Sure, it's a pleasure to watch Thornton stretch his legs in Matthau's role, but I miss Tatum O'Neal as his firebrand daughter.

A smart, sweet, and thoroughly disarming ensemble comedy that isn't afraid to wear its humanism on its sleeve.

If "Sarah Marshall" spawned Aldous Snow, maybe there's room for a Sergio Roma vehicle?

Part of the Clerks charm was that Kevin Smith made it for $27,000, and a bigger budget doesn't really help this kind of tale's authenticity.

In the annals of Mediterranean island love stories, Respiro reflects the effortless charm of a film like "Il Postino," rather than the untidy manufactured romance of another "Captain Corelli's Mandolin."

It's worth noting that Oliver Twist will likely be no Harry Potter at the box office, due in no small part to a lack of bombastic special effects and supernatural subplots, yet it's nearly as entertaining, even without the wizardry.

Overall, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 1 is a harrowing and substantial set-up to what promises to be a climactic final chapter in one of the most popular and successful move franchises of all time.

The movie belongs to Wood, who creates a unique portrait of a girl hesitating at the threshold of womanhood; she's smarter, more attuned, and more spiritually ambitious than those around her, but also too decent and loyal to break from the world she knows-and too unformed to have a grasp of what she wants outside of that world. It's fantastic work.

While Solondz's world is a hell hole and Anderson's "Rushmore" is a place of high-toned and often poignant whimsy, Napoleon Dynamite's unceasing burlesque creates a world that is pretty much a cartoon--and it's a damn funny cartoon to boot.

Conran's Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow is a pastiche of everything from "King Kong" to "The Wizard of Oz," a movie that escalates to a breathless cliff-hanger every 20 minutes or so and reinvents itself with every reel.

Marie Antoinette churns a symphony out of a single note, too light and hermetically sealed in the minds of Coppola and her queen to transcend its artfully cared-for fluffiness.

The fact that Boyle and Garland have here created something close to an actual trip rather than the mere spectacle that most screen sci-fi contents itself with being nowadays is enough to recommend Sunshine.

If you're looking for memorable dialogue and gripping drama, then you better get in line for another flick. But if it's spellbinding special effects and high-wire acts you crave, Wanted should be at the top of your list for big budget thrill rides.

Northfork feels like the work of a couple of ardent art students who, for whatever reson, are very keen on pleasing their teacher. [July/August 2003, p. 23]

It's not often that Hollywood is willing, or even able, to accurately dramatize what it's really like to be poor in America -- to evoke not only the circumstances, but also the sense humiliation and failure. That a European director like Gabriele Muccino, helming his first English-language film, is able to capture the essence of that experience is a testament to his skill as a filmmaker.

The dogs are such charismatic performers it's almost a shame that there have to be humans in this story at all. Still, the Antarctica sequences alone make Eight Below one of the better family films out there right now.

All of the actors are on point (Dupontel and Morante are particularly good), the individual story arcs are involving, if not exactly complex, and Thompson keeps the proceedings moving along at a comfortable clip.

While 1408 is no classic, it is refreshing to see a horror picture that just wants to do its job rather than prove to its audience how ruthlessly nihilistic it is.

Bardem plays the part with all the pent-up animal rage of a young Robert De Niro.

The tension's palpable and the deaths are gruesomely inventive (and jarringly abrupt), but the clincher is so far-fetched you may end up wishing you'd opted for the relative reality of a week in Cancun instead.

It’s tempting to summarize this Irish picture as a working-class version of "Love Actually," and indeed, the hardscrabble lives of most of its amorously unfulfilled characters go a long way in making it a whole lot less emetic than Richard Curtis’s hugfest.

Wisely unbiased-but also unfocused, uneducated, and underachieving-which makes for an occasionally hilarious, frequently anemic parody that misses its opportunity to permanently document a scathing critique of current events.

It's not the life-changing movie experience the intense viral marketing attention would lead you to think it is, but its decision to focus on ground-level humanism rather than epic disaster is what separates it from the pack.

This might just be a tad too grueling and bleak for everyone’s liking, but it’s a Road that’s definitely well worth traveling.

Up will still make you feel like you've caught a big wave.

Malkovich is more interested in hitting notes of elegiac lyricism than delivering socko action; this is a thriller that means to get under your skin rather than make you leap from your seat.

While brisk, informative, and entertaining, feels frustratingly sketchy.

It's a fantasy of one night in New York City and all its insanity, grossness, romance, and glamour.

Jarecki seems all too eager to buy into Toback's depiction of himself as the ultimate Hollywood outsider. Try telling that to the independent filmmakers who aren't on a first-name basis with Warren Beatty.

