Designed to capitalize on the title and premise of the original but offers little to those who fondly remember it.

This is a good premise for a comedy, but somewhere along the way, it got diluted and turned into a sappy, feel-good story of family togetherness.

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.

Let's Go to Prison ultimately feels as long as a stint in the big house.

This thoroughly repetitive, ill-conceived and poorly executed effort -- with an emphasis on the word "effort" -- defeats these two talented people more often than not.

The charisma-endowed Washington and Sy do all they can to make the proceedings engrossing but even they are hard-pressed to make it interesting.

Viktor would be campy fun if it wasn't so relentlessly tedious.

Director/co-screenwriter Pearry Teo succeeds in investing the silly proceedings with spooky visual stylishness, providing enough scary demons and possessed mannequins to deliver the requisite jump scares. Unfortunately, the film also features sound, which results in the audience being able to hear the inane dialogue accompanying the familiar horror tropes.

It is full of the signifiers of musical devotion but lacks the hummably acerbic insight of the best music it namechecks.

For all its vividly and realistically rendered graphic violence and gore, The Basement is an example of torture porn at its most ironic. It threatens to bore its audience to death.

Racially insensitive, politically incorrect and beyond crude.

Vaughn Stein's Terminal blends tropes from several sorts of crime flicks into a soundstagey affair that's more brittle than hard-boiled.

It's all very familiar in that Blair Witch kind of way, with neither the characters nor situations proving remotely interesting.

Several people get wrongly accused of being responsible for somebody's death — there's as much undeserved guilt floating around in this picture as in a Fundamentalist kid's puberty years — and all three of our aforementioned protagonists find they have family issues that need working out. All are broadly drawn and unconvincing, like everything else in this pandering supernatural romance.

Despite the high-stakes drama, there's nary a compelling moment throughout, and some of the characterizations, especially Stormare's villainous Sanitation Department honcho, are so absurdly one-note that it's hard not to think that the film is meant as parody.

The general air of slipshod incompetence thus torpedoes the intriguing concepts underlying Lewis's screenplay.

Clearly nothing but a paycheck project for all concerned, this is definitely the least and hopefully the last of a franchise that started amusingly enough a decade ago but has now officially overstayed its welcome.

What's most disturbing about "Bank" is its lack of ambition. Maybe Jenkins will take more chances in the future. If he's lucky, this stinker will be quickly forgotten.

The wholly amateurish doc offers much that has been explored more effectively elsewhere; though it makes a few fresh points as it gets into its second half.

A sense of heaviness, gloom and complete disappointment settles in during the second half, as the mundane set-up results in no dramatic or sensory dividends whatsoever.

Combining the ludicrous with the lurid, Twisted is twisted all right.

Actually offers some decent scares before descending into typical horror film bombast.

Once the initial round of breast-feeding and rectal thermometer bits is fired off, the picture starts to give off the funky whiff of unattended Pampers.

Depicting the effects of a mysterious, ethereal stranger on the residents of a small town, Change in the Air proves frustrating and dull for most of its running time, displaying unwarranted confidence in its ability to cast a spell.

Amongst the cardboard-cutout supporting characters, Lauren Graham brings a welcome deadpan sensibility to the overeager proceedings.

After multiple "Saw" franchise releases, writer-director Darren Lynn Bousman goes it alone for 11-11-11, with at best tepid results elaborating an unconvincing premise.

Should well succeed in attracting their literally faithful audiences, although its heavy-handed proselytizing and soap opera-ish storytelling will prove a turn-off to those who don't pray on a daily basis.

Don’t Sleep practically begs audiences to defy its ill-chosen title.

The formulaic script by Steve Koren doesn't manage to exploit the absurd premise with any discernible wit or invention, and the star is left floundering.

Onscreen, it somehow manages to be at once wildly overblown and terminally boring.

This is a film that just very expensively sits there onscreen with nothing ever seeming even remotely at stake. It has no weight or substance and delivers no impact of any kind.

A towering heap of nihilistic nonsense that plays like a cornball "Children of God."

Safelight squanders the efforts of a talented cast who are unable to lift the material beyond its clichés.

The mangy humor provides a steady stream of laughs, but Look Who's Talking Now won't be confused with the better breeds of film comedy. [3 Nov 1993]

The Choice is the cinematic equivalent of staring at a Hallmark Card for two hours.

