The result is a revelatory, challenging and deeply affecting portrait, anchored by what may be Kidman's most profoundly moving performance to date.

Disarming one minute, baldly manipulative the next, Champions is a tricky one.

The Devil Has a Name has an important message if you can get past the unwieldy melodrama of the film, but the second coming of “Erin Brockovich” this is not.

Because The Campaign tries to say something about truth vs. hogwash in election season, it's doubly sad the efforts of screenwriters Chris Henchy and Shawn Harwell come to so little.

It’s a premise for a pitch, not a screenplay, at least not a sharp-witted or interesting one. I’m not fussy. I’m not looking for the most interesting romantic comedy in history with this one. But I do wonder if some writers are so determined to stick to a formula so slavishly, they forget to make the characters funny, or to make characters rather than vaguely delineated personae in the Clooney vein or Roberts vibe.

Almost as uncompromising, and sometimes as funny, as "Dollhouse" or "Happiness."

A lively little Australian rock movie hamstrung and sunk by one of the least successful story ideas I've seen recently.

There is a genuine sweetness in Reitman's work that balances the innate cruelty of much '80s film comedy. But this time the gags are too feeble to provide a counterweight and the film tips into the cute, benign and pointless. [9 Dec 1988, p.A]

She delivers a solid and easy star performance. Some young performers lack a relatable quality; Seyfried has it, even with those old-school, big-screen peepers.

Classic Bay, except it's missing the crass director's fine-tuned rhythm, his feel for adrenaline, his breakneck edits and sense of humor.

This movie's good. It's fast, deftly paced and funny.

The Ten changes tone every few minutes, ranging from lowbrow gross-out gags to elevated language to a big, sloppy musical number.

The performances feel natural, improvised, and it’s easy to believe this is the world we inhabit. But if Rifkin’s message is pro-privacy, his script, laced throughout with menace, argues against it.

With a smooth overlay of LA sights and sounds, and a side of blueprints stolen from “Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner” and “Meet the Fockers,” “You People” ends up a lot less insightfully funny than “Black-ish.”

Blast is just shooting blanks. [12 February 1999, Friday, p.A]

You'd have to go back to "My Stepmother Is an Alien" to find a male fantasy/nightmare this off-putting.

Human-spirit cliches and all, the movie accomplishes job one: It moves. It also has a choice soundtrack, spiced by the likes of Missy Elliott’s “Shake Your Pom Pom” and Digital Underground’s immortal “Humpty Dance.”

Prince of Darkness is a real tour de force, and a welcome return.

To say this movie's premise is bonkers is putting it mildly.

Isn't good satire or good slapstick. It does have those lyrical, catchy Menken tunes, and the film perks up whenever Raitt or lang sing one of them. But much of this movie is deadly.

A talented craftsman of dark raillery, Day and his fixation on Hollywood melodrama are indulged to delicious effect in his sophomore effort.

At least Poseidon takes care to dispatch the Black Eyed Peas' Stacy Ferguson who, as the shipboard entertainer, sings what may be the worst song ever written, reprised over the end credits.

Overall, Wide Awake is a sound concept that fell considerably short of its goals. [27 Mar 1998, p.B]

Chevy Chase doesn't seem to have enough to do in "Funny Farm." He's a physical actor whose appeal can turn flat if he spends too much camera time sitting at a typewriter or working on his love relationship. Smith, as Elizabeth, is gorgeous and competent, but she lacks the comic verve of Beverly d'Angelo, Chase's memorable co-star in the National Lampoon series. This is a vehicle that does a lot for its supporting character actors and almost nothing for its stars. [3 June 1988, p.B]

Eric Bana doesn’t have much to do as Henry VIII except play the monarch as an overgrown spoiled brat. He is, however, awfully nice to look at.

It's sort of fun, certainly more so than the "National Treasure" pictures, as well as less manic (a little less) than the recent "Mummy" films.

Even the cute factor of A Dog's Way Home can't obscure its narrative weaknesses.

