The film is at its most potent delineating Hefner's role in the American civil rights movement, going beyond the pages of his magazine.

Doesn't exactly bring anything new to the genre, it's no less effective than its predecessor in expertly conjuring an air of low-tech-style dread.

Convincingly argued and extremely polished, it has theatrical potential for auds whose reservoir of worry about humanity's future hasn't already run dry.

While the film is too convoluted to stir boxoffice excitement, it offers some rewards for sophisticated moviegoers

One is hard-pressed to imagine who the audience might be for this actually quite mesmerizing film. Its violence is way too intense for the art film crowd, and its glacial pacing and fascination with brooding on nothing will surely alienate those who've come for the blood and guts.

The results are entertaining -- up to a point.

Filmmaker Leon Gast ("When We Were Kings") paints an entertaining portrait of the still-working 79-year-old photographer.

Decidedly stimulating in its own right, at least in the early going.

Joel Schumacher's Twelve, the latest expose of self-indulgence among privileged teens, is sleek, giddy fun.

Although at times the film gets bogged down in psychological murkiness, the relentless pace and brooding charisma of its star overcomes its narrative deficiencies.

James Newton Howard's music picks up its comic cues perhaps a bit too swiftly and loudly, but little of this detracts from the movie's many pleasures.

Despite a virtually unplayable premise, The Switch overcomes this handicap to turn itself into a friendly, offbeat romantic comedy.

Centurion delivers some large-scale action but plays almost like a Roman-era Western in its depiction of a few soldiers trying to get home alive after the slaughter of their comrades.

The ensemble cast -- ranging from an Oscar winner (De Niro) and faded action star (Seagal) to a B-movie vet (Fahey) and tabloid fodder (Lindsay Lohan, not exactly playing against type as a drugged-out, hell-raising sexpot) -- pretty much offers something for everybody.

The production comes by its authenticity naturally -- and not only because several of the cast members (fascinating faces all) happen to be related.

Though it drags here and there and is a bit flat in places, the film is solidly made and for the most part quite involving.

In a fine ensemble with many well-drawn smaller characters, Bleibtreu ("Run Lola Run", "The Baader-Meinhof Complex") as the hapless brother, Unel ("Head On") as the fussy chef and Bederke, as a waitress, all stand out.

What's cinematic experimentation without a few failures in the lab? Maybe that's why Howl is so appealing: The filmmakers don't get everything right but their passion for Ginsberg's genius and their excitement over trying to deconstruction a literary master work is contagious.

Although the tentative performances of his two human leads proves less satisfying, and the story's not-so-underlying sociological context can be hard to miss -- it takes place along the U.S.-Mexico border -- the overall picture still impresses.

Megamind is snappy good fun.

Women will love this, and men won't mind the eye candy either, so it looks like this Screen Gems release can't help becoming a hit.

Stripped for action without a moment wasted on unnecessary dialogue, exposition or nuances.

A passably entertaining hodgepodge of old and new animation techniques, mixed sensibilities and hedged commercial calculations.

After her foray into historical costumers with "Marie Antoinette," Sofia Coppola makes a happy return to "Lost in Translation" territory in the cutback charmer Somewhere, which illuminates the emptiness of a movie star's life in Los Angeles through close observation and gentle irony.

Never achieves sufficient traction to go the blockbuster distance.

Jaw-dropping and surprisingly kind-hearted considering the circumstances.

Admirably resourceful, Prince of Broadway thrives in that increasingly fertile stylistic niche combining documentary and narrative aesthetics.

This sporadically engrossing mockumentary, which gets better as it rolls along, must have been planned way back before Phoenix bombed on "Late Show With David Letterman."

The film is always engaging, from the boyish horseplay of the young innocents to the bravado shown in multiple encounters to the involvement of the revered king in exile to the final toll taken by the increasingly ruthless Nazis.

This redemptive tale set against southwest Ireland's moody seascape holds its tangible charms.

It's a safe bet that exposure to the film should cause audiences to make room on their iPods for some serious downloading.

The real-life tale of a group of female machinists who took on the Ford Motor Co. in England and earned equal pay for women gets a rousing and entertaining telling in Nigel Cole's crowd-pleasing Made in Dagenham.

In the end, this is a smart movie that could have been smarter. The script feels like it was a draft or so away from total clarity and focus. But the energy of the cast and a dive into an unfamiliar world make the movie rather addictive.

Slick superlobbyist Jack Abramoff is the colorful subject of Casino Jack a similarly slick and undeniably entertaining true-life D.C. crime story, boasting a robust Kevin Spacey performance.

