The movie wants to make a serious point that old folks shouldn't be treated as children; the message would be easier to swallow if the moviemakers didn't treat the audience the same way. [20 Oct 1986, p.78b]

The whole movie has the air of a sermon delivered over an empty grave. In surfers' terms, Big Wednesday is a wipe-out. [14 Aug 1978, p.62]

In the end, it's just another novice-teacher-takes-on-inner-city-kids-and-nobody's-life-will-ever-be-the-same film

For Your Eyes Only is one giant second-unit film, an anthology of action episodes held together by the thinnest of plot lines. Most of these episodes are terrific in their exhilaratingly absurd energy: Steven Spielberg himself would not sneer at them. [29 June 1981, p.72]

Murphy raw is better than the well-done ego served up in Beverly Hills Cop II. But he's become a brilliant wise guy, unlike his hero Richard Pryor, who can turn profanity into poetry and hipness into humanity. [11 Jan 1988, p.57]

I'm not sure what kids are going to make of Bee Movie. The shiny, vivid computer-animated images pop off the screen with the vibrancy of the Pixar movies, but the understated, throwaway humor is pure Seinfeld: adult, observational, feasting on the small ironies of human (make that "beeish") behavior.

Hill has never been better in shaping and pacing a movie that has the excitement, romance and resonance of the best popular art. [15 Oct 1984, p.118]

Copycat is satisfyingly tense, but the disgusto factor is balanced by its obvious theatricality--neatly captured in the contrasting performaces of Weaver and Hunter, the one playing neurotic standard poodle to the other's tightly wound terrier. [6 Nov 1995, pg.86]

Kill is a disappointing movie: slow, overpopulated and muddled in its thinking.

Hyams's attempt at a cosmic conclusion is about as earth shattering as yesterday's weather report. [10 Dec 1984, p.94]

The film is too dumb to work as patriotic exhortation and too mawkish to work as blood-and-guts exploitation. It's a long commercial in which the Marlboro Man has become the American Guerrilla, with his good buddies, good guns and a bottomless case of Coors. [03 Sep 1984, p.73]

Veteran director Richard Fleischer brings to the Conan sequel some of the endearingly stolid craftsmanship of his old movies, while avoiding the lip-smacking sadism of the original. The movie is consistently dumb, though not hard to watch, but it would be a lot more fun if someone had bothered to give Conan a personality. [02 July 1984, p.45]

(Katja von Garnier's) talent makes this original film exciting and moving, a raucous ride.

You can convince yourself you're having a good time watching Big Business. The idea seems so funny you smile in anticipation of the jokes, but the laughter is strangely tinny. It's a harmless concoction, but so mechanical it vanishes from your head the instant it's over. It should have been so much more. [13 Jun 1988, p.74]

Paradise Alley lacks Rocky's primal simplicity: It's a parade of outrageous ploys that come pelting at you from all angles. [13 Nov 1978, p.106]

This echo of the WWII internment of Japanese-Americans is the only new gimmick in Edward Zwick's entry in the cliche- terrorist genre.

It's like nothing you've seen before. Yet, over all, the story it tells seems predictable, secondhand, and its "profound" revelations hackneyed. [12 Sep 1983, p.88]

The heavy-handed direction by Volker Schlondorff doesn't help to make the movie convincing or dramatically effective. [16 Mar 1990, p.54]

Everything in Rounders is right there on the surface. Watching it is about as exciting as playing poker with all the cards face up. [14 Sept 1998]

Crash has no plot to speak of. It's a cinematic tone poem of collisions and coitus.

With a strong soundtrack and a little humor, In Too Deep remains good entertainment.

Harris leavens the familiar suburban angst with dark humor, rich characterizations and a terrific cast.

Since this isn't one of your deep-think sci-fi movies, you look for the happy hardware to get you kicks. [4 July 1976, p.102]

These actresses are always worth seeing in just about anything, as is Tuscany. Together they are able to make up for the meandering plot and lack of dramatic oomph.

Nair and Witherspoon pull back from the ferocity of Thackeray's portrait: they're afraid we won't find Becky Sharp likable enough. Yes, she's the most brilliant, bold and vibrant creature in this social panorama, but she should also be chilling.

Strictly as exploitation, Bad Boys is a pretty slick piece of work. It's overlong and short on characterization. But it's unsentimental about its teen-age hoods and unsparing about the nastiness of juvenile jails. [28 Mar 1983, p.73]

In Lost Highway, reality has become a dream. But Lynch has forgotten how boring it is listening to someone else's dream.

Hackman is brilliant at being almost -- but not quite -- ordinary, and Archer gives a compelling performance as the witness who wants to "do the right thing," but is afraid. [01 Oct 1990, p.70D]