The Drop can feel like being stuck with someone who has their good qualities, in serious ways, but that you can’t stand.

Triple 9 is terrific melodrama, but it’s melodrama all the same, and shameless.

The designer’s own recollections paint the most vivid pictures throughout the film, as do his sketches and the extraordinary parade of shoes that go by like models pivoting on the runway.

Much of that appeal comes from compelling performances by the two main actors.

Well-polished and well-intentioned, this human-among-the-fairies adventure is filled with plenty of rousing action for short attention spans. But the beautiful visuals are paired with a mediocre script. The pacing is off and scenes become repetitive. While Epic has broad appeal, it's hard to imagine this will be anyone's favorite movie in 5 or 10 or 20 years.

Li is a phenomenon.

The funniest film to come along since "South Park," and one that succeeds in a more difficult and satisfying way.

De Palma seems to be trying too hard to make somebody else's great movie, once again an Alfred Hitchcock movie. Would someone please tell this guy to relax?

[Duhmel] brings surprising nuance to an ostensibly shallow character, a guy who's not really bad, just caught up in his own celebrity.

Seems to want to be a fierce satire of corporate culture. But by hewing so faithfully to their source, the creators don't let the material pursue its own direction, and the result feels dramatically arbitrary.

It's an honest portrayal, but it leaves the audience stranded, without the emotional hook of a character we can care about.

Chalk it all up to prettiness, if you like, but Lane's case has more to do with spirit -- with warmth and emotional readiness, plus a kind of open-book quality that makes her both lovely and comical, usually at the same time.

Smothers whatever merits it may have had in a rush of bells, whistles, bombast and smoke.

Safe House is an idea for a movie. It's a few blustery gestures in the direction of a story, with five good actors doing their best, trying to hold up the barest frame of an idea, while investing the surrounding emptiness with all the truth they can muster.

An absorbing, educational, sad, humorous and ultimately uplifting film that is easily accessible and entertaining even for those not familiar with the grunge rock scene, or with the considerable role that Schemel played in that milieu.

The visuals themselves are inconsistent, but never boring. The sidekicks seem considerably less painstakingly rendered than the leads. A few of the merchants have the unnatural look and jerky movements of Pirates of the Caribbean animatronics.

This is win-win for everybody, but it's too win-win - a setup that short-circuits drama, that shoehorns a situation into a precooked formulation: He's a real prisoner and she's an emotional prisoner, and each offers the other the possibility of freedom.

It’s a somber, serious experience that won’t appeal to everybody, but it’s quite smart and will keep you guessing until its last seconds.

No matter what you think of dumb comedies, The Interview, thanks allegedly to Kim, has gone from disposable to indispensible cinema. It’s a must-see movie in the context of what has happened, and will spark a discussion of, in comedy, how far is too far?

RoboCop is no canned remake of the 1987 action film. It's a reimagining that responds to everything that has changed in American life over the past 27 years, addressing new threats and exploiting new anxieties.

Saint Laurent’s designs and working life take a backseat to scenes of him stuffing his face with pills, accidentally poisoning his dog and sleepwalking through sex with a variety of lovers. Two and a half hours of this. Bonello might as well have shown him sleeping eight hours or using the toilet for all that says about the man and his work.

Leong is a San Francisco native, and the documentary has a strong local feel. Lin's high school basketball coach Peter Diepenbrock and his shooting coach Doc Scheppler are interviewed extensively, as are both parents and Lin's brothers.

Beautiful Creatures has its metaphysical cosmology worked out, and it gives it to us in doses big enough that we understand its rules and believe in its world, but not so big that it starts to get cute or that we stop caring.

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.

The result is a winning comedy.

The success of this film may ride entirely on the alchemy of these particular actors, but whatever is carrying it, The Intern gets there.

Ultimately, that's all Highwater offers - barely explored concepts and short profiles.

The showcasing of Basinger's body becomes ludicrous. Twice she is shown taking a shower. In another scene she lounges in some very nice designer underwear -- white satin, very becoming. She ends up looking foolish, constantly having to undress in this feminist role. [11 Feb 1994, p.C1]