Stephen Hunter

This one has crossover hit written all over it.

The movie is as tawdry as someone else's lingerie, yet not without a certain prurient watchability.

It's fast, slick, stupid, violent fun and, despite the cynically high body count, without serious intention in this world.

Far from great, but much farther from awful, Troy offers several popcorn buckets' worth of good old-fashioned time at the movies.

You may find some of the story developments melodramatic -- I did -- but the film itself is quite powerful.

Andre Hennicke is particularly chilling as the yappy mad dog judge who sends them to death.

[Craven's] stroke of genius is to offer the horror movie in an ironic mode. He's winking at viewers and inviting them to share a clever conspiracy that we on the cholesterol-clogged side of 30 cannot begin to understand.

That's not to say it's great; it's not. Maybe it's not to say it's good, because it's only sort of good. It is to say, however, that it's nifty.

Some of the tropes of The Lost City are ineffective. What does work is the sense of loss. The late Cuban novelist and screenwriter G. Cabrera Infante finds a brilliant device in the love affair between Fico and Aurora (Ines Sastre), his sister-in-law, in that Aurora in some way becomes Cuba.

The movie suffers from an uncertain structure, but it boasts an extraordinary naturalism, not particularly flattering. Sharon Stone has a brilliant, harsh turn as Zack's mom, and both Bruce Willis and Harry Dean Stanton have good turns as the elder generations of Trueloves. But the movie belongs to its youngsters, and it's a real eye-opener.

It's tough, astringent, darkly funny and . . . well, it's also generic, untidy, condescending and mild of impact rather than stunning.

It's not without moments of wit and powerful emotion, but somehow Stepmom never feels either real enough to move us deeply or bubbly enough to make us forget our woes.

A brisk, entertaining and even moving exploration of the sometimes frayed intersection where Christianity meets homosexuality.

Incisive and possibly a bit melodramatic as it lays out the reasons and the results of the violent campaign and marshals indignation on behalf of the victims while crying out for Western engagement.

If you love the theater, you've got to see the film.

It believes, in the end, in the decency of most people.

Funner, biggerer, brighterer, bolderer, Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End is not only okay, it may even be close to good. A lavish spectacle illuminated by Johnny Depp's swishing pirate captain, the movie has its dull moments, but not many.

Cameron captures the majesty, the tragedy, the fury and the futility of the event in a way that supersedes his trivial attempts to melodramatize it.

It's enough to send you home with jiggly knees and a tummy ache.

It's kind of like a hit man's Olympics. Isn't this grown-up? In a word, no, and that's what's so much fun about it.

An anti-capital-punishment polemic that won't change a single mind anywhere on Earth but will entertain well enough everywhere on Earth.

"Lost" star Matthew Fox pitches in with a strong performance as a coach who, by the laws of whimsy, didn't take the final flight home and had to struggle with survivor's guilt.

It's the last thing anyone expected: an old-fashioned monster movie with a heart.

Isn't particularly scary. No, it's much harder on you than mere fright: It's . . . creepy.

There are plenty of reasons to like the movie, such as its genuinely gentle wit, its occasional capture of the absurdities of aging and its endorsement of the permanence of lust, but one factor in particular is its brilliant cast of discarded '70s-era Hollywood stars.

The movie doesn't so much end as reach a stopping point and limp hurriedly off-screen, like a bad stand-up chased out by boo birds. But God, is it funny.

It's a brilliant movie, fluent, spectacular, breathtaking and basically, uh, wrong.

It's so spoofy it's difficult to call 'good' or even 'bad'; just say it's smooth.

A few others have compared this to a James Bond movie, but it's more of a piece with a Tom Clancy movie; it never leaves the real world that far behind, it has a fair sense of documentary reality, and the action sequences -- from shootout to car chase to a commando takedown of a tanker on the high seas to a final knife fight -- are extremely well managed.

You may not enjoy The Mother (I certainly didn't), but it's a movie so heavy on truth, its spell cannot be denied.

If nothing else it's a wonderful essay on the meaning of freedom and the courage it takes to wrestle it from despots. In that sense, it feels more political and cultural than religious.

