Taking satiric aim at a familiar target, conformity, Australian playwright Tony McNamara's film debut is by turns incisive and broad.

Packed high with explosive action and loaded with high-stakes jeopardy, Con Air charts a generally sound narrative course, although it hits some story turbulence before it hits its climactic jackpot.

Although Criminal retains its source material's cleverness and intricate plotting, something seems to have been lost in the translation.

Despite the sterling performances by the two main actors, the movie tends to lose pace in the second half and needs more secondary characters. But for a first time in the director's chair, Samuell shows a deftness of touch that bodes well for the future.

In the midst of this didactic, self-conscious movie about a high school shooting comes an extraordinary and intense performance by a young actress named Busy Philipps, which elevates the whole picture.

It's too loose and casual, all too willing to trade the writer's trademark wit and literary mischief for slapstick comedy.

The film would make a better fit on television or at one of Disney's theme parks. In cinemas, Heart & Soul is an odd duck, out of sync with the current generation of documentarians whose films dig deep into stories and issues the media generally overlooks.

Incident at Loch Ness manages to cross "Project Greenlight" with "The Blair Witch Project" in a way that makes one pine for the originals.

A meticulously rendered romantic drama, very well acted and featuring solid production values and location work that makes New York feel like one of the movie's characters. The only problem is the story is rather flat.

While it has its moments of pure Farrelly inspiration and swell performances from Matt Damon and Greg Kinnear...the patented blend of the outrageous and the sweet that has become the brothers' trademark struggles to find the desired balance here.

This comedic jape delivers some sharp jabs at obvious targets, namely the boosterish excesses of American religiosity.

The familiar formula feels significantly watered-down the third time around.

Resembling a short story more than a narrative feature, the film tells its slender story in leisurely fashion, relying more on mood and atmosphere than dialogue or character development.

Suspect Zero has enough going for it to eventually develop a cult following. But compared to "Silence of the Lambs" and "Seven," it's still the minor leagues.

Tambini and Sandoval lived in the community for a year and present the story with great immediacy. The film could have benefited from some deeper analysis of why these people feel their way of life is so threatened.

Where the best Coen brothers comedy is a matter of finely tuned tone, diction, attitude and visual rhythms, everything in The Ladykillers feels out of kilter. With Tom Hanks delivering -- arguably -- one of the most perplexing performances of his career.

Cruises along agreeably on the easy chemistry between Ben Stiller and Owen Wilson, who step in where Paul Michael Glaser and David Soul left off.

The film will still prove a tonic to those holding left-of-center views.

Pleasant and atmospheric family romp, offering enough mildly chilling thrills to keep everyone entertained during its brief running time.

As drama the film mostly serves to illustrate the two sides of this crucial social debate in Africa.

A respectable and at times an exciting film that should appeal to males of all ages, history buffs and -- yes, it's inevitable -- patriots.

The plot, of course, is merely an excuse for an endless series of gags, and the percentage of them that score is fairly high. But since the jokes are based over and over on the fact that Lloyd and Harry are really, really dumb, a certain repetitive factor sets in.

Ending with neither a bang nor a whimper, the finale falls somewhere in between. It's an improvement over its concurrently shot, babbling predecessor, but it ultimately fails to capture any of that jaw-dropping sense of exhilaration that made the original such a must-see event.

While far too much of the film is staged discussion and smug political jousting, there is savage and lethal black irony.

Character eccentricities and off-kilter group dynamics play out with a comic vengeance.

The film is an initially insightful portrait of modern corporate society that unfortunately lapses into melodrama.

Rue plays her with just the right combination of sweetness, sexuality and sass.

The film becomes markedly more entertaining with every appearance by Walter Hagen (Jeremy Northam), Jones' archrival, a raconteur and bon vivant who, though fiercely competitive, enjoyed playing while drunk and clad in a tuxedo.