There are stretches when this true story can be a clunky inspirational piece about a young man who overcomes class and racial barriers to excel at science, business and helping his community. At regular intervals, though, it shifts to darker crime drama with dire themes of injustice and manipulation. The two moods don’t always transition smoothly, but each complements the other as they unfold.

3 Ninjas is shoddy, violent and numbingly pointless, an action comedy in which three brothers spend their summer practicing martial arts under their grandfather's tutelage. [07 Aug 1992, p.C4]

The Night We Never Met gets phony but it doesn't get boring, and that's not bad. [30 Apr 1993, p.C5]

Running mainly on adrenaline and a gimmick, it's different from other holiday movies in that it's not ambitious, earnest or overblown, and it obviously wasn't made with one eye on the Oscars.

Gimme Shelter is an attempt at something grand, and though it doesn't get halfway there, it covers some ground.

The film is deadly slow and uneventful, with brilliant scenes bursting to life, here and there, like roses in a wasteland.

What Laika achieves is an effective mixture of hyper-real and hyper-stylized, a combination that keeps “Kubo” appealing to the eye for audiences of all ages. If the film’s plotting and dialogue had measured up, “Kubo” might have been a masterpiece.

When the film sticks with the eccentric comedy of a highborn woman attracted to a preoccupied genius, it works splendidly. When it strays into melodrama, it is as ill-equipped as Luzhin.

Well-intentioned but lifeless.

It rambles, it's repetitive, but once in a while there's a sparkling moment when someone speaks in a way that conjures the fierce passion of the '60s.

As a coming-of-age melodrama and high seas adventure, White Squall is fair.

Edge of Seventeen is sweet and affectionate, but it also has "first effort" stamped all over it. Director David Moreton never made a feature before this, and has yet to learn how to compose a shot or block his actors.

Clearly, this is something rare: a movie that insulates itself against its own rottenness by being lousy by design.

With a subject like Roman Polanski, you don't really need to do much to capture audience interest. But maybe that's the reason Roman Polanski: Wanted and Desired doesn't live up to its promise.

Some of the results are delightfully loopy. Some are cornball.

The music and wizard DJs in Groove are better than the dopey story.

Wants to be a brightly colored bubble but has trouble getting aloft.

A Burton film that mines the romantic fable elements of “Edward Scissorhands,” while pushing the disturbing limits of a film that seems to be marketed for small children, even if it isn’t really intended for them.

Sexy and passably entertaining, with a plot that's too clever by half.

Most of Widows isn’t felt. It’s a cold exercise, and occasionally a ridiculous one, as when McQueen tries to get fancy, with camera angles that make no sense.

Polish director Malgorzata Szumowska (“The Other Lamb”) directs for the big screen, with eye-pleasing mountain visuals (the Slovenian Alps subs for Mount Washington) and a well-executed adventure. But when the setting is in civilization, the drama grinds to a halt.

A feverish, unremitting and grimly joyless film.

Escape Room is an amusement park ride. It has no reason for being beyond that base-level kick, and it doesn’t, as they say, transcend the genre. But there’s something to be said for amusement park rides. People like them for good reason.

Only intermittently funny.

There's talent here, but for directing, not writing. If Ritchie wants to last, he's going to have to allow somebody else to write his screenplays.

The likability of Lydia and Emily helps, but writer-director Ben Falcone’s tendency to milk emotion that isn’t there drags down the movie and some of the comic bits feel obvious and pushed.

There are some rumblings about the sea monsters wanting to express their true selves and being accepted by humans even though they are different, yadda yadda, but it’s not very well developed and Luca, like its charming village at low tide, is a shallow dip in the water.

So, Dogman is a strange case: Great actor, great character, but a story that’s like an overstretched anecdote infused with art-film portent.

Pretty and vague, the kind of film that might play on a loop at a county fair's Americana exhibit.

There’s no denying that this imaginative puzzler has moments you won’t soon forget.

In the end, this is not really a World War II movie. It’s just a pretty good action film that borrows the plot from about three or four “Fast and Furious” movies, while stealing riffs from Tarantino.

A mean-spirited comedy...that steals the rampaging-psycho-chick formula from ``Fatal Attraction'' and tries to make it funny.

Darned if this film doesn't have some nice touches.

Interesting and often compelling, and a must-see for organic food zealots.

As a visit to a world and a way of life most of us will never experience, American History X is vivid, and it feels honest. At the very least, it's not typical.

