Susan Wloszczyna

Branagh, the actor, comes through unscathed. Branagh, the director, not so much.

Clumsily conflates our country’s racist genocide of Native Americans with the era’s marginalizing of women and their lack of rights.

Consider The Other Sister emotional quicksand. [26 February 1999, Life, p.5E]

Passenger 57 already has been labeled Die Hard on a plane. Die Lite is more like it. [06 Nov 1992, p.2D]

But for all the fancy-schmancy effects (budget: $90 million-plus), the vision of a hypercongested metropolis is not much more sophisticated than an episode of "The Jetsons." [9 May 1997]

A blah romantic comedy that has the bad taste to force the heavenly Ashley Judd into being an insecure, date-desperate, quirky career gal.

Until it coughs up a ridiculously convoluted explanation of why an isolated town in Colorado suddenly goes deader than a weekday matinee of "The Postman," Phantoms delivers the shivers.

There's some heavy-duty Oedipal stuff going on underneath all the running gags about Hooters restaurants. [25 June 1999, Life, p.8E]

A weak whinny of a horse opera tailor-made for those who can't quite locate "Young Guns" or "The Long Riders" in their video store.

The Dancer clearly needed a better task master behind the camera. There are too many scenes of Fuller physically and mentally suffering for her art as she questions if what she does actually qualifies as dance.

As the director, co-writer, editor and composer of ominous piano tinkling heard on the soundtrack, Jason Saltiel is nothing but ambitious when it comes to this semi-successful creepy thriller that, intentionally or not, pushes the #MeToo buttons perhaps a little too hard.

Edited like the world's most expensive car ad. The screen opens and closes like a nervous accordion, and the action shifts speeds like crazy.

While the attractive cast is willing, the translation into '90s teen culture is weak -- like a clueless adult's notion of cool.

The story isn't a grabber.

Fox's innate likability does go a long way to make sitcom- shallow Doc Hollywood mildly entertaining. [02 Aug 1991, p.5D]

As a piece of filmmaking, Torn is slightly above TV-movie quality.

Rio 2 has exhausted its limited amount of charm. Most regrettably, Rita Moreno appears in her first movie in eight years as Jewel’s overbearing Aunt Mimi but is barely allowed to make an impression.

The film desperately tries to be wild and out of control, but it ends up as more of a slapdash portrait of cartoony desperation than any sort of realistic depiction of millennial angst when it comes to current-day female lifestyle choices.

Still, I laughed — enough to feel mortified at myself.

Much like any child, even a supposedly surefire nugget of an idea requires careful nurturing. In this case, The Boss Baby often tries too hard and succeeds too little.

The nasty, overlong and undisciplined sourball of a sex farce about a mother-daughter con team will nonetheless satisfy bigenerational libidinous fantasies.

This movie-within-a-movie action-comedy spoof is a too long, too loud tease as it toys with the Schwarzen-dude's well-toned cinematic image. [18 Jun 1993, p.1D]

Suddenly, The Book of Henry turns into a not very believable thriller, complete with a ticking clock and a talent show.

If Nancy Meyers ever decided to dabble in gothic romance, it probably would turn out to be something like The Face of Love.

Seeing gawky Charlie Korsmo, one-time movie moppet, as a superbrain whose introduction to alcohol leads him to do a rip-roaring rendition of Guns N' Roses' Paradise City, is worth a smile or two. But even that can't save [the] film.

Just like the popular (and more graphically violent) video game it's spun from, kung-fooy and kartoony Kombat shoves plot and personality aside to focus on action cloaked in mystic mumbo-jumbo and gloomy mock-gothic graphics. [21 Aug 1995 Pg. 03.D]

The cheesy production values won't grab anyone. When Bryan-Brian aren't schmoozing, there's not much to look at. It's anyone's guess whether this sequel will be as big a hit on tape. But it'll end up on the shelf soon enough. [10 May 1991, p.2D]

While Basinger admirably invests her role with deep passion and looks splendid in her Kenya khakis, the true story she stars in is disappointingly tame and dramatically inert.