V.A. Musetto

Will there be a “Hatchet IV’’? I shudder to think about it.

Gil Kofman has an interesting and funny story to tell in his documentary Unmade in China. Too bad he spends more time talking about himself than detailing his misadventures in Xiamen, China, population 3.67 million.

Most are exercises in sickening bad taste, with an emphasis on human bodily functions. The biggest stinkers? “T Is for Toilet” and “F Is for Fart.”

Director Jacob Rosenberg makes heavy use of family photos and talking heads, but the person we want most to hear from, Way himself, is largely missing. Go figure.

The actors are personable, but they're burdened with a script full of stereotypical characters and offensive jokes. By the time Christmas Day arrives, this movie will thankfully be long forgotten.

The documentary tells us little we don't already know and is overwhelmingly one-sided. It would make a nice TV infomercial, but certainly doesn't deserve a big-screen release.

There's little reason to see the claustrophobic Chronicling a Crisis unless you have a fascination with the Kolleks. Watching the vanity project is like being forced to sit through a friend's boring home movies.

Features some good acting, but most of it doesn't ring true.

Completely lacking in imagination and purpose, this vanity project might suffice as a home movie, but it's hardly worth the expense and bother of seeing it in a theater.

Yunus would seem to be a prime candidate for a movie about his work. Unfortunately, director Holly Mosher's by-the-numbers documentary Bonsai People isn't the answer.

After Fall, Winter would play better minus at least half an hour of flab.

Director-writer Shimon Dotan takes this iffy story and makes it nearly unwatchable by jumping back and forth in time, using screens within screens and bouncing between color and black-and-white.

Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, Brazil's reformist two-term president, gets the once-over-lightly treatment in Lula, Son of Brazil.

Zhang Yimou, one of China's best-known filmmakers, deserves a great big lump of coal in his holiday stocking thanks to his ludicrous soap opera The Flowers of War.

A documentary hardly anybody has been waiting for.

While the original was an art-house success, this English-language redo, now getting a one-week run after sitting on the shelf for a year and a half, doesn't measure up.

Love in Space is just what movie fans have been waiting for: a romantic comedy from Communist China.

Little more than a rehash of old news.

A chaotic mess.

The preachy movie is hardly worth the hassle and money required to see it in a theater. Better to download it or wait for it to pop up on TV.

Japan's Takashi Miike has the formula down pat, but Eisener has no idea how to give violence a touch of class.

If there's a fresh idea in When Harry Tries To Marry, I couldn't find it.

Peros probably intends Footprints to be an homage to Hollywood's Golden Age. But the script's so incoherent and the acting so amateurish that it makes the worst old-time Hollywood B-flick seem like "Citizen Kane."

The praise for this static, overlong, stagebound work is a mystery to me.

The noise level reminds me of Canal Street in Chinatown on a Sunday afternoon.

It's an interesting story, but the presentation is more like a home movie than something you'd pay to see in a theater.

The dialogue is banal and the acting, especially Wortham's, is unconvincing. Even the sex and nudity, of which there is a lot, grows tiresome after a while.

Nothing would help make this dud understandable.

Sillen drags out generic talking heads who say generic things about Bernstein, a generic boho. The film might suffice if you're looking for something to watch on cable TV some early morning. But it isn't worth the hassle and expense of going to a theater.

Lilien is an amateur filmmaker, and his movie -- which at times is more about Lilien than Pale Male -- shows it.

If all terrorists were like these idiots, the US would have nothing to worry about.

Maybe being able to look back in time is comforting for Block and company, but what makes him think complete strangers give a damn about his not-especially-interesting family? I certainly don't.

There's certainly a good movie to be made about Muslim punk musicians in the US, but this isn't it.

Pretty but tedious Euro-pap at its most self-indulgent.

Skip it, and rent "The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert" instead.

Having root-canal surgery would be less painful than sitting through the martial-arts disaster Ong-Bak: The Thai Warrior.

Brainless and pointless.

An amateurish, pointless exercise in filmmaking.

It's hard to believe that the distributors of See No Evil were so afraid of what critics would say about their movie that they refused to provide advance screenings. The movie's target viewers aren't the type who read reviews, if they read at all.

There's plenty of material here for a dark comedy, but director Martin Curland isn't up to the job. His film - like Luke - plods along, unsure of exactly what it's supposed to be.

Politics aside, Trudell plays like an infomercial for its subject rather than a serious examination of the man and his beliefs.

If you go to the movies to ogle topless young women, Simon is definitely for you. If, on the other hand, you want something more cerebral with your $10 ticket and overpriced snacks, stay clear of this Dutch melodrama.

What's Vincent to do? Will he come out of the closet? Will he lead the swim team to victory at the big match? Will he find happiness with Noemie? Does anybody care?

One big cliche.

Has little to offer beyond titillation and pretty landscapes.

