There's no use griping about the superfluous white-on-white romance that generates so much dead space in Zwick's movie, for without it Blood Diamond would never have been made. Which would be a pity, for as liberal hand-wringing goes, it's a winner.

It all sounds like a recipe for the most noxious liberal jerk-off movie since "Crash," but in the hands of writer-director Richard LaGravenese, Freedom Writers turns out to be a superb piece of mainstream entertainment -- not an agonized debate over the principles of modern education à la "The History Boys," but a simple, straightforward and surprisingly affecting story of one woman who managed to make a difference.

Something New never feels remotely like the world we live in - it's a fabrication of a gauzy romantic-comedy movieland where people of all colors can be equally trite and dull.

With its young-vs.-old plot conflicts, its vid-game-reminiscent setups and its prominent positioning of a 12-year-old in the cast, the ninth Star Trek movie explicitly stalks kids, and probably snares neither them nor their parents.

Engrossing.

The movie belongs quite rightly to Wendy, the most enchanting little girl in English fiction, and to the untrained actress, Rachel Hurd-Wood, who plays her.

Although that's enough plot for two movies, Niccol proceeds to clog up his meticulously mounted story with a murder and a romance (hence Uma Thurman), allowing needless intrigue to distract from his ideas.

On a storytelling level, Robots is in dire need of an upgrade.

The film is being sold as a comedy, and it is amusing. Secretly, though, it's a romance, with Merchant's roving camera discerning the tempestuous love triangle at the heart of Naipaul's novel.

Roger Nygards’ sweet, gently funny documentary about the wild and woolly fans of all things Star Trek doesn’t really reveal much about the original landmark series and its various spinoffs, nor does it ever really get to the heart of the shows’ enduring appeal.

On its own, the story is tepid, and less than original. What draws us in is the way in which Gatlif sets it against a rich Andalusian backdrop.

The movie looks like it cost a fortune, with Dean Cundey's glistening widescreen compositions and Bill Brzeski's towering, storybook sets providing the backdrop for seamless visual effects. What's more, it's equally rich in ideas.

If there's anyone to credit for The Butterfly's eventual triumph over the inherent fatuousness of the material, it's the great Serrault and his tiny leading lady, who matches her elder nearly line for line and look for look.

Almost nothing comes as a surprise in this stately old fogy of a movie. The pacing is glacial, the screenplay is stiff as a board, and things heat up only in the movie's final scenes.

The boldest provocation of Mitchell’s sweet, tender and gently funny film may be its exuberant celebration of community and togetherness at a cultural moment rife with fatalism and disconnect.

Like two of the year's other standout American films, Kelly Reichardt's "Old Joy" and Ryan Fleck's "Half Nelson," it's a movie of ideas in which the ideas flow effortlessly out of the material instead of being plastered on top with a heavy cement roller (as in "Crash," "Babel" and "Little Children").

I was astonished to find myself weeping copiously over von Trier's latest, which is another parable of monomaniacal sainthood.

This is some of the best filmmaking ever done by director Richard Donner, a longtime Hollywood journeyman known more for his proficient deployment of three long-running movie franchises (The Omen, Superman and Lethal Weapon) than for his lyricism.

Director Paolo Virzi (who co-wrote the script with Francesco Bruni) errs badly by creating totems and types in lieu of characters.

The Shapiros, whose film is intercut with hilarious clips from vintage TV interviews with Mike Douglas and Charlie Rose, ultimately reveal a frail but mentally robust old man.

Best seen as a performance movie, featuring music (by Iris DeMent and Taj Mahal, among others) too wonderful to be overpowered by director Maggie Greenwald's plodding direction and leaden screenplay.

The irony is, it's his vulgarity, this mixture of the gaudy and the glossy, that distinguishes Lyne, that makes his work identifiable and, when the story's right, such a guilty pleasure.

No matter how tactful and sensitive Franklin's direction, he has made himself complicit in a polarization that panders to anti-intellectual populism even as it caters to women's movement backlash.

Those who are already in her (Breillat) camp will find much to feed on in this at once intellectualized and accessible, documentary-style peek inside the head of a passionately driven woman and artist.

Andy Abrahams Wilson builds a decent, if stylistically dull, case that Lyme disease is far deadlier and more neurologically debilitating than most doctors want to admit.

The rewrite went well, and the crew did a fine job; but you insult us, Mein Disney, serving up leftovers on such expensive china.

The love that grows between Fish and Poinsettia could have turned treacly in the wrong hands, but director Charles Burnett -- has the direct observational style of the silent masters.

Secretary's treatment of female sexuality is as matter-of-fact as its handling of self-mutilation, and the key to both is Gyllenhaal's remarkable performance.