The big shave is the starting point for a clever, if somewhat too clever, film from French critic, novelist and documentarian Emmanuel Carrere. La Moustache could be clipped down to Franz Kafka-meets-Jerry Seinfeld, where a whole slew of absurd petite calamities befall our everyday hero, triggered by his trim.

Da Vinci never rises to the level of a guilty pleasure. Too much guilt. Not enough pleasure.

A backyard ecological comedy outfitted with some fine, silly slapstick and clever animal characters.

Beautifully shot and well acted, the film might well cause controversy among fundamentalist believers as a provocative allegory challenging the power of faith.

Lemming does possess a mordant humor as it watches characters spin out of control. But the payoff is slight.

A grim little drama about a young woman's experiences with a left-wing cult, Alison Murray's debut feature suffers from disjointed storytelling and myriad other problems, including a bizarre reliance on modern dance sequences to interrupt the action.

Lacks the powerful focus of the filmmaker's debut effort and often flounders under the weight of its melodrama and contrivances. But it also boasts many well-observed moments and features stellar performances by its youthful cast.

Among the willing cast, only Jacinda Barrett and topliners Josh Lucas, Kurt Russell and Richard Dreyfuss manage, just barely, to suggest a third dimension to the script's cursory character sketches. But that won't matter to audiences craving a disaster thrill ride.

Has the feel of a contemporary screwball romance, if not the crackling one-liners of classic screwball. But Lindsay Lohan and Chris Pine make a charming star-crossed couple, and tweens and teens will find enough plot reversals to keep them hooked.

The film is filled with deeply unpleasant and stupid people whose vapid speech is largely incomprehensible due to thick regional accents.

While Giuliani Time offers a wealth of important information that many might have long forgotten, its impact is diluted by its heavily biased nature and lack of balance.

What could have made for particularly potent satire in the hands of an Albert Brooks or a Christopher Guest arrives in the form of a politely benign family comedy by first-time director Scott Marshall.

Solid family fare. Like its source material, the Missouri-shot Saving Shiloh is down-home country without condescending to hicks from the sticks.

Veteran actor Richard E. Grant makes his writing and directing debut with Wah-Wah, a startling portrait of his own startling and unusual childhood, growing up in Swaziland in the waning days of the British Empire in Africa.

You learn as much as you need to know to understand Gehry's architectural process and to appreciate his enormous contribution to modern art and architecture. Which is not a bad thing. Just sketchy.

Another highly entertaining portrait of attractive young Europeans looking for personal and professional fulfillment amidst gorgeous locations.

In his feature debut, "Lost" creator J.J. Abrams, who got the job on the basis of "Alias," takes the driver's seat with both feet on the accelerator.

With an "Animal House"-ish deportment, Art School likely will entertain a sophomoric audience and etch some winning college-kid figures, but art house audiences will be disappointed by its paint-by-numbers storytelling.

Solomon crafts a quality horror piece from strong performances and effects. The chief disappointment of An American Haunting is that it doesn't exploit more opportunities for the sublime subtlety of performances by Sissy Spacek and, especially, Donald Sutherland.

A blandly generic family film.

Edward Norton serves as lead actor and producer, but even his star power won't help this misfire reach a wide domestic audience.

A fascinating, mythological western.

Neither as breezy nor as edgy as it pretends to be.

Its deadly serious take on the subject may inspire more titters than anything else.

Shades of "Like Water for Chocolate" and "Chocolat" -- but unlike the latter's tender Juliette Binoche-Johnny Depp romance, the ordained Rai-McDermott union fails to generate any convincing heat, and no amount of cardamom pods or lotus root is going to help.

Greengrass has made not only a thoroughly fact-checked film but a film that uncontrovertibly comes from the heart.

Spends an inordinate amount of time ogling the tight, lithe bodies of its young female characters. Thus, what might have appealed only to teen girls might well have crossover appeal to leering young boys as well.

Effectively anchoring the picture is Keke Palmer's lovely lead performance as Akeelah Anderson.