With an exciting way out, the audience would have gladly overlooked all the loose ends from earlier in the movie. But the way Hall plays it, he undermines the early style and intelligence of his all-black action movie, taking audiences for the wrong kind of ride in the end.

One shallow film, that quickly returns to where it started: Zero.

Merely adding an older generation of lovers to a love story does not make your romance one for the ages. Doesn’t even make it "The Notebook."

What you don’t expect is camp. The Counselor is more "Wild Things" than "No Country for Old Men", with which it shares a border town setting. But at least "Wild Things" knew what it was. The Counselor treats its material seriously and seems to have no idea it’s a joke that can’t even muster up a bit of smarty-pants Tarantino cleverness or energy.

The best thing you can say about Scooby-Doo is that Matthew Lillard makes a really, really good Shaggy.

Filmmaker Christopher Cain has turned a national tragedy into a teen romance, and not in a grand, entertaining, "Titanic" way.

A $100 million production of a 10-cent script, is so clunkily written, so bereft of any engaging ideas or emotions, you'd think De Palma would have sneered at it on first reading and passed

The explanation for all this mayhem eludes me, and even a lame last-minute twist isn't enough to cover the fact that Jigsaw ain't as clever as the movie thinks he is.

Maybe there's a good movie to be made about the affair between Franklin Delano Roosevelt and a distant cousin. I wouldn't bet on it, and Hyde Park on Hudson isn't it in any case.

For all of 10 minutes, Gray Matters looks like it might have accomplished the impossible: uncovering a romantic-comedy scenario audiences haven't seen a million times before.

What we are not spared is the sort of trite movie that lacks the backbone of any good dysfunctional-family comedy: a thread of the universal amid the absurdity.

A compendium of missed opportunities, uninspired action and clichés so tired, you wish the screenwriters had called 911, too.

If you liked the meat of Kramer vs. Kramer, the reasoning goes, this movie should be the sauce. Too bad. Irreconcilable Differences, the latest comedy by the husband-and-wife writing team that simmered away schmaltzily in Private Benjamin, has its seasonings awry. [28 Sep 1984, p.B1]

How High is not a particularly good movie, but then again it's not trying to be. It's a project by two B-list rappers seeking to extend their music careers in the way of stars like Will Smith, Ice Cube and Tupac Shakur.

A cliché-ridden, condescending and ham-handed film that clumsily fails to bring to life what should be an interesting story. You might say none of its punches even comes close to connecting.

Amounts to Chicken Soup for the Soul-style torture -- unless you like that kind of thing.

The Search for Spock should be great fun for Trek fans; it's splendid junk when it works. But if you can't hum the theme from memory, Trek III is likely to be just another way to kill two hours. [1 June 1984, p.D1]

Mediocre.

All its freewheeling makes for a really "moving" movie, one in which the big chase scene involves, predictably, a car and a bike. But there's not much else to it. [21 Feb 1986, p.6]

The whole thing feels at least three summers too stale.

In the end, Wendy and Hiro lose their identities in each other's cultures -- an interesting premise for a movie. However, this potentially dramatic point suffers from a badly paced script, and acting that leaves you wondering where the characters are. [15 Apr 1988, p.C12]

What's missing is some faith in the audience's intelligence and, more importantly, the jokes.

A lackluster holiday-theme comedy featuring production design half a notch above a snow globe and a star who doesn't so much act as revive a well-worn persona.

Crudup is about as effective as anyone could be in the dreary World Traveler, but he can't keep this shallow, pretentious film from wallowing in banality and staggering self-indulgence.

The Lake House overflows with heart-stopping thrills, if by ''thrills'' you mean ''watching attractive people wait around for letters to be delivered by mystical forces.'' Which, come to think of it, makes this romantic melodrama sound a lot more interesting than it is.

Whether his character is happy, sad, angry or scared, Spade affects precisely the same knowing smirk and sarcastic delivery. This one-note style makes him a funny stand-up comedian. But in a role, it's usually pure amateur hour.

Unfortunately, this dimwit concept barely has enough spark to power a single strand of Christmas lights, much less rival the classic-by-comparison "National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation" in side-splitting Yuletide snafus.

In Percy Jackson: Sea of Monsters, choosing the dumbest character is a colossal task.

Neither as good nor as bad as you'd hoped it would be: It's just a mediocre exploitation picture with an inspired premise (succinctly spelled out by its title), loads of gratuitous gore, a dash of equally gratuitous nudity and enough inanities to make you wonder if Ed Wood rose from the grave to serve as a creative consultant on the project.

Like Russia's answer to "The Matrix" and "Lord of the Ring"s trilogies, Day Watch offers the second chapter in an epic battle between the forces of Light and Dark, the result of which is a gaping gray area where nothing much makes sense.

The movie is all moist grime and seedy atmosphere, and it's certainly something to look at: It's beautifully lurid. But it's an empty, unengaging movie, and by the end, it has become ridiculous, too.

A romantic comedy so rote, dull and predictable that it makes "You've Got Mail" seem innovative and fresh.

