Based on the novel by Robinne Lee and adapted by Jennifer Westfeldt and director Michael Showalter (“The Big Sick”), the film is smart, realistic and emotionally honest.

Salinger, who died in 2010 at age 91, probably would have hated this movie. If Jones doesn’t quite pull it off, it is at least a film of many pleasures and a thought-provoking look at American literature’s most famous loner.

The only scene that takes a stab at saying something about the root causes of the violence is the weakest. At a poorly attended community meeting called by the police to urge residents to speak up when they witness a crime, one black Vietnam veteran angrily mentions the lack of jobs. [15 Apr 1988]

The Disney cartoon roots are in there somewhere, but this is an oil painting come to life.

Wickedly funny.

A surreal comedy about sex that comes as close to charming as Greenaway ever gets.

It’s ambitious, and has a great ’90s indie feel.

Barbarella is a pure goof -- Vadim called it a kind of sexual Alice in Wonderland of the future -- and Fonda seems to have reveled in every sexy, campy moment.

Anyone who prefers Hugh Grant and Sandra Bullock to Ralph Fiennes and Jennifer Lopez is bound to regard Two Weeks Notice and not "Maid in Manhattan" as the better candidate for romantic comedy of the season.

More than most espionage movies, the film is about relationships, the men with each other, the men with their own disapproving wives, and governments with each other. Everyone courts someone.

Working from Harold Pinter's subtly suspenseful script, based on Fred Uhlman's spare, evocative novella, director Jerry Schatzberg captures the tensions of an emigre's return to the beloved country that betrayed him. [17 May 1991, p.E4]

Deserves to ride the wave of the latest, hottest micro-trend in pictures: the romantic comedy for guys.

There’s a French saying, “In love, there is always one who kisses and one who offers the cheek,” and usually, the more interesting story belongs to the one doing the kissing. In A Secret Love, that’s Pat.

Huppert shows everything to us, and it's fascinating.

Truth or Dare is like a detective story. You try to infer the truth by looking between the frames. The picture we get of Madonna is a contrived one, but it's revealing anyway, because it's the one she wants to present. [17 May 1991, p.E1]

The murder plot is a cheap turn that says nothing about the nature of Suzanne's ambition. Without Suzanne's media-obsession as its focus, To Die For becomes just another fairly good black comedy.

Thought-provoking.

A suspense thriller of rare intelligence.

Is it possible to enjoy a movie musical while actively disliking its songs? It is with “Kiss of the Spider Woman,” which proves the durability of a good story — and story within a story — no matter how many generic John Kander and Fred Ebb songs, weakly performed by Jennifer Lopez, come with it.

A glib satire with a slick surface, lots of snappy patter and nothing to sell but its own cleverness.

Dark, disturbing and audaciously original in a way only indies are given license to be anymore, the film never telegraphs where it's heading. But you don't need a pathfinder to sense the general direction is toward hell.

This is interesting, at least reasonably. But to a large extent, how you perceive the film will have much to do with how you see the story as relating to today’s headlines.

The Peanuts Movie delivers genuine happiness with the door left open for woe.

It is an original and might give new parents a valuable reminder: Environment matters in child rearing.

It is old-fashioned in a good way, classical and well-acted, and that it has no surprises keeps it from being disappointing, even as it keeps it from being great.

For those willing to enter this world and pay attention, A Late Quartet provides distinct and uncommon satisfactions.

A deceptively simple but enchanting story about a father who bonds with his young son on the Mexican sea, accomplishes something quite complex: It provides a breathtaking sense of place, chronicles in intimate detail a way of life, and touches us with a relationship that develops naturally, right before our eyes.

Last time, Peele made a movie about the country. This time he made a movie about himself, and it’s even better.