With no live dialogue, Waters relied on his vast knowledge of music to move this feature along. Snatches of Elvis Presley, R&B, Lou Christie, doo-wop and more carry Mondo Trasho through cinematic moments of nude hitchhikers, foot fetishists and the struggle of always striving to be "truly divi-i-i-ne." [30 Sep 1988, p.66]

Ploddingly written by Barry Michael Cooper, this shrug-evoking movie has been grimly directed by the numbers by Ichaso, who overlays his production with the obligatory sax music and in-your-viscera violence. [25 Feb 1994, p.A]

The component genre parts coexist, excitingly, without veering into camp or facetious desperation. Alien-invasion aficionados should be pleased. Western nostalgists may be pleasantly surprised. Fans of cowboys-versus-aliens movies, well, it's been a long wait and here's your movie.

Dominik drains the complication and, saddest of all, the screen wiles, from a plainly complicated legend.

A pumped-up, flag-waving, outrageously hokey and ridiculous -- but sometimes incredibly exciting -- war movie.

At its best, this new film does mix grandeur with skepticism, excitement with reflection. In the end, like Harry, it redeems itself.

A limply derivative, disappointingly trivial and hokey fish-out-of-water crime comedy.

What a bright, entertaining, cleverly updated and utterly satisfying comedy the new Alfie turns out to be.

A wildly improbable story that neither Newman nor co-stars Fiorentino and Mulroney, for all their panache and chemistry, can make much sense of it.

A confusing and not entirely believable ending clouds the issue, though, burying some fine performances and cinematography under an avalanche of gore and plot twists.

A big, hearty fantasy-adventure with spectacular fire-breathing effects and a fizzling story. [31 May 1996, p.C]

There's a certain quirky charm to the young Hopkins in his creep-out role as Corky, a shy, failed stand-up magician. [25 Apr 2006, p.3]

The film doesn't pretend to be anything other than what it is: a story of one woman overcoming low expectations. Gugino and Burstyn and the young performers playing the young players do likewise.

This is the third in a hyper-violent and rather stupid series of thrillers about an adult child killer--with knives for fingers--who is burnt to death but now has returned to haunt more teenagers in their sleep. The kids are all patients at a clinic where group therapy fails to stop their nightmares. What you get for your money are scenes with a severed head, the simultaneous injection of 10 hypodermic needles presumably filled with heroin and four long tongues that turn into arm and ankle straps for a sex scene. Whoopee! The film's only blessing? It just may be bad enough to kill off the series.

Allen is obsessed with the notion of getting away with murder, mulling over which personalities can shoulder the psychological burden of killing without remorse, while others crumble under the pressure. The problem is, you don’t feel the human sweat and strain in Cassandra’s Dream, despite game work from Farrell and McGregor.

Warming up this material, as Johnson tries to do, doesn't make it warmer; it just makes it seem warmed-over.

Stupid but fun.

Just doesn't have the same zing.

Sean Anders' derivative gross-out movie Sex Drive is easier to take if you accept that the answer to every baffling plot question is "because it’s a teen sex comedy."

While no doubt a contribution in terms of historical record, the 2003-2004 timeline of the movie makes it feel out of date. This offers perspective on the insurgents then, but leaves the viewer wondering what they would be thinking and saying four years later.

A ravishing crock. Like its title character, a computer-generated movie star programmed to resemble a cross between Grace Kelly, Audrey Hepburn, Lauren Bacall and Kim Basinger, it's beautiful but empty, gorgeous but spurious.

The flaw in Death of a President isn't one of morality. It's one of dramatic interest.

A relaxed-looking expert piece that immerses us in another world. At the end, Hanson has a bonus. He and his producers hired Bob Dylan for the Oscar-winning "Things Have Changed" in "Wonder Boys," and Hanson brings Dylan back here, for a folky, bluesy number called "Huck's Tune."

