The way the tightrope works is vague, but what the exercise shows is straightforward and marvelous.

Few directors make action movies with the pizazz of Hong Kong's Johnnie To, although his films rarely get runs in New York. That's all the more reason to see his Vengeance.

The well-acted, pleasantly lensed drama doesn't recall Hollywood's generic approach to fragile couples, and that's just fine with me.

Although this version is some 30 minutes longer than its predecessor, anyone looking for new story twists or, say, an inspiring backstory for the antelope that gets eaten, will probably leave disappointed.

An offer you shouldn't refuse: It's laugh-out-loud, side-splitting funny.

In an era when documentaries are looking more and more glossy, it's almost refreshing to see the austere approach taken by veteran Frederick Wiseman.

A smart, funny, stylish and very violent British gangster movie.

This is a smart, vivid, thrillingly real gangster picture that nevertheless resembles many others.

It's highly entertaining, even if it's almost entirely one-sided.

Mistress America never falters in its case study of a complicated female friendship.

The gory-as-hell movie is as campy and fun as any chapter in producer Sam Raimi’s four-decade-old horror series. But trapping kids in an apartment — as opposed to college-age friends in a cabin — raises the stakes and brings on legitimate scares. And some hearty laughs, too.

Delivers a sugar rush without the calories.

A tour de force that is weird, wacky and wonderful.

Dunham has made a really attractive and cohesive film, merging her modern, punky sensibilities with the dirt-and-stone drear of the time period.

It’s the most touching dramedy about young women battling over a sash since “Little Miss Sunshine.”

Perhaps the best compliment I can pay to his work in Edge of Darkness is that I wouldn't particularly want to see this movie with grumpy Harrison Ford starring instead. Welcome back, Mel.

You can't get this kind of full-on sensory-jolt anywhere else, not legally anyway. "Sharkboy" will be equally beloved in elementary schools and in college dorms.

You couldn’t ask for a more fun summer popcorn movie than White House Down.

That rare documentary whose first half could have been written by Rosie O'Donnell, the second half by Pat Robertson.

It’s a wispy movie that does not end so much as peter out, and it could have benefited from a little more humor and a little less heinous male behavior. Miller and Farahani, though — both sometimes used previously as decoration — give strong performances as women bonding over their delight in both movement and their own beauty.

Veteran French star Michel Piccoli is superb as an aging actor named Gilbert Valence.

Abduction uses interviews, vintage photos and re-creations to tell the sad story of love and hope in riveting, suspenseful style. So powerful is this film, it brought tears to my eyes.

Fairly suspenseful.

A 3-D epic that, despite its title, is more of a soap opera than a swordplay thriller.

Would that all death be so peaceful.

As a primer on one of history’s less flashy leaders, it’s a worthwhile watch — mostly for fellow Texan Woody Harrelson’s committed performance behind those prosthetic ears.

It's not up to the high standard of the Clooney-Heslov script for "Good Night, and Good Luck,'' or what you'd imagine that, say, Aaron Sorkin could have done with this premise (for starters, sharper dialogue). Or what Elaine May did with the similarly themed "Primary Colors" 13 years ago.

Very much a feminist Western — one painting a vivid picture of how difficult it was for even a strong and determined woman to survive in frontier days.