A gorgeous, gory epic, is a blow-your-mind masterpiece about the emperor who ruled more than 2,000 years ago.

Anderson, 29, does so much in Magnolia, with such nerve, with wily humor and out-of-the-blue bravado, that the film's flaws and lapses don't really matter. It ain't perfect, but it's awe-inspiring.

He (Irving) has been able to capture the quirky tone of the popular novel.

An ambitious effort that fails as satire and as history, although it probably succeeds as a cautionary tale.

Surely a life sentence goes by quicker.

The jokes are unabashedly pitched at 12-year-old boys, with flatulence, masturbation and excretions as the leading themes.

The effectively creepy Stir of Echoes, is enough to make your blood chill.

Even though the soap employed is Irish Spring, this is still a soap opera.

Rather prosy until its final third. Then it grabs you with unexpected force.

Either Campion is the most inspirational director of performers or Winslet the most carnal.

Brave enough to take up the war from the Southern point of view.

Arnold has a gem for the third millennium in End of Days.

Toy Story 2, like its forebear, will stand the test of time.

Hoffman's turn as the drag queen has its endearing and comically catty moments, but Flawless' utter phoniness subsumes all efforts at honest acting.

Spoofing James Bond in the '90s may lack an original comic bite, but making James Bond in the '90s is positively toothless.

Your body's sitting there in the theater, but it feels as if your head is someplace else.

This is more than a movie: It's Almodovar's design for living.

Enormously satisfying.

As pleasant and rosy and optimistic as it is, Liberty Heights doesn't really soar, emotionally or otherwise.

It does commit a cardinal sin of filmmaking. It's boring.

In this, Alfred Hitchcock's centenary year, Felicia's Journey so startlingly channels the obsessions of the late director that it might be the greatest Hitchcock movie the master of suspense never made.

Corny and blubbery as it is, still packs an emotional wallop.

You might be occasionally dumbfounded by The Messenger, but you won't be bored.

Heartbreaking and sometimes dazzlingly effective, the film still has flaws -- most of them in a too-often-maudlin script.

Essentially, the film functions as a holiday catalog, introducing fans to a new Pokemon whose effigy they can collect in trading cards.

Feeble and formulaic.

Weaknesses are confirmed in the movie's laughable climax.

Few American directors drive this wedge between mind and gut as masterfully as Michael Mann.

It's never entirely clear whether Borchardt is also an object of ridicule for documentarian Chris Smith.

There is one scene in The Legend of 1900 that is easily worth the price of admission. It finds the ship heeling in an Atlantic storm. In the ballroom Roth plays the piano as it moves and slides in an eerie waltz around the floor.

The choppy film is like a composition crowded with competing themes.

In theme and technique, it pushes the boundaries of animation and opens up new and imaginative possibilities.

So jaw-droppingly out there, so bracingly bizarre, and, much of the time, so fall-over-funny that even its flaws don't matter. Easily the oddest movie of the year, it is also one of the best.

Perry and Campbell are charming despite this straitjacket plot.

The kind of date movie that should do a lot to promote celibacy.

A chick movie for guys that zings and pings like a game of supersonic pinball.

Develops microclimates of mood without fully developing the same shadings of character.

Moodysson has an uncanny eye and ear for teen speech and attitude, and is able to capture it without the usual condescension and exploitation.

If you are unlucky enough to stray into the presence of Bats, I strongly recommend you follow their wise example. Hang from the ceiling and go to sleep.

A squirmy mix of therapy-session slogans, pop psychobabble, and lots of crying, yelling and pouting on the part of its two stars, who appear in various alarming hairpieces.

A beautiful, appropriately loping little gem about growing older, daring to take risks and follow your heart. That probably sounds corny, and The Straight Story is.

A knockout...So feverish is Fight Club...that thermometer contact might make mercury shatter.

Sorely needs the injection of skepticism - a quality that would have been even more useful when Pollack was mulling over doing Random Hearts in the first place.

The pleasure of The Limey lies in watching what actors who have aged like fine wine can do in that world.

How'd this thing get made?

To say this bone-chilling, gut-turning feature is "The Crying Game"-meets-"In Cold Blood." But this is a film - writer/director Peirce's first - that matches those pictures in power, in surprise, and in unnerving drama.

If you enjoy visuals with substance as well as flash, look no further than this exuberant movie.

There's probably not much of an audience for Elmo in Grouchland beyond the toddler crowd.

Illsley's fine cast, with a riotous contribution from William H. Macy as the sheriff who falls for Harry, plays out the comedy without condescension.

Yet another Hollywood serving of everyman pluck, sports division.

Cheerful mishmash.

Buoyed by the appealing Hart and Grenier.

Exhilarating, alternately funny and horrific film.

Preposterous, if diverting, revenge fantasy that rivals Rambo in sheer narrative chutzpah and vigilantism.

This eccentric fairy tale with the feel of "Our Town" has a number of remarkable performances.

At the heart of the film, Polley - with her wary, unsure stares, her open smile and beguiling intelligence - is terrific.

A far more trenchant - and funnier - satire of the fame-afflicted than Woody Allen's "Celebrity."

Achieves the rare feat of fusing tightly ratcheted suspense with intense romance.

Mendes nonetheless works this screenplay like a jazz virtuoso plays with a familiar theme such as "Mary Had a Little Lamb."

Begins with a scene of mass repentance, but the real sin here is a profligate waste of talent.

Despite its familiar formula, feels fresh.

Warrior has the underwritten, overproduced bluster of "Conan the Barbarian."

Two of its youthful actors, although adorable, are not skilled enogh to carry their parts.

Laceratingly funny Hollywood comedy.

