The superiority of the musical sequences, and laziness of the writing, creates a dynamic where you find yourself wishing the characters would shut up and dance.

Clearly, Avary wrote himself into a tight corner and, unlike his mentor, lacks the narrative imagination - the clever shifting of time planes, the neat overlapping of incident - to extricate himself. Instead, quite literally, he blasts his way out and, in the process, shoots his picture in the foot. Killing Zoe starts life as a vigorous wannabe, but pulls up dead lame. [04 Nov 1994]

Centred on an uxorious guy who is building a gambling palace, Live by Night invites unfortunate comparisons with Martin Scorsese’s 1995 classic "Casino," in which the hero is tortured by his dishonest business and his unstable wife. Of course, Affleck isn’t Robert De Niro – delivering what was probably the last great dramatic role of his career – and Chris Messina as Coughlin’s rather bland sidekick most definitely isn’t Joe Pesci.

The decision to overhaul the Scary Movie franchise by sending up such non-horror titles as "8 Mile" and "The Matrix Reloaded" also pays dividends.

Lee’s is more of a hard-edged, hammer-and-nail noir than Park’s existential horror, and it’s far less concerned with the internal state of Joe’s mind than the external havoc it creates.

The script, based by Ephron herself on her own tua culpa memoir of her marriage, is spread wide, but the film never goes deeper into its subject - estrangement and adultery - than a bent dipstick. Heartburn is gentrified Neil Simon. [25 July 1986, p.D1]

This is a stunning-looking film with a dark romantic cloud (quite literally) hanging over its every shot.

In the end, this tale of human decency fails to make you feel enough.

All would be forgiven if Peter were worth believing in. Instead, the boy who wouldn't grow up comes off like a shrill, obnoxious little drip. Shrek should give him a right pounding.

Between a string of post-Friends dismal rom-coms, Aniston has succeeded in these kinds of grownup roles every few years. Here, she negotiates the character’s quirks and contradictions competently, but nothing short of a rewrite from scratch could make Cake palatable.

How Besson drags this premise into 90 minutes of screen time should be of interest to the perverse among you – or anybody teaching a how-not-to-make-a-movie summer course.

Its peculiar strain of anti-Americanism aside, Run, Fat Boy, Run tries to bridge the gap between self-deprecating Brits and self-aggrandizing Yanks, settling down somewhere between the two. Don't ask me where, exactly, but this mid-Atlantic meeting point is an ultra-neutral zone.

The differences between the two movies are, first, that Scoop is a comedy and, second, unlike "Match Point," it's not very good, as Allen also returns to pre-Match Point mediocre form.

What's shocking about The Exorcist III is that it's a civilized albeit undemanding entertainment, more Hitchcock than Hellraiser. [20 Aug 1990]

Bay has attempted to carefully characterize and humanize each member of the security force, and Krasinski, Dale and Schreiber are largely successful at creating personable fighters.

Director David Dobkin, best known for comedies such as "Shanghai Nights" and "Wedding Crashers," demonstrates his serious intent mostly by paint-by-numbers psychology and a ponderous pace.

The movie, directed by Marek Kanievska (Another Country), does have an ending, but it belongs on a lectern. It mechanically begs a lengthy list of questions in favor of a finger-wagging warning that purports to reveal the fate lying in wait for those who play with snow indoors, along with the rewards assigned to those who study hard back East, where it only snows outdoors. [6 Nov 1987]

Too often, the script collapses into what feels like improvisation, in which the characters find a kind of common ground: Infantilism.

Ready To Wear is certainly a disappointment, if not an outright flop. [27 Dec 1994]

Most of Nattiv’s film is a dry and frustrating affair.

Doesn't quite reach the heights of the original film, which found surprising pathos in Doug's tale of sweet good guy to brutal goon. But it delivers on nearly every other scale, including standout performances from returning players Scott, Alison Pill and Liev Schreiber, as well as some bits of comic gold courtesy of series rookies Wyatt Russell, T.J. Miller and Jason Jones.

Could have taken a witty scalpel to baby-boomer posturings. But Dolman, whose instrument of choice is the rubber mallet of smarm, just isn't the man for the job -- he ends up enshrining the very hypocrisy that should be dissected.

On the whole, the film slays in all the right ways: killer cast, killer one-liners, killer kills. But there's a distinct sense that the story is stitched together from other, hastily discarded plot lines – even the simple manner in which some characters get from Point A to Point B is messy.

Even without a chronological point of reference, Outland has an intriguingly realistic look. Unfortunately, both the realism and the intrigue begin and end with the sets. [25 May 1981]

This movie wants to be a horse but, even measured in box-office millions, it's just another nag.

Blake Edwards' latest comedy about a man who comes back in a woman's body has some laughs, but it lacks his usual style, wit and humanity. Switch suffers from glitch. [16 May 1991]

As for who’s the cat and who’s the mouse, that’s easy: Filmmaker Campbell is the former and we’re the latter. The Protégé plays with its viewers – if one is up for the game, there are worse ways to spend 109 minutes.

A spring-autumn romance that comes with side helpings of local colour and melodramatic backstory.