Staggeringly misjudged in virtually every department, from the wannabe effervescent script to Johnny Depp's dopey hairdo.

More than even the most faithful of the earlier episodes, this film feels devoted above all to reproducing the novel onscreen as closely as possible, an impulse that drags it toward ponderousness at times and rather sorely tests the abilities of the young actors to hold the screen entirely on their own, without being propped up by the ever-fabulous array of character actors the series offers.

Dead Awake, now receiving a limited theatrical release, is the sort of B-movie effort that so screams "direct to video" that it's a wonder they don't hand you DVDs as you enter the theater.

The film starts out as a gentle Hollywood satire, shifts abruptly into a comedy of (bad) manners, turns into a crime story and deviates into a suicide attempt before it reverts to a Hollywood satire with a happy ending. No Hollywood satire should ever have a happy ending.

The film does achieve moments of catharsis, but it can be heavy going.

Far less daring than her 1999 "Titus," which took an electrifying, stylized approach of a lesser-known play, The Tempest in comparison looks disappointingly middle-of-the-road.

So like much of this film, the viewer is turned into an observer. You never feel close enough to the action, either in the ring or in the kitchens, living rooms and tough streets where the story takes place. The characters engage you up to a point but never really pull you in.

The simple but affecting film begins a weeklong award-qualifying run Friday before opening in stateside art houses Jan. 21, and is worth a look for its gutsy and commanding central performance.

One ticket buys you cowboys, samurais, gangsters, ninjas, spaghetti Westerns, Hong Kong martial artists, knife throwers and even Fellini-esque circus performers. But like kimchi pasta, some things aren't meant to mix.

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

It all ends up being a half-hour too much of a just okay thing.

After slipping badly with the second installment two years ago, the Narnia franchise does a full-on belly flop with this third.

Well-made and acted Coen Brothers remake lacks the humor and resonance that might have made it memorable.

Indeed, White Swan/Black Swan dynamics almost work, but the horror-movie nonsense drags everything down the rabbit hole of preposterousness.

Remains mostly fascinating even in an amateur storyteller's hands.

Filmmaker Javier Fuentes-Leon's delicately and sensuously illuminates this collision of contemporary sexuality with centuries of dogma and tradition. At times, he interjects magical realist elements into the story, which makes it confusing rather than lifting it to a higher plane of understanding.

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

Contains enough fascinating archival footage to make it worthy of interest.

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.

Although involving, this remake of a recent French film never reaches the anticipated heights of excitement and suspense.

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

It merely recycles 1987's "Broadcast News" with only a single reference to YouTube.

In retelling the still-astonishing story of the political career of Eliot Spitzer, a shooting star whose spectacular crash might forever obscure his accomplishments, Oscar-winning documentarian Alex Gibney has all the ingredients for a potboiler: greed, corruption, sex, power, overweening ambition and jaw-dropping hubris.

Liman outfits the film with spy-thriller packaging worthy of his "The Bourne Identity," so the film probably will attract above-average coin and possibly awards attention.

A hilarious farce and a brilliant takedown of the imbecility of fanaticism.

(Perry) style is too crude and stagy for Shange's transformative evocation of black female life, and his moralizing strikes exactly the wrong notes to express the pain and longing that cries out from her heated poetry.

This tedious exercise in abstraction by Belgian filmmakers Helene Cattet and Bruno Forzani well apes the visual stylization of such filmmakers as Mario Bava and Dario Argento without bothering to provide anything equivalent in terms of theme or content.

They don't make movies like Jolene anymore, and that's a good thing.