It's old, old hat.

Williamson's screenplay doesn't match the cleverness of his conceit; it lacks the requisite archness and wit.

While Grant is sublime, the "Godfather" spoof he's in sleeps with the fishes.

Spoofy and sweet... endearingly old-fashioned.

An upbeat-if-shapeless Canadian comedy about two adorable young women, an artist and an aspiring writer, who fall in love at first sight. [26 Jul 1999, p.C06]

With deft and subtle performances and an uncomplicated but savvy script, Autumn Tale gets to the inner lives of its characters.

Few movies are as eloquent in their performances and their art direction.

An unnerving and astonishing thriller.

Although the pervading mood of Twin Falls Idaho - a beautifully shot, noirish thing - is one of sadness and loss, the Polishes' film is playful, too.

The $40,000 budget of The Blair Witch Project wouldn't cover a day's limousine bill for a production like The Haunting, but if you want a genuine chill on a hot summer night, that - not this - is the horror movie for you. [23 July 1999, p.03]

Who would have imagined that the galactic Gonzo would turn out to be a more entertaining space trip this summer than you-know-what? [14 July 1999, p.D01]

Exceptionally funny, unexpectedly tender, and lewder than a teenage boy's dreams.

As he's done in such otherwise diverse pictures as Lone Star, City of Hope, and The Secret of Roan Inish, in Limbo writer-director Sayles circles down into a community of friends, colleagues, strangers - and shows what happens when paths cross, and sometimes double-cross. [04 Jun 1999, p.03]

Although Angelopoulos' film is not for all viewers, it rewards the patient moviegoer with an incomparable emotional journey. [09 Jul 1999, p.04]

Hirokazu Kore-eda's After Life is a minimalist, mesmerizing allegory set in a limbo. It is not a memorial to the dead but an extraordinary consideration of what memories mean to the living. [11 June 1999, p.12]

With its mix of Lewis Carroll and William Gibson; Japanese anime and Chinese chopsocky; mythological allusions, and machine-made illusion, offers a couple of hours of escapist fun.

One possible explanation for My Favorite Martian, a picture so bad it's unwatchable, is that moviemakers are from Mars and moviegoers are from Venus. Not since Howard the Duck has a comedy tried so desperately hard for so pitifully few laughs. [12 Feb 1999, p.17]

The script, which needs not just doctoring and could benefit from a spell in the critical-care ward, is full of dress-up and put-downs, and comes alive only when Prinze or Cook are on-screen. In short, She's All That aspires to be Clueless. It succeeds in being clueless.

Jaw-droppingly corny. [22 Jan 1999, p.03]

Nolte, reinforced by the bleak discretion of Schrader's direction and a wonderful supporting cast, makes the most of the opportunity.

Mighty Joe Young is a movie only an 8-year-old could love. How cheesy is it? Well, it leaves the ooze of Velveeta in its wake. [25 Dec 1998, p.4]

The small victories that people win in Down in the Delta are earned, and so is the praise that has greeted Angelou's long-overdue arrival behind the camera. [25 Dec 1998, p.05]

A TV-movie-ish love story laden with heavy-handed metaphor... The Theory of Flight is feeble stuff.

One of the great things about this unpredictable, exhilaratingly goofy fable is how it shows that even the clueless - and the tragically morose - have a shot at redemption.

Younger children who might buy into the fantasy are not of an age where they will recognize the family conflicts that Jack Frost is trying to raise and resolve. As the film serves up slapstick, chases and empty-headed seriousness, don't be surprised by their puzzled expressions. After all, a profoundly puzzled expression is what should have greeted the idea of Jack Frost when it was broached. [11 Dec 1998, p.03]

As directed by the stupendously talented and aggressively eccentric George Miller (creator of Mad Max and producer of the first Babe), Pig in the City is far busier and faster than the original, which was directed by Chris Noonan. This has some benefits. [25 Nov 1998, p.D1]

Owing a debt to Scarface (the DePalma remake more than the Hawks original) and to the gangland opuses of Scorsese, Belly gets inside the gangsta culture with a wired authenticity. [04 Nov 1998, p.E04]

How much is shaman and how much is showman is hard to tell. Some of Levitch's staccato soliloquies have the ring of truth, and some have the ring of jive. Either way, though, The Cruise is a journey worth taking. [27 Nov 1998, p.03]

An unforgettable and profoundly inspiring film. [05 Mar 1999, p.04]

The cast is uniformly good. In the end, though, as Stiller's Stahl does the rounds of the talk shows, plugging his book and his newfound sobriety, Permanent Midnight fails to deliver a true story of redemption, of someone who has come through the dark side and conquered his demons. The guy is still feeling sorry for himself, and the residue of narcissism - the lifeblood of the entertainment industry - is caked all over the place. [18 Sep 1998, p.03]

The accomplishment of The Eel is to be both sardonic and compassionate - often at the same time. [23 Oct 1998, p.16]

Engaging, though certainly not groundbreaking, I Went Down manages to quote from Plato and deploy a cheap joke about masturbation (twice). As gangster movies go, it's a charmer. [3 July 1998, p.3]

Apart from the patness of its conclusion, the main weakness in Edge of Seventeen is a question of balance. The women in the movie - Angie, Maggie and Eric's mother - are strongly acted and better drawn than the protagonist. Even so, candor and accuracy give Edge of Seventeen an edge over many other contenders in the field. [03 Sep 1999, p.03]

There is much of interest in Baumbach's pictures - the confident handling of actors, the introspection, the terra-cotta and teal-painted walls. But what do you call a comedy of manners that's not particularly funny? [19 June 1998, p.04]