Moments of life intrude, particularly with the periodic appearance of Eli Wallach as a superannuated hitman, a truly bizarre performance (he's got a sawed-off shotgun but his eyes are so bad it doesn't matter). And there are times when the sheer vitality of the two stars -- particularly Lancaster, who has not lost a thing -- promises to lift the movie. But it's too flimsy, and we're left with two stars in search of a story. For a while, it's fun watching them hunt. Then it's just a chore. [3 Oct 1986, p.D2]

Together (Hunter/Murphy) they're actually sort of fun to watch, and it's amusing to realize, not quite halfway through the film, that its most potent chemistry exists between them.

Medicine Man is an adventure story with a message: We must save the Amazon rain forest. It's certainly a noble cause, filmmakers forgot to make their movie any fun. [08 Feb 1992, p.E6]

It's crisp, efficient, well-made and strangely, vaguely dull.

The real Guerin deserves a more complete cinematic tribute.

This movie couldn’t be more fantastical if dragons swooped down and incinerated London, Paris and the south of France.

Yes, it creaks. It creaks mightily. But The Net cheerfully plugs along, asking you to swallow one whopper after the next without burping. [28 July 1995, p.6G]

Prostitution is hardly a new topic for film, of course, but Working Girls was directed by a woman, working with a largely female crew, and that is unusual. So is Borden's technique, which is almost anti-technique. It's the film's strength, and its weakness. [27 Mar 1987, p.D5]

Fletch Lives passes over you like most Chevy Chase movies. You chuckle, maybe laugh, and afterward forget the whole thing. [17 March 1989, p.10]

It's a disappointing chapter in what until now has been a highly entertaining, even thought-provoking series.

Shakur and Belushi are badly mismatched. Shakur -- he of the expressive, soulful eyes and vulnerable heart -- was evolving toward greatness on film. Belushi, though, is completely one-dimensional. [8 Oct 1997, p.1C]

Depp isn’t doing anything different here than he did in "Dark Shadows" or "Alice in Wonderland" or the "Pirates of the Caribbean" movies. Once again, he’s unrecognizable under elaborate makeup and prosthetics, and he speaks with a peculiar voice (this time a thick South Boston accent).

In post-"Wedding Crashers" Hollywood, the entire exercise feels dated (just as the comedy's PG-13 rating -- this in spite of a recurring rape joke -- makes it feel neutered).

It is not in most respects more than an ordinary thriller, however; were it not an Eastwood picture, it would be instantly forgettable. [17 Aug 1984, p.D1]

The actor who used his Aikido moves to snap bad guys' forearms in Above the Law and Hard to Kill devises gorier ways to dispose of scum. But he does it all with such an obnoxious sense of higher purpose that we get the feeling he's not in on the fun. [09 Oct 1990, p.C5]

For all its pretension, Powaqqatsi is a confused work -- both a compeling analysis of underdeveloped nations and a self-indulgent exercise in cinematic drudgery. [24 Jun 1988, p.C5]

While there are some genuinely creepy moments, it never truly ends up as more than an average "X-Files" episode.

Sweet but colossally dull relationship movie.

Steven Soderbergh has been telling interviewers that he's planning to take a sabbatical from filmmaking because he has lost his inspiration. His lack of interest is palpable in Haywire, a rote exercise in action filmmaking that is sleek and polished and instantly evaporates from memory.

Won't surprise you, but it's more tolerable than the grating, garish, millinery-challenged Cat. Besides, a cadaverous Terence Stamp trumps a glossy Alec Baldwin as a bad guy any day.

By the time Ceremony reaches its admittedly clever finale, you're too wrung out from Angarano's tiresome antics and Winkler's unconvincing dialogue to care who ends up marrying whom.

The Sentinel isn't nearly as slick as it must have looked on the page. Those zingers are perfect fodder for a movie preview, but they just don't lead anywhere interesting on-screen.

The movie is polished, well-acted and atmospheric, but still pure formula, and not very scary, either.

The overwhelming sensation of deja vu is exhausting and disorienting. You really HAVE seen it all before.