The by-the-numbers story never achieves its aimed-for grandeur or intensity, and the striking Turkish locations prove far more interesting than the characters.

Roth’s messy storytelling is so anxious to get to the next blast of rote action — amped up by Steve Jablonsky’s hard-working synth and orchestral score and lots of shoddy CGI — that the characters have scant opportunity to form real bonds.

A wrongheaded, utterly incompetent, and nearly laugh-free satire.

The only people sure to love this concoction are those working for Rio's tourism bureau.

A lame action-comedy that seems ready made for undiscerning late-night cable viewing.

It is an airless and stilted endeavor driven by a mechanical screenplay (written by Matt Sazama & Burk Sharpless and Claire Parker & Clarkson). Its lack of imagination would be astounding if it wasn’t so expected.

It should surprise no one that, as Hell Fest comes to a close, Evil Hoodie Man pulls a Michael Myers disappearing act. This leads to a narrative twist so ridiculous that all non-syringe-pierced oculi will roll.

Elba, who recruited his former Luther director Miller into the project, gives the film more dignity than it deserves, and Henson delivers a performance of complex emotional shadings. But their fine work is utterly wasted in this B-movie exploitation thriller that would barely make for passable viewing on late night cable television.

Quickly paced and based on a novel, and creepy, idea, the film fritters away its potential by delivering only a modicum of horror and compounding that disappointment with some creaky performances.

Morrissey gives a stiff, awkward performance, while Stone moves dangerously close to overplaying the femme fatale. There is little if any intrigue in the story or the characters. Even the murders don't even seem to matter much.

The Squeeze is bound to appeal to aficionados of the sport. But despite the fact that it's (loosely) based on a true story, it fares less well in dramatic terms.

A misconceived washout of a darkly gothic story of madness, addiction and child abuse made all the more unpleasant by Gilliam's trademark intense visual style.

A muddled and routine murder mystery tricked up with a science fiction gimmick that wouldn't pass muster for a "Twilight Zone" episode. The writing is poor, but the direction is even poorer. This is a film to delete from one's memory bank.

Zoom is a movie that would make Dr. Frankenstein proud. Put together with parts from so many other movies, the thing positively clanks.

Although not exactly original in its aspirations or execution, the film's engaging performances and occasional funny moments lift it a notch above the pack of similarly themed fare.

Mistaking arrested development for enlightened innocence, Waiting for Forever is an indigestible hash of whimsy, drama, romance and, for good measure, crime.

Manages to be simultaneously offensive and bland.

Its release calculated to coincide with the X Games, Supercross: The Movie is advertainment to the extreme.

And to be fair, Cusack doesn’t phone it in. He gives the part his all, displaying his usual expert deadpan comic timing while delivering the weak quips in Carmine Gaeta and Luke Davies’ screenplay. But it’s disheartening nonetheless to see him working so hard to enliven such inferior material.

Achieves a certain cinematic distinction by outdoing "Dumb and Dumber" in sheer grossness and detail with its depiction of the unfortunate effects of explosive diarrhea.

Despite its noteworthy cast who presumably had some time to fill between better gigs, this is the sort of instantly disposable B-movie effort that Quentin Tarantino would have chucked in the wastebasket after a first draft.

This war-horror movie basically plays like "Blair Witch" in Afghanistan.

An oddity as awkward as its title, Angels With Angles is writer-director-star Scott Edmund Lane's would-be valentine to old-school showbiz comics, wrapped in a silly adventure-romance involving Cuban cigars and, yes, Fidel Castro.

Depicting the very long, violence-filled night that ensues after a group of young people trespass in a creepy, abandoned prison, Against the Night proves as generic as its title.

River Runs Red is neither substantive nor thrilling enough to prove satisfying.

A compelling and disturbing drama about some elemental male issues.

This middle portion of an intended trilogy will only play to the converted who have already seen Part I, and then only to the most gullible among them who will swallow mediocre filmmaking for the sake of ideology.

The cheap and cheerful picture has its humorous moments thanks to Steven P. Baer's broad but buoyant script and a supporting cast of character actors who know how to hit a good line home.

Alien Outpost doesn't even manage to do justice to its thematic conceits, failing to weave in its current day parallels in sufficiently thoughtful fashion.

