Acted with earnest commitment and scored and edited with jazzy, laconic grace, "Lights" tells us absolutely nothing we haven't heard before -- and often -- in sports films

Plays like a certain brand of indie film I hadn't seen in a while: the Self-Consciously Odd Journey of Self-Discovery Through the American Southwest, in which people learn Important Life Lessons while encountering "colorful" characters in small-town diners and motels amid the tumbleweeds.

Overall, the trip successfully embodies the spirit of the original Magic Bus man, Ken Kesey, whom these modern-day pranksters visit in a poignant scene filmed just months before his death.

For those to whom life is but a stage, this will be sweet, sweet candy; to those of us destined to be their audience, it's a satisfying, if flawed, look behind the curtain.

I reckon that for everyone who's enthralled by the film there will be others who wish they'd heard about it rather than seen it.

Moves you with a couple of its grittier dramatic choices, but overall the film feels cheap, tugging a little too hard on the almost instinctual pride you feel when seeing a hero in fireman's outfit.

Noisy, garish, cluttered, simplistic and often dark in content, it nevertheless sings and preens and jokes and tugs at you with such persistent verve that, exhausted, you give in.

With its lackluster surfaces and thin core, his (Russell) film displays neither heart nor brains enough to earn its whimsy.

It's a teeming, steaming, bubbling stew, a tremendous good time, a rich entertainment and a heck of a lesson in music, human etiquette and the politics of making it (or not) in show biz.

Someone should send him (Kerry) a copy, if only to remind the senator of the days when he was willing and able to speak with the courage of his convictions, and when he had a lot less to lose.

Could easily be seen as little more than a commercial for his (Jakes) life-changing influence. Call him the first of a new breed: the cinevangelist.

Director Jim deSeve has done an excellent job of providing both historical and personal perspective on a topic that provokes heated emotional reactions.

Enjoys the weird distinction of being one of the year's funniest comedies and one of the best zombie movies ever made.

The movie works reasonably well at this for its first half, but by then we've pretty much figured everything out.

The result is a rare and precious work. The Motorcycle Diaries is an epic road movie with everything you'd want from such a film: laughs, kicks, adventures, pathos, poetry, natural beauty, strange encounters and friendship tested and strengthened.

Does have its charms. While the videography and most of the supporting performances are amateurish, Clark and Caland are winning actors.

You can only kick against it so long before you succumb to its sheer energy and verve. Waters and company simply have too much fun for some of it not to reach out and touch you through the movie screen. If you can stand the pace, you'll likely leave happy.

The only genuine laughs come from Peter's self-sabotaging inner monologue.

Despite its flaws, Sky Captain indulges that inner kid who always wanted a single movie crammed with robots, airships and dinosaurs, with World's Fair hopefulness and panache.

Armed with a cliche-ridden script and a gaggle of unconvincing performers, the result comes off more like an Ernest Hemingway letter to the Penthouse Forum than a revival of Hollywood magic.

Sayles has committed the cardinal sin of putting his politics ahead of his characters, and the result is predictably lame.

Innocence revisits imagery from the first film. But this time computer animation pumps everything up to epic proportions. The results are overwhelming.

In addition to being a funny movie about the movie business, it's a cheeky, ingenious motion picture puzzle.

What's truly disheartening about Cellular is that just as logic has become a luxury in a thriller, so has anything resembling tension.

The bad news? The movie is monumentally stupid. The good news? It's a fun kind of stupid.

The resulting film, while derivative, is worth the price of admission.

One too many scenes with Hartnett's genuinely unpleasant doofus drain away any investment in a film that's suddenly become an elaborate farce without jokes.

Nair, against all odds, has injected new life into this oft-filmed tale, handily re-creating the grimy look of early 19th-century London streets.