Ultimately, Bad Boys is too slick for its own good; all gorgeous photography and little story. It's like a two-hour-plus music video. But it probably will be a hit. Lawrence and Smith are hot, and if the Beverly Hills Cop formula worked with one comedian, it should certainly work with two. [7 April 1995, p.5G]

Four Christmases is sour to the point of curdling, a satirical look at the holidays a la "Bad Santa" that does exactly what that film avoided: come off as both off-puttingly misanthropic and gloppily sentimental.

You'd be hard pressed to find a more routine, more shamelessly by-the- numbers flick than this one. Predictability? In the case of Nowhere to Run, everything feels recycled -- even the title. [21 Jan 1993, p.F5]

Like its eponymous subject, it succeeds only in being shallow and crass and not very much fun to be around.

Carlei’s film is not particularly imaginative in terms of context, but it offers proof that this material never tarnishes, that with the right sort of movie magic, even a traditional telling can be thrilling.

You don't have to love dogs to enjoy Darling Companion, but it couldn't hurt.

House of Wax won't give you nightmares, but it upholds teen horror traditions with flair and energy.

Illegal Tender is the sort of crime movie in which nothing, not one detail, has been observed from real life; it's composed entirely of fantasies and falsehoods lifted from bad movies and hip-hop videos.

There isn't a single scene in this story about a traveler from another planet (Jim Caviezel) who crash-lands on Earth during the Iron Age that doesn't remind you of another, better movie.

Flat and forced, Jakob the Liar aspires to be a poignant parable about the power of hope but instead uses one of humanity's greatest tragedies for trite melodrama.

The Hunted is so openly, defiantly derivative of 1982's "First Blood," you figure there has to be a copyright lawsuit brewing right this very minute.

The climax of Things Are Tough All Over finds Cheech and Chong slouched in a seedy theater, watching themselves perform in a pornographic film with Rikki Marin and Shelby Fiddis, their real-life wives. Yuccchhh to you, too, fellas. [9 Aug 1982, p.3]

Compared to other summer blockbusters, Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: The Movie is as cheesy as the TV show. The computer animations are second-rate, the sets are theme-park attraction quality. [30 June 1995, p.6G]

It's the cinematic equivalent of Bon Jovi's You Give Love a Bad Name: You know in your heart it's a crappy song, and every wince-inducing line is an affront to your intelligence, but hey, it's on the radio, so you turn up the volume and sing along anyway.

Mazursky never makes the case for his hero's disaffection, and Cassavetes is not one of those screen presences for whom we are willing to fill in the blanks. [24 Sep 1982, p.D2]

It would have taken another director (the late David Lean, for instance) and a better script to make this movie into the serious, full-blooded epic it wants to be. But Power of One succeeds in entertaining and getting audiences to think about the tragedy of apartheid; flaws and all, it's still worth seeing. [31 March 1992, p.E6]

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]

Final Analysis is a big, brooding film about desire, betrayal and psychosis that seems to have Alfred Hitchcock's fingerprints all over it. It has all the ingredients of a great thriller: a bizarre love triangle, murder, gunplay on a stormy cliff. But Hitchcock isn't in the director's chair. Phil Joanou (who made the arty State of Grace ) is, and his movie winds up as just another clumsy mystery. [13 Feb 1992, p.F1]

Rapidly devolves into a pedestrian thriller in which almost nobody behaves in a recognizably human way.

A biopic that is as messy as the life it details.

There isn’t a moment of spontaneous fun or humor in this long, turgid movie, the latest let-down for rabid DC Comics fans who’ve been waiting for someone to pick up the baton Christopher Nolan left behind and do this universe justice. With “Suicide Squad,” the long wait continues.

The visuals are really the only compelling reason to see Appleseed.

The movie is all visuals and atmosphere without an effective structure. It doesn't move you, it's on display. [24 Feb 1990, p.E5]

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.

Realistic, it's not. But Max Keeble's Big Move, predictable though it may be, makes most of the right moves for the older elementary/younger middle school market.

Flamboyantly over-the-top, visually kinetic.

The result is far funnier and much less annoying than you might expect.

A shapeless, chaotic, overly frantic comedy that manages to make almost no sense, even if you're paying close attention.