Simon Curtis's watchably third-rate biopic doesn't try to sort out truth from fabrication; that would be like "teaching Urdu to a badger," as the short-tempered Olivier - played by a whole-hog-slicing Branagh - might say. Better to print the legend and be done with it.

You still can't help admiring the project's ambition; an odd combo of "Babe: Pig in the City" and Godard's "Histoire(s) du cinéma," Hugo is the strangest bird to grace the multiplex in a while.

If the movie falls just shy of our highest mark, this is because Cronenberg is tamping down on his usually naturalistic performances - everything feels vaguely mad-scientist-ish.

A fascinating experiment is about to happen, and who doesn't want to be part of a little fun? That rarest of birds - a b&w silent film - is set to swoop into multiplexes. Trust us, it won't bite.

It would be a Christmas miracle save for one lump of coal: an ear-shattering Justin Bieber song over the end credits. Gotta sell something to the kids at Yuletide.

"Rosemary's Baby" it's not, but color us stoked that a Twilight movie even strays into evil-fetus territory.

Essentially a queer-cabaret-cum-performance-art-spectacle, the Croquettes went from local phenomenon to international sensation, opening up sexual mores in then-repressive Brazil and wowing Paris before their AIDS-fueled downfall.

You could get whiplash watching this bipolar drama jerk between extremes: For every extraordinary scene - such as an authentically awkward exchange between Bosworth and estranged dad Thomas Haden Church - there's a sequence or three that might be extended collegiate acting exercises.

Tyrannosaur won't translate into entertainment, nor as a wake-up call to the dark side of humanity - though it does work nicely as a tart slice of hard-bitten acting; the entire cast is superb.

O'Grady, at least, gives a nuanced performance, even if she appears to be doing an uncannily accurate impression of Kristen Wiig.

The movie meanders like its dissatisfied, part-time pothead protagonist, not wisely but too well.

As a micro-to-macro tour of Germany's fraught relationship with its Jewish citizens, In Heaven Underground couldn't be more connective; as a straight doc, its aesthetic choices couldn't be more confusing.

Whether sleuthing or smacking around thugs, Sisley makes a dashing hero, but this glossy action flick is heavy on tedious convolutions and depressingly light on character depth, suspense or political-economic intrigue.

The jarring juxtapositions only heighten the enigmatic air of the film's subject; even when he's right in front of us, he seems to be plotting his next wily act.

As this engaging, if rote, doc points out, the name Eames, much like Victorian, now defines the style of an era. Yet how many of us knew that the industrial designers behind those midcentury molded mod chairs were an eccentric married team?

Tomboy may add little to conversations about gender or sexuality. It has everything to say, however, about that period of childhood when identity is at its most malleable.

A veteran of the Saw franchise, Darren Lynn Bousman trades torture-porn antics for an old-fashioned Euro-horror vibe, complete with old dark houses and creepy maids; he then wastes what little suspense he generates with endless dorm-room philosophical debates about faith versus atheism and religio-conspiracy theories so far-fetched they'd embarrass Dan Brown.

The trek to get there is sluggish at best, torturous at worst. March away, penguins. Far away.

This is an exquisite portrait of a family navigating the wreckage imparted to them by one of their own.

The film is merely a series of random celebrity cameos and shameless product placements. (In one case, both-thank you, Jared from Subway!) But there are a few moments of inspired absurdity, mostly provided by a surprisingly energetic Al Pacino.

The filmmaker's work is infinitely more exhilarating when he's relieved of the need to be in any way serious. He should play dumb more often.

Subversive elements or not, this is essentially little more than a TV soap opera spiced with hot-button topics (gender issues, clandestine gay trysts), and the combo of TV melodramatics and mumblecore-ish aesthetics eventually wears out its welcome.

The story's half-baked environmental themes become more prevalent as Letters from the Big Man progresses to its back-to-nature finale, which unfortunately distracts from Munch's consistently sure hand with his actors.

It is during Melancholia's second half, after a ruinous conclusion to the wedding, that the real magic happens, with our heroine hardened into a wry, cynical Cassandra - the voice of Von Trier himself.

What does resonate is how the film captures McCartney in laid-back ambassador mode, walking around in midtown and turning big names into awestruck fanboys.

This full-clip misfire reminds us of a valuable lesson: Not even talent, tastefully dressed tough guys and a metropolitan backdrop dripping with after-hours menace can compensate for a complete lack of momentum or drama.

Into the Abyss is too self-admiring of its own loose ends to come to the indictment that would put it in the company of "The Thin Blue Line," but these personalities stay in your head - which is the whole point.

Content to be a typical piece of tween rural-versus-urban fluff from the old Hannah Montana: The Movie mold. Such lazy complacency is almost enough to make you see red.