What Daylight lacks is the knowledge of its own limitations. The only really hysterical line is delivered by Sly's son, Sage Stallone, who plays one of three young prisoners also stuck in the tunnel...Surrounded by rubble and rising water, he gazes longingly at the 14-year-old Harris and says, "If we don't die in here, I was wondering if I could give you a call. . . ."

Still, the film's limitations are serious. Pennebaker and Hegedus did not begin their film until Clinton was already nominated, missing out on the big stories of the primary season: Gennifer Flowers, the draft flap and Clinton's knock- down, drag-out with Jerry Brown in the New York primary...With mixed results Pennebaker and Hegedus attempt to sketch in what's missing via unused news footage and out-takes from ''Feed,'' the Kevin Rafferty-James Ridgeway film about the New Hampshire primary. In one example that I picked up on, Pennebaker and Hegedus juggle the time sequence, giving the impression that a scene of Clinton hanging out in a hotel with his handlers in New York occurred in New Hampshire. [30 Dec 1993, p.E1]

There is no diverting from strict chronology, no point the documentary wants to make that requires moving forward and back through time. It just inches ahead, one year to another, sometimes one day to another. By the middle, each time a year changes, it's a relief.

A neo-noir thriller long on atmosphere and short on production values.

It's worth seeing the movie just to observe [Grodin's] delicious blend of unctuous manipulation and anti-Communist sanctimoniousness. [15 May 1987]

A little movie with a lot of hilarious swearing and an unexpectedly big heart.

Starts off with a burst of energy but becomes tedious midway through.

A film made with high aspirations and more than the usual commitment but one that, after an arresting beginning, changes into a passive rumination.

Funny though it is - is it could have been a whole lot funnier.

Has an oddness and whimsicality about it that can, at first, be confused for authenticity.

Guadagnino has a choice, whether to be an artist or just the maker of artistically rendered, conscientiously realized garbage. It’s time to quit while he’s behind.

In a blind taste test, I couldn't possibly have identified this as a Linklater movie, and he's a filmmaker I generally like. If anything, Bad News Bears shows that Linklater can get in and out of a movie like a cat burglar, without leaving his fingerprints anywhere. OK, he's proven it. He need never do that again.

While there are entertaining segments, and even a couple of comedic touches, in the end the film isn’t convincing, and parts have a paint-by-the-numbers feeling.

Despite its fascinating and humorous moments, one can't help but be frustrated when at times it switches away to spiritual pretentiousness.

Yes, Charli is playing a version of herself, but she does it well.

Ovation has a self-involved air that may be off-putting to those who don’t feel deeply immersed in that world. You may get the sense you’ve wandered into a super-intense acting class or someone’s therapy session — a hothouse atmosphere that’s oppressive.

The result is a film that feels like unfinished business. At the end, there’s a compendium of scenes from the previous “Ip Man” films, and it’s a sweetly nostalgic way to go out. If only what had come before it had been more satisfying.

Amiable though slow-going.

It’s not for people in the midst of their teen years, but for kids who are right on the edge of that social, hormonal discombobulation and are anticipating it with fear and dread. If “To All the Boys” gives courage and reassurance to apprehensive preteens — and is there any other kind? — then it will have served its public service. Still, as a movie, as entertainment … eh, it’s OK.

This latest installation in the “Big Fat Greek” franchise is colorful and celebratory, eager to entertain and wears its heart on its sleeve. There’s something to be said for that.

At 116 minutes, Five Feet Apart is too much of a just-OK thing. All the same, I want to see Haley Lu Richardson’s next movie.

Eileen builds and builds and builds, and it definitely goes somewhere, but in a way more gimmicky than true — and that leaves us feeling like we were wrong for taking it seriously.

The movie is a fantasy, and the choice is either share the fantasy or don't participate.

It's the kind of movie that crumbles into trash -- non-recyclable -- if you spend more than 10 minutes thinking about it. It's designed for dumb fun, and delivers some. [10 July 1992, p.D3]

Doesn't quite measure up to the extraordinary sweetness of the classic children's book by E.B. White on which it is based. But then again, how could it?

The makers of We Are Your Friends got halfway there, and then lost the beat.

It all gets a little unwieldy at times, but Shooting the Mafia is far from boring. We can’t take our eyes off it, just like a photo that’s out of focus, yet somehow remains arresting.

The action is difficult to follow.

Although it’s good to have a critical accounting of his role in modern American politics, most of what we see here has been reported elsewhere, and this documentary seems aimed at rallying the troops.

There may be no more unusual movie around than Vengo.

For all its sensitivity to the horrors of mental illness, The Soloist ends up as a fairly canned piece of work.

