A funny, freaky, fiendishly good flick that might just find a following beyond the standard cadre of horror fanatics.

Throughout the film, music is used to define character and place. Two metal bands, Moral Decay and South Central Riot Squad, dominate the soundtrack whenever the gang is on the move.

As clumsy as the movie is in many ways, it strings together maybe a dozen situations in which we are absolutely, excruciatingly, on the edge of our seats -- which is to say that the new Poseidon essentially does its job.

In a summer of comic book super-operas dense with psychological torment and sprawling well over two hours, the unpretentious efficiency of Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines is refreshing.

In typical Fellini fashion, there is much frantic activity - no less than three films-within-the-film, several surrealist sequences that come out of nowhere, and many scenes that deliberately make reference to, and comment upon, the director's life and past films. [17 Jun 1993]

It's Waters' way of saying: It's only a movie.

"Network" it's not. Weitz doesn't have the killer instinct for merciless satire but he knows how to stage a gag and deliver a punchline.

Re-creates the era convincingly, and, as usual, Penn is mesmerizing: a consummate movie actor at the peak of his game.

The film dwells more on the sensationalistic aspects than the sport itself but it's impossible to deny the tawdry entertainment value in this compelling film tabloid.

A furiously choreographed martial-arts spectacle wrapped in a fumbling narrative.

There are hints of madness in all the characters, and it gets creepier and more surreal as it goes along until it finally comes to a showstopping climax that took me completely by surprise and made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up straight.

A solid piece of storytelling that doesn't pander, skips the usual POW stereotypes and allows the film to work reasonably well as an epic of war, a survival story, a prison thriller, a murder mystery and a courtroom drama.

A highly entertaining film that still packs much of the punch and the quirkiness of Willeford's novel.

Fascinating and mostly sympathetic.

Plays in spots something like a stage play smartly brought to screen.

The cast, collectively a successful example of the lovable-loser protagonist, shows deft comic timing, particularly Chandrasekhar, who wrings laughs just by his reaction to the locals' racist remarks.

Captures the infantile fantasies of rock 'n' roll's self-made messiahs with an honesty that is rare in today's MTV world of promotional entertainment.

For all the misery and emotional mess of Snow Angels, Green finds resilience and hope in the kids and even in some of the grown-ups.

The film still shines.

The hit-and-run destructiveness of the rapacious media is nothing new, but Cordero gives his cynical take a unique setting and a queasy climax.

Could there possibly be a worse time for a movie celebrating a draft-evader who embraces Islam? You wouldn't think so.

There is a ton of psychology and inference in this intriguing first feature by French director Anne-Sophie Birot.

The directors have told the press that one of their goals was "to make horseracing -- a great sport that has gotten progressively less attention over the past 30 years -- cool again." The movie actually does this. It sure inspired me to make plans for Emerald Downs.

Yu has a good time making fun of white people, in particular a pair of rival ping-pong teachers who seem inspired by the gay villains in the Bond film "Diamonds Are Forever."

It's high melodrama all the way - a play written early in Shakespeare's career, filled with great poetry but lacking the sensitivity and complexity (and historical accuracy) of his more mature histories, and revived so often on stage over the centuries primarily because it's such a rousing, audience-pleasing theater piece. [19 Jan 1996]

The film is so well acted -- by Byrne, who makes Harry's internalized agonies and continuously carried torch for his ex-wife touching, and by Watson and Hoult -- that its more cloying moments, including a staged version of the musical "Camelot" (which is too long), are a moot point.

A perfectly titled and thoroughly engaging -- if at times gleefully violent -- black comedy.

Exquisite and fragile in visuals and tone, yet has some difficulty with a choppy narrative.

Unusual even for Japanese animation.

He (Chan) still can turn a silly little action comedy like this into a high-spirited, butt-kicking good time.

The style is dated, and its neorealism seems forced and ineffective, but it's still delectable, and mostly for the things Pontecorvo hated about it: its delirious '50s color, and its stars, particularly Montand at the peak of virility.

Director Neil Burger manages to make his technical deficiencies and clumsy interviews work for the credibility of his story rather than against it, and he builds an eerie, naturalistic suspense that's believable enough to raise an authentic goose bump or two.

