Steve Davis

The movie brims with unexpected zest, an enthralling joie de vivre that seduces despite any reservations you may have.

Satan & Adam eschews ebony-and-ivory banality to depict a friendship that refuses to be tinted in black and white.

The micro-homilies proliferate, the stagy drama heightens, and subtlety gives way to a little pandering. You can forgive these transgressions – there’s never any doubt that Branagh has put his heart into this endeavor – but they keep it from achieving greatness.

Every so often, a spark in Marinelli’s mesmerizing blue-gray eyes flickers and you can imagine the passion that drove the man to his madness. In those moments, Martin Eden subtly flames, if only briefly.

It’s a rat-a-tat-tat animated comedy that rarely lets up, clever and silly and funny, and yes, a bit batty.

The film's greatest strength undeniably lies in Gosling's revelatory portrayal of Danny.

If you’re a movie geek and Hitchcock freak (guilty!) who can never get enough of this kind of stuff, 78/52 will rock your world.

That’s the problem with this well-meaning but ultimately hollow film romance: You don’t see it; you don’t get it.

As in Richard Linklater’s lovely "Before Sunrise," the film’s principal pleasure comes from watching two people connect as they get to know each other over the course of several hours.

All three principal actors – Weisz, McAdams, and Nivola – give effectively constrained performances. They work as a team here, consistent with the delicate balance in their characters’ complicated relationships with one another.

Though this capable documentary is comprehensively informative in so many ways (perhaps to a fault), the one thing it doesn’t quite convey is the wonder and marvel of the undersea world of Cousteau, which continued to move him until his death at age 87.

This is a guy who marched to the beat of his own drum, even one that’s got two spoked wheels and some handlebars.

The dialogue is enough to make your hair stand on end.

Other than the unsatisfactory ending, however, there's much that is commendable in the The Italian, not the least of which are its social criticisms of the buying and selling of children through the adoption businesses currently thriving in Russia and neighboring eastern European countries. In some respects, unfortunately, not much has changed since the world was introduced to little Oliver Twist nearly two centuries ago.

Even the most ardent of neoconservatives might find this intimate and nuanced documentary about life in occupied Iraq difficult to shake – all politics aside, it is the human element that ultimately defines a nation as a people.

A laugh-aloud film that exemplifies the snap-crackle-pop of exquisite comic timing.

As real as the Astroturf in the Brady's backyard and as eager to please as Alice's meat loaf, The Brady Bunch Movie is -- to exhaust this string of metaphors -- pure junk food. But like most junk food, it sure tastes good.

When combined with Sinise's solid work in front of the camera (as George) and behind it, this Of Mice and Men makes for an unassuming but well-made movie which, unlike so many adaptations of literary works, does not go awry.

In her sophomore film, director Fastvold, assisted by painterly cinematographer André Chemetoff, has envisioned a softer version of the American frontier, still untamed but capable of hope. It’s a befitting vision of a world to come, one in which forbidden love will one day finally find its name.

With these two actors in command, Supernova doesn’t just dare to speak the name of a love between two deeply committed men facing an untenable situation. It shouts it from the rooftops.

Frankenheimer resorts to gunfire and explosions to bring the film to its predictable end. It's when things get mundane that you find yourself wishing that Brando would reappear on the screen to make things interesting again.

Ryan and Duchovny hold their own in this talky two-hander, navigating their characters’ highs and lows with conviction.

One thing about this extremely talented artist: He never sees anything in just black-and-white.

While sturdily constructed, Simon Beaufoy’s upbeat screenplay spells almost everything out in capital letters, with little nuance. It seldom trusts you to make your own judgments about the diverse cast of players in this chapter of pop-culture history.

Although its ambitions often exceed its reach, the meta-mad Filipino film Leonor Will Never Die (a terrible Americanized title) bursts with imaginative impulses, scoring slightly more hits than misses in a Charlie Kaufmanesque storyline that flip-flops between reality and fantasy using the tropey device of a movie within a movie.

For a while, the freeing experience of the clan’s nonconformity gets tamped down, and the movie appears headed toward some kind of moralized conclusion. Once back on familiar ground, however, Captain Fantastic rights itself toward as happy an ending as possible, without too much compromise.

It’s a cliched happy ending, one you’ve seen countless times before, but never in this way.

It’s a scrummy omelette of a movie, a dish that’s off the menu. The ingredients are unorthodox, but they come together in an uproarious way. As a Dubliner would say, it’s absolute gas.