For all its impressive set pieces and breathless momentum, it's neither passionate nor urgent.

Can't find its rhythm and stride. It plays it far too safe and slick.

It's weird, clean, good-natured fun, and it's far too subdued for its madcap milieu.

Competently directed by Christian music producer Steve Taylor, it's a sincerely (if not exactly subtly) performed spiritual drama with a faith-based lesson in humility and the practical charity of offering a helping hand.

In fact, when not kicking butt, (Li)'s kind of a blank spot in the center of the screen.

Melancholy, haunting and riveting true-crime saga.

A sad, sad, sad, sad rip-off.

Diane Lane overplays many scenes, she tries way too hard to be ingratiating and, in many other ways, it's one of the least of her performances.

Time travelers, hobbits, ghosts? Those I can buy. The impossibly quaint world of small-town innocence and Hollywood harmlessness in Win a Date With Tad Hamilton? Now that demands a serious suspension of disbelief.

They try too hard to be funny. It's hardly a damning fault, but it has a tendency to drown out their satiric observations.

It's a surprisingly happy film, almost completely devoid of bitterness or cynicism.

Whatever else it does, it absolutely convinces us that the life of most women during this supposedly enlightened period of Renaissance history was little better than slavery, and the only level playing field in the war of the sexes was the courtesan's bedroom. [27 Feb 1998]

The film is dominated by computer-generated effects and they're most of its problem -- they don't give us anything to emotionally attach to or invest in.

Poetic Justice is much more self-indulgent and self-consciously arty and shows [Singleton's] directorial inexperience in almost every scene. [23 Jul 1993]

Finn Taylor's lark of a movie feels like two unfinished films awkwardly fused together and ever threatening to snap apart.

Imaginative and frequently thrilling, and the love-hate relationship of its protagonists is quite compelling; Woo is always at his best in portraying the complexities of male bonding under intense pressure and violence.

The result is a heartfelt film brimming with ideas and passion but hampered by a literal approach that douses the emotional heat.

The film attempts to put Zizek's philosophy into practical, accessible terms. Accessible, of course, being a relative term.

It's a barrage of visual stimulation so excessive that it's hard to sort it all out. But it's often funny, its texture can be breathtaking and its pleasures likely will grow with repeated viewings.

Before the movie reaches its climax, it has created a mess that requires divine intervention.

Amounts to little more than high-class soap opera.

For all its somber heaviness and reverential gravity, it never quite pulls all the elements and themes together.

Quickly becomes an endurance test: like watching an old Carol Burnett skit that's not working, or a high school play that's trying to be bad.

There's no comic spark under Showalter's drab direction, and no good argument in the film why we should ever wonder about the guy left at the altar.

In any case, for all its good points, this movie doesn't click, it never builds much dramatic tension or momentum, it doesn't communicate a clear vision of the man behind the myth, and it finally can't find a coherent narrative line to tell its (ultimately inaccurate) story. [01 Dec 1995]

A film that takes you by surprise, refusing to relinquish its grim, fascinating hold. Better yet, it has crept up on us without much advance promotional fanfare. The less known about its twists, the better.

The good news is that Kidman's the best thing in this rather subdued film: sexy, coy and even a bit funny. The bad news is that the movie itself is unlikely to register very long on anyone's radar.

An almost too-sophisticated comedy, pitting the New World mentality and brash pugnaciousness of America against the staid arrogance of custom that defines the French bourgeoisie.

No more or less than it appears to be: a paean to the benevolent fate we'd like to believe watches over us.

Makes no effort to learn about the culture. It idolizes the idea of spiritual purity without offering any insight into what it really means.

This is an actress (Streep) who can pull off anything -- including a shamelessly kitschy musical.

If "Splash" was a movie for grownups and "The Little Mermaid" was a film for kids, it's safe to say that the latest flick to feature a mermaid is aimed directly at those who are neither adults nor children, but rather lost somewhere in that awkward middle zone in between.

Grown-ups, depending on how in touch they are with their inner child, will be split during most of this, inspired to either smile or roll their eyes.

It's vaguely humorous, and kids will like the animal sequences, but the movie as a whole doesn't hold a candle to the original. It can't re-create the pleasure of discovering something new, innovative and effortless. [13 Apr 1990]

"Time destroys all," claims the film, but the monstrous capabilities of human evil is the real culprit here, and Noe is determined to prove that the real evil that men do is not fodder for cinematic spectacle and cinematic entertainment.