Far and Away, a mildly old-fashioned romantic melodrama that has as many charming moments as embarrassing ones. Much of the charm is supplied by the earnest performances of Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman. [22 May 1992]

Howard has a wonderful touch with actors, and almost all of them here have their moments. [26 March 1999, Friday, p.A]

The Good German is just stiff. When Soderbergh tries one of those patented swoop-in-on-the-diagonal moves at a key dramatic moment, the effect is comic. And at that precise moment, the story starts dying a slow, oxygen-deprived death.

The film is an epic treatment of a childhood curio. It's also the kind of elaborate movie stunt you can't imagine someone really pulling off. [26 May 1995, p.C]

Stone had the right instincts about the part — she inhabits Senna beautifully, and her performance anchors the light-as-air All I Wish. It's the perfect role for her to sink her teeth into, sexy and fun, but she brings a sense of real intelligence and soulfulness to the character. That's true star power.

Gyllenhaal certainly holds the screen; at this point in his career, he has found a way to rise above whatever needs rising above. But midway through Demolition, I longed for a sequel to "Nightcrawler" instead.

For visual noise by the ton, Emmerich is my kind of hack, the pluperfect blend of leaden self-seriousness and accidental-on-purpose self-satirist.

What's missing most conspicuously from Great Balls of Fire is an interest in the historical and cultural context that made Lewis' career possible - that moment when a dying rural tradition intersected with a booming urban economy to create a whole new kind of music and with it, a whole new America. McBride treats the '50s as a joke - a montage of "Leave It to Beaver" complacency and H-bomb panic. The truth is more complex than that, and a better story. [30 June 1989, p.A]

Has the potential to be much more than it is, especially with the collection of able actors on hand.

The acting is primo and the cinematography, on high-definition video by the gifted M. David Mullen, is striking.

It's good, hard-edged stuff, violent and a bit exploitative but also nicely done, morally alert and street-smart.

The notion that stories are the lies that tell the truth isn't new -- even Shakespeare knew that -- but the central conceit of "let's save lives by putting on a play" seems not only artificial, but also hollow.

Jack Lemmon and Walter Matthau, the co-stars of Out to Sea, keep fooling, beguiling and surprising us. Nothing can sink or ruffle them. Even with substandard scripts or dubious projects, they remain one of the greatest comedy actor teams the American movies have had: two longtime stars with formidable talents who complement each other perfectly. [02 July 1997, p.2]

Most of this doc is content to wander through Franken's recent show-biz resume, to no particular end.

Hawke and McGregor are the kind of actors who hold your attention as the story evaporates around them. Even so, they deserve far more to play with than they get here.

Writer-director Kouf often comes up with seemingly sure-fire ideas and then fails to develop them. "Gang Related" takes some chances. But, while trying to shift the moral center and avoid cliches, it keeps floundering and stumbling back into them. Like the accumulating corpses on Divinci and Rodriguez's beat, it seems a victim of greed, confusion, mistaken identity and a mixed-up system that turns good guys bad. [8 Oct 1997, p.1]

If frenetic pacing alone made a movie interesting, Queens would be cinematic solid gold.

The story is a lot harder on its female protagonist than the 2000 film was on its male equivalent. This makes a depressing amount of sense, given what women are up against in most workplaces. Henson’s Ali plays both the dramatic encounters and the slapstick opportunities for higher stakes than Gibson ever did.

The results impart that "trapped" feeling all too well. It's a sullen affair, dominated by a grim visual palette that intrigues for about 30 minutes.

It's by far the best cast Burns has assembled -- so much so that, unlike his other films, he doesn't come near dominating it.

Once Schwarzenegger got attached, the short-sighted, commercially minded forces took over; the man is desperate for a hit, so the movie dare not overestimate the audience's intelligence or tolerance for uneasily resolved dilemmas.

Isn't likely to satisfy the gamers' appetite for action. It also probably isn't heady enough for the science-fiction crowd, and it's too remote for those who simply wish to be immersed in a head-spinning fantasy world.

