It's rare that a movie is so graceful and so gross.

A fairly dreadful melodrama drenched in self-pity.

lLght and likable - a low-budget "Steel Magnolias" without pretense.

An exceptionally fine children's film.

If you were to judge Let Me Explain purely on its performance portion, filmed at Madison Square Garden during Hart's 2012 tour, the film would merit a full extra star. But at 75 minutes, it feels too skimpy to rave over.

There are tiny glints of humor and intelligence at work, and the action and animation rockets along slickly and stylishly. But unlike the protagonists of almost any and all of the Pixar titles, Astro Boy's namesake lacks even an iota of soul.

A long, tedious and convoluted follow-up to 2003's rollicking high-seas hit, The Curse of the Black Pearl, this second installment in the promised trilogy lacks the swash and buckle of the original. And then some.

Like Clint Eastwood’s masterful 2006 WWII drama "Flags of Our Fathers," Lee’s film is as much about how we spin war stories as it is about war itself. Both involve a group of heroic soldiers sent home by the Pentagon to help drum up popular support. Both are made by filmmakers keenly aware that stories have the power to justify a war or turn the public against it.

The movie is beautiful but, for one unfamiliar with the source material, confusing. I needed an owl scorecard.

Subversively funny, Stick It sees gymnastics as a microcosm of teen life.

The movie's combination of unabashedly fun carnage, cool special effects, and tongue-in-cheek dialogue keeps the ball rolling (albeit at reduced speed), until the last of the titular terrors has bit the dust.

The humans, particularly the wistful Wilson, deadpan Alan Arkin (as Grogan's editor) and Nathan Gamble, a 10-year-old who plays the eldest Grogan child, are very affecting. Aniston, who has great offbeat comic timing, doesn't quite find her rhythm here.

An uneven, perpetually redundant comedy-drama.

If you're going to take another stab at this tale of a taunted, traumatized teen who exacts fiery revenge on, well, everyone, then Kimberly Peirce is the director to do it.

It's not easy being macho while you're shivering like a frozen puppy, but Kutcher pulls it off.

In Time is that kind of movie: Philip K. Dick for knuckleheads.

Roos introduces the possibility that perhaps two partials add up to the whole truth, and in so doing creates a provocative love story that sticks with you long after the credits roll.

Provide more than you ever wanted to know about the reigning kings of geekpop, but he (Priestly) does so without giving you much reason to care.

What's on screen is a hash, though it may very well be the most comprehensive catalog of male erotic fantasies in one single film.

DePalma's movie offers its own doctoring and processing, without delivering an ounce of real humanity - good or bad - in the bargain.

A small, dreamy romance.

Tomorrow Never Dies sticks to the Bond formula without bringing anything new, or particularly inspired, to the proceedings. (Besides a lot of shameless product placement, that is.)

The main flaw of White House Down is that it overstays its welcome, thanks in large part to a silly climax that seems to unfold in three laborious acts. At least, Tatum keeps his shirt off.

Isaac's emotional performance as the man who learns to share the woman he loves with the God he worships is profoundly moving and gives the movie its heart.

Each actor is unusually watchful and wily, and their actorly competition underscores the one-upmanship of their characters.

A postfeminist valentine to the Paleolithic days of Woman Power when dinosaurs walked Manhattan in heels with matching handbags.

It's not fresh and irreverent, qualities we admire in Allen. It is recycled and irrelevant.

Law shines like a sunbeam, warming the film with rakish charm and unexpected emotionalism.