A clever DIY comedy that could be this year's "Humpday" for art house audiences in search of characters they recognize from their own lives.

Hatchet II earns bragging rights with buckets of giddily over-the-top blood 'n' guts in sequences that are as gratuitous as they are amusingly ridiculous.

Not hurting matters for foreign and Indian film devotees, the film features two icons of Indian cinema, Madhur Jaffrey and Naseeruddin Shah.

The final act hits like a gut-punch. Worst fears are confirmed, and the protagonist faces a moral dilemma no father should have to confront. Kormakur and his writers give their protagonist no easy way out.

The most illuminating nuggets come from playwrights, authors and journalists, including Tony Kushner, Terrence McNally, Larry Kramer, Michael Cunningham, Paul Rudnick, Dan Savageand the late Dominick Dunne, who helped get the movie version made.

Despite some choppy transitions and a few melodramatic moments that don't work, the film casts an effective, deepening chill.

Although its sendup of L.A.'s shallow, self-absorbed show business culture is not exactly revelatory, the film does deliver solid laughs, many of them thanks to Philips' wittily provocative, surprisingly hostile confessional ditties.

It generally succeeds, too, thanks to a visually energetic approach by director Jon Chu that keeps all the obligatory backstage/onstage bits moving fluidly.

Director Jaume Collet-Serra provides a steady flow of suspense and a very Polanski-esque feeling of paranoia.

Not a particularly deep portrait of its iconoclastic subject, this loving documentary should be of interest to aging baby boomers with long memories.

Played for laughs drawn from characters rather than funny lines, the Norwegian film is a charmer with Stellan Skarsgard for once in a role worthy of his attention.

Fast-paced and episodic, the film at times provides such a torrent of information that it becomes more wearisome than enlightening.

The outcome is a flamingly sexy soap opera whose satire on high society is sometimes as savage as Claude Chabrol's "La ceremonie."

There's a hint of 'Twin Peaks' and a large helping of the Coen Bros. in this offbeat, cleverly crafted French thriller.

As an allegory on power, corruption and rough justice, it has flashes of intelligence and political acumen.

Compared to his stellar hit "Ip Man" - a biopic on the Wing Chun master who tutored Bruce Lee - Wilson Yip's more lavishly produced sequel Ip Man 2 is a fistful of hits and misses.

The predicable, overlong romantic farce has enough sass and sex appeal to appease fans of stars Adam Sandler and Jennifer Aniston.

The movie has a cheerful good nature and a solid cast of youngsters - including Aimee Teegarden and Thomas McDonell - but any resemblance between this and real high school is, of course, purely coincidental.

Hop delivers plenty of wit, verve and surreal mayhem to entice even the post-adolescent crowd into this jolly (and strangely Christmas-like) Easter egg hunt.

Successful to a point (though seemingly unaware of the chuckles it produces in between shrieks), the movie has strong prospects with genre audiences but won't spawn a phenomenon resembling the filmmakers' previous franchise.

Voice work across the board is top-notch, with the Black Eyed Peas' will.i.am and Jamie Foxx adding sass to their smooth-talking bird buddies, and comic George Lopez solid as a party-loving toucan named Rafael.

The script makes no attempt to assert its plausibility or realism; it is, instead, refreshingly frank about what it is, a simple, workable framework for the melees and mayhem.

The co-screenwriter of "Kissing Jessica Stein" goes solo as writer and director with a romantic comedy that takes time to find its groove but steadily accumulates heart and humor.

Captain Jack Sparrow is back in excellent form for his fourth adventure in Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides, which is more serious in the hands of a new director, Rob Marshall, and thanks to Penelope Cruz it's also a good deal sexier.

It's not exactly "The Hangover," but the dialogue and situations often get distinctly gamey.

The Eagle is an engaging, if straightforward and one-dimensional.

Although scattershot in its approach and relying a bit too heavily on cutesy animation, Orgasm Inc. is an eye-opening exposé.

Entertaining and comprehensive in its account of the man's career.

Not everyone will wax lyrical about this enigmatic and troubling film, which is also Chan-dong's most slow-moving one. But those with an eye for reading between the lines can find layers of meaning.

Documentaries have been coming down on humanity so hard in recent years -- from "An Inconvenient Truth" to the latest Oscar winner, "Inside Job" -- that it's refreshing to bask in a bit of optimism coming from a nonfictional film.

Sticking to its simplistic, patriotic origins, where a muscular red, white and blue GI slugging Adolf Hitler in the jaw is all that's required, Captain America trafficks in red-blooded heroes, dastardly villains, classy dames and war-weary military officers.

