Crime-by numbers-cop drama.

You feel the full weight of the movie's three hours, since the filmmakers only had 90 minutes' of plot.

The movie's afraid of [Stiles], turning Kat from riot grrrrl to Solid Gold dancer in the time it takes to drop one Notorious B.I.G. song at that house party - which is why it's the Spam of processed teen movies.

It's a movie drenched in narcissism and wish-fulfillment, almost a textbook on how to make a formulaic, romantic film.

When the mystery is unraveled and the frame-up is revealed, I, personally, had no idea what anyone was talking about.

Cholodenko's strategy of having the actors, in every scene -- whether it involves Lucy, the boyfriend or the Frame editors -- perform with an intonational flatness approaching monotone pretentiously undermines the effectiveness of her subject matter.

It seems like another misstep - the story just doesn't hold up to Ritchie's treatment.

Frill-less almost to the point of minimalist, teary without being lachrymose, hers is a performance you'd think was great were the movie in a language you didn't understand.

The picture is a relentless blast of color and movement that's based on the old TV show, but boils down to a supercharged version of old-time Saturday-afternoon movie serials.

No-one's-home acting by Bierko and Mol doesn't help, while the talented D'Onofrio ("The End of the World") and Mueller-Stahl (a veteran of European pictures) are better than the material.

A harmeless concoction.

It's hard not to keep thinking that this movie is basically "Yentl" with a nose job.

Carrey's style is to keep the jokes moving so quickly and with such force that you can hardly stop to consider how stupid they are.

Now and then the script reaches admirable heights of humor.

The real trouble with this movie is that it represents the continuing departure of Almodovar from the chaotic, riotous and anti-social roots that gave his best movies their zest.

It's hard not to like a movie like Men of Honor, but it's entirely possible.

There's more gymnastic yammering in Loving Jezebel than in a season of "Dawson's Creek."

The comedy-drama is worth seeing for Christie's performance as a former B-actress married to a philandering handyman. She radiates a mature sexuality that's a rare treat on screen these days, and when the camera strays from her, you want to reach over and turn it back.

These pictures need a light touch and a lot of attitude, but this time you can hear heavy breathing in the background.

The cast and crew and screenwriters seem to have had some fun with it, and the audience, coming along for the ride, has some fun with it, too.

The laserdisc of media movies - it plays fine, but it's clunky and cumbersome.

This movie may not be brilliant, but every now and then it's really funny.

Congratulations to director Mick Jackson and writers Jerome Armstrong and Billy Ray for liberating themselves from the tedious demands of believability.

A shameless "Shawshank" redux.

The Frighteners is a gooey pastiche of Casper, Ghost, Poltergeist, Back to the Future (it's produced by Future director Robert Zemeckis), Ghostbusters, and episodes of Columbo.

Tank Girl - a slapdash but lively film based on the underground comic of the same name - takes militant feminism of the "Thelma & Louise" school and weds it to the punk nihilism of the "Mad Max" school. Actually, given Tank Girl's personality - sassy, sexy and gun-savvy - "weds" is probably the wrong verb.

While the premise is intriguing, the movie is gluey, bumbling and singularly un-thrilling.

Although most of the stars of this movie are real, live actors, Casper is mostly just a big cartoon in which those live actors must interact with some devilishly clever spectral animation.