The Jungle Book has its moments — the panther Bagheera voiced by Ben Kingsley, the python Kaa voiced by Scarlett Johansson and a funny porcupine voiced by the late Garry Shandling are all memorable creations — but the overall film feels cold and mechanical, befitting a movie that was made primarily because technology made it possible.

Something Borrowed commits the most fatal mistake of all: Its characters are so deeply uninteresting that the audience can't get invested in their eventual happiness.

The great strength of Le Carre's novel was that it twisted the psyches of the characters as it tensed their muscles. This movie muscles through the action, but it takes the psychic tension out of the twists. [19 Oct 1984, p.D6]

There was, however, another question the screenwriter should have asked: Why does the script focus on the wrong couple?

Even with sex, Big Top Pee-wee seems dry and juiceless. [22 Jul 1988, p.C7]

An impeccably shot, studiously staged, passionately acted bore, one of those curious fizzles in which everyone seems to do everything right, but the film simply refuses to take off.

Soon settles down into a drizzle of steady mediocrity, never living up to all the frenzy of those first few moments.

Ihave it on good authority that Pat Conroy's The Prince of Tides is a wonderful book. People rave about it. But Barbra Streisand's lumbering, tearjerker adaptation gives little hint of that. This movie is long and full of pain, and it's driven by the most syrupy musical score I can recall. [25 Dec 1991, p.1]

Once in a great while, a film of insight and wisdom defines a generation. Step Up is not that film. Instead, it's the sort of mildly entertaining movie that comes along a couple of times a year.

You know a movie's not working when you see minotaurs, flying monkeys, "The Wizard of Oz's" Toto and Helen Mirren riding a unicorn -- all on the screen at the same time -- and you're still waiting for the thing to be over so you can go home and get on with your life.

Kids will probably be entranced by Flipper's antics, even if he is played by three dolphins and an animatronic robo- Flipper. But for baby boomers who remember the squeaky clean, black-and-white TV series, the new Flipper will seem like a farce. [17 May 1996, p.5G]

After an exciting high-speed car chase reminiscent of the Mad Max pictures, The Rover settles into a two-character drama between Eric and Rey, but Pearce is so one-note that their relationship is never engaging.

Assassination Tango offers little heat. In dancing with death, Duvall stumbles a few too many times.

With all the obvious work that went into this beautifully detailed, giant-scale movie, and considering the historical importance of the subject matter, was it too much to ask for a trace of intelligence, or maturity, or even insight?

By flaunting its own stupidity, The Ten practically dares you not to laugh at it, like a stand-up comic who sells an unfunny joke through the ferocity of his delivery.

Even the women in Festival in Cannes feel more like sketches than fully realized people -- the aging actress, the naive hopeful, the newly minted starlet -- leaving you nothing but the showbiz satire to chew on.

Monsters University feels half-hearted and lazy, like they weren’t even trying. At least show a little effort, guys.

Just one more in the plague of weak Cinderella stories released in the past year. It's too sugary to be good for you, but in the end, its over-the-top sweetness won't kill you.

Kenan Thompson may not look the part, but he's instantly likeable as Fat Albert.

Ultimately Three Fugitives is too sweet for its own good. It has moments of real hilarity, and moments of oh-please. Veber, we know, can do better. [27 Jan 1989, p.C5]

Little Ashes succumbs to the dreaded Masterpiece Theater syndrome as a talky historical drama weighed down by self-importance.

The kind of movie that rockets so far beyond the line of credibility and so deeply into the realm of utter stupidity, you start to wonder if the filmmakers aren't putting you on.

Assange is a compelling figure that merited a better effort.

Mostly, by story's end, we're just glad they and their unfortunate clothing are out of our sight for good.

Based on evidence in My Favorite Martian, it can be concluded that while life does exist on Planet Disney, it's not particularly intelligent. Or funny. [12 Feb 1999, p.10G]

The lack of cynicism is refreshing, but someone needed to tell Redford pixie dust and a nine-iron will only get you so far.

