A scathing, scurrilous, sometimes silly but often searching comedy about the nature of faith in the 21st century.

Mirren simply is, and she takes Hitchcock up a notch with every look and line.

Fans of their grossest stuff needn't fear: The Farrellys are still the guys who put the last three letters in "crass," and their potty humor was too extreme for me once or twice.

Juuso, who made her film debut at 22 in this movie, is spunky and funny. The two guys play off each other like bickering old pals, and so they are: They and the director have worked together on three movies and a TV show over the last decade.

This isn’t a history lesson. It’s pure entertainment, an excuse for good actors to romp through a twisting, well-told tale.

The British actor, best known as Loki in the “Thor” and “Avengers” series, disappears into the character’s skinny body and twangy voice.

Hollywood hardly ever pays attention to such people, and the average moviegoer won't either. But Leigh makes an irrefutable claim that their lives matter, and that attention must be paid.

One of those documentaries about a family train wreck that makes you wonder how people consented to have their tawdry laundry washed so publicly.

Carrera directs with a light touch, letting the screenplay speak for itself.

The sunshine in Sunshine comes from women around him (Fiennes).

It's gay in the old-fashioned sense, a giddy whirl for the senses, from chilly English drawing rooms to lush Neverland jungle. It's innocent in believing love banishes all ills, even physical ones, and inspires unthinkable heroism.

This picture won't attract white audiences. I doubt that blacks would flock to a Jerry Seinfeld concert film. But we'd all get along better if we realized we had the right to laugh at each other's foibles

There’s not much new to The Infiltrator – perhaps nothing, except the setting of the climax – but the vintage stuff is satisfying.

The film doesn't lose its way emotionally; it's full of great monologues about loss and responsibility.

The movie doesn't need to preach a "we're all equal" message. When we watch the boys bond with their new kin over food or music, then see the lines of Palestinians plodding through armed checkpoints to reach jobs or visit Israeli friends, we get the point.

The Rookie is "Rudy" in a baseball uniform.

Burger has opened up what was a very interior book and injected it with a jolt of cinematic electricity. Smart move, smart movie.

Greenwood, whose range has carried him from the lonely widower of "The Sweet Hereafter" to the creepy husband of "Double Jeopardy," gives a star-making performance.

A clever blend of the high school comedy and the superhero genre.

The film's not really a whodunit or even a whoizzit, so learning his identity matters less than what happens after he reveals it. The film becomes truly French in its attitudes toward thwarted ambition and emotion, right down to an ending that may strike Americans as melodramatic.

It's made with seriousness, intelligence and craft, and filmgoers who aren't put off by the slow pace of life in 1380 should see it.

At its best, The Mist just wants to make you jump.

John Hancock must be the best filmmaker working in LaPorte County, Ind.

The movie should come with the tag line “Don't try this at home,” because the method has near-fatal pitfalls. Yet the characters' clumsy emotional growth shows us there's hope even for a stumbling father and two sons groping toward peace.

The unspoken heroes of the project are cinematographer Peter Biziou, who finds all the beauty in Cornwall's landscapes, and U.S. violinist Joshua Bell, who extracts beauty without schmaltz from every violin solo.

Whatever you feel about Truman Capote, you won't be able to turn away from him here.

Ryan Gosling's riveting as a neo-Nazi who was raised in Jewish faith

In its design, at least, Mindhunters"surpasses all other Christie knockoffs.

The planets aligned favorably, and this "Music" is sweet without cloying the appetite. It follows the meetcute-kissyface-breakup-reunion pattern of most of its kind, but the behavior seems more genuine and the situations less forced.

The movie may best be appreciated by people who know the references. All five monsters come from low-budget science fiction films of the 1950s.

These veterans realize they’re all playing cogs in the director’s plot-twisting machine.

Anyhow, I believe you would probably like this movie if you let your mind drift during the slow parts. That is easier for some of us than others, and I was thinking about my next runway project about half of the time.

Did anybody expect it to be a metaphor for modern America?

It's a smooth journey across familiar territory to a safe emotional harbor, always professional and occasionally delightful.

Ferrell's ideally suited to man-boy characters, and that's what Phil Weston is in "Kicking."

For much of the film, Jérémie comes off as sullen, then unsettled, then just creepy. Yet at the end, as he struggles to start over, he engages our pity.