There’s nothing here to match the ingenious audacity of, say, the hospital-shootout-with-infant sequence in 1982’s “Hard Boiled,” but once Silent Night finally unwraps its gratuitous gifts, the faithful Woo fans should find them worth the wait.

Midnight Special is a sincere movie, but sometimes sincerity is half the problem.

By the time audience members start to get the joke, the film is already over.

Bratton has made a film that isn’t necessarily anti-military — he is no doubt proud of his service — but pro-humanity. In a sense, Ellis is going through his own personal boot camp. Perhaps the film should have been called “The Introspection.”

To earnest for its own good. Sincere and heartfelt, it's the kind of family film that might be at home on cable.

The last half is so superior to the first that you wish they'd rethought the whole thing and devised a way to make it more of a one piece.

The people who made this film -- particularly the ones responsible for the story and the dialogue -- should look no further when trying to understand why In Her Shoes lands with such little impact. The characters seem authentic -- until the chick-flick template distorts them.

Eddie Murphy and Martin Lawrence are back together and give both of their careers some new life in this sentimental comedy.

The picture is a soggy, all-over-the- place mess.

The film is worth watching thanks to a flawless central performance by “Glee” alum Dianna Agron, solid elder annoyance shtick from Candice Bergen and Dustin Hoffman, and Bialik’s “Big Bang Theory” co-star Simon Helberg locating his pain and relishing every minute of it.

The emotion the Zucheros are trying to express and illustrate here is a deep, fathomless, infinite loneliness, and here and there, but more than once or twice, they hit their target.

A fine ensemble piece, but a maddening and unjustified length.

The tone is both satiric and serious, zany but heartfelt, and for a while - maybe 20 minutes - all seems well.

the movie comes perilously close to implicitly justifying the killing that sparked the plot - a killing, by the way, that is close to senseless.

There's no buildup and little shape. Scenes are strong, but the movie as a whole flags.

Rote drama better suited for British television than theaters.

It almost works. We almost care about her. A whopper of a plot twist late in the game explains Pippa's transformation as some kind of self-flagellatory penance, but by that point it feels like an afterthought.

It's one thing for a romantic comedy to be predictable - they all end at the same destination, after all. But it's quite another thing to be predictable at every twist and turn of the story.

This is all good movie material, so far as it goes ... but Get on Up can't go any further. Sometimes damaged people stay damaged, and sometimes popular artists make their contribution and then stay in one place forever. It's a big letdown for everybody, but in a biopic, it's poison.

Though Man on the Moon is lost when it comes to Kaufman's inner life and motivations, it offers a detailed account of his career.

Sing is a tribute to struggling live theater.

Apart from its cast, however, Gas Food Lodging doesn't have a lot to recommend it. This is true: It's earnest, the milieu it establishes feels authentic, and the three actresses work hard at giving their characters a life...But Anders' inexperience at writing and directing shows. She overloads her film with too many subplots, and consequently loses whatever steam she manages to build up. She introduces too many secondary characters -- two suitors for Nora, one ex-husband, and two boyfriends apiece for each daughter -- but never develops any of them adequately. [9 Sept 1992, p.E3]

A strange good movie, bad in every way but its effect. And it’s an effective woman’s story, not exactly believable, but with another kind of truth, a truth of the heart. If that’s not enough, it’s close.

Hackl weaves scenes from the previous films into this one in clever ways, without adding to the confusion. The director also does a good job of maintaining the dark tone, which includes FBI offices that look as if they're being illuminated by night-lights, and dungeons that look as if you'd catch a venereal disease or two just by touching the door handles.

Thanks to him (Neeson), I not only enjoyed Non-Stop, but I'd watch it again. Particularly on a plane.

First Daughter can be measured in degrees of Holmes' discomfort... There's never a moment when she doesn't appear as if she'd rather be in a different movie.

A better-than-average follow-up, but Tony doesn't suit up enough.

A very smart noir about gambling, smartly directed by Mike Hodges -- until almost the very end. It craps out in the decisive London casino heist scene.

The car chases and other stunt work are excellent, although there could have been more action, and the downtime scenes of the characters plotting their next move or ruminating on money’s role in moral corruption are fine. But the bottom line is there’s nothing super original here.

Cuesta’s direction is all blunt objects, like a doctor performing surgery with a plastic fork from Burger King. But he shines in the more testosterone-charged scenes, including the opening terrorist attack with its tracking shots above and below water.

Has a few charming moments and a scene or two with legitimate hilarity, but mostly it's just mediocre.

The adults watching know that a dinner isn’t going to heal decades of resentment, but the film charms a tiny part of you into hoping it does something, if only for the kid’s sake.