The fight sequences are well handled, the three leads are pleasant (and quite good, it seems, at the martial arts) and the violence is bloodless and amusing, with all kinds of cartoon sound effects thrown in to soften the chop-socky violence. If the audience at a sold-out Saturday afternoon showing I attended is any indication, 3 Ninjas delivers the promised action-packed, empty-headed goods. As long as your age is still in the single digits, that is. [10 Aug 1992, p.C6]

For 2 1/2 hours, Strange Days swirls and blooms its way into your head, sounds and colors popping like fireworks, a stream of ideas flowing steadily beneath the dazzle. It's a light show for the mind, a kaleidoscope of exhilarating action, social commentary and post-modern science fiction -- yet when it's all over, you can't help but think, "Is that it?" [13 Oct 1995, p.5G]

It's a formula and hard to describe as good in any artistic sense, but the viewers who pay to see it -- and many, many people are going to -- will get exactly what they want.

Aside from its period New Zealand setting, there is little to distinguish Bride Flight from something you might watch briefly on Lifetime, then change the channel.

The movie is best when it sends up the whole culture of child stars and commercials -- "I wanna grow artistically," says one well-paid brat. "I wanna work with Michelle Pfeiffer." But it loses its edge, and soon Life With Mikey is awfully close to the thing it sets out to lampoon. [4 June 1993, p.G5]

At least The Game Plan does have Johnson, whose innate charisma will make it easier for adult viewers to endure the film without ruing the decision to make a family outing to the multiplex.

Good for some giggles. Especially if you're under the age of, oh, 8 or so.

Its failure to be extraordinary is thus all the more cutting, and its redundancy all the more unforgivable.

It's a bloodless film, however; a spy story that actually drags for long stretches in the middle. And even though it's based on fact, there's rarely any drama in it. These are odd failures. [25 Jan 1985, p.D6]

So it's all pretty silly. But it does move along, and the range of weapons is formidable. Steve Carver, who did Norris' An Eye for an Eye, knows how to handle action, though Lone Wolf might have been more convincing had he let any of the bad guys shoot straight. [5 May 1983, p.B10]

The body part joke to alien joke ratio seems slightly skewed in favor of the former, which makes the humor more than a little repetitive. How many different ways can one film say: "Men are idiots"?

A splashy, silly movie that inexplicably stars Jeremy Irons but will delight 10-year-old boys across the realm. Regrettably, the hordes of pre-adolescent boys it would have delighted most were that age 20 years ago.

Mr. Destiny wouldn't be all bad if it made some variation on the recipe, but it's too generic and predictable -- and too blandly acted -- to be engaging. The magic's gone. It's like sucking on a Tootsie Pop for two hours and never tasting the fudgy center. [12 Oct 1990, p.G5]

New Year's Eve is not unbearable. It's not bad, but it's not good, either. It delivers exactly what you expect: pretty faces, shallow romance and a mythical fanaticism about an event in a friendly Manhattan unblemished by hyper-vigilant security measures, obnoxious drunks or New York Jets fans.

We get the feeling that whatever it is Scorsese and Price have to say about these marvelous characters, it is not anything very interesting.

Lack of any real substance.

If you're in the proper frame of mind -- namely, forgiving -- there's some fun to be had here, but you'll respect Don't Be a Menace's daring more than you will its humor. [15 Jan 1996, p.8C]

Mistress is a black comedy about the trials and tribulations of a writer/director trying to get his film financed, and if it had been released last year, it might have seemed better. But memories of Robert Altman's The Player, which deftly covered similar ground, are still fresh, and Mistress suffers badly in comparison. [30 Sep 1992, p.E7]

Tadpole was shot on digital video, and the images often look smeary and blurry, to the point of distraction. Then again, in a better movie, you might not have noticed.

While the scope of the movie is bigger, its impact is smaller. "Blue Valentine" was a precise, heartrending portrait of a marriage coming apart at the seams. The theme of his new movie is a lot harder to discern.

The movie is facile and manipulative, but it can't hide the gifts of Jackie Gleason in the role of Hanks' father. [30 July 1986, p.D6]

Chasing Madoff is as much a journalistic exposé of Madoff as it is a love letter to Markopolos, shot in the style of "Natural Born Killers" by a director terrified of boring his audience. In Proserman, the documentary genre finds its own Michael Bay.

Next time Damon will have to find a worthier vehicle. As the intended start of a franchise, The Bourne Identity is a bit of a bust.