Watching a Bruckheimer with natural comics like Smith and Lawrence makes it all go down easily. If you like this type of movie, that is.

It works as a fascinating and often very funny character study/satire of a famous author, though it loses interest the harder it tries to be profound and falls apart completely toward the end.

Despite some iffy moments, Lighting is the closest one to get to the music from which, as Hubert Sumlin notes, "there is no retiring. You stay with it until the end."

The result is a painful and poignant film at once empathetic and critical, more soberly unnerving than exciting, but never less than compelling.

The film's near-fatal flaw is its dialogue, which had to be invented wholesale from the Old English text. It alternates between sounding stagy and anachronistically hip -- with more overuse of the F-word than any two Samuel L. Jackson movies. It's a big mistake.

Oliviera's mastery is a joy to experience and his bittersweet comic touch adds a loving absurdity to what could have turned maudlin or morose.

If cheesy, feel-good riches-to-reason romantic comedies are yours, this is your fix. It's a harmless indulgence that, like shopping, may make you feel good for the short term, but later you'll need more.

The rough, exposed emotional candor of Cheung's singing voice carries into her performance.

Difficult to weigh and rate precisely because it deals with real life and real people.

My Brother Is an Only Child isn't a critique of the left but a film about the consequences and responsibility of "political action." Luchetti measures social justice not in ideals but in positive change and the compassion with which it is accomplished.

Linklater powers the film with the energy and attitude and beat of his soundtrack.

Wry and dry.

Well-paced, well-structured nail-biter with precious little of the usual Hollywood nonsense, several virtuoso sequences, and a camera flourish that only occasionally gets silly.

A gripping, unusual and suitably harrowing -- if, in the final analysis, not particularly satisfying -- concentration camp drama.

The skewering of spiritualism, dogma and passive-aggressive prayer groups has an exaggerated absurdity that borders on cartoonish and Dannelly's satire is more clever than cutting.

Does a solid job of dealing with the problem but with enough originality that it's not an exact duplication of the Gore film.

A winning combination. By some bizarre quirk of star chemistry, their persona complement each other, the action scenes have comic flair and the movie is mindless fun.

An inspired melding of action thriller, satire and biographical drama through the looking glass of a funhouse mirror.

Never quite builds the compulsive emotional power it needs to be an unforgettable personal drama.

Works well as a metaphor for a more innocent time.

This unusual journey behind prison bars is not only a plea for the rehabilitation of incarcerated criminals, but a testament to the redemptive powers of art.

The result is joyous and exhilarating.

It's getting hard not to think of De Niro as anything but a dead-pan comedian.

Stanley Nelson's documentary shows how a religion becomes a cult, and how people are deceived by an ideal.

A harrowing, frustrating view of paranoia and ineptitude that may seem a case of being in the wrong place at the wrong time but evolves more into a mystery.

And despite Kellyanne, at times, coming off as more annoying than sympathetic, the film succeeds because of the great lengths to which Ashmol goes to bring her peace of mind.

It's the kind of stunt that gets Oscar nominations and accolades. Theron turns it into a raw, bristling performance that deserves them.

All told, it's a reasonably effective movie, but it might have been a lot more effective had it the guts to portray a Saddam Hussein or Osama bin Laden-like character as its villain instead of this rather unbelievable, but more politically correct, gaggle of cardboard neo-Nazis.

The film is annoyingly sketchy on Thompson's early years and education, and it spends so much time on his coverage of the 1972 presidential election and his own race for sheriff of Aspen, Colo., that major aspects of his career get short shrift or go unmentioned.

Ultimately though, this remake doesn't stand up to the original. And it's precisely because this new Alfie is more likeable and thus less challenging.

Where the Wayanses flogged every last chuckle from their belabored ideas, Zucker spring-loads his gags and lets them fly in rapid-fire succession. Not everything hits the target, but he tosses so many of them off with a wink and a grin that they catch you by surprise.

Much of the film is oddly ambiguous, as if Tran used it to explore conflicts of tradition and modernity and never came up with any answers.

A slick, smart-alecky rat-a-tat crime comedy.

Where other documentarians look for a charismatic personality to enliven their films, Berlin and Fab focus on the community as a whole.

It's more admirable than enjoyable, beautifully crafted and artfully unpleasant.

A richly textured thriller.

