Endearing performances buoy predictable film about love in the wake of divorce.

Bringing a much needed personal perspective to a war that has claimed thousands of American lives, the film nonetheless suffers from a hagiographic quality that, from everything we hear expressed about its self-effacing subject, would have disturbed even him.

Although it is overlong, it manages to be fascinating for much of its running time. But it also disappoints on many counts, providing another example of hype outpacing actual achievement -- a syndrome that Salinger himself would probably have deplored.

Although there is incident in the film's second half...it doesn't build to the level of compelling drama, leaving the film in a quiet, temperate realm that scarcely makes the pulse race.

A dynamic breakout performance from Gina Rodriguez helps this rap-infused drama about a young Los Angeles Latina overcome its patchy storytelling.

While rambunctious and passably humorous, this offspring isn't nearly as imaginative and nimble-minded as the forerunner that spawned it.

Speaking his (Rourke) lines in an unintelligible accent that occasionally requires subtitles and wearing a white suit that never seems to get bloody even when he’s stabbing people to death, the actor brings an undeniably fascinating strangeness to the otherwise familiar proceedings.

Watching a bunch of people take a drug trip is seldom either entertaining or edifying, but Chilean director Sebastian Silva manages to make it at least tolerably amusing.

The filmmakers’ intent to depict them as “normal guys” mostly succeeds, primarily due to their not inconsiderable charm.

Only God Forgives is a hypnotic fugue on themes of violence and retribution, drenched in corrosive reds.

Although ragged in its presentation and frustratingly unfocused in its storytelling, Babe’s and Ricky’s Inn is an endearing cinematic valentine that pays well-deserved tribute to a vanished musical institution.

Although it sketchily touches on many provocative issues -- the inhumanity of this form of incarceration, the relationship between the artist and subject -- Herman’s House fails to explore them in a fully satisfying manner.

A film that (whatever massive efforts were required to work around [Paul Walker's] absence) is as stupendously stupid and stupidly diverting as it could have hoped to be had everything gone as planned.

Davey’s tortuous emotional distress, while generically relatable, seems more appropriate to a younger teen rather than a young woman who’s practically a college freshman. This curious disjunction impacts the performances as well, which are adequate but rarely persuasive.

Revenge of the Nerds is primarily the story of outcasts getting their just rewards, and that is always a satisfying movie ingredient. Nonetheless, this scattergun, often scatological film is filled with extensive racial stereotypes, which may offend some moviegoers.

More a filmed haunted house than a movie, the picture is in love with the cobbled-together monsters on offer and will engender similar emotions in many horror buffs.

All of the cast members deliver smooth, capable performances, but this sequel clarifies why Howard has become the biggest star from the original ensemble. (He also gave one of the strongest performances in Lee Daniels’ The Butler this past summer.)

Ambition markedly outstrips achievement in The Congress, a visionary piece of speculative fiction that drops the ball after a fine set-up.

A lovely film that makes little emotional connection.

Sleek and engrossing, though awfully drawn out and short on psychological complexity, this is a straight-up police action thriller that adheres to a very familiar Hollywood template.

A stylishly made but unyielding drama.

The sometimes forced if well-intentioned social proselytizing is alleviated by the well-drawn relationships among the central characters.

It’s all absurd in a way that is typical Besson. But it’s also undeniably entertaining, and it marks a relatively pain-free way to kill, if not three days, at least a couple of hours.

Manages to be reasonably diverting even as it proves inevitably minor in its impact.

This reflection on the past, love and death through the prism of layers of theatrical endeavor is both serious and frisky, engaging on a refined level but frustratingly limited in its complexity and depth.

An ordinary look at four extraordinary kids, Scott Hamilton Kennedy's Fame High sticks firmly to convention but will please viewers who can't help but want the doc's sympathetic teens to escape the heartbreak most would-be artists face.

It all barrels along with a certain good-natured brio, even if ultimately falling short of bringing much that's new to what's already an overstocked table.

The film’s restricted scope of analysis and limited selection of sources threatens to undermine its conclusions.