It's familiar, drawn-out shtick, and the humor lacks the subtlety of the first and best Ice Age, but there are some visually inventive high points.

Never less than gripping.

For all its aesthetic deficiencies and self-promotional aspects, it at least provides a valuable and important message.

An appealing coming-of-middle-age comedy, My Afternoons With Margueritte exhibits a pleasantly light touch even when dealing with some fairly weighty issues.

Zokkomon gives Indian youngsters not only their first super hero but, even more tantalizing, he is a young boy "terrorizing" susceptible adults in a small village to the increasingly delight of the town's children.

It's messy and leaves an unusual taste on the palate, but Bellflower has a strange, ugly-sweet appeal that couldn't have been produced without the schlocky entertainments that have channeled the imaginations of gifted but impressionable kids for decades.

How To Live Forever is less about how to delay or defeat death than a film about what gives life meaning.

Haroun is uninterested in big war scenes and is best at evoking the little details of life.

A gritty, low-key hybrid of horror film and road movie that aptly demonstrates the stylistic flexibility of this undying genre.

The spotlight illuminates a well-chosen quintet of subjects, all wholesomely passionate practitioners of a readily dissed form of entertainment and each at a different point in their career.

Informative if selective documentary will eventually find its natural home on the History Channel.

Fly Away is an affecting portrait of a single mother and her severely autistic daughter.

By keeping things simple and understated, director Chris Weitz and screenwriter Eric Eason have crafted a little gem where humanity is observed with compassion, not condescension.

The movie is fast, funny and light on its feet, dipping less into politics or religion than into cultural quirks and characteristics.

The result is a stylishly executed but punishing ultra-realistic thriller that might be classified as family torture porn.

A quietly captivating portrait of an unlikely character, Buck is as modest as its subject and wins viewers over just as easily.

So strong are the emotions - and, yes, the melodrama - that Snow Flower and the Secret Fan represents one of Wang's best films to date.

Tomnay skillfully shifts the film's initial tone from suspense to dark comedy so that the transition never feels forced.

If the lighter scenes sometimes lean toward sitcom cuteness, Jacobs has a sufficiently deft touch to get away with it. The territory often seems closest to that of NBC's unjustly short-lived "Freaks and Geeks," which is by no means a bad place to be.

Deeply felt first-love tale offers convincing performances and a fine-tuned storytelling sensibility.

Morris clearly invested so much time and energy in McKinney's story because he saw her as emblematic of our crazed times. Others might wonder whether the sad saga deserves quite this much attention, but there's no denying the film's morbid fascination.

Mitchell still manages to plant a flag on this well-trodden territory by steering more toward drama than comedy, though he scores points on both fronts. Where he exceeds those films are sensual visuals that recapture summertime adolescence in all its vivacity.

Occasionally borders on hagiography, but it nonetheless provides wonderful insights into the book's social and literary importance as well as its author's personality.

Informative and insightful for films buffs without sacrificing accessibility to the casual fan, "Cameraman" is essential viewing for anyone interested in film history.

A sweet 'n' sassy period comedy with a "Juno" sensibility and the soul of a "Little Miss Sunshine," the hard-to-resist Dirty Girl announces the official arrival of Juno Temple.

Duvall can play an avuncular cowboy sage in his sleep, but there's truly no one on Earth you'd rather see dishing out homespun aphorisms, so it's pointless to resist the pleasure of watching him do what he can do better than anyone else. Baker and Melissa Leo, as the waitress' mom, are not asked to exhibit a fraction of their talent, but they further class the joint up.

Nicholas Stoller and Jason Segel's latest collaboration offers a more relatable rom-com scenario while generating laughs that should still satisfy "Forgetting Sarah Marshall" fans.

While Hooper favored shock value and jump scares, Kenan and cinematographer Javier Aguirresarobe construct far more fluid sequences as the camera glides and hovers over its subjects, reserving the most impactful shots for the climactic scenes, particularly a concluding sequence that’s particularly thrilling.