As a portrait of a collaborative artist at work, the film is an invaluable document, not to be missed by anyone with more than a passing interest in theater.

It's a romantic fantasy of the gangster brotherhood and their doomed lives, executed with Takeshi's unique mix of stoic ruthlessness and giddy energy.

Really two movies working against each other. One is a feel-good movie -- But the more intriguing movie is a tragedy that studies the subtle but long-lasting impact of the teacher's single moral lapse.

Dark farce, a four-handed game of sexual trumps.

The good news about Alan Rudolph's new film, Mortal Thoughts, is that it is dramatically engrossing, brilliantly acted by its big-star cast and filled with the touches of a virtuoso director at the top of his form. The bad news is that it leads us to one of the worst shaggy-dog endings of any mystery story I can remember. It's so totally unsatisfying, in fact, that it almost spoils all the good scenes that have come before it. [19 Apr 1991]

It's Shakespearean in its political machinations and closer to "Saving Private Ryan" and "Starship Troopers" than to "Dracula" or "The Howling."

Suffers from a simplistic reductionism that suggests buying from local organic farmers might help avert the possibility of a worldwide famine triggered by Monsanto's suicide gene. It is a noble and quaint solution to a situation that won't be easily swayed by consumer votes.

The embittered men make fascinating subjects.

There is no denying the power of The Handmaid's Tale. It's a scary exaggeration of a world that many people claim they want to build. It should be required viewing for anyone who advocates a fundamentalist point of view of any kind. [09 Mar 1990]

Jordan unites his favorite actors -- Liam Neeson, Stephen Rea, Ian Hart and Brendan Gleeson -- with the swoony presence of the talented 29-year-old Cillian Murphy.

Once you get the joke and grasp the aesthetic they're after, it's fun, and it almost works on the steam of its clever plot mechanics.

A deviously delightful entertainment.

An often touching and always intriguing look at the fall and rebirth of a nation and the resilient spirit of its women.

Quite a bit of fun. In fact, in its own good-natured, silly way, it works better than most of the year's other adventure-gutbusters.

Inkheart feels a little confused in its tone and direction, but only a little, and I appreciate the way it both celebrates the power of literature and reminds us that stories have a life beyond the page, even if they are only in our hearts and minds.

This remake is considerably different and, for once, the changes have not hurt the film.

Salvadori's homage is a bittersweet, funny, sporadically charming and consistently entertaining love story between two "kept" people.

While it's flawed and often tedious, Kaufman's script is, on the whole, boldly imaginative and enjoyably challenging.

Lacks the cohesive flow of "Fantasia" and suffers from an attention deficit that seems to mark and flaw our current fast-paced technological era.

This tale of kooky social misfits finding their place in the world is an audience pleaser, for all the reasons such tales usually are.

There's not enough insight to the social phenomenon presented onscreen, but that doesn't make the utterly human horror of this thriller any less unsettling.

It definitely gives us our money's worth in the sheer volume of its imaginative fantasy creatures and it's that rare superhero-movie sequel that's better than the original.

From the floating particles of dirt that open the film to the final image of a man and woman on a beach, Yes insists that we live with our mistakes since there is no escaping them.

Its power and bite come from the contrast Seinfeld makes with Orny Adams, a younger comedian on the verge of success who is everything Seinfeld is not: hungry, vain, petty, mean-spirited, desperate for recognition.

A delight and a surprise.

Love it or hate it, X-III packs more action and razzle-dazzle visuals into its 104-minute running time than "Mission: Impossible III," "Poseidon" and "The Da Vinci Code" combined.

An absorbing but somber drama.

The film's strength is compelling character relationships and Whedon's trademark dialogue, a smarter version of the cliched action-movie barrage of wisecrack under fire, only better executed, laden in personality, and enriched with evocative western colloquialisms of a frontier culture.

A first- or second-date flick, after which there can be some Cheesecake Factory and maybe a peck on the cheek, no harm done. What Happens in Vegas is pleasant enough for all of that (and it sidesteps all that "Forgetting Sarah Marshall" raunch).

As well made, entertaining and seductive a showcase for Hanks as it is, the movie doesn't have a magical impact and doesn't stay with you. And while you're watching it, there's always some slight annoyance, inconsistency or motivational-lapse to slap your face in almost every scene.