Ruthe Stein

That Duncan can't come up with a satisfying ending and lets the story drift into a confusing polemic is hardly surprising. He's guilty of overreaching -- interrupting his very sly satire with quasi-serious thoughts on the end of Soviet communism.

It's hard to get swept away when you're struggling to figure out who's doing what to whom and why.

Insightful but unfocused.

Hauntingly tells a story older than the Odyssey and as timely as today's body count from Iraq.

Imaginative and immensely engrossing film.

If you enjoy gross humor -- elevated by an occasional witty line -- and looking at babes, and don't mind a little blood and gore, do I have a date movie for you.

Deeply affecting, "Blade'' portrays an oddly elegant way of life that will soon be like the era in that other movie, "Gone With the Wind."

Totally original yet filled with familiar human frailties, "Everyone" leaps off the screen to become one of those rare movie-going experiences.

Daring in its affirmation that a dowdy woman in her late 60s still can let go of her inhibitions and exhibit a lascivious side.

Boy A will rivet you while raising issues about forgiveness and just who deserves it.

Evokes grand emotions -- anxiety, sadness, joy -- sometimes within moments of one another. Broken Wings has heart and a poetic soul.

An unusual look at love and how it can unexpectedly develop. Those for whom the concept of an arranged marriage is foreign will get a little history lesson on the immigrant experience watching this sweetly engrossing film.

Extremely amusing.

Dunye's engaging personality quickly wins you over. She deserves to be a character in a movie; she's more interesting than most.

Riveting.

Unlike Sean Penn's demagogue in "All the King's Men," you're able to forget that Whitaker is acting. He embodies the role. When clips of the real Amin are shown at the end, it's almost shocking to realize the extent to which Whitaker has become him.

Gut-wrenching.

An eerily affecting domestic drama combining elements of "The Lost Weekend'' with "Lost Highway.''

One of very few films to accurately portray the experience of growing up male.

While hardly glorifying abusive husbands, Take My Eyes, a mesmerizing and deeply disturbing film from Spain, makes an attempt to understand their thought processes.

Utterly enchanting.

Played by likable newcomer Jamie Sives, who resembles Colin Farrell without the scowl, Wilbur grows on you the same way this offbeat movie does.

An argument could be made that too many bad things happen to the good members of this sisterhood. The movie does occasionally teeter on the brink of soap opera, but then, so does life.

Heart-wrenching film.

The result is a deeply moving experience, alternately funny and sad.

Shot on the streets of New York and offering vistas of the city before all the glass and steel skyscrapers, The Naked City, which won Oscars for cinematography and editing, boasts an impressive pedigree. [04 Jan 2004]

Hanssen is such an enigma that any attempt to explain him has inherent interest. Breach expends too much energy on a minor functionary, but it is still worth seeing for its fleeting looks into a heart of darkness.

Opens up a world of words.