As action movies seem to get more complicated and convoluted with international conspiracies and technological concepts, the "Transporter" franchise is refreshingly simple.

Scott, whose sensitive turn as a priest inspired by Ralph's conviction and commitment gives the film a touch of grace at the cost of revealing McGowan's drab direction of every other actor.

Its animation is simply glorious, but its story and characters are trite.

Many will find Griffin profane, sexist and decidedly offensive. Many more will find his raunchy insights inspired, his body language hilarious and his gift for mimicry and caricature worth the entire show.

Truly, this is a bad script.

Most of the film, however, goes down easily enough. The Queer Strokes, an all-gay rowing team, provide a humorous contrast to the less sexually confidant characters.

A mystery that isn't mysterious, a thriller that's barely thrilling.

The film strains to achieve the comedic gait of "Wag the Dog" or the improvised, overlapping style that so defined Robert Altman's Hollywood movie, "The Player."

Even a one-two punch from Australian stars Guy Pearce and Rachel Griffiths, who are wryly good in this crime caper, can't keep it from sinking into a cavern of cliches.

Most Bond parodies tend to flatten because they fail to evoke the production design overkill and slick cinematic style of its target. Johnny English is no different. Director Peter Howitt delivers action like a journeyman, but Atkinson saves him time and again.

Though you might expect a film of a bunch of performers on a bus to explode with camaraderie and high jinks, the Wild West Comedy Show offers only standard patter about how hard it is for four dudes to share a bathroom, a map graphic between scenes, and one -- just one! -- priceless moment.

At its best, The Promotion offers a sympathetic view of ordinary people caught on the hamster wheel of corporate politics.

It's still primarily a showcase and offbeat star vehicle for Moore. It's a bravura role and she brings it off with a chilling malevolence and a strange, disjointed vulnerability that almost, but not quite, makes her sympathetic.

As hard as it tries to capture that blend of domestic comedy and paternal angst that made its predecessor a classic, it is still a pale shadow and a barely passable Steve Martin vehicle. [20 Dec 1991, p.10]

While the film is intriguing as it's transpiring, it has very little impact. It's more intellectual than emotional, its message doesn't come through without a struggle and it was completely out of my mind five minutes after seeing it.

It's so affected and arch it flops into self parody.

It's a movie brimming with good intentions, solid production values and searing performances. However, it never quite clicks into place with any real satisfaction.

I can't imagine how Smith can capture a big enough audience to pay off this private joke, but the inner geek in me had too much fun to care.

A modest but amiable comedy.

At times it gets lost in the backwaters, but the eccentric characters and offbeat humor make it an entertaining detour.

Captures the overwhelming and uncontrollable emotional assault of loving and living through captured moments and sensuous images.

Avoid the hype, just go enjoy the movie

Popcorn is not scary enough to work as horror, not funny enough to work as comedy, not cute enough to work as camp, not skilled enough to work as a tribute to the bad movies of the '50s, and so indifferently acted by the cast (including Tony Roberts, Dee Wallace Stone and Ray Walston) that it just seems a waste of everyone's time. [01 Feb 1991]

The filmmaker's vision is harrowingly ugly and profoundly upsetting every step of the way.

The movie's political and moral points -- and theme about creating family however you can find it -- elevate it above the average kids movie.

Vividly captures the joy of sailing.

The Program has little bite as satire or as muckraking. It doesn't really want to offend anyone very deeply (perhaps because it was filmed with the cooperation of nine separate college athletic departments). If you read the sports pages, you could devise your own script and it would be twice as devastating.

Will Statham make it as an action hero? Hard to say. His personality makes Vin Diesel look positively debonair.

As a thriller it's dull and incomprehensible; as a romance it's empty and emotionally uninvolving; and as a character study it's strangely repulsive.

Plenty of visuals but little of the rhythm, flow or characterizations that made the earlier film an instant children's classic.

Although the film is entertaining, its cleverness is not enough to cover its shortcomings.

Has a delightfully nasty villain and pumped-up action, albeit along familiar lines.

Kidman's performance is the best thing in the movie, but it's not at all appealing.

An honorable and often enticing piece of personal filmmaking.

Watts and Coffey may have vaulted Hollywood's gated enclaves, but this affectionate film shows they haven't forgotten, nor idealized, their days among the ranks of the struggling and ambitious.

There's also a terrific performance from Collette, who, in only a handful of scenes, wonderfully communicates the unusual resourcefulness of a demented woman who has spent her life assuming a succession of physical handicaps as a survival technique.

