Easily the worst movie I've seen so far this year.

For all its outré set pieces it never rises above the level of pretentious trash.

What the Charles Darwin biopic Creation mainly creates is a do-over for Paul Bettany: This time he gets to have a beautiful mind.

There's a lot happening here, perhaps too much. At times, the movie threatens to implode under its own weight. At others, it's wickedly funny.

Unfortunately, this ultra-glossy romantic drama derived from a best seller twists into very dark territory — a drastic tonal shift that neither its stars nor debuting director, Thea Sharrock, a respected stage veteran, manage with dramatic credibility.

The three women deliver solid performances, but the film is diluted by the use of flashbacks superimposed over present-time scenes. The result is visual chaos.

There's a geyser of ambition in the visually stunning The Fountain, but the story of a thousand-year quest for the Fountain of Youth eventually trickles out.

A flaccidly pretentious and snooze-inducing trilogy of allegedly racy tales.

Legends is the latest in a long line of terrible “Karate Kid” movies. A passing of the torch, such as it is, to the next inferior rip-off.

Charmingly profane, with a buzzing riot-grrrl soundtrack, “Izzy” is a stylish twist on an ’80s trope: Here it’s the woman as pathetic supplicant, trying to win back someone who’s moved on.

A surprisingly nasty fable about a particularly silly, very English brand of animal-rights extremism.

The originality and intelligence that made Smith's "Clerks" and "Chasing Amy" such refreshing pleasures are all but absent.

One big cliche.

Seems almost like a self-parody of Williams' earlier work.

Thrillers can be a valid Hollywood escape, but this one made me as uncomfortable as its hero is with small talk.

Lee gives his childhood hero altogether too much face time to defend himself against the numerous allegations and charges of assault, both physical and sexual.

About as exciting as watching someone else's home movies -- albeit, beautifully photographed ones.

There are the makings of a funny movie here, but novice director-writer Anna Reeves isn't up to the job. While her cast is talented, Reeves doesn't concentrate long enough on any plotline or character to build viewer interest.

The biggest problem is Wong's decision to cast Norah Jones as Elizabeth, a New Yorker who hits the road after a love affair goes bad. Jones, in her first movie, can't act. (There, I said it!)

“Scratch the surface and there’s only more surface,’’ a character all too accurately observes in this clunky, ugly and dull mash-up of a mystery.

Jane Wants a Boyfriend loses momentum careening between Dushku’s Bianca and Krause’s Jane — the latter of whom is far more interesting.

If Broadway shows had DVD featurettes, the unexceptional documentary Broadway Idiot would be perfect for one.

Saint Laurent was known for an almost monk-like focus on his work. And so this film springs to life — the actors, the camera, the editing — when we see his creations the way they were meant to be seen: in motion, and worn by beautiful women.

The romance between Winslet and Schoenaerts — billed as the film’s centerpiece — is, regrettably, never really allowed to bloom.

Forget the hype, and the backlash. The Phantom Menace is captivating.

A dreary message movie.

The extra money has bought a professional crew for scripted sequences, in which Jonathan and his mother too often mug for the camera.

After 23 years and three attempts, Predators finally delivers a solid sequel to the Arnold Schwarzenegger B-movie classic.

Kids will be as enthralled by this film as you were by the live-action Disney movies of the '70s. It doesn't get any sweeter than a roomful of mattresses with kids and dogs jumping on them.

A very rare contemporary romantic comedy that doesn't succumb to terminal stupidity.

Director Francisco de Lombardi fills his sensual film with plenty of gorgeous shots of the lush landscape and its equally exotic, miniskirted "fauna."

Turns out to be a choppily written, unevenly acted exercise, no less shlocky and predictable than any of Hollywood's average second-string heterosexual comedies.

Another big, dumb action movie in the vein of "XXX," The Transporter is riddled with plot holes big enough for its titular hero to drive his sleek black BMW through.

The most interesting parts of the movie are the long, sexy and well-staged dance sequences, some of them involving a very nimble Duvall.

A visual treat diminished by lifeless dialogue and self-conscious acting.

PAGING Pedro Almodovar! We have a movie badly in need of your help.

