Steve Persall

The Host doesn't strive for social allegory, as previous body snatcher flicks have done with the Red Scare, civil rights and Watergate. If anything it's merely a teenage girl's fantasy checklist for prom.

Even when Magic Mike is skimpier than a g-string it soars on daring, as if Soderbergh asked himself who could possibly make a good movie from such offbeat material, answered "I can," and did.

Anchored by Viggo Mortensen's prismatic portrayal of Ben, this is one of the summer's nicest movie surprises, and among its wisest.

It is interesting even when nothing much happens, which is for most of its 3-hour running time.

DeVito's pacing stunts the eventual triumphs and gives devotees of Dahl's book one more reason not to trust anyone past middle school. [03 Aug 1996, p.2B]

The Cabin in the Woods isn't merely another "Scream" exercise in self-awareness, or a "Scary Movie" spoof of the same. It's a wickedly smart hybrid mutation, biting the severed hand feeding the genre.

There might be a great movie about any of Hoover's triumphs and secrets, but not all at once.

Everything plays out brutally, and the acting's not bad. But it's unsettling for external reasons beyond its control.

Egoyan's self-importance mars every frame of his film. [24 Mar 1995, p.9]

Safe is the operative word here, since One Fine Day wouldn't think of messing with its casting chemistry to take any comedic risks. Clooney is as benign here as he was dangerous in From Dusk Til Dawn. Somewhere in the middle, I bet he'll make a terrific Batman next summer. [20 Dec 1996, p.10]

The soundtrack is a small marvel of music hall tunes and dialogue that is mostly garbled, allowing expressions and body language to be interpreted.

The movie's first half is its funniest, as Moore sets up this alternate low-resolution universe.

The movie's erratic pleasures are like its ghosts; now you see them, now you don't.

Hail, Caesar! is maddeningly hit-and-miss.

Christine is a movie as bleak and withdrawn as its protagonist, with Hall making the most of her best role in years, a slow death spiral that's hard to look away from.

This is a story to make blood boil and change demanded, so future waves of incoming freshmen — even that term is male-centric — won't have their dreams ruined.

Yes, this one is even better: funnier, brawnier and ingeniously constructed for appeal to both devoted fans and reluctant converts.

Whatever definition of "dope" you prefer, it applies to Rick Famuyiwa's movie of the same name.

It's irreverent about cancer and that could be inspirational. And it's surely one of the most enjoyable movies I've seen all year.

A movie of here-and-now thrills, goosed by judicious CGI effects that never overpower the humanity of the situation.

War Horse takes time reaching its full emotional gallop with a late sequence combining man, beast and barbed wire. Yet it remains a technically magnificent ride throughout, and a checklist of visual influences from "All Quiet on the Western Front" to "Gone with the Wind."

Screenwriter Bert V. Royal takes the oldest adolescence hook in the book - losing one's virginity- and turns it inside out.

It's enough to make Kim Jong ill.

There are too many convenient romances, trumped-up crises and reversals of conscience to clear up while those poor whales suffer. Big Miracle isn't an entirely bad movie but a wholly misguided one.

Youth is a movie of dreamscapes and insinuated feelings, gorgeous and puzzling at once.

Wan in particular is pacing today's movie horror by reverting to the past. There's a touch of Hammer Films in his haunted house atmospheres, and Roger Corman in his groaning comic relief from the dread.

Shame smears the lines between daring and taunting, and art versus indulgence. When it ends there's the urge to take a shower, and not a cold one.

A nice balance of solemn myth making and genre irreverence lifts Doctor Strange to Marvel's first tier of movie franchises.