Although envisioned before the world economy went to hell, Tokyo Sonata is relevant to the mess we're in now.

Director Zack Snyder's cerebral, scintillating follow-up to "300" seems, to even a weary filmgoer's eye, as fresh and magnificent in sound and vision as "2001" must have seemed in 1968, yet in its eagerness to argue with itself, it resembles "A Clockwork Orange."

Phoebe in Wonderland happens to be at least partly a Lifetime movie, but this special little film is no disease-of-the-week tear-jerker.

Heiskanen is a revelation as the put-upon wife, and the cinematography (some by Troell) effortlessly transports us back 100 years.

There are no talking heads, but lots of singing heads and sexy dancing bodies, many of them belonging to stars in Spain. In total, there are more than a dozen performance pieces, all stylishly lensed.

A stultifying vanity piece.

Coming-of-age road trips have rarely been more tedious or predictable.

Carax, who hadn't made a movie since "Pola X" in 1999 comes off best.

The time passes quickly. This is the rare remake that does honor to the spirit of the original.

Direction of all three films is no more than workmanlike, which isn't surprising since they were originally made for British television. The acting, on the other hand, is sometimes superb.

Here comes Wayne Kramer's Crossing Over, a bid to create the "Crash" of illegal-immigration dramas.

The film gets one star from me for the admirable brevity of its running time and another for the definite article in its title, seemingly an implicit promise that there will be no sequel.

The toilet caper is the lowest point of a movie with many low points, including bad acting and a generic script.

Even Oliver Stone would giggle at the notion that the CIA couldn't reach JFK through any means except via one of his blond playmates.

Slovenian-born writer-teacher Slavoj Zizek, narrator of the movie "A Pervert's Guide to the Cinema," provides the most entertainment.

If this movie were a teenager, you'd put it on Ritalin right away.

The film is light on those kitschy musical numbers that make Bollywood movies fun to watch.

Though this is the rare documentary that admirably admits recording "reality" on film actually shapes how people behave under the camera's gaze, I think Eleven Minutes is going to appeal mostly to hard-core fashionistas.

As with "Capturing the Friedmans," the documentary is grueling to sit through. Yet the greasy, guilty thrill of being privy to your neighbors' most intimate dramas makes it impossible to stop watching.

Wajda, who lost his father in the purge, gives the film an awful silence and mystery at its core.

Is the Crystal Lake PD really doing such a good job? You'd have to go back to Phnom Penh in 1975 to find a place with a higher per-capita rate of unprosecuted homicides.

The Caller qualifies as something of a Holocaust movie, with flashbacks to World War II France. Guess who the two boys we see grow up to be?

The film's disclosure that Camorra money is involved with the reconstruction of New York City's Ground Zero will give viewers something to think about.

The only possible interest the movie will inspire in anyone comes when Paltrow flashes a breast toward the end, far too late to pump any excitement into an aggressively boring film that gurgles with self-indulgence.

Jim Carrey mostly plays it straight as the narrator. The 3-D effects are uncanny; much of the audience ducked when sea snakes lunged at it. You can't get that on your TV set. Yet.

This is perhaps the most effective 3-D movie I have ever seen, with a sophisticated, involving story that will appeal to many adults. The only reservation I have is with the PG rating, which seems too lenient for a story that may give very young children - particularly if they are sensitive - nightmares.

Like the recent "Sex and the City" movie, this spinoff not so subtly tries to have its cake and eat it by ALSO suggesting that a woman is nothing without a man.

The movie hopes to be regarded as childlike too, but there's a difference between kid-friendly and just regular old dumb.