It's a nightmare fairy tale that can be very difficult to watch.

Funny, very clever and still packs some cover-your-face bloody thrills that top any "Saw" or "Hostel" movie.

Because Gyllenhaal is a more complicated actor than Swayze, and more comically adept, the new “Road House” has more humor and more attention to the peculiarities of the central character.

The Grand Seduction slowly brings its story into focus and then sneaks up and becomes quite funny.

It's gimmicky Saturday-morning cartoon wackiness in your face -- funny, but brain-deadening.

This is like any other Edward Burns film, except for one thing. It's unmistakably better. This is the movie I believe Burns has been trying to make since "The Brothers McMullen," 11 years ago.

A pretty ugly movie in its own right.

The drama surrounding the romance gets a little too precious -- though I loved it 15 years ago; maybe I'm getting cynical -- but everything else is excellent, including Jack Nicholson, who is subtle and sly in a small, key role. [18 Jan 2004]

Little Buddha is ambitious, sincere and squeaky clean -- a dose of spiritual eyewash that skims the surface of the Buddhist religion and leaves us wishing for more. [25 May 1994, p.E3]

Extremely pleasurable and well worth seeing.

Fascinating and distinctly politically incorrect.

Unfortunately, Encounter is the kind of small film that could get lost in the holiday cinematic shuffle. But Ahmed’s performance is one that’s worth unwrapping.

Owen is a magnetic, sensitive presence at the center of a movie that doesn't deserve him and that barely deserves to be seen.

Some will say this film is overly ambitious, but what the hell. The man put five years of his life into making this epic mystery. We can surely give it two hours of ours.

Does have a certain classy charm because of its upscale setting. One could wait for the video.

The always fierce Bassett is a little too fierce here, reacting with unwarranted emotion to each romantic twist and turn.

The possibilities of Jenna's confusion are exploited for full comic effect. Garner, who turns out to be a charming, abandoned comedian, makes Jenna's incredulousness and innocence very funny and occasionally even touching.

Ultimately, the film works because the doctor's relationship with the general - and both of their relationships with the doctor's young boy - is just as complicated as the action-packed coup.

Margot Robbie plays Tanya, Kim’s best friend and professional rival, and it’s a real asset to have someone with that kind of a star wattage in a supporting role.

What makes Chemical Hearts so good is it’s unafraid of its feelings. It tackles complicated emotional issues such as depression, suicide, sex and love with a straightforward honesty. For once, a film about young people is completely free of snark and irony.

A sweet, innocuous romantic comedy.

Snyder served as his own director of photography for the first time and, aided by terrific effects makeup and digital production design, he’s created a sprawling graveyard Vegas of detailed, decaying awesomeness.

Drama is as much about perspective as it is about events, and the angle provided by How I Live Now turns out to be self-defeating.

Really, the only thing kinky about this movie is its title.

For almost an hour, it keeps us off balance. But once we find that balance, the movie seems to coast.

Wexler gets tired of his own movie near the end of it. The viewer will get tired in 15 minutes.

The action ramps up so much toward the end that there’s really no time to care whether it makes visual or logistical sense. It’s sustained, exciting and increasingly gory fun that’s a pleasure to get to after some of the film’s earlier, dour stretches. It’s sustained, exciting and increasingly gory fun that’s a pleasure to get to after some of the film’s earlier, dour stretches.

The movie gets bogged down in the formula conventions of romantic comedy, and in the process, it loses all honesty.