By the end, you may be exhausted by the effort of trying to unravel the thing, but you may also be taken by the power of its spell. This is a movie that compels you to watch.

The zingers come so fast and furious that if you miss a few (and even the most alert viewer will the first time), there are always more.

With the exception of Murphy . . . the rest of the cast Oz has assembled acquit themselves only adequately or worse.

At the heart of it all is an entrancing lead performance by the teenage Kilcher.

Virgin is astoundingly astute but also wondrously clever, written with more care and joy than any hundred comedies to come out of Hollywood in years.

A fresh, intimate, gloriously unpolished performance film that measures up to the classics of the genre.

Scrupulously accurate, sometimes-tedious account of Stephen Glass' malfeasance.

The filmmaker who once aimed to enchant his audiences with cheerful stories of beatific visitors from outer space now wants only to scare the hell out of us. E.T., as it turns out, is a mass murderer after all, and we are his Reese's Pieces.

A film built upon transitions so weak and obvious it's astonishing the entire thing doesn't collapse on itself.

In the end, Stevie is a relentlessly messy, sometimes trying picture of family dysfunction, official neglect and personal tragedy, a disturbing redneck soap opera about real people and real consequences in which the protagonist--like the filmmaker--often proves to be as unlikable as he is sympathetic.

Pure joy to watch -- and an invaluable documentary record of a bygone era.

No matter how well you think you know this tale, you do not know it at all. It offers the oldest clichés polished up like some brand-new thing by director Greg Whiteley.

A perfect marriage of author and director.

The film's demands may be too perplexing.

Where Bowling for Columbine is at its most valuable is in its examination of America's culture of fear as a root cause of gun violence.

Two minor drawbacks: Onscreen IDs of speakers are sometimes omitted. And Kissinger's crimes seem almost paltry in comparison to current American policies.

In the end, Stone Reader gives us an old-fashioned romantic's view of writers and their craft--complete with the hint of a happy ending.

Though it's become almost redundant to say so, major kudos go to Leigh for actually casting people who look working-class; you'd be hard-pressed to get an American studio to go along with that, even though Leigh alumni often become famous.

It's beautiful to look at, and yet the story is strangely lacking; the novel's first chapter, available online at author Chevalier's Web site, tchevalier.com, seems to contain more plot points than the entire film.

That the film is good rather than great proves a disappointment, but just finding a good film these days is rare, especially a big studio picture.

3-Iron is at times deliciously sensual, creepily somnolent, whimsically spiritual and disturbingly violent. But it is never quite coherent.

The fanboy in me loves it, being wrapped in the warm projected glow of nostalgia for a movie I've memorized since age 9.

Whatever its faults -- and it has more than a few -- it is unquestionably different. It at least takes a stab at interpolating cerebral ideas into the format of a thriller.

Winterbottom has never before done such potent work; he's created a fiction film about the siege of Sarajevo that bristles with the raw, unnerving textures of a battlefield documentary.

Hellboy is as much a wreck as "The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen" or "The Punisher," coming and going in two weeks, and as much a bore as "The Hulk."

Such a funny mess that it keeps you laughing even when you realize it's not much better directed than a cable-access talk show.

A celebration of the naughty joke and the courage it takes to tell one.

The first exceptional drama of 2004, The Mother feels like life itself, sharpened to its finest points.