2000 isn't about nobility and humility; saving the planet from evil collectors is what sells video games.

A scattershot satire about the vulgar, privileged one percent, British division, that’s almost as funny as it is furious.

Above all, the film is lucky to have one of the better character actors in recent movies in a lead role: Ciarán Hinds as Michael Farr.

Ironically, Born to Be Wild banks solely on its tameness to captivate and inspire, aided by an upbeat, sometimes incongruous soundtrack.

One of the best things about the documentary is their interaction, as Depp visits Steadman at his home in the English countryside — surely, it has a garden? — watching him draw and paint (and splatter) in his studio while asking him questions about his life and work.

Despite the revival of narrative vigor accompanying Licence to Kill, you will perhaps sense that I find it too sane, too engineered. Preposterousness seems an integral part of the James Bond universe, which I'd hate to think was turning rational, falling into step with the '80s by abandoning fancifulness. Mercifully, Licence to Kill isn't altogether stripped of excess. [14 July 1989, p.65]

Does a lot of winking and teasing.

Ingrid Goes West doesn’t offer Plaza a breakout role so much as a dig-deeper role. There’s a bravery to her performance that recalls De Niro as Pupkin. Actors really, really like to be liked — and understood. Ingrid is intensely unlikable — and opaque.

It plays something like Robert Altman Lite. It's saved from writer-director Willard Carroll's increasingly forced linkages and made watchable by the resourceful acting of its ensemble, some of whom get more to work with than others. [22 Jan 1999, p.D4]

Ultimately, Joy Ride is an uneasy melding of “Girls Trip” and “Return to Seoul”; it’s two pieces that work well by themselves but clash when forced to collaborate.

William Friedkin directs the adaptation of Matt Crowley's off-Broadway play about a group of gay men in Manhattan speaking increasingly frankly as a birthday party wears on. Sufficiently effective that you wonder what Friedkin was thinking with Cruising. [09 Nov 2008, p.N16]

For a certain kind of moviegoer, Saints and Soldiers provides above-average nostalgia. Others, more hardened, might call it child's play.

The film is surprisingly light on conflict and definitely goes a bit heavy on period bromantic bonhomie. Even so, it’s an intriguing study of the personalities and torturous process behind some of the early 20th century’s great writing.

Brain Candy may be too safe a venture for the Kids in the Hall, but it still has more oddball charm than most Lorne Michaels-produced comedy on the big screen. [12 Apr 1996, p.68]

"Mars" needs Mom more than the filmmakers seem to realize.

German director Roland Emmerich's action sequences are terrific and funny. [10 July 1992, p.37]

All writers are entitled to tell the story of their own war, whether it's on the battlefield, in their head, or -- as is usually the case -- somewhere in between. Like it or not, Anthony Swofford did just that. Mendes, by contrast, tells the story of a Hollywood war, and it's simply not the news we can use.

A taut, engrossing action movie about real-life heroes, so why is it a disappointment? Because director Peter Berg is telling the wrong story.

Richard Attenborough's film version of the long-running Broadway musical hit A Chorus Line not only avoids the disaster that many had predicted for it, but is often surprisingly effective and enjoyable, transcending its troubled history. [20 Dec 1985]

Showing up for Molière eager for the story of one of the theater's greatest comedy writers would be unwise. It's not that kind of party.

The best moments in Watchmen, then, work as delirious music-videos.

The movie is by no means good but it’s surprisingly enjoyable: a misty, moody Saturday-matinee monster-chiller-horror special.

The movie could have used a little fire and brimstone itself. It’s a little too cautious.

A fascinating shambles of a documentary - fascinating because its subject is so influential and so deranged, a shambles because its filmmaker can't decide which approach to take and so takes all of them.

A paranoid male fantasy about cheating, with surface similarities to Hollywood movies like ''Fatal Attraction" and ''Unfaithful." This one's Italian, though, and its attitude toward adultery is more European.

Formulaic but extremely good-natured comedy.

The performances are meticulous and passionate, the narrative low-key and obliquely sensitive enough to conceal, until the traumatic incidents keep piling up, the film’s contrivance.

There's a lot to like in Mr. Holland's Opus, even if you find yourself wishing it had been more artfully written, directed - and trimmed. [19 Jan 1996, p.58]