It's hard to hate, because as a rabble-rouser it is superbly effective, driven forward by two powerhouse actors.

The much ballyhooed movie, far from great and far from short (2 1/2 hours!), is still great fun.

It's not a great movie by any means, but it grips tighter than a chokehold and it cuts as deep as a knife.

It pulps you, but it doesn't enlighten you.

A big, fat, gorgeous, mesmerizing mess.

Until that sugar coating at the end, Out of Time is clever, believable and gripping, and seems to be headed to a wondrous, bad place as it carefully modulates classic '40s themes.

It's a long and relatively underdramatized film, but it's powerfully true.

A surprisingly lush, well-produced film.

Leconte is always a deliriously clever director; his "Ridicule" and his "The Girl on the Bridge" stand out as vivid films on subjects no one in America would even consider. Possibly he's trying too hard here to be liked, just like Francois. But as long as he's merciless, he's great fun.

The movie is taut, fast, achingly authentic and terribly melancholy.

He treats jocks like humans, not stars or superheroes, and in the end has managed something unique for documentaries these days: It's as entertaining as it is fair.

Petersen leaves out, largely, character, back story, anecdote and warm personal relations. Poseidon isn't cute, funny, warm, nice, inspirational or uplifting. It's about the incredible labor of survival in a world turned totally sociopathic in an instant.

One of those rich girl/bad boy things that defy understanding and leave you on the outside. Fascinated, but on the outside.

The remake is directed by another slickster, the Irishman John Moore, who is no deep thinker (as his "Behind Enemy Lines" confirmed) but, like Donner, he's an able hack -- smooth, stylish, clever, soulless and a hoot. And so's his damned movie. And it is damned.

The movie is almost devised like a rat-in-maze experiment at the Yale psychology department. Each few minutes some new obstacle comes up for Chris, threatening to obliterate his dreams, at which point the film stands back and watches him improvise brilliantly on the run.

It's a handsome thing, familiar and new at once, thoroughly entertaining if hardly memorable.

What the movie lacks in clarity, it makes up for in honesty, toughness, relentlessness and passion.

This is a great liberal movie, which is to say, it will be loved most passionately by great liberals, and despised by the conservatives it contemptuously fails to notice.

Lower City is sexy, but in a nice, dirty way. Everyone in it is deliciously low and sleazy, and so underdressed in the blazing heat that they are just dying to strip.

The film is nowhere near the level of Pontecorvo's masterpiece, or even his subsequent flawed allegory on Vietnam, "Burn!," but is clearly the work of a natural coming into the full range of his powers.

It would be nice to report that director Stanley Nelson comes up with something new, some illumination, some revelation, some heretofore unglimpsed irony, but he doesn't.

It's a great family movie, if not historically perfect, and something that a lot of people are going to like.

First-class in all departments except clarity.

Talk to Me, with two great actors, tells that story, and it makes you feel not only the joy people experienced in the wash of Greene's raucous, truth-saying humor, but also his wisdom and calm. And many mourned his death at 55 in 1984.

The movie is pure pro-choice agitprop, as it tracks Homer's conversion to the cause of choice and posits the heroism of the abortionist. Pro-lifers will hate it on that point alone.

A profoundly disturbing -- and depressing -- look at the New Anti-Semitism of the post-9/11 world. Produced by the Simon Wiesenthal Center in Los Angeles, the film is remarkably restrained, given the outrages it documents.

Wang is working on your mind, not your body.

An exceedingly bright comedy that never makes you feel stupid for enjoying its brisk pacing, smart lines, sound construction and superb comic acting, not only from Ashton Kutcher but from Cameron Diaz and well-chosen No. 2 bananas Rob Corddry and Lake Bell.

The movie, with its panorama of emotional epiphanies and its belief in the talent and grace of young women, is nevertheless bracing.

Rock is such a consistent delight, and so powerfully amused at the profound pleasure of being Chris Rock, that he shares the wealth with all of us.

It is piffle done well. A (literally) lighter-than-air story, full of goofs and creeps and fools and silliness, it manages to delight without simpering, make points without lecturing and break hearts and mend them again without turning you weepy.

