Stay home and watch Friends. It's cheaper, funnier and mercifully shorter. [8 March 1996, p.08]

Bedtime Stories does have a comic buoyancy, even as its plot trots on a predictable course. Perhaps the different accents and sensibilities have something to do with that.

A heartfelt, '70s-era coming-of-age story with a prologue and epilogue set in the present day, marks the filmmaking debut of actor David Duchovny, who also wrote the symbol-studded screenplay.

A toothless political satire set in a Maine coastal village. It plays like six subplots in search of a sitcom.

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 left hand doesn't know who the right hand is shooting in State Property 2, Damon Dash's prodigiously muddled thug-life sequel.

A weak "Toy Story"-esque animated film for preschool kids made with little imagination, little art, and even less soul.

Murderously unfunny.

A supremely silly eco-thriller with aspirations to Dances With Wolves. [22 Feb 1994, p.D03]

Hands-down the most nightmarishly awful film of the year.

Love Happens announces itself as a romantic comedy but doesn't speak the language of love. Instead, it trades in the slogans of self-help procedural.

Reiner, who demonstrated an affinity for storybook yarns with The Princess Bride and sensitively addressed coming-of-age issues with Stand By Me, has trouble getting beyond the episodic nature of Zweibel and Scheinman's screenplay. [22 Jul 1994, p.03]

I would have told you that its title refers to recreational vehicle. Having seen it, I now know the initials stand for reeking vulgarity.

The three parallel love stories of daughter and dad, girlfriend and boyfriend, sister and brother, are nicely handled. Robinson is a sympathetic director of actors, allowing almost everyone their dignity. For the most part, she keeps this emotionally charged story in the schmaltz-free zone.

It seems sadly apt that the Daddy Warbucks figure played by Jamie Foxx in the new Annie is a cellphone mogul. Because Foxx is pretty much phoning in his performance.

With his beard and '70s clothes, Reynolds looks like Val Kilmer playing Jim Morrison. Before things go precipitously south, he gives an endearing performance that proves he's ready for far more substantial roles than Van Wilder.

Plays around with some interesting notions, such as the nature of reality, the nature of humanity, and the nature of spiffy apartments with sleek bathroom fixtures.

The lead performances are very strong -- few actors possess as much sheer physical presence as this pair -- but their dialogue is stilted, as though lost in transit from a Victorian hothouse.

Uptown Girls gives the impression that everyone behind the camera just threw up their hands in helpless resignation.

If that sounds a lot like Rushmore, it is, except that the heart has been sucked out of the thing -- replaced by glib chatter, gratuitous Baudelaire references, and distracting product placement.

A stale and stupid thriller.

Sandler, shambling and smirky, delivers another of those one-take performances of his - likable and lazy, forever on the verge of cracking himself up.

Imagine "King Lear" art-directed by Martha Stewart and you have Hanging Up.

In truth, despite more corn than Mel Gibson grows on his farm in "Signs" (another Shyamalan effort), After Earth is worth a look.

At its best when it employs the conventions of romantic comedies to satirize them through the eyes of an anti-romantic wedding planner.

My guess is that the film will appeal equally to broad-minded 10-year-olds and their grandparents.

A tepid PG-13 iteration of the already lame 1979 genre classic "The Amityville Horror."

Though imaginatively directed by Harald Zwart, Mortal Instruments, which is adapted from Cassandra Clare's YA novels, is marred by significant flaws.