Charlie St. Cloud is primarily a vehicle to prove the actor can do more than dance and sing. It's more of a demo reel for Efron than a movie. His predominant fan base, though, won't mind a bit.

The hands-down funniest elements in Dinner for Schmucks turn out to be the mice dioramas, which become increasingly clever - even touching - as the film unfolds, then laugh-out-loud hilarious over the end credits. But you know you're in trouble when the best thing in your movie is a bunch of dead rodents.

Tender and sentimental, a little schmaltzy, and ultimately too slight.

Kline salvages the picture with his dynamic, utterly unpredictable performance -- the work of a highly skilled comedian thrilled by the opportunity to go nuts once again.

In a way, Phillip Noyce's film is the anti-"Inception"; it's never dazzling, but it's never confusing, either. It's a Bourne movie minus the exotic locations and sickening handheld camera, and its head spy has way better lips than Matt Damon.

In the film's most frightening sequence, Countdown to Zero imagines what would happen if someone detonated a bomb in the heart of a major city, such as New York City's Times Square.

The movie earns its tension and suspense the old-fashioned way: By making you care about its characters.

Here, finally, is something you've really never seen before.

Little happens that you don't see coming, down to which cast members will get picked off and in what order. It's a dumb action movie in a summer full of dumb movies, and yet it's always entertaining. And you won't really miss Arnold at all.

The story is far from finished; the film can't help but feel like a bridge to its end. But the power of that partnership forged in "The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo" remains strong.

Shyamalan takes the beloved Nickelodeon anime series -- the full title was Avatar: The Last Airbender -- and turns it into 103 minutes of overproduced, stilted nonsense.

Eclipse, like its two predecessors, is ham-fisted and obvious, a mass-market entertainment with a frustrating lack of imagination.

The guys are more amusing than not, and they display the easy chemistry of real-life pals.

Wild Grass, which employs a wry, self-deprecating voice-over narrator and some highly stylish camerawork, feels like a comic thriller building into a kind of strange romance.

Restrepo makes time to observe these men during brief off-duty stints -- at one point four use an iPod to form an impromptu, joyous dance party -- but the bulk of the film centers on their insanely dangerous and heroic work.

Too bad, though, that whenever the characters stand still to talk, Knight and Day induces stupor in the viewer.

A worthy and delirious final chapter to this hallowed animation franchise.

I Am Love is a bold and thrilling masterpiece -- the introduction of a major talent to the world's stage.

It's a shrewd, poignant drama disguised as a comedy.

The genius of a feature film based on the 1980s TV series is that it can't help but exceed expectations that are so low to begin with.

Although Joan Rivers: A Piece of Work is unmistakably a fawning love letter to an amazing performer, its subject proves to be her sharpest, bluntest critic.

Unlike last year's "Coco Before Chanel," in which Audrey Tautou played a warmer, kinder spirit, Mouglais presents her character as steely and unbending, a woman who has built her empire on her terms and refuses to abdicate the slightest control on her life.

It's not always an easy movie to watch, but its characters are unforgettable.

Mostly, though, Ondine deftly demonstrates just how far we'll reach for any promise of relief from life's hardships, in whatever form -- magic or plain dumb luck -- it arrives.

By the time the film's climactic 15 minutes rolled around, viewers at a preview were laughing as if they were watching "Knocked Up." For a horror picture, such a reaction is the equivalent of a stake through the heart.

The volume is pitched high, perhaps so you won't notice how lackadaisically structured the picture is. Get Him to the Greek isn't really a story but a collection of comic set pieces.

There's plenty of action, but it's all the same.

Micmacs is a wan fizzle of a fantasy, a spirited, imaginative spectacle that never quite takes flight.