A big, dark film that should satisfy the many fans of the Orson Scott Card novel and engage newcomers, too.

A rare drug-crime movie devoid of violence, and pretty much anything in the way of excitement.

Bland and timid.

The action-adventure aspects of “Christmas Chronicles,” with sleigh chases and a reindeer fights, are cluttered. More appealing are the real-world storylines, such as the siblings dealing with their mom getting serious with a new beau.

But like he seems to do with every project these days, Grant runs away with the movie.

Say hello to my leetle dagger! Shakespeare meets "Scarface" in an Aussie adaptation of "Macbeth" gone gangsta.

More fun and somewhat more coherent than its Sylvester Stallone-directed predecessor, The Expendables 2 serves up a planeload of thickly sliced, well-aged beef and ham amid lots of stuff getting blown up.

While Star Trek: Nemesis isn't nearly as good as the best Nicholas Meyer-written movies like "The Undiscovered Country," it is far from the worst, thanks to the topical issues it raises, the performances of Stewart and Hardy, and that essential feature -- a decent full-on space battle.

Kidman gives an other stunning performance in Birth, but it is a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma that ultimately reveals . . . not much.

Writer-director Keith Bearden was also smart enough to round up a couple of other old pros: Brian Dennehy, as the hero's eccentric grandfather, and Keith David, as a wise collector of pop-culture artifacts.

In a movie season - and a month - filled with so much gunfire, bloodshed and human despair, it's refreshing to sit back and bask in the sheer joy with which these brightly costumed, stunningly agile performers navigate fire, water and air.

I’ll say one thing for The Call: Its ending is actually a bit of a surprise. Just when you think it couldn’t get any stupider, pow! I’ll be damned, Hollywood, you still have the power to blindside.

The stars' utter failure to create sparks is only one of the problems with this Labor Day weekend dump job.

As filthy as the back of a sanitation truck — but it has heart, too. Most of the comedy is funny, some of it is hilarious.

Roth goes to town with this juicy part, and seems to enjoy herself immensely in this merry farce, which runs out of gas toward the end due to an over-complicated plot.

It's depressing as hell. While most of the seven say they want to beat the habit and become productive citizens, only one, Ron, follows through successfully.

As evident from The Brown Bunny and his directing debut, "Buffalo 66," Gallo is talented, although in an unconventional way. Call him an angry young man with a future.

Naomi Watts is the only explanation for the existence of the student-y digital video feature Ellie Parker.

The story is far less gripping than the consistency of the hunky lead actor’s facial hair. For most of the two hours or so, the beard is perfect. Frozen in time.

Lucky “Day Shift” has an Oscar winner in Foxx, who’s appealingly heroic, and gags about a burning sensation on characters’ privates.

Seventh-graders are far cooler and more anarchic than depicted in this often-dopey movie, which is aimed at more of a fourth-grade sensibility.

This Sundance dud is a turgid gay soap opera with a limp twist, showcasing Robin Williams at his maudlin worst.

Lawrence’s script for The Rewrite could have used one, and his direction is uneven, but it’s still rewarding watching Grant dispensing his dithery charm surrounded by old pros.

One of the worst depictions of our city ever filmed.

The superficial script doesn’t go nearly deep enough to begin explaining Lovelace.

Good on J.Lo for protecting the integrity of flighty rom-coms. Every movie need not be so serious and socially conscious.

It’s breathtaking. It’s dazzling. It’s world-altering, is what it is. For the first time ever, a movie has actually done it. Hardcore Henry has precisely replicated the experience of watching someone else play a video game.

All of this is secondary, even tertiary material, even if much of it is interesting and even wrenching to behold.

Interminably long, dull and incomprehensible, John Carter evokes pretty much every sci-fi classic from the past 50 years without having any real personality of its own.

Pollak obviously had fun, but you get the feeling the best bits never made it in.

A Liam Neeson thriller so lacking in ambition they should have called it "Paycheck."

A lighter hand would have enhanced some very good performances.

There is too much funny here for a movie (even though it continues into the closing credits). Step Brothers should be a TV show.

A mediocre music documentary about veteran country rocker and activist Steve Earle, who created a furor with a song sympathetic to American Taliban John Walker Lindh.

