With Almodovar, things tend to happen fast, and "Kika" is all speed and no depth.

Unable to embrace the world he's seeking to depict, Cherot is left with a lifeless shell, a movie so preoccupied with being noble that it forgets to be interesting. The problem with G is not that it's unbelievable, it's just boring.

A Good Man isn't hard to find -- it's all over the place -- but it does grow hard to bear. [09 Sep 1994]

The kind of joyless, over-calculated hit that may leave viewers feeling not haunted but headachy.

To their credit, director Nick Cassavetes and screenwriter Jeremy Leven heighten the melodrama and seize on the most distinctive strokes of Nicholas Sparks' bland best seller.

The story is a comic-book tale at its most basic level.

What's frustrating is that the movie should be so much better, or at least more entertaining. With Baldwin, Macy and Bello, director Kramer is holding three of a kind.

The whole thrust of the movie is to warn black women against emasculating their men.

Batman Begins is obvious from the get-go - and almost no fun.

Go to enjoy the technical expertise, and take a first-grader (and not a particularly savvy one) along to find something of value in everything else.

Falls victim to flimsy characters and a love story that strains reality.

Ella Enchanted is one cute movie.

As for the Ya-Yas: They're not as much fun as the First Wives' Club.

Wants to be a bittersweet comedy about erotic loss and memory loss. But it doesn't have the heart or brain.

The final half-hour is like the not-so-grand finale for a silly-sticky sitcom. It's a college-town “Friends” with an unearned doctorate.

Though lovingly crafted and beautifully photographed, the movie does little to make Jones seem compelling, or even all that good.

The result is a film that plays like a creaking melodrama, with good guys and bad guys and precious little in between.

The real obstacle here is a lack of filmmaking imagination.

Culkin is -- well, Culkin is Culkin, cute and malleable, absolutely empty, absolutely precious, absolutely irritating. [17 Jun 1994]

Cadence is a bare-bones film. It needs more fill-in, but in spite of its gaps is entertaining and even a little provocative. It is a movie that says something positive about humankind, and there aren't that many films that do.

The script gives the actors less of a chance than the dragons give to Homo sapiens.

The talented and quirky-pretty Sarah Jessica Parker gives an excruciating performance. It's a keenly self-conscious caricature - the bold, showy kind that often wins awards yet sends audiences running from the theater.

Put the tango in "To Sir, With Love," and you've got Take the Lead.

It's also unclear just what Niccol wanted this film to be: a satire? a spoof? a black comedy? a pointed social commentary? Perhaps all of the above - way too many hats for a movie this slight to wear.

Meandering, forgettable trifle.

With Nicholson and Sandler aboard, we want to love it madly. But instead of a tickle, this big-name comedy just grates.

The movie is so confused about itself that it comes across as toneless, a bunch of characters wandering around in a story no one is controlling.

Cold, bland and gimmicky - that's how the movie has turned out.