The irony is worth noting: Back when it was really 1949, Hollywood made noir with teeth; this is nougat with pretensions.

One of those headed-for-cable oddities that must have sounded like a good idea at the time.

Not terribly funny. When it does strain for humour, it opts for Farrelly brothers-style gross-outs -- vomit and chewed food and blocked drains -- which makes the movie itself seem like some kind of undigested expulsion rather than a well thought-out idea.

There's a head-pounding, gob-smacking literalness to this flick, extending from the title right through to the recurring imagery.

Despite a superb cast and a fabulous look, the picture collapses under the weight of its lofty pretensions, especially in the black hole of the last act, where it topples into near-absurdity.

A bit of a docu-mess.

Certainly, this imagineered version of P.L. Travers’s life provides an orderly drama, but it’s uncomfortably reductive. It may be a small world, after all, but it comes in a lot more shades than Saving Mr. Banks suggests.

Astro Boy definitely sets himself up for a sequel, and the overall scenario is ripe to explore many current issues. But let's hope the creators trade in the well-used parts for some fresh material.

Much of Dodgeball feels competent but lazy. The nerds are barely distinguishable, except for one who thinks he's a pirate and says arghh a lot to no humorous effect.

A larger discomfort with Extract is an ambivalent attitude about comedy and social class. Mocking an officious middle-manager is always fair game; ridiculing blue-collar workers who resent their mindless jobs just feels mean.

Really, Casa de mi Padre is a skit blown up to a feature flick, amusing for a while until its welcome wears out.

That the film – part dark comedy and part cinematic dare – is the most unusual sight you’ll encounter at the movies this year is not up for debate.

For a movie aimed at children, Shark Boy and Lava Girl is gloomy.

Strip away the transparent moral shading, erase the buddy-picture twist, and True Colors is nothing more than a watered-down mix of Wall Street and The Candidate, a sentimental variation on a sentimental model. [15 Mar 1991]

Actress Kristen Stewart – coolly intense, androgynous, and intelligent – remains the series' strongest asset, as Bela, the emotional centre of the story.

Formula action films don’t come much more formulaic that this.

Based on an allegedly true story, this is a dark comedy that begins with a charmingly light touch.... Alas, it's when the tale stays murderous, amateur night dragging into amateur day, that the picture loses both its energy and its edge. [09 Apr 1990]

The film's broad attempts at humour are all mouldy bits from Hollywood films.

The new film is intended to act as several things, none of them particularly admirable. It is a sequel to the underperforming and largely confusing "Prometheus"; it is a prequel to Scott’s own 1979 classic "Alien."

Teenmeister John Hughes, begatter of Pretty in Pink and Ferris Bueller's Day Off, has permitted Planes, Trains and Automobiles to be promoted as his first "adult" feature, but it's actually a re-run of a movie he wrote in 1983, National Lampoon's Vacation, another primitive cartoon for the kinds of adults who find Neil Simon too sophisticated. [27 Nov 1987]

With its glum litany of naked corpses and mutilations, and understated actors looking bluish under the morgue's fluorescent lights, Nightwatch drains the fun out of horror. [17 Apr 1998]

By focusing his lens on the personality of the diva, as opposed to her artistry, Larrain doesn’t truly give us insight into what made Maria into “La Callas.” We get glimpses of the tragedies and scandals in her life that inspired and informed her powerful – and often divisive – vocals. But we don’t understand the artistry behind the voice.

Broken Arrow conforms faithfully to the tongue-in-cheek, post-Die Hard action genre, with the usual spectacularly choreographed action sequences and rudiments of a story line. Even considering the meagre demands of the genre, though, character and plot seem woefully underbaked and the reliance on improbable solutions soon makes the groans of incredulity outnumber the gasps. [9 Feb 1996, p.C1]

The big, disappointment here are the flat musical numbers that bide time between adventures and fail to sink Maui’s hook in us.

Rousing? Sort of. Never before, one feels, have so few given so much for so much real estate.

Antebellum is a film that lives smugly within its final reveal – and what’s worse, this reveal is more groan-inducing than anything else.

About as gripping as its title.

Yet the performances are just sturdy boats against the narrative current - the plot is altogether too calculated and wholly without surprises, either pleasant or unpleasant... The painting is just fine; too bad the numbers show through.