Until a disappointing tailspin in the last hour, Pearl Harbor is the best piece of popular entertainment to come along in years.

It's not a great movie, but Yu Nan's performance is superb without being showy or melodramatic.

Do you Bean? If you do Bean, rejoice. Bean is back. If you don't Bean, here's a chance to start. Bean now, or forever hold your peace.

For the truth is, given the audacity, the organization, the seriousness of purpose, the movie isn't nearly as provocative as you think it might be.

As a piece of almost dadaist filmmaking, Spy Kids is great fun with its continual spirit of invention.

Political junkies will love this movie.

Manages to be profound without being pompous.

What is memorable is the film's portrait of a man of honor in a sleazy world, possibly a metaphor for the struggle of the artist to stay honorable in a world of backbiting, betrayal and hunger for easy money.

It is a rabble-rousing cheerfest, based on a true story.

It's one of those "I-can't-believe-I'm-enjoying-this" kind of things.

An infectious (in a good way) documentary.

The "Citizen Kane" of twisted-geek movies.

The movie alternates between cornball and ridiculous, and the frequent violence is extremely bloody if stylized. Love it or hate it, and I'm not sure which applies to me, you've never seen and never will see anything quite like Tears of the Black Tiger.

The movie has more cleverness than violence, and its breakdown of cliches is vivid and witty. Baesel is an extraordinary presence, holding the film together with his mesmerizing performance, charm and openness, and Goethals measures up to him.

The movie feels more like a thriller than a drama; it's paced like a thriller, building to a murder that never happens, exciting passions that are never unleashed, waiting for a crime to occur. The only crimes, however, are of the heart. Meanwhile, the movie knows exactly what it's doing, and does exactly what it intends, without making one false move.

One of the excellent attributes of Shut Up & Sing is that it lets the cards fall where they may and really doesn't try to spin the Chicks themselves. It's quite possible, then, to watch the film and come to the conclusion that Maines has a big mouth. Spectacularly talented, the young singer is also a spectacular blowhard.

As for Hathaway, she's a revelation. Those eyes are still as big as Beamer hubcaps, but she's able to show more edge than her previous goody-goody roles have allowed.

Marshall keeps the film lean and focused. He does have a nice taste for horror imagery.

It's not as good as "Eat Drink Man Woman," for no imitation ever surpasses its original; but it's so brimful of life you can't say no.

Crank" is "D.O.A" on methamphetamines.

It's a stunner that sadly grows tiresome at the end.

A provocative experience that lights you up even as it brutalizes you. And I don't even like Brad Pitt very much.

Enter the world of the sociopathic killer and enjoy.

As entertainment of a tawdry but compelling sort, The Contender certainly delivers.

The movie is both exhilarating and depressing. The trouble is, I can't figure out which is more important.

Modest and winning.

Here are old people in all the magnificence of their elderliness. The movie doesn't pretend like getting old is any fun. But it's about the transcendental power of -- well, yes, music; and each of these folks has a talent whose expression is a fuel to survive.

It's got a subtext but not a subplot.

It is surprising that no matter how much we know what will happen, we never stop watching.

It lacks Altman's wisdom, but its sense of humor is corrosive, if dispiriting, and its willingness to show the human animal at his most disgusting has a kind of anti-grandeur to it.

It's fast and furious, and it proves that crime doesn't pay, unless you know how to do it right.

Le Petit Lieutenant shows how good French movies can be when they stay French and don't try to go international.

Anyone who doesn't smile is probably either too adult to count or too dead to care.

The movie is small but sensational. I don't know what writer-director Frank E. Flowers might lose by trying to take his career international, but he has real talent.

The result is a big, gushy, emotional, secret-driven, family-obsessive casserole, perhaps facile in some of its resolutions, but so full of good heart and love -- the real kind, which is scratchy, awkward, difficult to express and doesn't conquer all but just some -- that the movie is difficult to resist.

Powerful, depressing and very, very long. At close to three hours, it virtually enslaves an audience, which may be part of the point.