It's faint praise to say that this is the best of the "Planet of the Apes" movies, because the evolution of special effects and makeup was predictable. But the unexpected strength of the film is its heart.

Wysocki is perfectly cast as a teen who's at odds with both his environment and himself. It's a terrific performance. And as the empathetic Fitzgerald, Reilly is at his quirky best.

I still think it's a funny movie, but given its genes, it's a bit of a slacker.

Smith turns in a subtly layered performance that suggests the hurt behind Kathy's callousness. And O'Donnell gets to the heart of a man who realizes too late that he's made unfortunate choices.

Once we've quickly digested the fortune-cookie message that modern women are as bound by obligations as their grandmothers were, all we can savor is the scenery.

Although this sober film spares us some of the grim, survivalist details, the harrowing adventure from a girl's perspective is so compelling that Julia's simultaneous sleuthing seems like an unnecessary distraction.

Directors John Requa and Glenn Ficarra were weaned on earthy comedies like "Bad Santa," and every moment of mature insight in Crazy, Stupid, Love is answered by a scene of formulaic farce.

It would have been nice if Cowboys & Aliens had come come up with the right equation to balance originality and homage. But in the end, it all turned into trigonometry.

A bait-and-switch comedy. It poses as a naughty "no-mance" about friends who use each other for casual sex, but at the moment of truth it goes limp.

The best kind of comic-book movie. It's stylish and spectacular, yet it's rooted in history and human emotions. It's smart yet it's funny. It's wise yet it kicks ass when it has to. Just like the U.S. of A.

Unfolds like a fable instead of a believable slice of life. Mexican TV and film star Bichir gives a poignant performance, but he's distinctly more European than the cholos and Chicano laborers on the sketchy edges of the hero's plight.

If you require a plot, look elsewhere.

Like the previous seven movies, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2 obliviates the line between art and craft, but the witchcraft conjured for this satisfying finale is uniquely generous.

Both arduous and artful, City of Life and Death is the best imaginable movie about the genocidal siege that's now called the Rape of Nanking. Anything more explicit would be unwatchable; anything more contemplative would be a betrayal of the sustained suffering.

As a critic who complains about painless and brainless action movies, I hoist a glass of mead to the men and maidens of Ironclad.

Spacey evokes memories of other movies in which he's played a shark, and it's inherently fascinating to hear Aniston talking dirty and to see Farrell with a combover, but nothing in the film is genuinely provocative.

Given the turbulent water of world affairs and sea changes in the media, a follow-up a year from now might be titled "Gray Lady Down" if the Times does not chart a new course.

Trollhunter has a lot of down time as the crew treks to the fjords, but it's also got dryly subversive humor and, eventually, some impressive special effects.

When the two men compare impersonations of Michael Caine or Sean Connery, Brydon's version is always slightly better - and Coogan knows it.

It's simply an opportunity to spend time with characters who may lack depth but are fun to watch.

One small step for action movies, one giant leap into the abyss of mindlessness.

A lovably quirky comedy-drama with a rhythm all its own.

A tearjerking romance that belongs to another era, when female moviegoers wanted to be transported, not grounded in grim realities.

Beautifully but simply wrought by director Cindy Meehl, this deft documentary is a poignant reappraisal of what it means to be human.

A serviceable behind-the-scenes tour documentary with about as much insight as a talk-show monologue.

Cars 2 is like a gorgeous sports car with a toxic tailpipe, a busted navigation system and a loud stereo that plays only commercials.

Brazenly funny in its own right - until it turns into a goody two-shoes.

Bonnaire, whose films include "Vagabond" and "Monsieur Hire," gets Helene just right, registering her joys and disappointments with finesse.

As an homage to an influential director, Submarine blows "Super 8" out of the water.

Yet notwithstanding its derivative dolefulness and PG-13 timidity, The Art of Getting By is smart and sweet enough to become the favorite film of some Midwestern adolescent who wrongly believes he's already seen the dark side.

The moral lesson that this movie feeds us smells fishy - because it's not in the book. But the backbone story about a guy who inherits some penguins is enough to tickle the kids.

