Despite the high spirits, most of the comedy is feeble and forced; Steve's career as a therapist seems especially far-fetched.

Falk throws himself into the part and almost single-handedly enables this comedy drama to transcend some of its sitcom limitations.

Jessica Lange brings so much energy and personal involvement to her portrayal of Frances Farmer that you can't help but feel sorry for her; nothing else in the film remotely matches her talent and dedication, and she seems alone—and even slightly absurd—in her feverish creativity.

The direction of Fran Rubel Kuzui (Tokyo Pop) suggests that she's more comfortable with character than action, and Joss Whedon's script has some fun with Valley talk (both genuine and ersatz) but strains to sell the story.

Director Anne Fletcher delivers more bite and brisker pacing than she did with "27 Dresses."

Apart from a few incidental flickers of Wang’s sidelong humor, there’s little of his personality evident in this film about a divorced underground cartoonist (Tom Hulce) finding himself enmeshed in a murder plota story that steadily loses coherence and interest the longer it proceeds.

Leave it to coproducer Jerry Bruckheimer to revive the Indiana Jones cycle without the period setting, the camp elements, or Spielberg's efficiency; director Jon Turteltaub just plods along, and the script by Marianne and Cormac Wibberley is equally poker-faced.

Director Rob Cohen supplies plenty of gore, attitude, loud music, and extreme-sports action -- in particular, a thrilling aerial drop that's followed by a crushing avalanche.

It's all very impressive without being particularly enthralling.

The filmmakers realize that playing baseball isn't nearly enough to fix what's wrong in these kids' lives, which might have made a more provocative ending than what follows.

If spelling out stereotypes were inherently funny the movie would be a hoot.

This dazzling CGI feature by DreamWorks Animation appropriates the vivid undersea psychedelia of "Finding Nemo," though in contrast to that movie, the father-son parable here is just an excuse to burlesque "The Godfather" for the 100th time.

This is mainly the girl's story, though the numerous southern archetypes out of Tennessee Williams and Carson McCullers (who's explicitly referenced) keep threatening to overwhelm her.

There's nothing remotely new here, but the movie has the taut, queasy feel of an early 70s drive-in shocker: old-fashioned suspense without any guarantee of old-fashioned mercy.

The gods, led by Sean Bean, are mostly stiffs; thank heaven for Uma Thurman, raising hell as a stylishly leather-clad Medusa.

This is pretty much the Lucas mixture as usual, this time in a Tolkien mode, with everything from the Old Testament to Kurosawa to Disney fed into a blender and turned into wallpaper. For easy-to-please five-year-olds of all ages.

Not a bad film, and certainly more polished than Holland's "Better Off Dead" debut, though it's marred by unevenness and the director's ineradicable penchant for infantile clowning (think Three Stooges, think Soupy Sales and worse).

Wade lampoons our tendency to rigidly define sexual preference, but eventually the high jinks start to resemble an episode from the old TV series "Love, American Style."

It's the angriest comedy I've encountered all year, though it's pretty well spoiled by Carrey, who insists on turning it into a star vehicle with his slapstick and spazz attacks.

May have more heart than head, but it's also just as interesting for what it leaves out of its romantic story as for what it retains.

A reasonably updated facsimile of a 50s service romp called Operation Mad Ball, a similar celebration of high jinks.

Real-life partners Olivier Ducastel and Jacques Martineau wrote and directed this frothy sex farce, incorporating musical numbers that recall Jacques Demy; the results are middling, but the actors' verve compensates for the clumsy choreography and lackadaisical camerawork.

Sublimely stupid.

Would have proved the point if it weren't so mechanically scripted.

A wizard at manipulating time, Kitano introduces staccato elements that interrupt the meditative pace even as they help set it.

As a romantic comedy this is a cut above the norm, satirical in its treatment of both spiritually bereft New Yorkers and materialistic Indian immigrants.

The insultingly trendy post-postmodern tale rationalizes its own product placement by using overkill.

The direction is so muted and sentimental and the pacing so soporific that only Ciarian Tanham's saturated color cinematography of the sylvan countryside breaks the monotony.