In terms of real horror, nevermind sexual-politics provocation, "Grave" can neither re-create its predecessor's impact nor compete with stranger new beasts like Lars von Trier's "Antichrist."

The production is over-stuffed with cutesy split screens, jarring dream sequences and a pushy score by Bright Eyes band members Nathaniel Walcott and Mike Mogis that succeed in dragging the proceedings from merely cloying to increasingly annoying.

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

Jonathan Lynn's lamentable black comedy Wild Target again shows that attractive and charismatic actors can do nothing to save a movie that's charmless, pointless and witless.

A rote captivity drama with aspirations of sociopolitical relevance, As Good as Dead has nothing to say about torture or racism and little excitement to offer as compensation.

(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.

An aimlessly wandering DIY-indie that will send viewers retreating to popcorn movies at their local multiplex.

Feste, who has one previous effort as a writer-director, last year's "The Greatest," fails here to do the most basic thing -- give an audience a rooting interest, or any interest at all, in these four troubled people.

Speed-Dating seems designed to exploit the black indie theatrical circuit but hardly merits even a DVD release.

Extremely crude in its technical elements, the low-budget film does reveal stylistic ambitions through devices like frequently reverting from color to black-and-white film stock. But the shaky narrative style and broad characterizations undo its effectiveness.

This lame comedy about a big doofus who enters the fight game manages to take every cliche in the book and render them even more cliched.

Features sitcom-style stock characters and situations, not to mention the sort of ethnic stereotypes to be found in TV ads for fast-food Mexican restaurant chains.

The most banal and indulgent of Gus Van Sant's periodic studies of troubled kids, this agonizingly treacly tale comes off like an indie version of "Love Story" except with worse music.

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.

A "non sequel" to Alex Cox's 1984 classic "Repo Man," the crazily plotted and deliberately garish Repo Chick only serves to provide further evidence of the cult director's diminishing talents.

Not only is this film's form clichéd, so is its content.

Mistaking arrested development for enlightened innocence, Waiting for Forever is an indigestible hash of whimsy, drama, romance and, for good measure, crime.

As it thuds along from one wolf attack to the next, Catherine Hardwicke's first film since taking leave of Bella and her toothy friends adamantly refuses to provide any wit, humor or fun.

Starring a painfully awkward Katherine Heigl, One for the Money mostly resembles a failed television pilot.

An alien invasion flick that evidently expects dramatic shots of a depopulated Red Square to make up for a flatlining screenplay and the absence of even a single compelling character.

There is no purpose to the film other than random blood splattering amid scenes of bondage, primitive savagery and S&M eroticism. The film is numbing and dumb with its hero indistinguishable from its villains.

Arriving eight years after the lame third installment in Dimension's profitable series, this seems like far too little way too late.

Lincoln's script has no knack for the pacing of cinematic exorcisms, and the truncated climax he does offer is short on action and scares.

Whatever gothic originality the first Human Centipede possessed is altogether lacking in this sorry follow-up.

As sequels go, Piranha 3DD has barely enough heft to squeeze out 83 minutes of ho-hum entertainment, although it faithfully delivers plenty of menacing fish and bouncing boobs, as amply advertised.

The lameness of the gags and dialogue and the film's frequent deep dives for the bottom at the expense of real comedy speak to desperation in Hollywood to figure out the audience for contemporary naughty comedy.

The result proves to be as appealing and effervescent as a flute of flat champagne.

Despite a couple of unconvincingly upbeat tacked-on moments at the end, Project X basically reads as nihilistic, as not believing in or standing for anything. Not even fun.