Director Simon West aims for a kind of Jason Bourne or Mission: Impossible feel, but he falls short in budget, star power and explosive spectacle.

Freelance fails to deliver on every front. Worse, it barely seems to try.

Much of the original cast and creative team have reunited for this wholly unnecessary sequel, which once again proves that oversized animatronic animal figures, no matter how homicidal their behavior, are more laughable than scary.

Ragged, uneven and potholed with some dire dialogue and performances.

Part adventure saga, part elaborate home movie, the documentary showcases both the emotional and physical pitfalls faced by this emotionally fraught crew.

When a slasher pic can't exploit a woodchipper for more sadistic thrills than we get here, it shouldn't expect moviegoers to salivate for a sequel.

Replacing the first two films' simplistic, man-on-the-run premise with a stuttering plot comparatively light on action and stuffed with red herrings and inconsequential characters... Besson's team has signed off the trilogy with a whimper rather than the kind of unfettered bang delivered by the first two films.

No one doubts that the country faces major challenges in the next four years, but there is one safe bet: The future is unlikely to be affected by this simplistic documentary.

A cut below its predecessors.

The film’s uneasy mixture of melodramatic and supernatural elements quickly devolves into a frequently risible genre mashup.

Using the Desperate Hours template that has fueled countless thrillers since, Survive the Night is a particularly forgettable example of a tired subgenre that, like so many of Willis' recent efforts, squanders his still estimable movie-star charisma.

After a very effective opening scene, it starts to go off the rails and finally derails completely.

Beyond the dazzling "first contact" sequences seen in the trailers, Skyline is a spasmodic and incoherent shambles hampered by an astoundingly stupid screenplay.

The character deserves better, and so does the audience.

The execution, however, leaves something to be desired, as this effort seems more visually muddled and choppier than previous installments.

14 Cameras is another pointless exercise that equates sliminess with terror. The film is creepy, all right, but not in a way that proves remotely edifying.

Cain has crafted a modest picture, filmed in Canada, that too often feels like a very elaborate episode of "Gunsmoke."

Director Christian Alvart ("Pandorum") is unable to invest much stylization into the proceedings, and Ray Wright's by-the-book screenplay only serves as a reminder of the innumerable demon-child movies that have preceded this one.

To the director’s credit, the animated sequences are richly rendered, making the most of the rather stiff and plain-looking originals (though, if you want to get nitpicky, an early gag poking fun at the fact that Playmobil legs are unbendable is soon forgotten) and offering up a plethora of settings that help compensate for the lack of good writing.

The film will leave viewers feeling emasculated in more ways than one.

You have to credit the filmmakers for at least acknowledging their level of dreck during the final credits, when Lovitz rhetorically asks, "This was a complete waste of time, wasn't it?"

Proves to be more prone to malfunction than dysfunction.

Lacks sufficient substance to be of more than quickly passing interest for all but the most devoted fans.

Working from a flawed premise with characters lacking credibility and plot turns more moronic than funny, the movie flatlines in about five minutes.

In addition to its unconvincing, cliché-ridden storyline, Alina takes itself too seriously.

Without Antonio Banderas, The Big Bang would be a whimper of a movie, too awful to watch.

This passably palatable film never hits any real high notes.

Koechner tries hard, but ultimately scores few laughs except for when, like Ferrell, he bares his comically less than toned, fleshy body.

The film is the product of the same production company responsible for such previous Willis duds as "Vice," "The Prince," and "Fire With Fire." Either the Die Hard star enjoys working with them, or he's being blackmailed.

Writer-director James Bird’s second feature tells an entirely familiar story with a dash of transvestism thrown in, but doesn’t do anything interesting with that twist – and the lumpen screenplay is drag enough.

Marred by juvenile humor and ersatz emotion, the film, directed by Pitipol Ybarra, is so bad that an even worse Hollywood remake seems inevitable.

It’s a loud Oz hodgepodge that never adheres to a prevailing tone long enough to allow viewers to emotionally engage with those characters in spite of some admittedly inspired CG flourishes.

Without creating fully fleshed characters or truly involving conflict, the film aims instead to provoke howls of recognition and tears of gratitude by appealing to very basic notions of parent-child love.

From its uninspiring title -- and certain turnoff for young males -- to its limp slapstick and uneven acting, A Cinderella Story arrives with a dull thud.