There are three or four big laughs scattered throughout The Pink Panther 2, along with a smattering of decent chuckles. But all those moments combined account for maybe five minutes of screen time, which leaves you with another hour and a half of movie to sit through.

Misses out on just about everything that made the original work, most notably Falk and Arkin, whose odd-couple pairing was the foundation on which the entire movie rested.

Amounts to little more than a downbeat soap opera as half a dozen squatters -- hustler, junkie, stripper, queer, fallen Madonna and skank, with a mentally challenged roomie thrown in for good measure -- try to hold their lives together in a grungy New York loft just days before Christmas. Think "Rent" without the music.

A loud, dumb movie, but its male, car-obsessed audience will probably enjoy it anyway.

Viewing the new Martin Lawrence kiddie movie is more enjoyable than watching my dog eat a desiccated toad carcass he pried off the road, but only marginally so.

If heavy gore is your kind of entertainment, you'll get a buzz out of The Fly II. But be warned -- don't take a squeamish date. [13 Feb 1989, p.C7]

Swami says, “Steer clear of The Guru, a dismally dumb sex comedy, lest you waste $9 and 90 minutes of your life you will never get back.''

Besides the clever name and some striking images from director Dwight H. Little, the only other entertaining bits in Halloween 4 come from Donald Pleasence. [29 Oct 1988, p.C4]

The film is more of an exercise in pandering and propaganda -- give your baby up for adoption, you selfish pig! -- than the heartfelt drama it aims to be.

Satisfaction, an adolescent saga about a teeny-bopper rock band hoping to make it big, has Bateman trying to be hip and heavy at once. She comes off like Mallory, the mall-hopping phone monger from the sitcom. [17 Feb 1988, p.D6]

It's an hour longer than the average sitcom, but The Wedding Date isn't much different from what you see crammed into any TV comedy lineup, minus the laugh track.

You know this supposedly risqué comedy is in trouble when the funniest gag involves a foot cramp during sex.

Demolition is so busy trying to be profound, the film doesn’t have much use for humor.

The film is so gleefully ridiculous that you start to suspect the filmmakers were in on the joke and forgot to tell the actors.

Have you ever noticed how it's always the worst horror movies that go really far out of their way to lay the groundwork for a sequel?

In Year of the Dog, director Mike White willfully violates one of the great unwritten rules of Hollywood screenwriting: Kill as many human characters as you want, just spare the dog.

With director Mel Damski making his debut at the helm of a feature, Yellowbeard is a film adrift. [27 Jun 1983, p.C6]

There's nothing here that hasn't been done before, and better, in any given "Halloween" or "Friday the 13th" sequel.

License to Drive takes too much license with its nuttiness, playing wacky moments to the point where the comedy sputters. [06 July 1988, p.D6]

It has virtually nothing in common with the charming book written by the Gilbreths about their turn-of-the-century family and everything to do with making money on DVD rentals.

The formulaic movie would be forgettable but inoffensive if it were anyone else posing for blue screen CGI effects.

In the end, they are only moments, and even at a merciful 86 minutes, Dirty Dancing: Havana Nights feels formidably long.

An apocalyptic Bob Dylan song made cinematic, with all the vision and poetry dissipating in the transfer. It's as if the filmmakers listened to "Desolation Row" just one time too many.

It's fun seeing what these two can do when they're inspired, but it's awful having to sit through what happens when they're not. [21 Dec 1984, p.D10]

This is a gleefully repulsive movie. Spun is bound to be described as bold and cutting-edge by those who confuse shock value with achievement. Most people, however, will just long for a shower after it's over.

Too inert to be titillating, too generic to be engaging.

Even with a glittering cast, this would have been a dull, hackneyed, overlong affair, but the contributions of such stalwart actors as Clint Walker and Tommy Sands insured that The Chairman of the Board's first shot in the director's chair would be his last. [17 Oct 1982, p.5]

Amateurishness -- the camera angles sometimes chop off the top of Reiser's head -- aside, The Thing About My Folks is also weirdly dated, especially with regard to technology.

An inane martial arts movie... Thomas is a glorious gymnast and may be a competent karate fighter, but this fight choreography does both disciplines an injustice. Better to spend your $4.50 renting a tape of Thomas scoring a perfect "10" at the American Cup. [10 May 1985, p.D3]

These are things to keep in mind while the movie lumbers along from retread situation to punchleszs comic setup. Pirates looks cheap and runs long; it moves fast only when it is scrabbling for a shred of charm. [18 July 1986, p.D3]

Derivative and self-important, Third Person is a concept and not much more, precisely the sort of film that makes you wonder why anybody would bother to see it at all.

A tired and unnecessary sequel.

Only one-third of these gags are funny. [5 Dec 1989, p.C1]

Certainly a grand-looking picture. For a film that's filled with CGI effects, there wasn't a single shot that looked artificial, and the production design is tremendous. But it's a hollow, boring spectacle.

This is 40 is crude and dull, with a supporting cast that reminds you how utterly uninteresting the main characters are.

