Lethal Weapon sinks an unexpectedly sharp hook at a delightfully unique angle, and never once lets up. A purposefully off- kilter flick, it fakes one way and moves another, thwarting our conditioned responses and fuelling our happy surprise. [6 Mar 1987, p.D1]

It's obvious Some Kind Of Hero was never meant to be more than what it is - a cute "uplifting" comedy - but Pryor's performance pushes your expectations. It makes you wish someone would give him an honest dramatic part, and that he could work with a director who wouldn't let him get away with his transparent heart-tugging tricks. Director Michael Pressman has a good touch with his actors, but falters structurally to accommodate Kirkwood's script. [3 Apr 1982]

Ultimately, Fear Street is a shiny and expensive super-cut of callbacks and needle-drops. It is cool but empty horror worship.

Beatriz at Dinner works well beyond both lecture or lesson because of the care and attention everyone has put into the people that play them out.

Kubrick certainly doesn't fail small. One could fast forget The Shining as an overreaching, multi-levelled botch were it not for Jack Nicholson. Nicholson, one of the few actors capable of getting the audience to love him no matter what he does, is an ideal vehicle for Kubrick. [14 Jun 1980, p.E1]

A funnier, faster, altogether more energetic film than Star Trek I, The Wrath of Khan doesn't linger over its modest special effects. This is really down-home week with Captain - now Admiral - Kirk and the boys. [5 June 1982]

The greatest story ever has finally been told. Or, if you prefer, the damn thing has come to its merciful end.

The problem is, while alluding to the depressing state of things, the gleeful fun Gunn insists on having, with his kitschy aesthetic and silly humour, can feel forced.

A long, ambitious, fitfully rewarding movie, The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford is less about the gun-toting outlaws of the 1880s than the filmmaking outlaws of the 1970s.

The delight here is in the sheer workmanship. The performances, the direction, the plotting, they're just nicely engineered, usually with an eye to that most underrated of virtues -- refined simplicity.

Departures is, well … a nice film. It breaks no new ground, offers no audacious insights or rude revelations.

The result is an oddly compelling documentary that sheds light on an important – albeit forgotten – cornerstone of modern, contemporary cuisine.

The film doesn’t feel like homework. Still, while its description of the problem is convincing, you wish it could offer more of a prescription.

What's before our eyes suggests we share the planet with some amazingly strange beings.

My advice is to choose the first half, where things are really funny until they aren't.

When Veber is on form there's no one better. And when he's not, well, give The Valet a look anyway -- there's still much to admire.

Sometimes, when you least expect it, Hollywood is so Hollywood good, serving up a flick guaranteed to answer the clarion call of the multitudes. "I just want to be entertained," you say? Well, fork out then, because The Italian Job does the job.

There are unresolved questions and puzzling detours along the way, but Bikes vs Cars does show that cars, millions and millions of stationary cars, may yet prove the bike’s best friend.

As Kurt finds his true art in the West, thanks to the help of a fictional version of Joseph Beuys, the film turns gripping, but it ultimately reduces art appreciation to the autobiographical.

Perfectly passable kiddie escapism. It has a thrill or two, and a chill or three, but it has no poetry, little sense of wonder, no resonant subtext (Jungian or otherwise), no art... When it's over, it's gone. Extinct.

Rogen’s always a dominating presence, but the doll-like Australian actress, who showed her comic chops in "Bridesmaids," comes close to stealing the movie here, in an uncorked performance full of volatile, liberating mischief.

This film offers a child's perspective on the ravages and complexity of war and is also a convincing testament to the healing power of creative expression.

Winterbottom's efficient yet prosaic approach is evident from the first grimy frame. [18 Oct 1996]

Kilmer is an improvement on Robert Hays of Airplane], but both gents perform with the facility you'd expect from a random sampling of Gentlemen's Quarterly models; like any svelte clotheshorse, Kilmer is good-looking yet self-effacing and he doesn't seem in the least perturbed that his wardrobe upstages him.[25 June 1984]

What could have made Noah work is the same sense of urgency – of fateful craziness – that made "Pi" so memorable, and which also factored into the fatal obsessions of "The Wrestler" and "Black Swan" (two very flawed movies that admittedly benefited from stronger lead performances than the one here).

Crimes of the Future is a dirty little thing because it dives deep into the muck of humanity, where Cronenberg finds a perverted pleasure in the absence of pain. Every millimetre of this film is filthy, decayed, polluted. And thank god for that.

A cheap, crass and ruthlessly sloppy skewering of celebrity culture that is barely a millimetre above the material it thinks it is so sharply satirizing, Gormican’s new film is the definition of disappointment.

Once we’re in the story proper . . . Black Widow quickly turns into another rote exercise in Marvel house style.