This is a meaty, well-crafted thriller that absorbs and disturbs you from first frame to last.

As entertainment, Nicotina manages a bracing balance. It arrests with violent bursts and anxious pauses until its three plots merge in a satisfying resolution; its laughs caught in my throat like smoker's cough.

While I wish van Heijningen's Thing weren't quite so in lust with the '82 model, it works because it respects that basic premise. And it exhibits a little patience, doling out its ickiest, nastiest moments in ways that make them stick.

We're snowed by a great deal of intersecting and crisscrossing information in The Fifth Estate, and Singer's script lacks organizational skills. I can relate. But that doesn't make parsing this busy film, or — crucially — its true, contradictory feelings about Assange any easier.

Watching actors this good handle material this dopey is like waiting for Itzhak Perlman to pick up his violin and start playing variations on My Baby Does the Hanky Panky. It's funny. But it's also sad. The movie suggests we get the government we deserve, but do we really deserve this movie?

It’s a sidewinding but often effective L.A. crime thriller saddled with the wrong leading man.

In Richie Rich, the cliches are generic, and the film runs out of gas early on. [21 Dec 1994, p.7C]

If you have ever been the butt of a practical joke, you have some idea how you will feel during the last few minutes of April Fool's Day. [27 Mar 1986, p.2C]

With its lilting Lerner-Loewe score and great Kelly dance numbers, this is almost a Hollywood musical masterpiece. But it's sabotaged by the airless "outdoor" studio sets mandated by MGM. [13 Mar 1998, p.L]

Now and then the movie rouses itself to deliver. If you go to American Reunion - and many will, if they harbor fond memories of the first one, and if they can find a sitter - you should stay through the end credits.

Amid the nervousness Douglas and Sutherland do what they can to enliven their warring stereotypes. And now and then, blessedly, The Sentinel nudges toward camp.

The Money Pit, a miserable ripoff of the old Cary Grant comedy Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House, has nothing to do with such nuances of the human experience. Instead, it is an action comedy that regularly throws its actors around and through pieces of plywood, into and out of windows.

In a funnier world, Zoë Chao and Tig Notaro are starring in their own romantic comedy together.

Provides some compensatory satisfactions, thanks mostly to the actors, as they make the most of a series of pencil sketches.

A fine and moving film could be made from this story, which was inspired, loosely, by events and situations in the lives of Kurtzman and Orci. But the script sets an awfully low bar for Sam's redemption.

It sets a tone, all right. A lot of gamers (sorry, "filmgoers") may well enjoy writer-director Michael Davis' ultraviolent lark. It's not meant to be taken seriously. But films like this are worth taking seriously because they're genuinely cruddy and hollow and, yes, vile.

Marked for Death is, even by the xenophobic standards of the recent action genre, uncommonly racist and misogynistic.

For an hour or so, aided by the autumnal glow of Ben Seresin's cinematography, director Hughes maintains a firm handle on the story's turnabouts. Then the script goes a little nuts with coincidence and improbability.

There's a sass and bite to Winger's acting, a grinning intelligence, unabashed sexiness and total immersion that make her one of the movies' few hipster female stars.

What pulls us along through the inky shoals of The Way of the Gun? Sheer style, plus the movie's refusal to play nice.

A tearily adorable canine valentine.

A master of atmosphere, Japanese director Takashi Shimizu leads his audience along on a celluloid leash to his pitch-black attic of horror, inviting each hair on the back of your neck to stand up.

Packs so much hell-for-leather action, gorgeous Moroccan scenery and eye-popping Industrial Light and Magic visual effects into its two hours that, after a while, I began to get tired of it.

It's the centrifuge around which the rather uneven film whirls, and Malek keeps it going with his sheer will and talent, aided by a parade of legendary Queen hit singles.

It's not very funny, but your kids might like it.

The movie`s underlying message seems to be that racial harmony can best be achieved by allowing white boys to beat the stuffing out of minority kids- that`s what really earns their love and respect. There must be a better way.