It is trim, fast-moving and often quite funny, particularly in the exchanges between Ferrell and Heder -- the former's trademark clueless oafishness meshes nicely with the latter's alternating current of petulance and sweetness.

The Fall is a movie whose every frame pulsates with the desire to be a transportive, transcendent work of cinema. And each one of said frames is full of visual bedazzlement and wonder. So full that one is loathe to sum up with the phrase "Close, but no cigar." But there is something, finally, kind of pushy about the film's desire to be a masterpiece.

This is a smart script. There is a wealth of twists, but none of them have to beat you over the head.

Never achieves greatness, but it has the right people in place to suggest the greatness that might have been.

It’s a playful study of Arctic life, starring a polar bear cub, its prey, and a tagalong fox -- with the inevitable dramatic moments when bear meets walrus.

The result is more bawdy diversion than historical fable.

It’s an uneven outing from the Frat Pack, and an equally sad commentary on the state of American comedy: This run-on mess is the funniest film of the last six months.

Not that Diamond skimps on the social commentary; far from it. But it makes its points without too much breast-beating, caching its polemic within a tough-minded entertainment.

An enchantingly cryptic, ethereally photographed slice of somber surrealism that should definitely appeal to fans of David Lynch and Luis Buñuel.

The image of Gwyneth Paltrow looking anguish-stricken has become such a cinematic meme that it hardly bodes well for Proof that it opens with this sight.

There's too much going on to take it all in. It's a shame, really. Robots boasts some of the most vibrant visual design ever captured on screen.

It's flat-out comedy all the way, head-spinningly clever (you'll be talking about a sequence set in the Louvre for weeks) and always engaging. For my money, it's the comedy of the year.

The arc of the story mirrors "Before Sunrise" and "Before Sunset," but the writing isn't nearly as strong, nor the characters as believable -- or likable.

Mitchell's energy and occasional ingenuity make Shortbus an engaging viewing experience, provided you can stomach it.

What sets Fast Food Nation apart from other recent multi-character studies like "Crash," "Bobby," and "Babel" is that Linklater doesn't set up a single incident that ties all the story strands together.

So you'll laugh, you'll groan, you'll leave the theater singing "I'm gonna beat off….all my demons/That's what lovin' Jesus is all about" -- and isn't that, ultimately, a good thing? Yes.

Although Scott seems to be making a point about both parties' ongoing feud for Jerusalem , the movie seems more like a classic Western than a contemporary political allegory.

An enjoyable mess that aimlessly goofs like "Men in Black" when its script calls for "Black Adder."

Like any coming-of-age story, there's enough drama, comedy, and, of course, romance to be entertaining. But moreover, Sisterhood furthers an honest dialogue among young women.

Why John Cusack stopped doing this kind of movie remains one of the late-20th century’s great mysteries. Teaming him with contemporary comic vanguards Corrdry and Robinson is equal parts welcome and unexpected as the three relive the social, sexual, and Soviet fears of the era.

Anchorman is the kind of wonderful, cotton-candy escapism that should leave you with the right kind of stomachache.

Constructing the narrative (made up mostly of dramatic reenactments, although given the static nature of many of the scenes, the word "dramatic" is pushing it) obliquely, Devor and co-writer Charles Mudede weave in the thread concerning the individual referred to as "Mr. Hands" into the film almost casually.

After the widely reviled "Rocky V," it was just as unlikely for there to be a satisfying conclusion to the Rocky saga, but Rocky Balboa fits the bill.

Children of all ages: Brace yourselves for a helluva ride.

It's at times implausible and heavy-handed, but thrillers need villains and it's not like the Ba'ath Party had an exclusive license on 'em.

The brilliant subtleties of this absorbing, must-see drama are best seen through Penn, who transforms a strongly nuanced script into the greatest performance of the year.

The result is enjoyable and frequently affecting. The one weak note is Douglas' performance — he does more than phone it in, but his essential Douglas-ness makes the character less believable than he might have been.

As The 11th Hour's message of Profound Importance warrants a four-star rating, the film itself does not.

Although McDormand's performance is consistently focused -- one would expect no less from the actress -- the movie itself can't settle on whether Miss Pettigrew is Mary Poppins minus the sugar spoonful or just plain Carrie Nation.

In equal parts powerful and peculiar, the film is not my favorite of Green’s, but it helps solidify his position as one of the most visionary young directors around.

Open Water may not be a pristine or complex suspense thriller, but you'd be hard-pressed to find anything else as terrifyingly potent in such a tiny package.

You might not bust a gut laughing, but Malkovich’s performance alone is worth the 90-minutes required to watch it.

