Amateur is a subversive action movie that uses lurid material for its own puckish purposes. [02 Jun 1995]

Zeffirelli's Hamlet is lively, energetic and suspenseful. [18 Jan 1991]

For a film that shows the folly of failing to take the female orgasm seriously, Hysteria ends up taking a silly angle on a potentially fascinating slice of secret history.

Often as not, the movie works. Here and there, it works kind of beautifully.

ASM 2 makes too many of the same mistakes that have brought other superhero movies low (including Sam Raimi's "Spider-Man 3"). It tries to pack in too many characters and plot lines, for one.

Developing late in the film, the romantic subplot has the effect of retarding the war story, stretching it out and adding unnecessary elements of sentimentality and sensationalism.

There are movies that are made for the big screen, and movies that are made for the small screen; Passionada is the latter type.

Rent isn't nearly as transporting a film as the Oscar-winning adaptation of "Chicago," but its energies and passions compensate for a lot of its deficiencies.

The handful of laughs is overwhelmed by a dull assemblage of chase scenes (one involving a huge dog and an orange tabby), tilted camera angles and dangling plot threads. [23 July 1993, p.AE17]

The movie is gorgeous to look at, the script has a killer twist and the cast is competent.

The Killer Inside Me isn’t for everyone, and even some people who think it’s their sort of thing might be offended. But it’s too well made to dismiss outright for its twisted cruelty. Maybe that’s a compliment, maybe not.

Kids will love this typically well-done Disney film, and there's enough to keep parents entertained as well. [07 Apr 1995, p.26]

Overall, The Pretty One suffers from excessive, unfocused quirk and a predictable sitcom resolution.

It's not a political film, but it's also not a bland recitation of homilies about the honor of serving one's country. It's a jokey road movie, in which three soldiers heading home from Iraq are forced into a cross-country van ride together.

This makes "Eli" sort of wonderfully silly toward the end, as if the Hughes brothers set out to make the first-ever faith-based "Mad Max" movie.

Yes, you can enjoy bits and pieces along the way, more than a few, even. At the end of this journey, though, you feel more exhaustion and relief than catharsis or satisfaction.

Strictly for boys -- grown-up boys -- the more boyish and less grown-up the better.

Funny, dumb, cruel and sick, Girls Will Be Girls is a relentlessly mean picture that will tickle those tired of sweet comedies whether in drag or plainclothes. In short, "Tootsie" it ain't.

It's not particularly logical and it's not particularly fun. As deliberately amateur as the herky-jerky photography is, the rest of the film isn't much more professional.

In addition to the slick but generic computer animation, it's also got an A-list voice cast: Nicolas Cage as Dr. Tenma, the grieving inventor, and Donald Sutherland as a scheming politician.

Stunningly photographed, acted with occasional bravura and structured with exacting precision, it fails to sing more than once or twice, and then only briefly. [2 Feb 1996]

Sufficiently resembles the first film that the heartiest fans should be content.

Badham, a journeyman director prone to coughing up hairballs such as ``The Hard Way'' and ``Bird on a Wire,'' does unexpectedly well with the supporting cast. He actually wrests a good performance out of Anne Bancroft, as a veteran operative who trains Maggie in feminine wiles and etiquette. Improving on Jeanne Moreau in the original, Bancroft is a fierce combination of society hostess and drill sergeant. [23 March 1993, p.D06]

Other than flubbing the dismount, Stick It is smarter and funnier than it has any right to be.

The people behind Eight Legged Freaks were absolutely correct not to make it too loopy or too dark. But they ought to have made it too something. Real fun is never this tame.

By a certain point The Heart of Me becomes pointlessly depressing and unlikable without offering insight.

Well-crafted as it is, though, The Artist and the Model suffers from the familiarity of its plot, and especially in comparison with "La belle noiseuse," which ran over twice as long as this film but contained ten times as much insight into human nature.

The Guardian doesn't offer too many surprises. Except for one: it's genuinely well-made and, at least when it comes to the character Ben Randall, kind of moving.