The spectacular collapse of Green Lantern is bound to be blamed on Reynolds, but the villainy has its origins in an injustice league of TV-trained screenwriters and tin-hearted studio suits.

A fanciful French cousin to Allen's "Zelig" and "The Purple Rose of Cairo," yet the fulfilled wish for a better life is high-concept absurdity without high-anxiety guffaws.

The Tree of Life is a religious experience. Overtly. Audaciously. Unashamedly. No film has ever reached as high toward the face of God and, in our commodified future, few are likely to try.

Such a disarming homage to the cinema of the Reagan era that even grouchy gremlins might feel like it's morning in America. But be forewarned that if this movie is exposed to sunlight, you'll notice the puppet strings.

An artfully observant and unexpectedly moving documentary.

X-Men: First Class is a mutant movie, half fun and half fearsome. For those who have developed an immunity to fanboy hype, the contradictory traits may seem to weaken rather than strengthen this beast, but readers of the "X-Men" comics will hail an origin story as satisfying as "Thor."

L'amour fou means "crazy love," but we don't learn anything crazy about these devoted lovers.

This well-executed sequel is sneaky. While it distracts us with Chinese backdrops and buffoonish humor, it sucker punches us with a message about belonging.

It's clear that Phillips is betting heavily on funnymen Jeong and Galifianakis to hide his creative bankruptcy.

Canadian director Denis Villaneuve knows how to stoke a hot debate about the legacy of violence. But in this case, where there's smoke, there's not enough air.

Although there are gentle detour discussions about advertising in classrooms and school buses, Spurlock's ironic approach can't convince us that ads are toxic. Indeed, when he visits sprawling Sao Paolo, Brazil, where all outdoor advertising has been banned, it seems as sterile as Stalingrad.

On Stranger Tides has the fishy smell of something washed ashore and sold as new. But this shipwreck isn't worth a wooden doubloon.

Notwithstanding exquisite images that evoke Terrence Malick's "Days of Heaven," city-slicker audiences may find themselves getting saddle sore. But those with the courage to explore uncharted territory will be rewarded with a rough gem of a movie.

The Beaver isn't a perfect film, but it's challenging and original.

The simmering rivalry between Di and Fiamma, inflamed by the kind of glimpsed indiscretion that makes adolescent melodramas tick, explodes in a thriller ending that turns an observant coming-of-age story into something resembling "The Lord of the Flies."

For the rest of his life, Spencer Susser can brag to the other ditch diggers that he persuaded two of the best young actors in Hollywood to star in one of the worst movies ever made.

Kristen Wiig is the best sketch comic alive, and Bridesmaids should finally make her a movie star.

Ferrell's dryly understated performance is a shorthand for an alcoholic's denial and repressed rage, and as Nick grows increasingly desperate for a drink, he keeps his anger stashed like a last beer for emergencies.

Superbly acted, and a return to form for Tavernier, who guided jazz legend Dexter Gordon to an Oscar nomination for "'Round Midnight" (1986).

There Be Dragons is tethered to the earth by a tangled plot, wooden acting and the heavy burden of healing old wounds.

Amid other wedding movies crowding screens these days, not to mention Perry's "Madea's Big Happy Family," Jumping the Broom feels instantly familiar. And tired.

Imagine an opulent movie palace that was 30,000 years old, with posters preserved on the curving walls and the bones of the Stone Age patrons peacefully sleeping in the fairy dust. That's essentially what archeologists found in a French canyon in 1994 and what Werner Herzog brings back to life in the extraordinary documentary Cave of Forgotten Dreams.

Although it starts slowly, the accumulated tension and thematic resonance leaves us breathless.

Doesn't break any new ground, but it is a decent way to spend a girls' night out.

With its references to other properties in the Marvel universe and to classic tales of redemption, this no-surprises summer movie might appeal to those who've been bitten by radioactive spiders or the Shakespeare bug.

It's got a grown-up artfulness, but Winter in Wartime could become a lot of boys' favorite movie.

Although the choice of interviewees skews the movie in a New Age-y direction, there's less pseudoscience and more heart than in the kindred documentary "What the Bleep Do We Know?"