The film's first half has a lovely feel for how bizarre California must seem to foreigners, and there's a piercing sense of the stop-and-start ways that people deal with grief.

Where Anonymous has it all over "Shakespeare in Love'' is its detailed evocation of London from four centuries ago. The rowdy audience for Shakespeare's first works at the Globe Theatre is especially colorful.

Cruise's Jack Reacher is a loner who doesn't smile, charm, love the ladies, aim his index fingers to the heavens or sing "You've Lost That Lovin' Feeling" in bars. Here he just snarls and kills people. Yes, please, and let's have more of the same.

At the start, “The Cut” is an adequate, typical gloves-and-shoves picture. And then, with a snap of the fingers, director Sean Ellis’ film turns absolutely interminable.

A spoof of you-know-what that's a lot less funny than it sounds.

One sequence is amusing: a number called “Fairytale Life (After the Spell)” in which panini grills and espresso machines sing along like they live in Pee-wee’s Playhouse. You struggle to care about the rest.

Not as elaborate or entertaining as Anderson's last feature, "Transsiberian," but it's got enough shocks for an entirely respectable addition to the post-apocalyptic genre.

If you're in the mood for a clichéd gangland B-movie, though, you could do worse.

A murky, vaguely fact-based melodrama that quickly sinks into the same swamp as such recent De Niro mistakes as "15 Minutes" and "Showtime."

Follows a narrative arc as choppy as a messy windswell, and the result is a dog's dinner of profiles, repetitive narration, safety tips and banal "insights" into the joys and dangers of cresting waves that sometimes reach 70 feet.

The star of the movie is Caeli Veronica Smith, 12, an accomplished violinist who frequently performs in the park. Seeing her play in person would be worth the bus trip to Philly.

Franco’s distancing routine helps sink True Story, an already turgid and tone-deaf adaptation of a self-serving memoir by a disgraced New York Times reporter (played by two-time Oscar nominee Jonah Hill) who bonds with a murderer he’s trying to exploit.

As pure comedy, it’s a hoot.

The Death Cure doesn’t work on every level. The movie has, for the most part, jettisoned many of the story’s previous science fiction elements to focus more on action. In so doing, it relies on a lot of repeat devices to earn its thrills — namely perfectly-timed, life-saving rescues, often from the sky. Sometimes, you just want to hear some scientists talk shop for a minute.

"Happy Feet" was one of the greatest and most original animated films, but the sequel can't even decide what it's about for the first 40 minutes.

It’s a shame that George Michael’s final major artistic contribution to the world is the crummy movie Last Christmas. In its shoddy attempt to make a splash in the British romantic-comedy genre, it amounts to nothing more than a careless whisper.

Crowe makes the most of his own quiet presence, and this ode to the world’s never-recovered soldiers and their families is a fitting meditation on the insanity of war.

Final Destination 5, which, despite its lowbrow story, turns out to be one of the fastest-moving films of the year, is a suspenseful and macabre exercise in dread for the absurdly cosseted.

In order: bland, annoying and misused.

The movie quickly sinks into a terminal case of the cutes and extreme predictability - amid the usual surfeit of wacky supporting characters.

The girl you see stabbing and shooting prisoners and fellow trainees makes the killer from "La Femme Nikita" look like a wuss.

There's nothing especially new or interesting about the guests, the party or the movie. One bright note is Nicol Zanzarella as the elegant Susan, a freelance TV editor and co-host.

Rebecca Hall is wasted as Sandvig's sister and the film's voice of reason.

A credulity-straining thriller featuring a few good paranoid moments — and, perhaps most important, Rebecca Hall running in high heels.

A contrived comedy that could have made an especially weak episode of “Everybody Loves Raymond.”

"Precious" worked partly because it did not wrap its sordid tale in Christian uplift and dime-store psychology -- elements that have made Tyler Perry a rich filmmaker but have turned For Colored Girls shrill and manipulative.

Burt Reynolds and Sally Field they're not, but you could do worse for mindless late-summer entertainment than Dax Shepard and Kristen Bell in Hit & Run.

It’s a disappointment as a movie, though Shannon is especially fine in a rare sympathetic role.