Emphasizes the best element of the first one -- the half-kidding, insult-filled conversations around the shop -- and doesn't need to spend time introducing us to the characters.

Director Peter Berg and first-time writer Matthew Michael Carnahan do a smooth, efficient job of storytelling most of the way.

t’s possible to laugh at Marguerite and with her at the same time. Cover your ears at key moments, and you may even fall in love with her.

A fairly standard story for the period, about a girl from the wrong side of the tracks who ends up living the good life as a gangster's moll, but Crawford gives an astonishing performance. [17 Jun 2005, p.13H]

One of the opening scenes of The Accountant consists of puzzle pieces being dumped on a table, and that’s a fine metaphor for the film.... A few pieces can’t be made to fit, and two of those are big ones. (More on that in a minute.) But the rest of the story has been well-constructed, and the picture it gradually reveals keeps you guessing up to the final scene.

It's visually surrealistic, acted with integrity, so brutal in spots that I averted my eyes.

The fact that I didn't understand a film, that its ending can be interpreted at least two ways and maybe three – all likely to be "true" – usually sends me growling in disgust from the theater. But The Life Before Her Eyes has grown on me in memory.

Van Sant moves easily from dreamy, impressionistic narratives to conventional, less stylized storytelling, and he does the latter job well in Promised Land.

The book's emotional passages have the power to move us on film, while the one ridiculous coincidence near the end is still ridiculous.

Statham fans weaned on the adrenaline flowing through "The Transporter" and "Crank" may feel short-changed, but the rest of us can appreciate the unassuming, old-fashioned craftsmanship of The Bank Job, which is based on a true-life heist.

The Hulk has a split personality: Two-thirds come from director Ang Lee, one-third from '60s comic book creator Stan Lee.

The movie leaves a bunch of questions unanswered but rockets ahead in such entertaining style that I scarcely minded.

This is an extremely simple but likeable film.

Last week, the American Film Institute named "It's a Wonderful Life" the most inspiring movie in the history of the English language. The film was initially a flop, but it's now considered so perfect that nobody would dare remake it - under that title. Folks who see Click will have no trouble connecting the dots.

Seeing Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers is like having a second date with the woman who made you fall in love at first sight.

The movie is based on the life of California high school teacher Erin Gruwell, played with captivating honesty by Hilary Swank, yet it feels like the usual Hollywood exaggerations.

Focus begins so elegantly, wittily and quickly that it sets up expectations it can’t quite fulfill. Yet if not every coincidence can be explained, if not every improbability gets addressed, it’s a satisfying diversion in a winter which, as usual, has too few of them.

Eastwood thrusts us into the period with an understated piano score (which he composed) and authentic production design by Henry Bumstead, who died last May after working on the film at 90. (He collaborated with Eastwood on 11 films, including the Oscar-winning "Unforgiven" and "Million Dollar Baby," and he's a dedicatee of "Flags.")

[Director Patricia Riggen] has made an old-fashioned film about brotherhood. “Old-fashioned” remains mainly a compliment here; it refers to efficient storytelling, a victory of some kind for each character (except one minor player), and English-language stars who put on accents with mixed success to play South Americans.

The movie is not credible, even in an inner-city setting. At the same time, it's touching.

Christian Bale loves to suffer on-screen. Werner Herzog loves to make people suffer on-screen. Rescue Dawn is proof they were made for each other.

Comedy comes from an exaggeration of reality, not reality itself -- and on that score, Diablo Cody's first screenplay gets high marks.

On the scale of summer action films, this is to the “Transformers” sequel what an Andy Warhol print is to a first-grader’s refrigerator painting.

The middle 90 minutes, which put Hanks alone on an island without voice-over narration or even a musical background, is as risky as anything Hollywood did this year.

For the first time in memory, the film ends not just with the promise of more Bonds but without a firm conclusion.

It's different from the usual fare in one obvious way -- most of the cast are African Americans -- and, more importantly, in its willingness to leave some problems unsolved and volatile or unhappy people unchanged.

Don't be misled by the chopsticks and cherry blossoms: Memoirs of a Geisha, for all its exotic casting and locale, is our friend "Cinderella" in a kimono.

The Martian celebrates both the indomitable human spirit and the belief that our species can, with patience and common sense, think its way out of almost any problem. If the film occasionally preaches, its message strikes home.

