Brothers has the careful observation, measured pace and lived-in feeling of a good European film.

A rule of thumb for characters in heist movies: If the idiots hatching the scheme swear it's "foolproof," it isn't. If they say they've got a rock-solid alibi, they don't. If they're convinced nothing could possibly go wrong, something will.

Now comes this American version, which turns out to be the exception, an American remake that's better than the European original.

Serious Moonlight is a tonal disaster, distasteful and sentimental by turns. It was probably a mistake to have Hines try to walk that same delicate line that took Shelly her entire career to master.

Strel is one strange duck, and you can only wonder that Werner Herzog, with his fondness for captivating weirdos, didn't get to him first.

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.

The latest in a year filled with Armageddon movies such as "Terminator Salvation" and "2012," and it won't be the last, but it's the most chilling so far.

The animation, sparkling and graceful, also ranks as the studio's best traditional work in ages.

This is the weird thing, Old Dogs is not that bad.

It's a gorefest, a borefest and a snorefest.

Christian McKay who, as Orson Welles in Me and Orson Welles"gives what I believe is the most exact and uncanny screen portrayal of an historical figure, ever.

Never dull, but it's rarely more than gently entertaining.

It's that constant weirdness, coupled with Nicolas Cage's best performance in pretty much forever, that makes this depraved, sexually charged, over-the-top drama so much fun to watch.

It all adds up to an entertaining combination of suspense and melodrama, a movie that doesn't cohere too well - and veers toward the silly in its more-obvious plot mechanics.

Let's just say it: It's great there's a movie that makes teenage girls scream. Half the movies Hollywood makes are designed to make teenage boys scream, and those boy movies are just as ridiculous and a lot nastier than New Moon.

The movie as a whole isn't exactly ground-breaking, and some of the humor tanks. But it has enough action, laughs and candy-hued visuals to satisfy the target audience without plunging grown-ups into despair.

Defamation tries to give all sides a full airing, but it's not hard to guess the director's own feeling. At the end, he says, "Putting too much emphasis on the past, as horrific as it has been, is holding us back."

Anyone who enjoys stylized hyper-violence should be enthralled by this long, sweeping, murderously vivid dramatization of ancient Chinese warfare, circa A.D. 208.

Anderson injects such charm and wit, such personality and nostalgia - evident in the old-school animation, storybook settings and pitch-perfect use of Burl Ives - that it's easy to forgive his self-conscious touches.

There's something to be said for a formula picture done almost to perfection. In 2012, Emmerich gives you everything you expect, but gives it to you bigger.

A privileged glimpse into people's private pain, a drama shot with the simplicity and immediacy of a documentary.

If you want to know years in advance what old-age nostalgia is going to look like for Baby Boomers, look no further than Pirate Radio, in which the sun always shines, the music is great and the sex is available, guilt-free and glorious.

Both a memoir and a history lesson, the film looks back on their late father - a crusading civil rights lawyer who later defended a host of unsavory characters - with a combination of love, admiration and bafflement for the man he was and the career he forged.

Some of the talking heads say entertaining or thoughtful things and some of the locations are quite exotic. But does this justify 98 minutes of screen time?

The sum here is less than the parts, which have problems of their own.

A movie about an obese Harlem teenager who's raped by her father and abused by her mother. It's depressing, devastating, harrowing and repulsive. But there are lyric flights of hope interspersed among that raw naturalism, and that's what makes this movie amazing.

What's impressive about Clooney in The Men Who Stare at Goats is how he marries his goofy, comic side with his dramatic side.

As it stands,The Fourth Kind boasts a creepy kind of joke - and a confusing kind of horror.