Forgettable fun.

The film’s political scope is wide, beginning in 1917 and extending for sixty years, and, especially in the first hour or so, the antic, magical tone of Rushdie’s novel is sustained.

It's all rather exhausting, as opposed to exhilirating.

It has weak spots, including bits of mystical mumbo jumbo about a legendary "Indian runner" with a ghostly message. But most of the film is articulate and absorbing.

Although the film's visuals are a cut above, say, "Sin City," another serioso graphic novel-turned-movie, it has the same mood: a film-noir-ish soddenness punctuated by megaviolence. Watchmen is the anti-"Incredibles."

Extremely goodhearted, if not exactly original or exciting.

The new remake has several strikes against it: self-indulgent dialogue, uneven performances, stupid shock effects, and a paranoid view of space exploration. It's also about 20 minutes too long. Yet it packs a strong wallop about half the time, if you see it as a child's-eye-view story that taps directly into preteen fears and fantasies.

This is the kind of movie where we’re not supposed to know at any time who is playing whom, but since the characterizations are glossy and paper-thin, it’s difficult to get worked up about who gets fleeced.

The results are ragged, disjointed, and endearing.

The well-staged opening sequence, which depicts the riot at the 1913 Paris première of "Le Sacre du Printemps," is, alas, the film's high point.

It's a pleasant time-killer, nothing more. But nothing less, either.

Good acting and pungent dialogue.

Traveling from the tragic to the comic, this multifaceted film is richly acted and imaginatively directed.

Informative, but very slow going.

It’s all fairly entertaining and eminently disposable.

The action is gripping and the story raises important issues about medical ethics in a high-tech society. Gene Hackman is in excellent form, and Hugh Grant does the most finely tuned acting of his career to date.

Kevin Spacey gives a richly nuanced performance as the accused killer, and director Clint Eastwood makes the sometimes sordid story less sensationalistic than it might have seemed in less accomplished hands.

Sadly, it lacks the classic awfulness that might have lifted it into the pantheon of Truly Bad Movies. Instead, what we have here is a garden variety bad movie, of which there have been all too many lately.

Why are Steve Carell and Tina Fey wasting their time, and ours, by appearing in the miserable comedy Date Night?

Doesn't develop enough momentum to justify its too-long running time.

Paltrow's performance in Sylvia doesn't have Oscar- worthy depth, but it's a solid, sincere portrayal that captures enough sides of Plath's complex personality to enrich the movie, directed with impressive visual power by New Zealand filmmaker Christine Jeffs.

The end result, at best, is high-toned pulp.

Pound for pound, Ami is a heavyweight.

They should call this overloud, underwhelming movie "Real Steal."

Framed as a cautionary thriller about the perils of high-stakes terrorism, but I took away a different message from it: Don't forget your briefcase at the airport.

Depp is disappointingly recessive here, as he often is when he's playing characters who don't have an antic streak.

It's a unique blend of history and hysteria, and there's no escaping the dead-serious ideas that run beneath its flamboyant surface.

Connery (an actor as well, and the son of Sean Connery) keeps the performers honest, and a few of the father-son tussles, with their admixture of love and envy, are powerful.