Unable to decide whether it wants to be a rambunctious family comedy or a tender romantic comedy, the Dennis Quaid-Rene Russo vehicle strains to be both and ends up falling short of both marks.

Johnny Depp makes a riveting antihero in a dark and bawdy period drama.

The character and geographical jumps leave you in a muddle with thinly sketched personalities and confusing plot points. Worse, dialogue dense with nuance and shaded meaning flies by too quickly.

Despite its contemporary sheen, it's very old-fashioned in its storytelling and structure. Unfortunately, it's more muscle than high-formula, and it clanks, sputters and spins out in its pedal-to-the-story medal style.

An unsentimental portrait.

The best one yet.

The decision to approach Johnny's life as a love story causes Mangold to neglect the development of Johnny's music.

The film possesses a quiet but powerful tension.

Fortunately, unlike so many similarly politically themed documentaries, the film makes its case with substantial intelligence and conviction.

Tedious portrait of a troubled Rolling Stone.

The Syrian Bride manages to entertain even as it both moves and amuses.

Turns Jane Austen's nimble satire into a lumbering gothic romance.

This flaccid psychological thriller keeps spoiling its own surprise by constantly signaling the big plot twist.

Favreau again delivers that rare beast -- a family film that even childless adults can enjoy.

Ultimately, its success may depend on how emotionally satisfying audiences find this flirtation with Jewish mysticism.

A splendid idea for a film goes largely wasted despite a brave performance by Naomi Watts as a struggling actress trying to figure it all out in Hollywood.

Definitely acquired-taste material and will perform best in the hipper, bigger rooms.

Refreshingly devoid of politics.

The writer-director's inquiry into this tragedy makes for a moving and intelligent film, but the dark story never feels fully realized.

For all its biographical truth, Get Rich's journey into a ghetto of hustlers, gangstas and mindless violence is all too familiar.

A consistently amusing, often inspired family romp.

Jarhead refuses to engage in its own point of view toward events it depicts. So the film feels empty and tentative, uncertain of what if anything these events add up to.

Ultimately has the air of a home movie project blown up to feature-length proportions.

Before it disappears into a fog of confusion and damaging contradictions within its characters, The Dying Gaul presents an ironic, provocative look at what its creator, Craig Lucas, calls a postmodern Hollywood noir.

Has little to say to moviegoers. Goldberg's direction is all flash and no substance, and his story and characters offer little reason for viewers to empathize with such self-pitying characters.

Lacks the cinematic panache to elevate it above the level of agitprop. But its all too relevant dissection of its subject is well worth paying attention to.

A sweet-natured holiday comedy that derives no small amount of specialness and energy from the fact that the movie offers a glimpse of contemporary American Indian life.

Turning "Zorro" into a family movie with domestic squabbles and sitcom situations takes some of the luster off the romantic adventure of Old California.

A prime example of a solid romantic comedy.

The killer himself takes a far more prominent role in this edition, and as played by the superb Tobin Bell he's quite a memorable creation.

In The Weather Man, Nicolas Cage doesn't so much play a protagonist, warts and all, as he plays a protagonist who is all warts.

A tender take on life after stardom.

While nothing truly new or shocking emerges, the film does bring clarity and compassion to its depiction of an act that baffles, angers and sickens people the world over.

The result falls somewhere between psychodrama and horror. Cult cinema fans should come away satisfied, though the stories are probably too brutal to reach much into the mainstream.

A deeply personal, often wrenching documentary.

A captivating if somewhat conventional documentary, Ballets Russes is a paean to the groundbreaking, 20th century ballet troupe that began as a loose group of Russian refugees, metamorphosed into the Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo and eventually split into two competing companies.

Showing that there is both rhyme and madness to seemingly unfragmented everyday life, screenwriter-director Michael Haneke has created a pointillistic portrait of terror, presenting a number of tiny, mundane incidents that eventually enable us to connect the dots.

Plot, character development and dialogue are so sparse that the screenwriters are fortunate they're not paid by the word. But this basic approach doesn't render it ineffectual. There's so little to go wrong that those who like their entertainment mindless and violent will find little fault.

Recycles just about every sentimental ploy and cliche from a raft of horse racing movies.

Displaying some fine performances -- including a lovely one by Claire Danes and a lively one by Jason Schwartzman -- the elegantly appointed Shopgirl certainly has the goods but it ultimately fails to make the sale.

There's really not much of an audience for this picture. The movie demands that its viewers put the fragmented images and information together like an intellectual jigsaw puzzle, but it never gives those viewers a good reason to do so.

Downey and Monaghan are wonderful at playing characters that compensate for the harshness of their past with flippant swaggers.

Puts a human face on the failings of the American judicial system and the growing importance of DNA in legal proceedings.

Sustains a pervasive feeling of anxiety and suspense, despite an absence of dramatic conflict or resolution.

Protocols of Zion is often funny, revealing the idiocy of hatemongers through their own harebrained explanations.

Well-meaning but woefully unconvincing.

In the charming comedy-parable Ushpizin, religious orthodoxy inspires not unbending dogma but humble, sometimes baffled spiritual striving by its embraceable, flawed characters.

The admirably tasteful result is a social study far more suited for the likes of Oprah Winfrey than Jerry Springer.

