti-war plea, it is also an eloquent and deeply moving argument that it is critical to never forget human atrocity, lest the past be repeated.

In the end, they are only moments, and even at a merciful 86 minutes, Dirty Dancing: Havana Nights feels formidably long.

The result, as is always the case with short story collections, is a mixed bag, although unlike "Paris Je T'Aime," the duds outnumber the winners this time.

It's all amiably hackneyed, but it sucks you in anyway.

Beguilingly odd.

Gets everything right.

There's nothing about United 93 that qualifies as entertainment in the traditional sense: It is an unpleasant, wrenching experience, which is just as it should be.

A big, bold movie that gets at undeniable truths about the way no one, no matter how powerful, is immune from manipulation.

Only a very stony heart could resist its pull.

A momentary diversion.

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.

This is a disastrously clumsy, heavy-handed movie, one so desperate and exploitative that it resorts to putting a live grenade in the hands of a baby in order to get its message across.

You don't go into a movie called Ninja Assassin expecting a hell of a lot, but this shockingly disjointed and relentlessly dull picture can't even deliver the martial-arts kick its title so plainly promises.

Does more than pay lip service to its subtexts.

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

The Straight Story truly is one from the heart, and it is wonderful.

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]