The set decor is more intricate than any of the characters.

It makes me sick all over again just describing this--the most affecting scene in a sluggish would-be comedy that reflects the dubious state of the art of fat male comedians exploiting themselves in 1997, the year its star died.

A loud and often stupid action thriller in which director Thomas Carter (Swing Kids) has every screaming psycho killer and every hysterical hostage behaving identically. Lots of car crashes, one superb explosion, and the fleeting charms of Carmen Ejogo (Absolute Beginners) hardly compensate for the overall unpleasantness, in which sadism is taken for granted and no character is allowed to develop. The idiotic script is by Randy Feldman.

But Peter Hyams, who's both director and director of photography, forces us to constantly strain to see what isn't there, until ultimately the screen explodes in welcome light, a cathartic finale in broad visceral terms even if the drama hasn't inspired much emotion.

As directed by Rob Reiner from a script by Lewis Colick, it offers the most decent and convincing portrait of the contemporary south I’ve seen in ages (apart from Sling Blade).

Scott Alexander and Larry Karaszewski's script may in spots be as much of a skim job as their one for "Ed Wood," but it's almost as sweet and as likable, and if the movie can't ever practice what it and its hillbilly hero preach--the only "beaver" shot in the movie involves a corpse--its heart is certainly in the right place.

In what I saw, Madonna in the title role tries bravely not to buckle under the weight of Stone and Parker's sense of Stalinist monumentality and fails honorably, while the Lloyd Webber music goes on being nonmusical.

Before this turns to total mush, it's a quirky, fitfully effective fantasy periodically enlivened by the cast.

An exquisite, haunting movie for grown-ups about love and family ties.

[An] unsatisfying mess.

Tiresome, blood-filled comedy.

A hallucination sequence and a scene set in a Vegas nightclub are so engrossing you forget they're animated; even the showiest techniques don't detract from the story.

An appalling piece of junk that tries to redo The Odd Couple and Grumpy Old Men in presidential terms.

Perfect acting by Keaton and Streep outshines the screenplay by Scott McPherson (who wrote the original play), even as the performances are overwhelmed by cinematography so gorgeous and distracting it makes the drama seem like just so much wheel spinning.

The film is all but crushed by Tom Cruise's screen-hogging demand that everything collapse and swoon around him. If the star gave us more of a rest, we might have more of a movie.

I'm not sure what it all means, but, as in Ed Wood, Burton's visual flair and affection for the characters make it fun.

Payne is just as guilty of using her (Ruth) as a figurehead for his ideas--most of them about the stupidity and futility of politics--as are the targets of his satirical abuse.

Perhaps the most remarkable thing here is Thornton's nuanced performance, but the film has other rare virtues: all the characters are fully and richly fleshed out (with some unexpected turns by John Ritter and singer Dwight Yoakam), and the story's construction is carefully measured.

If the Disney animated original (1961) -- adapted from Dodie Smith's novel -- tried to approximate live action, this 1996 Disney live-action remake often tries to evoke cartoon.

The virtue of this play and the film of this play is that many readings and meanings are possible. The same can’t be said for the propositions of its detractors, who merely want to sweep an enduring and potent form of liberal protest under the carpet.

The script by Brannon Braga and Ronald Moore provides all the background necessary for viewers unfamiliar with the characters' previous movie and TV-series exploits, but not so much as to annoy fans.

The high-powered drive of both the storytelling and the music is riveting.

It's reasonably well told and well mounted but little more.

Simpler and cruder than Who Framed Roger Rabbit in terms of story and technique, this is still a great deal of fun, confirming that Jordan is every bit as mythological a creature as Daffy Duck or Yosemite Sam.

You won't come out of it indifferent, and even if it winds up enraging you (I could have done without most of the ending myself), it nonetheless commands attention.

Director Ron Howard makes too much of camera and editing tricks, as if momentarily confusing us about where a character is or which character's point of view the movie is taking will somehow deepen the narrative.

Fairly strong on period atmospherics, but it mainly adds up to yet another pointless adaptation of a literary standby.

The movie illuminates how the moral, economic, and spiritual concerns of its characters converge in situations that defy ethical platitudes. In less capable hands the brasher metaphors might have come across as trite, but director F. Gary Gray (Friday) generally manages to ensure that the line where technique meets meaning is marvelously blurred.