The movie amounts to an extended short story that progresses slowly and fades away with key questions unanswered. Ambiguity isn't necessarily interesting.

Strictly for art-house types, particularly those familiar with the director, who makes no concessions to mainstream audiences. You have to abandon any preconceived notions about movies and allow your mind to be seduced by the mystifying, occasionally humorous world of a one-of-a-kind filmmaker. You might even find yourself becoming a fan.

Dickie is intense in her screen debut, which requires her to be in nearly every scene. The supporting cast is strong, and Robbie Ryan's handheld camera provides gritty ambiance for this taut thriller.

It's ragged, and at times it scrapes your comedy ganglia like a cheese grater. But 15 minutes or half an hour is an ideal chunk of time to set aside for truly inspired absurdism.

The movie takes us on a journey to an ugly, contentious period in our misty, ancient past - all the way back to four months ago, when "Apocalypto" came out.

Have you ever seen a movie without a single believable moment? Perfect Stranger, a convoluted and altogether risible thriller with Halle Berry and Bruce Willis, manages this difficult feat.

Some ideas are auto-stolen (from Coupland's last novel, "JPod"), but those quirky atmospherics aren't enough to sustain a largely plotless film.

Too much of the film is given over to the soap opera of Elmer's life.

Clever, wise and witty.

Shannon is wonderful as a woman pushed over the edge by the death of her pet in Year of the Dog, a very low-key, well-acted dramedy.

An amusingly preposterous last act keeps you guessing, or maybe keeps you ducking, as it lets rip an avalanche of startling revelations and double-crosses. Nothing is what it seems - unless it seems cheesy.

In his later years, Smith, who was also a gifted photographer, largely abandoned films in favor of performance art - and his art apparently included deliberately contracting the AIDS that ended his life.

There are a few decent jolts in Disturbia, but overall this ultra-predictable thriller doesn't live up to the hype.

To get to the best part first, Tarantino's adrenaline-pumping "Death Proof" is actually a good movie that - unlike Rodriguez's "Planet Terror," - rethinks its genre in ways that say something to contemporary audiences. And it's got some of Tarantino's best dialogue since "Pulp Fiction."

Hugely entertaining because director Lasse Hallstrom and screenwriter William Wheeler have greatly embellished the "truth" in Irving's book about the hoax.

Satire is merciless; it demands that mocker be superior to mockee.

Like a Canadian "Six Feet Under," the indie dramedy Whole New Thing mixes characters (teen and adult, gay and straight, married and single) who seem both completely plausible and capable of anything.

Director Lisandro Alonso is content to leave much to viewers' imagination. That he is able to do so and still hold our attention is a tribute to his talent as a filmmaker and an authentic performance by nonprofessional actor Argentino Vargas as the ex-con.

This stuff is strictly run of DeMille.

While the latest installment avoids the nonstop parade of potty jokes, it never rises much past the level of mediocrity.

There's too little dog and too much fire house in Firehouse Dog, a mild kid comedy that turns into a flaming arson mystery with some scenes that could be too scary for little ones.

On the one hand, Black Book has the artiness of subtitles, the dramatic weight of history, and the desperate heroics of Jews hiding from Nazis. On the other hand, it has Paul Verhoeven.

You know those one-joke "Saturday Night Live" sketches that start to age after six minutes? Blades of Glory is one joke that lasts 93 minutes, costs $11 and could involve sitting next to a guy who retells the movie into his cellphone.

Combines the sweet strangeness of "Fargo" with the existential panic of "Memento" and some Elmore Leonard tough talk. It all creates a cinematic tummy ache.

It's hard not to like a PG-rated 'toon that works in references to "Pulp Fiction" and "Fargo," even if Meet the Robinsons, a delightful, quirk-filled riff on "Back to the Future," proceeds in fits and starts.

After the Wedding is full of enough plot twists to supply a whole season of "Desperate Housewives."

Not an easy movie to watch, and it's far from perfect - but it does have an artsy integrity and a fascinatingly intense performance by Paul Giamatti.

These people are so selfish and self-absorbed you may not want to spent even 72 minutes with them.