Sean Axmaker

An inspirational documentary that treats thinkers (so often the villains of our entertainments) as heroes.

The orderly and clean drama is more like theater than history come to life.

More clever than smart and isn't always emotionally convincing, but the cast brings a palpable, persuasive awkwardness to the social tensions of this not-so-romantic getaway, and there's a sly wit to the way the filmmakers mix and match and upend genres.

Hammer filmed on location with local nonactors. Their lack of polish is evident -- Smith's inexpressiveness, though part of his character, is simply blank at times -- but their conviction can be just as powerful.

Romantic, real and as generous as it is vulnerable, the art of conversation has rarely been so acute, honest and revealing.

For a film so intent on the rules of engagement, this is hardly engaging drama.

The spirits of Jim Jarmusch and Kevin Smith hover over this breezy slacker comedy set on a comatose Sunday afternoon.

I'd like to think it's all a joke, that far from a dream this is actually Linklater's idea of a nightmare.

The actor holds the stage with his warm humor and emotionally charged anecdotes.

Yet another raunchy, gross-out farce, this one about smart-alecky city boys who have wacky adventures while exposing themselves in -- I mean to -- the great outdoors.

It's not the dance but the kids' passion, and the boisterous support of their friends and family in the audience, that makes the contest so entertaining.

The script is soggy and sloppy and Waters is no master of suspense, but he does have a pair of engaging stars flirting in a world of chic New York glamour.

For all its energy and inspired moments of giddy goofiness, Psycho Beach Party gets stuck in the sand.

A diversion so soggy that even the few combustible comic disasters fail to light a flame under the lukewarm laughs.

While Look at Me at times falls into familiar plotting, it never offers false hope or false characters.

This film is satisfied merely to wallow in women in peril, cinematic sadism and the spectacle of violent death and dismemberment.

It's not really scary, but it reaches a level of insanity so unhinged and dispassionately wretched that it defies description. Inspired, but not for all tastes.

For all the color and lively music, it's an overlong, messy labor of love built on a sense of personal betrayal that rings hollow.

Verbinski, Depp and company just want to make it the best ride you've had all summer. If that's all you demand of a frothy summer blockbuster, then this delivers the goods.

Even as the prosaic script gets lost in the intoxicating fantasy of the bloodless revolution, the hot heartbeat of the music drives the film with pure energy.

The social commentary isn't subtle, but Romero delivers the goods so effectively that many won't even notice.

Deliciously dark tale of insidious seduction.

Fumbling characters find that survival is not a matter of economics alone, it's also a matter of hope.

With the story's vivid and passionate women and the power of emotional healing (not to mention the intense eroticism of his hothouse romance), gives Sex and Lucia a dynamic, vigorous life.

The restrained drama both punctures the mythic ideal of the samurai culture (trained as fighters, they mostly serve as clan bureaucrats) and spins a romantic portrait of one man who values principle over protocol despite the cost to his reputation.

Between Stallone's soap opera of a script and Renny Harlin's speed-obsessed visuals, we're never really shown much more than fast cars and obsessed drivers.

There is no "why" in The Grudge, at least not an explanation that provides comfort or cure. It simply is. That's what makes it really scary.

The filmmakers piece it together with almost clockwork perfection and deliver it with masterful misdirection, creating the most ingenious, eccentric and brazenly jaundiced psycho-thriller to come along in years.