The presence of Robert Redford gives the character weight, if not depth, because we bring to the film everything we know about the actor from other movies. Redford’s characters have seemed unflappable for more than 40 years: sometimes cool, sometimes cocky, but almost always master of a situation. To see him beginning to flounder is to see a new Redford, one who catches us off guard.

It’s like an amusement park ride that drags inexplicably for the last hundred feet – but until then, it’s a joltingly fine journey.

Button has a wide-eyed innocence that almost never palls. It strays far from the mind of F. Scott Fitzgerald, but often enough it came near to my heart.

A rarely honest, funny movie.

The film soars in the right places, especially when powerful newcomer Jennifer Hudson sings, and the charismatic supporting cast keeps it chugging forward.

It's packed with such passion, humor, fine acting in small roles - there are no big ones - and vitality in the storytelling that the lesson comes across entertainingly.

About a guy who stood on the brink of greatness but, because of one flaw he could never overcome, had to settle for being pretty good before he faded away. Strange, then, that the movie works exactly the same way.

A thriller with its share of nail-biting moments.

They've made a thrilling traditional nautical picture from untraditional books.

I knew blues music can make you feel you're not alone when your woman has gone, and rock your soul when you're on top of the world. But until I saw Black Snake Moan, I didn't know it could also cure nymphomania.

The honesty outweighs the hokiness by a fair margin.

It's mostly a disturbingly believable portrait of a psychopath whose true depths of rage are buried where none but he can see. The ironically named Plainview does not come into plain view until the last scene, and the lupine, scowling Day-Lewis is mesmerizing in the role.

It's wise, funny, honest right up to its last sadly dishonest scene, doesn't mock us more than we deserve and offers attractive women in various stages of undress.

If you liked "My Big Fat Greek Wedding," you're on safe ground here -- Next time, I'd like to see Gedeck serve up a hearty meal instead of a tasty but unfilling appetizer.

If this story has a moral -- though unlike many horror films, it doesn't seem to -- it's that humans are likelier to destroy themselves than help each other.

Melissa Leo is one of America's most underrated character actresses, and Frozen River confirms that opinion.

Deep as a Canadian lake: Below the placid surface, menacing creatures swim around unseen.

An almost perfect example of mainstream Hollywood filmmaking at its most expensive, well-calculated and safe: opulent production values, solid acting from its name star, distinguished performances from people surrounding him, Big Themes concerning sacrifice and honor, and a ridiculous finale full of superhuman achievements.

A peaceful, unforced film, and it inspires a feeling of relief and joy that's hard to describe.

Finding Dory can be described in exactly the same way as its title character: good-natured, funny, optimistic, darting from place to place, ranging from anxious to frenzied in tone, and unable to sustain an idea for more than a few moments.

All are watchable, attractive people who haven't worn out their welcomes. But if they continue to go round and round like this, they may. Aren't more African -American actors waiting in the wings to play romantic leads?

Satrapi and Parronnaud give us clues but no solution. The fun, for those of us who like fairy tales, is in guessing.

I think Foy simply wants to deliver well-gauged terror and make a few points about personal responsibility and the need to overcome our fears. That he does quite well.

The three leads all played these characters over multiple seasons on the TV show; they're comfortable in these skins, and they show that. (Confusingly, all three appeared in "City of God" under other characters' names.)

The movie feels operatic at times. Tempestuous arias play on the soundtrack, and Puccini figures directly.

Treadaway gives a restrained performance that never begs for pity but earns plenty; he shows the day-to-day difficulty of living without simple necessities while retaining hope and dignity.

A summer action movie that has a brain and doesn't let it atrophy? Fan me, I'm fainting!

This is his (Kutcher) most relaxed and sensitive work on film.

Nobody puts the "angst" in "gangster" like a European director. When the director's a Dane, you can count on gloomy, chilly visuals and deliberate pacing. And when the director is Nicolas Winding Refn, who made the "Pusher" series in his native country and "Bronson" in England, you can expect intense, often brutal spurts of violence.

It's overwrought and overplotted, but it's plenty of fun.

When "Hedge" clicks on all cylinders, Chuck Jones smiles down from heaven.

Though all but two students look too old, their interpretations are unanimously fine.

Many critics will complain about emotional manipulation, but I share Roger Ebert’s view: “Some people like to be emotionally manipulated. I do, when it’s done well.” I think “Beauty” does it well.

Its sensibility stays true to Gaiman's style: heroic, wryly funny, but bloodthirsty as great fairy tales can often be.