The film is only "superior" though, not great. The themes feel shopworn and devotee of crime fiction can point to the any number of antecedents for these characters.

A risky bet that pays off solidly, Jodie Foster's much-delayed The Beaver survives its life/art parallels -- thanks to its star, Mel Gibson -- to deliver a hopeful portrait of mental illness that is quirky, serious and sensitive.

Like an old airplane (or spacecraft) jerry-rigged from scrap pieces and made air-worthy again, Super 8 has been patched together with 30-year-old spare parts to provide an enjoyable ride of its own.

Serves up all the requisite elements with enough self-deprecating humor to suggest it doesn't take itself too seriously.

Dragon Tattoo is too neatly wrapped up, too fastidious to get under your skin and stay there.

The impact of spectacular action on striking international locales is moderated somewhat by the repetitive nature of the challenges faced by this rebooted team of American agents.

A breezy, keen-to-please attitudes prevails, and director James Bobin (The Flight of the Conchords, Da Ali G Show for TV) moves things along with good cheer.

As she did in her breakthrough film Winter's Bone, Jennifer Lawrence anchors this futuristic and politicized elaboration of The Most Dangerous Game with impressive gravity and presence, while director Gary Ross gets enough of what matters in the book up on the screen to satisfy its legions of fans worldwide.

For longtime Wiig fans, this uneven, overlong, emotionally involving and discreetly ambitious film will represent a welcome and overdue step up from her popular sketch work on "Saturday Night Live" to something sustained and searching, not to mention pretty funny.

The six penguins cast in this amiable family comedy steal the movie -- along with any fish they can find -- although the film's star, Jim Carrey, does manage to hold his own. Barely.

Little kids will enjoy it all, while parents, when not checking their cell phones, will be thankful for the thoughtfully brief running time.

The movie suffers perhaps from too many characters and subplots but all the actors appear to have fun with their characters.

The Grace Card is a surprisingly hard-edged, faith-based drama.

Militantly superficial and revels overmuch in its campy gay sensibility, but is sporadically fun if not taken too seriously.

A steady supply of spiky humor and a game cast keep this cooking most of the way, though the pacing could have been tighter and the film seems as if it's about to end two or three times before it actually does.

To borrow from TV terminology, the series hasn't jumped the shark yet, but the strain of inventing bizarre deaths is beginning to show.

The movie does achieve something nearly impossible: Someone who doesn't even like the sport may care about Billy Beane and the 2002 Oakland Athletics.

A generic blast, Hobo with a Shotgun unspools like a spaghetti western but amped with enough testosterone to fill a video-game warehouse.

The pressure cooker plot calls for intense performances all around but first among equals are Winslet and Ehle.

Classy and professional throughout, the technical work gracefully holds all the threads together.

Whatever its missteps, this is a film that kids, middle-aged adults and grandparents can all see -- together or separately -- and get something out of in their own ways. There are precious few films that fit this description today and hats off to Spielberg for making one.

Arguably the director's least typical film, it doesn't dodge the potholes of earnest sentimentality and at times overplays the whimsy. But the uplifting tale has heart, humanity and a warmly empathetic central performance from Matt Damon.

Highbrow campus-comedy from long-lost Whit Stillman is a flawed but frequently hilarious comeback.

Stewart, selected for Marylou five years ago on the basis of her striking debut in "Into the Wild," is perfect in the role, takes off her clothes more than once and nearly always seems to be breaking a sweat, which kicks the sexiness quotient up high.

A compelling and disturbing drama about some elemental male issues.

It satisfies not only in the tradition of yarns boiled hard and wry, but as a savvy comment on fame and ambition.

Even at its most predictable, the winning characterizations and soulful insights into aging keep the handsome film on a warmly satisfying track.

The uniformly winning cast, led by Steve Martin, Jack Black and Owen Wilson, and the ultra-accessible touch provided by director David Frankel provide for a constant steam of gentle mirth, if not huge laughs.

One of the things making Goon so enjoyable is its fairy-tale suggestion that all humanity's violent impulses can be exorcized in a Zamboni-groomed ice rink.

It might even live up to that title: When it ends, you wouldn't mind a bit more, please.

A short and sweet outing pairing the Duplass brothers with mismatched screen siblings Jason Segel and Ed Helms, Jeff Who Lives at Home pulls back from the comedy of Cyrus in favor of character-defining vignettes and moments of grace.

Writer-director Richard Ayoade's feature debut is witty and quirky, with a gripping performance by Paddy Considine.

Stars Paul Rudd and Jennifer Aniston find themselves at home here, playing against a stock-raising performance by Justin Theroux as the charismatic libertine who prompts their adventure.