The film also has an unexpected and rich vein of humor. John Carroll Lynch -- you might know him as Norm Gunderson of "Fargo" -- is a stitch as a neighbor of the Burkes.

Each new plot point in Suddenly occurs like the title says, but the passage between them is slow, steady, and sure.

What isn't fair is the film's R rating, which makes this charming coming-of-age tale virtually inaccessible to the audience sure to cherish it most.

The thrills of this movie are aesthetic ones, the creation of new, ravishing imagery (and all three of our young heroes are beautiful enough to be up to this task), the surrender to dream logic, the adoration of the silver screen.

In the end, it's not Amy's secret that's the most shocking thing about Sleeping Dogs, it's Hamilton's fearless commitment to making what could have been just a cheap punch line into something warmer, richer, and far better.

The action is great, the story line unpredictable, the ending satisfying. Stander is crackling. Really.

A compelling, rousing and at times strangely moving entertainment.

Perhaps Highmore could have tried a little harder to make us doubt for a moment that, once again, Good will inevitably overcome Evil.

There's a persistent surface level, one-off quality to the whole business that repels emotional involvement at every juncture and seems stylistically in keeping with Disney's reluctance to greenlight each new Narnia film until the last one has proven itself at the box-office.

Hollywoodland is one of the nicest surprises of the late summer lull between blockbuster seasons, a smart period mystery--cum--character study--cum--bitter parable on the lures and liabilities of life in its titular locale.

Doesn't function particularly well as a documentary; it lacks a strong editorial point of view and doesn't really comment on the evangelical movement so much as it just portrays a selection of people and their views.

The film falters in the moments where it can't decide if it's an entertainment about a likable criminal, or a serious commentary on the exploitation of the Third World.

You'll laugh, you'll groan, you'll never buy wool again.

Where "Elizabethtown" pretends to have the meaning of life, Shopgirl hones in on a few telling details, then allows audiences to fill in the rest.

Right off the bat, Catch a Fire distinguishes itself from other recent international productions about Africa (including The Constant Gardener and The Last King of Scotland) in that it is actually told from an African perspective.

Alice has all the emotional truth of an America’s Most Wanted reenactment.

As the caper reaches its conclusion in a swirl of turnabouts and twists -- you'll never guess in whose favor all of them go -- Thirteen delivers more than enough gaming satisfaction for one such picture.

It hardly adds up to much, but it doesn't mean to, and it'll leave you with a cleaner conscience than an Austin Powers picture.

Neeson and Brosnan, along with the beautiful location photography from DP John Toll, keeps you involved even when Von Ancken's heavy-handed direction threatens to bog the proceedings down.

An astounding achievement in production design, an original creation so completely in tune with the books' macabre sensibilities that even the movie's (arguably) happy ending can't diminish its satisfying sense of schadenfreude.

The intellectual aspirations of this series are just window dressing. Which left this viewer to enjoy the freeway chase sequence (which really is cool), Hugo Weaving’s smirk, and even the PlayStationish stuff.

There's much visual inventiveness and a good sense of fun here. But I was expecting something more spectacular.

Boasts both wicked satire and a big heart, and as a result, is nothing short of brilliant.

As a superhero movie, it's something of an underachiever, missing out on easy opportunities to push the idea to the next level.

It may not be saying much, but what keeps this movie afloat, aside from solid performances, is the nearly sophisticated dynamic of an otherwise redundant punchline.

Aquatic maintains its buoyancy throughout.

Slick, well-acted, and smarter than it has to be.

It's goofy as hell but devilishly smart about it, which is why it's such great fun.

So stupendously funny at times that she (Streep) nearly salvages the whole thing.

What little anti-war critique Peirce presents -- and she has it in her, which makes it all the more dubious -- gets trampled over by jingoistic Rambo porn.

Irritatingly, Fleder's flair for broadcasting plot twists treats the audience with the same patronizing indulgence as Hackman does his potential jurors.

Meet the Robinsons is a mess -- a sometimes fun but mostly frustrating mess.

This is definitely one to make you feel good all over.

The Hanks overload feels like The Polar Express is "Being John Malkovich" transmuted into a computer-generated 21st-century children's Christmas film.

Looks, feels, and tastes like a more accessible evolution of "Cremaster," so try to gauge your own tolerance for indulgent eccentricity (at 135 minutes, it could stand to lose 20).

A thoughtful, involving and sometimes moving film that almost (and I do mean almost) justifies its use of 9/11 as a dramatic device.

It's the stuff of countless advice columns, daytime talk shows, sitcoms, romantic comedies. Quite frankly, it's tired. What makes a difference here -- although really not enough of one -- is the people.