A fairy-tale teenage romantic comedy that makes "The Breakfast Club" look edgy. And that's just fine, because this Disney product does straight-laced fairly well.

Mostly "Hoodwinked Too" is playing to young video gamers, with overblown action sequences and slangy 'tude.

Fast Five represents Yankee ingenuity of the brutally stupid kind.

Builds beautifully from a farcical premise that requires a suspension of disbelief to a musical climax that washes away our cynicism in a wave of honest tears.

Because we don't know or care much about the characters, this Israeli film never fulfills its potential as either an absurdist comedy or a humane drama.

The most rewarding way to watch Water for Elephants is to focus on the sideshow of costumes and craftsmanship, because the romance in the center ring smells like trained animals going through the motions.

Don't be late to this homecoming of director Wes Craven and writer Kevin Williamson's horror series, which begins with a twisty opening sequence that's bloody fun.

This melodrama about spousal abuse and honor killings might be too grim to bear, but Kekilli keeps it centered.

The libido and bloodlust flowing from the pint-size Page is the funniest thing in the movie, but elsewhere, the mix of the goofy and ghastly is hard to digest.

Notwithstanding some allusions to "Lady and the Tramp," the characters and their comic high jinks are nothing special, but the the getaway gives us spectacular 3-D images of the city.

The few Jewish characters are cartoonishly evil, but even the Palestinians are sketchily dramatized or, in the case of a terrorist, clumsily legitimized.

Instead of entertaining us, director Robert Redford offers us a handsome history lesson that's as dry as a hardtack biscuit.

Call it "On the Lakefront." Or "Pretty-Good Fellas."

It's an original that plays as if it were based on a novel.

Beauty comes to us unexpectedly. That's the message of Poetry, a Korean movie about an aging housemaid that turns out to be one of the best films of the year.

A good nature film - and a great technical achievement.

It's a compelling tale of surf and survival.

As the highly focused Hanna, Ronan - who had a breakout role in "Atonement" - is simply brilliant.

With such a thin excuse for a leading man, Arthur is a dud.

As popcorn entertainment, it's right on schedule.

Cunningham's answers to pointed questions about romantic love and religious faith are so open-hearted, we understand that he's bigger than just New York.

Although the film has elements of a puzzler by Michelangelo Antonioni and a psychodrama by Ingmar Bergman, it never becomes compellingly intellectual or unnervingly emotional.

A medical drama that pays lip service to the healing power of music but never finds the rhythm.

It's supposed to be sweet, but Hop is a headache waiting to happen.

A terrific but uncompromising film that's definitely not for everyone.

An inconsequential mess.

Skarsgard, who is perhaps best known for "Good Will Hunting" and "Breaking the Waves," makes the most of his rich role, imbuing Ulrik with a knockabout charm.

Scabrously funny yet essentially gentle, as the main thing that it's probing is our collective ignorance.

Strikes an uneasy compromise between liberty and justice. It marches at an efficient pace, but there's too much collateral damage to believability.

Rooted in empty materialism, but it never evokes the heady rush of a guilty pleasure or the precipitous payback of a thriller.

Director Dereck Joubert gleans a valuable thread that connects us to these endangered creatures.

The so-so film isn't nearly as good as any of the movies that may have inspired it, or even its own knockout trailer.

Mars Needs Moms is dark for a Disney movie.

Europeans have a taste for both the mechanics of trickery and the machinations of power, and the politically astute Spanish film "Even the Rain" belongs in the same conversation with Francois Truffaut's "Day for Night" and Pedro Almodovar's "Bad Education."

Such a sorrowful attempt to resurrect the marketing magic of "Twilight" that it ought to be titled "Career Eclipse."

Im Sang-soo has crafted an erotic thriller whose cool beauty speaks for itself.

An exhilarating balancing act, at once a science-fiction romp, a paranoid thriller and a philosophical treatise.

Hits most of the markers of a flashback film but not enough of the beats.

Rango is iconic like a spaghetti Western, smart like a '70s conspiracy thriller and lively like a Coen brothers comedy.

Paul Simon and a Parisian orangutan tell us the same thing: It's all happening at the zoo.