The numerous plot elements don't come together in the end. Even though we are gradually expected to sympathize with the plight of the murdering vigilante cop, the whole vigilante theme is suddenly dropped midway through the film. It seems to have no real place in the larger story, except as a clumsy and purposeless O.J. Simpson parallel. [26 Apr 1996]

Accomplished if misguided thriller.

The Will Ferrell comedy engine is running on empty in Step Brothers.

But Medak never finds his groove in "Romeo." Every scene smacks of deja vu, the cynicism and irony become smothering, it's never funny or exciting enough to hold our attention, and it finally just collapses into the same pointless violence of "Gunmen" - including a scene in which a character is buried alive. [4 Feb 1994]

Kline saves the movie and makes it something special. He does this not only by mastering the dialect and mannerisms and convincing us he is French, but by skillfully underplaying the character and slowly revealing his humanity. It's a master star turn: He makes a better Gerard Depardieu than Gerard Depardieu. [5 May 1995, p.28]

It's an unenlightening film that proves youthful anarchy is just as dull as a midlife crisis, and sadly, as predictable, too.

Of course, the whole thing would collapse in two seconds without a co-star on the order of newcomer Vidal, whose New York street kid is convincing and appealing without ever seeming forced. Together, she and Fox make you happy to overlook plot holes and enjoy what might otherwise be fairly routine family fare. [4 June 1993]

For some reason, the emotional payoff of the film -- the healing of a dysfunctional family -- doesn't quite come off. Possibly this is because Franco doesn't generate the necessary sympathy or father-son chemistry with De Niro, possibly because it's just not in the script.

The period detail, the makeup effects, the computer-generated transformations, and Jerry Goldsmith's brassy score are all excellent. The Shadow also manages to make fun of itself without ever letting the self-parody get out of hand, or disintegrate into camp. For what is essentially a summer slugfest, The Shadow also has unusually rich character performances. [01 Jul 1994]

This is an unmistakably Asian variant on the action movie, a sleek, slick, entertaining espionage thriller in the John Woo mold.

It's very flimsy, the harrowingly unoriginal screenplay rings false in almost every dialogue exchange, and first-time director Lesli Linka Glatter paints her scenes with the broadest of strokes and a clunky, heavy-handed, TV sitcom sensibility. [20 Oct 1995]

It has its flaws, and traditionalists are likely to think it falls well short of its inspiration, but it works on its own terms, it fills the screen with Burtonesque excitement and it strikes me as one of this tepid movie summer's better offerings.

Essentially works, even though the script is a mess and John Singleton's direction is often clumsy and heavy-handed to an annoying degree.

Opens on a display of humiliation and human degradation at its worst and then rewinds, like a video surfer zipping back to replay a favorite scene, to the nominal beginning of the spiral.

It's inconsistent and it fudges the script's murkier details, but Lawrence keeps the story on track and doesn't cheat the world of Constantine."

The film tells the story of Jimmy Hoffa in a refreshingly honest way. [25 Dec 1992]

By far the best thing about it is Zeta-Jones.

Director Cherie Nowlan creates vivid personalities for the entire family and exposes the raw nerves of the biting humor.

To director Justin Theroux's credit, he differentiates his film with a dusky visual style that reflects Henry's murky interior. He uses the grit of his Manhattan locations to give outward expression to Henry's volatile, selfish and terrified state of mind.

It's still too shrill and silly to take seriously, but the high spirits and naïve message of tolerance and pride is oddly, innocently winning.

A loving tribute to Hong Kong stuntmen by one of their own, the directorial debut of stuntman-turned-actor Robin Shou ("Mortal Kombat") is a wince-inducing behind-the-scenes look at the way contemporary Hong Kong action cinema is created.

It finally just rings false as a human drama.

If Irwin is your bag, then this is your film. Otherwise, Crocodile Hunter: Collision Course is dumb, mate. Real dumb.

There's no slow descent into ruthless warfare and we get neither the giddy charge of their bad behavior, nor the guilty sting of complicity in their ruthless desire. All that's left is an idea still in search of a script.

It's not really scary, but it reaches a level of insanity so unhinged and dispassionately wretched that it defies description. Inspired, but not for all tastes.

To be truthful, the movie is not much, even by the limited standards of the genre. It's played almost too broadly for its own good. [07 Nov 1992]

It never quite adds up to anything. It's engaging enough while it's going on, but has little visceral impact or resonance.