Adams and the school's students and teachers deserve an A-plus, although the film rates a much lower grade. It unfolds lifelessly, as Binzer parades a contingent of talking heads before the camera in what could pass for an infomercial.

Would that somebody had fired Gurwitch before she could have finished Fired!

A movie more interested in shocking than in entertaining.

The script is obvious and cliched and the action is more disgusting than frightening.

Schmaltzy and contrived.

The film is light on those kitschy musical numbers that make Bollywood movies fun to watch.

Marlene Rhein has directed 40 music videos, including ones for Tupac Shakur and Amy Winehouse. Judging by this, her feature debut, she should stick with the music.

Utterly predictable and full of trite dialogue.

Dom DeLuise, as a fruitcake director, and John Waters fave Mink Stole, as Robin's Jewish mother, spice things up, but not enough to make Girl Play worthwhile.

The autobiographical script meanders and the acting never solidifies. Besides, the leads look too old to be in high school - maybe even college.

The story is so contrived and the dialogue so stilted that no amount of talent could save Exist.

Tucker's message is sometimes on target, even if his film isn't.

It's a worthy idea, but the uninspired scripts, acting and direction never rise above the level of an after-school TV special.

Deadly dull.

If there is anything positive in The Girl Next Door, it is the brave performance by Auffarth, who is in her early 20s. Other than that, there's little reason to see the movie. Unless, of course, you get off on watching the sexual exploitation of underage girls.

Why make a documentary about these marginal historical figures? Wouldn't one about their famous dad, author of "Death in Venice," etc., be more valuable?

There are a few scares, but not enough to make up for the murky script.

Has a split personality. It starts as a comedy but morphs into an icky family melodrama. It should have stuck with the yuks.

Say a prayer that there's no "Hatchet III" in the future.

Provides a few minor thrills, but overall is talky and implausible.

The movie, directed by Mick Jackson, leaves no cliché unturned, from the predictable plot to the characters straight out of central casting.

The film's violent finale comes out of nowhere and will leave bewildered viewers wondering if they might have dozed off for a reel or two.

Mostly The Matador romanticizes a brutal tradition that has no place in the 21st century.

The writing, acting and direction are so amateurish that the only thing you'll care about is escaping the theater.

A bland look at professional surfing.

There are many new Japanese movies that deserve a stateside release. Why this hapless mess beat them out is a question that deserves an answer.

Plays like a bad daytime soap opera. The acting is amateurish. Ditto the uninspired script (continuity? what's that?) and direction.

Now that even Woody Allen has stopped making "Woody Allen movies," you would think that wannabes would move on, too.

Director Ferzan Ozpetek's film doesn't break any new ground; rather, it recycles every cliché about gays in what is essentially an extended soap opera.

Ohayon doesn't judge Thompson or his customers, but you don't need to be a Harvard-educated psychiatrist to realize that the bunch of them are dirty old men who treat women as commodities.

There are a few exciting battle sequences and the sets are lavish, but mostly the film meanders aimlessly for more than two hours. No wonder new sword-and-sandal movies are in short supply.

The story is superficial at best. And the movie is too long.

With so many worthy movies being made in Europe, it's a crime that something as mediocre as Erotic Tales gets a release here.

Makes little attempt to be credible or original. And the acting is poor.

Beautiful but boring.

Lackluster anime.

The overall result is superficial and deadly boring.

Fails to elicit any substantive information from his (Tommy Davis) subjects. And he fails to put their plight into perspective.

Loud, crass and full of slapstick humor that the Three Stooges would be ashamed of. And it is almost completely lacking in charm and nuance.

Silly and pointless film.

Proves, if anything, that sappy feel-good movies aren't restricted to Hollywood.

Allah made me funny - not.

Promoted as "the year's scariest movie," it's anything but.

Sexist, racist humor abounds, with Jews and gays especially taking a beating. I don't always object to non-PC humor -- but I like it to be funny, and here it isn't.

The cinematography and sets look great, but the script is a bummer. It's overlong, overwrought and overblown.

Schwartz throws in so many characters and implausible subplots - none worth mentioning - that Perception sinks under its own weight.

Let the French stick to love stories and leave stupid comedies to Tinseltown.

If the sight of naked, sweaty French hunks gets you going, well, then, Three Dancing Slaves is a must-see.

Utter junk.

There is, of course, a maximum of blood and gore. Sometimes the director's ideas work; often they don't.

Isn't very good. Not only has Ritter made his documentary a one-sided one, but he commits the journalistic sin of using himself as the film's main talking head. In other words, he's interviewing himself.

A lightweight French comedy worth watching only for Cecile de France. The gamine actress - decked out in short reddish hair, black tights and a thigh-high mini - is charming as Jessica.

The comedy is without distinction and the conclusion is melodramatic. I must note that ads for the film are misleading because they give no hint of the dark side of The Bubble.