Although most of the elements are familiar and virtually all of the characters are unpleasant, this is a better than average melodrama--mainly because of the volcanic power of Kathy Bates in the title role.

The humor loses momentum as the cleric shuns her advances, and the action grows frenetic following the arrival of his twin brother, a macho general.

Made-for-TV eyewash for disheartened Bears fans to drown their sorrows in.

This 1958 feature is thin stuff, seriously intended but not involving.

This French biopic of Nicolas Sarkozy plays like a competent TV miniseries, moving briskly and focusing on the hustle and bustle of electoral politics as the protagonist climbs toward the presidency.

The dialogue reproduces infantile idiom even as it parodies the baby talk of adults, and a touching, didactic scene involving a baby blanket that’s become the object of sibling rivalry may appeal to a broad age range: it’s as strikingly elegant as it is obvious in its use of metaphor.

Dark fantasy triumphs in this gorgeously animated surrealist adventure.

Not even D.W. Griffith, Steven Spielberg, and Stanley Kubrick working together could succeed in making this pandering piece of nonsense work dramatically on any level except the most egregiously phony.

Superlative documentary by Christian Charles delves into the world of stand-up with a seriousness and attention to detail matched only by Phil Berger's book "The Last Laugh."

Episodic but entertaining fantasy.

The leads are good, and Timothy Hutton is memorably off-putting as the pitcher's disengaged dad. But having created the aching umpire, Ponsoldt occupies him with some fairly shopworn situations.

Despite the sudsy, overlit look of William A. Fraker's cinematography and Downey's varying success with sight gags, this is still a lot of fun. An additional kicker is provided by the picture's crazed doublethink morality, which implies that incest is OK as long as you've got amnesia.

Ponderous, predictable, and unfunny, this gangster comedy was directed by Brian De Palma, though apart from a few of his characteristic symmetry gags in the opening sequences, it's indistinguishable from the work of any average TV hack.

In a novel twist, the movie's dumbest element--joke commercials for racist consumer products--turns out to be the most provocative when end titles reveal the products were all real.

This runs a close second to September as his worst feature to date--marginally more bearable only because it's a comedy and a couple of gags are reasonably funny.

Virtually unendurable.

The emotions are as gritty as the Edinburgh locales, and the sex is dark, urgent, and deeply selfish.

While his film certainly has the nastiness of satire, it doesn't have much political focus; petty malice rather than anger is the main bill of fare, with deep-dish notations about food and sex thrown in for spice.

The martial arts choreography is neither graceful nor exciting--it's worthy of a video game. Only after cars, trucks, and a motorcycle join the action--easily outclassing all the actors--does the movie take on a modicum of vitality.

It certainly fulfills all the conventions of the genre: sci-fi premise, noir stylings, martial arts, snarky dialogue.

MacFarlane gets an impressive amount of comic mileage from having a plush toy talk like a Boston low-life, though for gut laughs nothing compares to the brutal, frantic, and completely wordless fight scene between Wahlberg and his little buddy in a cheap hotel room.

The usual Spielberg rhetoric about the sanctity of childhood and the beauty of dreams seems wholly factitious in this crass context, which even includes a commercial--in the form of a rock video--for the tie-in merchandise.

The most daring aspect of the film, fully realized in Bello's grave performance, may be the notion that a parent can invest endless love in a child and one day find him unfathomable.

A raw, wickedly clever comedy that also includes moments of genuine terror.

Director James Watkins (Eden Lake) treats the material with surprising reverence, generating good clean scares from atmosphere and character revelations rather than shock editing or gore.

Jonathan Winters voices Santa with no edge whatsover, while Ben Stein deadpans a droll tour guide.

This early-1900s costume drama surely differs from Henry James's source novel.

Yet another unironic war movie.