Thanks to dynamic performances by Keira Knightley, Mickey Rourke, Edgar Ramirez and a strong cast -- sometimes all but buried beneath irksome stylistic flourishes -- this dark and absurd melodrama certainly has raw energy.

Tedious humor and sentimentality bury what could have been a pretty good road picture.

Director Rupert Wainwright fails to bring any style to the material, not producing a fraction of the suspense or wit generated by Carpenter in the original even while working with a far lesser budget.

Atom Egoyan has delivered a big, slick and sexy mystery in Where the Truth Lies, turning the Rupert Holmes novel into a sumptuous tale of show business hype and duplicity.

The issue of sexual politics so dominates the story that it's a relief when an emotional showdown involves family rather than workplace issues. Not so surprisingly, these are the movie's best scenes.

Directed with aching purpose by Lawrence David Foldes from a script he wrote with Grafton S. Harper, the lavish-looking but hackneyed memory play is small-screen fodder at best.

A riveting tale of survival and how even war cannot diminish a child's indomitable spirit.

A drama that is more contemplative at times than dramatic yet one containing several powerful moments.

A bold film both in its storytelling strategies and its filmmaking logistics.

Ultimately has few original aspects, but it is an intelligently wrought drama that makes it a respectable entry in the genre.

An inspirational film for cinephiles everywhere.

Thought-provoking story of how terror and paranoia affect two Americans who love their country.

Moviegoers who know their American political history will respond to the film's immediacy and forgive the film's tight focus and narrow view. Anyone hoping for an entertaining drama about newsmen and politics along the lines of "All the President's Men" will be disappointed.

Though the concept serves as a soul-stirring showcase for contemporary inspirational performers, the writing and direction (both attributed to Rob Hardy) commit a multitude of sins.

Director Curtis Hanson has made a chick flick with substance as well as style.

A muddled melodrama about the shady and questionable though not quite illegal world of "sports advisers."

Doesn't serve up enough laughs to build a theatrical following but could find life on video as a takeout item.

This well-made World War II film from Germany is both a coming-of-age story and a critique of National Socialist ideology.

Displays moments of cleverness but not enough to sustain its feature-length running time.

The movie rolls merrily along with slapstick action and whimsical characters.

Capote represents something unique in cinema.…Most eye-catching for critics and audiences in the weeks to come will be Philip Seymour Hoffman's brilliant metamorphosis into the persona of the late author.

Actor-turned-helmer Bill Paxton has fashioned solid family entertainment in this well-cast feature.

When under water, the action-adventure Into the Blue has genuine thrills. Above water or on dry land, this is one dead fish.

An appealingly low-rent, if not earth-shattering, 26th century "Star Wars" with faint glimmers of "Blade Runner," "Buckaroo Banzai" and "The Manchurian Candidate" for good measure.

Zeroes in on retail mania with a flimsy wire hanger of a premise.

While the juvenile performances are bright and engaging, and there's no shortage of genuinely humorous observations about love and life in the Big Apple, there's an inescapable small-screen dynamic to the scope and rhythm of the production.

If "The Wizard of Oz" were reborn in the 21st century, it might look a lot like MirrorMask. A product of the Jim Henson laboratory, the film is endlessly inventive with creativity to burn.

A spirited comic drama, toplined by Moore's lovely performance.

Does a fairly good job of laying out the basic political motives behind Islamic terrorism. Unfortunately, as a drama, it has its narrative peak in the middle and quickly runs out of story afterward.

Will primarily strike a chord with Latina-skewing audiences with minimal crossover potential.

Meredith has woven together a half-dozen portraits of contemporary lives-on-the-edge in this quietly searing drama.

A drab, minor-key melodrama.

Clever and fast-paced thriller.

There is something really nasty about this cold, calculating exercise in mob psychology and human venality.

Doesn't depart from the inspirational coming-of-age formula. But it has got enough heart and disco-fever exuberance to connect with audiences.

Aims for whimsy and poignancy and mostly comes up empty.

Part parable, part wild west shoot-out, yet totally original, Dear Wendy is a powerful indictment of American gun culture.

This banal comedy is filmmaking of the lowest order.

Inconsequential but intermittently charming.

A choppily told tribute to the Apollo astronauts that makes striking use of never-before-seen archival images.

Their stories add up to an unflattering picture of how the U.S. chooses its soldiers.

The biggest surprise in Roman Polanski's Oliver Twist is that there are no surprises.

Instant fodder for drinking games, Dangerous Men is a grand testament to its filmmaker's undeniable passion, tenacity and complete lack of talent.

Leave it to Liev: Schreiber capably adds writer-director to his impressive resume with this winning take on the Jonathan Safran Foer novel.

Gwyneth Paltrow is triumphant in this somewhat derivative and overly stage-bound film.

Fairly competent but hardly engrossing.

A cut above the usual level of slasher films, with its overly convoluted plot enhanced by an impressive level of cinematic style. It also places a greater emphasis on surprising plot twists than gore.

Crossing the life-death divide, Reese Witherspoon and Mark Ruffalo are a winning pair in this smart and tender comedy.

Cage is brilliant.

A wondrous flight of fancy, a stop-motion-animated treat brimming with imaginative characters, evocative sets, sly humor, inspired songs and a genuine whimsy that seldom finds its way into today's movies.