Homefront is done in by uninspired action scenes in which Statham’s athletic prowess is rendered unwatchable by hyper-editing, a shameful reliance on child-in-peril cliches to move the story forward, and so many loose ends that you wonder if 20 minutes were accidentally cut out from the movie.

The result is almost suffocating: a movie that has been tinkered and fussed with until there is no spontaneity left -- no warmth or life or messiness.

Superman IV works rather well as a children's movie. It even has a line or two for adults -- though not, one hastens to qualify, enough to actually warrant adult attendance. [25 July 1987, p.B1]

Has all the depth of an episode of "Joey."

This new, presumably improved Chainsaw is just as humorless as the original, but it's also slicker, glossier and resoundingly artificial.

Nothing wrong with a movie having a point of view, but watching people spout jargon or exposition doesn't really make for riveting entertainment.

The fact that Swept Away got made at all implies there simply is no dissuading Madonna from her movie-star aspirations. Her tenacity is admirable, but it's also block-headed.

At its heart, however, Soul Man is a one-gag story propelled by sitcom material; there are times you'd swear you were watching Lucy. And because the filmmakers really aren't up to their premise, the movie ends on a note of forced harmony that's enough to make the blood run cold. It's a reminder that even good white liberals still aren't sure how to act around black people. Which, come to think of it, would make a fine, socially "relevant" comedy. Perhaps Hollywood will make it someday. [27 Oct 1986, p.C4]

Explicitly invites us to mock its artificiality and giggly cluelessness, but beyond its attractive shell the film rings hollow. These days, even a comedy has got to have a heart.

Fleischer has missed his opportunities to get real comic- book style humor out of this movie. It could have been a lot of belly laughs -- but as it is, it's only an occasional snide chuckle. [04 July 1984, p.B5]

James and Riley might make an interesting Elizabeth and Darcy in a traditional Pride and Prejudice, but this version? It’s dead on arrival.

Loaded with so much drama that the story sinks into a grim, sloppy soap-opera mix.

The characters, starting with Lewis himself, are downright obnoxious. Not counting those singing frogs or the time-traveling T. rex (with its big head and little arms), only Lewis' sad-sack roommate ''Goob'' is remotely sympathetic.

It's a redundant comedy, like hearing the same tired joke for the 100th time.

Take away Once Upon a Crime's star-studded cast and sunny Monte Carlo vistas and what you have left is a dachshund in a green plaid vest. An apt image: The movie is a real dog. [12 March 1992, p.F5]

Mostly, though, The Big Bounce isn't offensive, or even terrible. It's just lazy, relying on numb moviegoers to fork over cash thinking they'll see the next "Get Shorty" or "Out of Sight."

The movie is basically a love story between a man and his elephant, and if viewed as such, it's not nearly as ridiculous as the movie it first appears to be.

No matter how much good will the actors generate, Showtime eventually folds under its own thinness.

Do not, under any circumstances, consider taking a child younger than middle school age to this wallow in crude humor.

There's nothing so artistic about it as to attract the same art-house crowd that braved subtitles to discover "Nine Queens," and yet, it's professional enough that Spanish speakers will be glad to have a heist movie on par with "Rush Hour 3" or "The Pacifier" made in their native tongue.

Huston's effort was an ambitious attempt to simmer down difficult literature, but this Under the Volcano is too thick and too thin. [31 Aug 1984, p.C11]

For an inaugural effort, Open Season ain't bad, but the studio shows far more promise with its gee-whiz visuals than it does in the story department.

And once these two curiosities are addressed, with 90 of the film's 99 minutes left to go, the plodding, gimmicky She- Devil becomes sheer hell. It's a comedy sketch inflated into a movie, a clunkily directed idea that follows a predictable path to an unsurprising conclusion. [8 Dec 1989, p.G5]

The film is supposed to be about tolerance, but the only acceptance comes in terms of how the islanders accept the Mormon teachings. Somehow, that doesn't quite feel divine.

Kids will love it. It feels fresh and original and mildly subversive, but it's all a cover for the filmmakers not having the patience or confidence to put together a real story with a beginning, middle and end.

For the story of a man who made his mark on pop culture by being a likable buffoon, the irritatingly arch Confessions of a Dangerous Mind takes itself way too seriously.

The cinematic equivalent of herpes, Sex Tape is an uncomfortable embarrassment to raunchy comedies everywhere. Fortunately, no medication is required after being exposed to it: The effects are not permanent, only painful.

As for comic rhythm, director Nadia Tass has no clue. [10 Aug 1991, p.E1]

Even the most ardent fans of Braff’s first feature film, the charming Garden State, will struggle to warm up to this self-indulgent, uninvolving drama about an immature, almost-middle-aged guy trying to find himself with questions he should have had answers to long ago.

Tiresome romantic comedy that reinforces every imaginable gay stereotype.

If not for some of Candy's inspired bits, Who's Harry Crumb? would have been nothing more than a watered down Ruthless People. [06 Feb 1989, p.C5]