Once this movie gets going, it works, and it works well. It has a slow buildup, but its final third manages to generate some eye-popping thrills.

We become so absorbed in the ramifications of the techniques involved that a more challenging plot might have resulted in sensory overload.

Astonishing, haunting and lyrical on its own terms.

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.

The fractured structure, which moves from one species to another while following a generally chronological overall arc, can occasionally leave your mind to wandering, but for a film with no plot or characters to focus on it is remarkably gripping.

If you're in the mood for a quiet, beautifully acted little drama, liberally spiked with comedy, about the universal desires of the human heart, this may be the obscure gem you're looking for.

But except for a few missteps, the movie is so beautifully and sensitively rendered in its particulars, in its characterizations of soldiers and officers, and in its dramatization of a nearly miraculous event, that the result is an affecting piece of cinema.

Bruce Nolan is one deeply disgruntled barrel of laughs--the emotional kin of Bill Murray's cynical weatherman in "Groundhog Day."

While the movie is frequently sharp and funny and weirdly relatable, the material feels too much like reality.

If there's a flaw with the film, it's that Justman doesn't trust his narrators enough; too often he'll stage a re-enactment while someone's talking, as if he's afraid the mere tales themselves won't hold our interest. But they will, as long as there's a kid slapping a bass, a sampler swiping a groove or some middle-aged couple slow dancing to Marvin Gaye or the Miracles.

Writer-director-actor Cedric Klapisch simultaneously shows great moviemaking flair and reveals a very peculiar worldview.

An engaging, family-oriented romantic comedy that should appeal as much to fans of the original movie as to viewers unfamiliar with the 1961 Hayley Mills version.

Director Kevin Rodney Sullivan (How Stella Got Her Groove Back) and editor Paul Seydor serve it up beautifully.

It's a melodrama more than a drama, a light thriller –- which is not to say that it is not wonderfully entertaining and satisfying. In fact, it is both.

Moviegoers bewailing the absence of literacy and shallowness of character they usually get for their seven bucks need look no further than this fluent and satisfying triptych for a source of hope.

The film successfully walks the thin line between slick commercialism and "serious" realism. It is sentimental, but it comes by its sentiment honestly, through well-observed performances by the leads and a keen insight into the quirks of the Japanese middle-class culture.

Capturing the Friedmans does not end after its credits roll; audiences will try the case over and over again in their heads. Jarecki does not judge, but leaves only tragic clues for us to ponder.

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.

The movie's diplomatic breadth compromises its thematic depth -- it basically repeats that fun conquers all -- but few movies will so generously rawk a crowd this year.

As enormously entertaining as it is appalling.

What it lacks in story, it makes up for with sharp dialogue and an amusing Walter Mitty-esque style.

What makes Silverman a truly gifted comic is her timing and delivery.

Soderbergh seems to have found his vision again. It'll be a great day when he returns to writing his own material, but until then, this is none too shabby.

A fascinating documentary by Bruce's longtime friend Rupert Murray, uses footage taken by both Bruce and Murray to document Bruce's harrowing, enlightening and occasionally hilarious experience. It's a wild ride.

This is not the easiest film in the world to untangle, but our attentions are soon rewarded.

The film falls short only in its refusal to take a stand on whether star Linda Lovelace was a victim, as she claimed.

Secrets & Lies is all about wounds and our tendency to embrace placebos rather than the harder courses of treatment.

As a film it's mostly top-notch work. Kiwi director Christine Jeffs has taken the poignant, thoughtful screenplay of erstwhile documentarian John Brownlow and rendered it a moving mood-piece of subtlety and ever-encroaching sorrow.