Robert Koehler

Mannion's script goes a bit too far in terms of twists, capping the third-act suspense with a plot U-turn, and then another, that leaves audiences feeling played. Worse, the final development loses credibility in retrospect, reducing the film to the level of an exercise in paranoia, effects and one actor's ability to hold attention for nearly 90 minutes.

If all that Ian Inaba's latest Guerilla News Network missive, American Blackout, wants to do is get left Democrats worked up into a lather of righteous anger at crafty Republicans, it does so at the expense of speaking to any other group of Americans. As such, docu is extremely limited and almost without purpose except as an organizing tool for party foot soldiers.

Result is a loose personal piece of reportage that places people over ideas and larger issues, and reveals the pic's severe limitations long before a surprisingly upbeat ending.

Begins as a smartly promising, gently farcical comedy of manners and ends as sourly and haphazardly as the lives it is poking fun at.

The latest model in the recent spate of underwhelming female star vehicles, Enough, a thriller detailing how a good wife gets back at an evil, possessive husband, is never provocative enough to generate strong emotional response.

Weaves a humdrum plot that's never ahead of the audience until three-quarters through.

The politics of homophobia and child molestation receive a badly misjudged tweaking in Peter Paige's writing-directing debut, Say Uncle.

An honorable but failed attempt to dramatize the dynamics that propel a basically good man to become a suicide bomber, The War Within contains provocative points inside a dull package.

Clearly inspired by, though not in the same dramatic league as, "Schindler's List," pic is marred by uneven perfs and lacks the intensity.

The star in this case is Martin Lawrence, who is not only thoroughly upstaged by nemesis Danny DeVito but is completely boxed out of his comfort zone for broad physical comedy.

Refreshing strokes of science-fact in the early sections give way to action strictly from the Ridley Scott-James Cameron playbook, but without a powerful helmer behind the camera or a memorable cast in front.

Hobbled by uninspired stabs at cleverness and surreal narrative curlicues, The Big Empty goes nowhere, replete with a question mark of an ending that isn't worth answering.

Every bit as cliched as it sounds, picture offers a dramatically crude, overly familiar take on the bad-boy-turned-good story. At its best, it offers young thesps E.J. Bonilla and Veronica Diaz-Carranza a showcase for their range.

Arguably the finest athlete in living memory deserves better than Michael Jordan to the Max, an honorific but unmoving portrait of the Chicago Bulls' No. 23.

Family drama appears content to present the situation without going for anything remotely close to the emotional jugular. Result is unsatisfying and even dreary, despite some fine work from Zooey Deschanel and a becalmed Will Ferrell.

Although guided by considerable empathy toward its small circle of kinfolk eking out a living in southern Texas, Eska's tale of a woman's unconditional support of her father-in-law is told with a faux-poetic sensibility that never really connects with his characters' lives.

The film toys with audience expectations and perceptions by playing fast and loose with circumstances and clues, while leading to an almost unavoidable and dismayingly obvious conclusion.

Never quite catches fire in its too-deliberate attempt to appeal to all ages and all tastes.

Ensemble proves improvisationally capable, but film overall is rather conventional, a Hollywood idea of an experimental film presented with a heavy serving of showbiz-type cynicism.

As a cautionary drama on the price of fame, Undiscovered could not tread on more exhaustively discovered territory, and the result is a reel-by-reel trail of cliches.

Picture veers unsteadily between melodrama and light comedy, with no confidence in either.

The joys of farce are fumbled in April's Shower, star-director-writer Trish Doolan's arch and undernourished comedy about a bridal shower turned on its head by the bride's lesbian past.

"Inspired by a true story" it may be, but inspired it's not.

Combining a gallery of targets including President Bush, "American Idol," the Iraq War and the overarching theme of a nation of citizens held in the thrall of phony dreams, pic and its ambitions are undermined by insistent cartoonishness and comic ineptitude.

Feels particularly like old news after the risks of the rock 'n' roll lifestyle were laid out for the previously uninformed in last year's "Almost Famous."

Pic displays filmmakers Kevin Harrison's and Kemp Curley's love of snowboarding, but suffers from an unjustifiably long running time, considerable repetition and a generally awkward structure.

Game 6, the first screenplay by one of America's great living novelists, Don DeLillo, is poorly served by Michael Hoffman's flat, soporific direction.

No movie like this about friendship between two young lesbians and their various adventures, punctuated with laissez-faire jump-cutting, should be this boring.