Robert Koehler

Intense, fair-minded entry in the pileup of Iraq pictures.

A strenuously solemn film that wants to create some kind of American pastoral tragedy out of the nation's current angst with the war.

At its best, Garbus' account quietly depicts a set of wasted lives, and a closing image of Allen's plywood casket carted away by a bulldozer is emblematic of the tragedy.

Before the music takes over, the film inserts a few bits of charm, such as Emmylou Harris excitedly following the latest Major League Baseball scores.

Melds a great cause and Dominique's incandescent charisma with care using research from nine years of filming and reporting.

Pic drifts onto a familiar obstacle course for its wide-eyed hero, but displays a spirited, open-hearted goodness along the way. Combination of warmth, humor, danger and a cosmopolitan take on young, urban Eire sets pic distinctly apart.

Falco, light years from "The Sopranos," is exquisitely vulnerable and her scenes play well with Hutton, in his finest role in years as a good man who knows he's sold out.

Succeeds in displaying the physical drive and demands of cheerleading.

Never quite sure what it wants to be -- a magical-mysterious love story, a psychodrama, a sprawling family saga, or an uneasy combination of these.

A blandly conceived youth adventure lacking zing or style.

Los Angeles may be the most photographed city in the world, but it has never have been captured with such complex layers of meaning and fascination as in Thom Andersen's remarkable Los Angeles Plays Itself.

Oil companies aren't the only ones profiting from a spike in prices at the gas pump. It's likely also to boost the prospects of Who Killed the Electric Car? a likable if partisan post-mortem on the now-defunct auto.

The unlikely success story of superstar Brazilian country music duo Zeze di Camargo and Luciano receives a polished if highly manipulative treatment in Two Sons of Francisco.

Fascinating if overly self-involved Slamdance entry is among the few U.S. pics that deliberately smudges the line between non-fiction and invention as it tells how Crumley and Buice meet online and develop a relationship.

The time away from the ring has done Rocky and the franchise some good, although it takes pic a good long while to gather momentum and clout before a surprisingly satisfying third-act heavyweight bout.

Little more than an overworked exercise in jostling red herrings, and not particularly fresh herrings at that.

Even more than in "Far From Heaven," Moore's housebound wife is a study in pent-up brilliance, with extraordinary devotion to her family.

The results will be received with a large, loud yawn by all but the most loyal fans of Pinter and hard-working co-stars Michael Caine and Jude Law.

Sandler turns the joke around on his detractors and manages to lead a devilishly energetic vehicle that contains about as many laughs as his previous features combined.

Monica Ali's elegant and critically trumpeted debut novel, Brick Lane, about the travails, conflicting emotions and quiet liberation of a Muslim woman in London, is a far lesser thing in its bigscreen transformation.

The textured, thoughtful results may prove too cerebral and abstract for audiences beyond Smith's hardcore followers,

Proves that few can maneuver one of Cohen's dusky, lovelorn songs like Cohen himself.

The most extensive interplay of live action and animation since "Who Framed Roger Rabbit?"

The live event was hopefully more engaging than this dull adaptation.

Sloppy but unconcerned about it, pic offers a trip back in time to a pre-PC and feminist era when men were sexist Neanderthals, women supported them from the sidelines and the guy with the biggest mouth scored.

A brawny commercial attraction strategically tapping into the auds for extreme sports, spy pix, thrill rides, popcorn actioners and anyone looking to see Diesel kick butt, blow stuff up and/or take his shirt off.

The filmmakers seem split between doing it straight and gleefully ripping up the genre, and never make up their minds.

Although this "Sopranos" writing vet delivers several flashes of that show's dark humor and irony, the pic leaves a hollow feeling at the end.