A big part of the problem comes in the casting. Guy Pearce and Katie Holmes - the kind of odd pairing of actors that comes only after your first and second choices have passed - are unconvincing and curiously unsympathetic as the architect Alex and his girlfriend.

An incredibly lazy movie -- but not an unbearable one, thanks to Aaron Eckhart's charm.

Seems to vanish from memory even as you're watching it. The movie is an exercise in minimalist storytelling.

Hard to Kill is all Seagal, and if pure action thrills are your preference, this will do just fine. [13 Feb 1990, p.C7]

What ensues is an uneasy mix of farcical slapstick and comedy of errors with a violent, blood-soaked tale of inner-city crime.

With more time and a dash more cynicism, the film just might have achieved the thrilling allure of Becky Sharp's perfectly icy heart.

Gag delivery is by shotgun and, as happens when there is even a minimum of talent involved in such projects, some of the material is on target. And some of it is awful. [27 Mar 1984, p.B5]

[A] visually stunning, technically impressive and crushingly dumb and overlong picture.

Even within the context of the superhero universe, the Silver Surfer initially makes for -- let's face it -- a somewhat silly-looking creation.

None of the actors is able to do much with their characters, because they are all playing game pieces on a schematic board. Rendition has passion to spare, but it is saddled with a story designed exclusively to drive home the filmmakers' message.

But this serious film feels strangely unfinished, as if it hadn't been fully thought out. [18 Feb 1994, p.G5]

All this has nothing to do with the movie's dragged-out and contrived plot, which unfolds predictably and much too slowly. Still, the performances are quite good, except for Jeanne Tripplehorn (Basic Instinct ) as Sam's girlfriend, an eccentric performance artist; she grates on your nerves the minute she's onscreen and grows more aggravating from there. [4 May 1993, p.E5]

You end up feeling sorry for all the actors forced to humiliate themselves, except for McConaughey, whose portrayal of sadistic, manipulative evil is mesmerizing, in part because it was so unexpected. He continues to surprise. Friedkin, sadly, continues to coast.

An earnest and well-meaning but disappointing failure.

Casino Jack fails at its most critical mission: Laying out in clear detail exactly how and when Abramoff broke the law.

What the movie is all about is Twin Peaks with the sex, violence and "colorful" language left in...Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me is not David Lynch at his most challenged and hence most inventive. The rigid restraints of television, with its prudish codes and goofy winks at prurient-life-as-we-know-it, may now be seen as Lynch's real muse. The movie, lurid as it is, reads like a perverse set of CliffNotes to the series, the details recapitulated explicitly but without a dram of passion. [2 Sept 1992, p.E1]

A drama about dysfunction, spelling bees, mental illness, Hare Krishnas and kaballah. The movie is just as unwieldy as it sounds, except that it also stars Richard Gere.

The Vanishing hooks you and doesn't let go for a good while, but it settles into formulaic, stalk-and-slash antics in its last 15 minutes. Which makes its failure hurt even more. [05 Feb 1993, p.G5]

After an hour of being stranded among these restless soldiers and their increasingly aggressive locker-room antics, you, too, will be longing for combat -- for anything -- to happen.

There are so many romantic-comedy cliches crammed into Valentine's Day that watching it feels like surfing through the channels of an all-chick-flick cable service.

The movie still feels strangely inert; it's an adventure in which nothing ever really seems to happen.

Luhrmann’s The Great Gatsby is a failure that should have at least been a magnificent mistake, a risky endeavor that showed a daring intent even if its brash vision didn’t quite succeed. Instead, the movie leaves you cold and weary and vaguely disgusted.

In actuality, it's silly fun custom-tailored for reluctant young fathers and that entire clan of 20-something man-children who still read comic books and play video games, guys who do everything possible to resist the notion of adult responsibility.

One national group for the blind protested Mr. Magoo as insensitive. Magoo's nearsightedness does play a part in the humor, but it seems mainly a manifestation of his kindly but naturally oblivious nature. There's not a cruel joke in this movie.[25 Dec 1997, p.5F]

Brain Candy is a good example of why not everything -- even a cult hit -- ought to be turned into a movie. [12 Apr 1996, p.6G]