William Arnold

As the most diabolically focused and politically incorrect cop this side of Popeye Doyle, Liotta is a hot prospect for this year's supporting-actor Oscar.

Some of the scenes are gorgeous, but "Papaya" is so passionless and empty it has no real impact. [04 Feb 1994]

The movie goes down very easily.

Wilde (Fry, in a wonderful performance) comes off less as a sexual martyr than a man who foolishly lets his obsession for an unworthy young lover (Jude Law) lead him into big trouble that he might well have avoided. The only totally sympathetic character in the movie is Wilde's wife (Jennifer Ehle). [05 Jun 1998]

With his usual intelligence, technical virtuosity (the reverse-aging effects are astounding) and storytelling panache, director Fincher gives the film a power and unity that make nearly three hours go by in a flash and pulls its diverse elements together to be something unique for a Hollywood movie -- a true spiritual experience.

After its irresistible first act, Owning Mahowny loses its energy and focus very fast.

The overall saga is moving, the performances are first-rate, the production values (which do not rely on the usual cartoonish CGI effects) are strong, and Carion captures the special insanity of stalemated trench warfare with an unusual horrific flair.

Cronenberg is one of the cinema's true originals, and a trip to his spooky world is always a harrowing, thought-provoking experience.

What the film does extremely well is take us deep into the crime scene, and give faces to the victims so we can experience this epic, incomprehensible and somehow prototypically American act of violence on a more personal and intimate level.

The film's added enigma makes the play's title even more appropriate, but it results in a more ambiguous and perhaps less satisfying dramatic experience.

Assuming the bulk of what we see is factual, it comes off as a gripping docudrama.

With a steady eye and a warm (but never overtly sentimental) heart, it explores a territory where few movies have ventured before.

The first two-thirds of the movie are a kind of stumbling relationship drama, but the last third segues into a spooky feast of torture, mutilation and murder.

It's a partisan campaign film, of course, but a subtle one.

It would be easy to categorize the Lebanese women's picture Caramel as a Levantine combination of "Sex in the City" and "Beauty Shop," but it's actually a lot smarter, sharper and deeper than that.

A documentary that is half confessional memoir.

The ordeal undeniably strikes an emotional chord, and much of this is due to Holmes, who wonderfully communicates both the character's streak of rebellion and her desire to atone. The movie is a solid star vehicle for her.

It's an eye-filling, sumptuously detailed historical epic that grandly re-creates the bloody gladiatorial spectacles and smoke-filled, spit-flying, claustrophobically crowded arenas of its bygone era.

If you're addicted to Billy Bob Thornton's slovenly charm, and thrill to the prospect of watching him talk endlessly about his bodily functions and penchant for anal sex with obese women, this is your movie. If not, it's like 90 minutes in hell.

Truth or Dare (the title comes from a game she plays in the final scenes) is actually most revealing when it is not trying to be. It gives us a good sense of the pressured life of a big concert tour, as well as how demanding and unbalancing it must be to have a star of Madonna's magnitude in the family. [17 May 1991]

As the very traditional hero, Li keeps us riveted through the fisticuffs, and he also carries off the film's heavier dramatic moments well enough -- though, as always, his lack of a strong personality prevents the movie from ever genuinely catching fire.

Ostensibly a love story, the film is also handicapped by Téchiné's strong gay sensibility and clear lack of romantic interest in his characters.

Dragon works just fine as a martial arts epic, with several extravagant and thrilling action sequences. [7 May 1993]

All told, the movie also is a tremendous downer. The script goes for a vaguely upbeat conclusion, but it has no spiritual dimension that the viewer feels with any emotion, and it conveys a hopeless, pessimistic future for the interconnected world that it portrays.

Griffin & Co. manage to be spectacularly outrageous, several of the gag sequences are hilariously imaginative and there's something almost deliciously liberating in the film's determination to make good-natured fun of what previously has been a very sacred movie cow.

The results are being billed as a reunion of the "Titanic" star team, but anyone expecting a similarly gushy romantic idyll is in for a shock: it is an uncompromisingly dreary view of two self-deluded people incapable and unwilling to understand one another.

It was also a miscalculation to make the film so sexually explicit. It doesn't particularly serve the story and, for all his gifts, Macy is just not the kind of actor most people want to see in a whirl of sweaty, naked sex.

Is Hollywood so disconnected from its past and bankrupt of ideas that it doesn't even know this movie is a screaming cliché?