The film's sure-to-be-brief theatrical release is a mere stopover on the way to basic-cable eternity.

Maybe it's this soapy saga's cocktail of the worst of both the Lifetime network and self-consciously quirky indie cinema, but the strong supporting cast (including Jenkins and Blythe Danner) looks downright queasy in every frame.

The problem, however, lies squarely with Portman herself, who (Oscar nod or no) seems unlikely to ever achieve a tone between histrionic and affectless.

Big on emotional highs but skimpy on details, Dressed rallies behind the orphan but fails to reveal the artist.

Just as soon as that rarest Lebowskian blend of casual pursuit and big-world conspiracy begins to emerge from the fog, Cold Weather appears to lose its nerve (or run out of money).

It's such a haphazard, absent-minded history lesson that you'd think the filmmakers had ingested some of the era's pharmaceuticals before concocting this tribute.

Into Eternity has the grandeur of ominous suggestion, but might have benefitted from a director more creatively unbound-an Errol Morris ready to play around at the end of the world.

The movie's first hour happens to be its most absorbing. Director Alexei Popogrebsky sets up the quiet tensions between his two generationally divided characters like a chess match pocked with occasional power grabs.

We certainly need all the ecological jeremiads we can get. But must they be so numbingly pedantic?

More than a few moments feel implausible or overwrought; yet the movie, about two people so desperate to be alive, is eerily haunting.

Once upon a time, raw talent was enough to get your name in lights; as this look at the underside of showbiz reminds us, you also need to know how to sell it.

The film has the look of unflinching truth, yet it too often feels like a calculated ploy to stoke viewers' liberal-guilty consciences.

While Araki has finally perfected a shoegazey visual aesthetic that's simultaneously sensual and too cool for school, it's hard not to feel that his reprise of yesterday's greatest snits borders on being stuck in a rut.

Yip's chop-socky sequel does manage to up the (admittedly modest) ante of the original.

Hollywood's hocus-pocus machine has turned out swill like this before, but even ultra-observant Catholics will find their interest waning. Hammy acting should make nonbelievers of the rest.

It's a pleasure to watch the granite-faced action star do his own stunts, particularly a death-defying leap from a bridge. Yet everything feels hurried.

Unfortunately, Mumbai Diaries addresses these weighty concerns with such delicacy that they barely make an impact, thus calling further undue attention to the creakiness of the warhorse plot.

Remember the "Seinfeld" episode in which Jerry and Elaine try to become friends with benefits, and set up unsustainable ground rules for their new arrangement? Imagine it rewritten by the Romantic Comeditron 2000 as a profanity-laced schmaltzfest, and you've got this tone-deaf dud.

If The Woodmans has something profound to say-and it does, unwittingly-it's that art can't raise a child solo.

An hour and half of comparable barbarity follows-all of it monotonous, none of it enlightening.

The major change is that the domestic, Eun-yi (the great Jeon, star of "Secret Sunshine"), is now more of a victim than an aggressor.

Her (Steen) emotional acrobatics are reason enough to sit through Applause's parade of pain, though it's a movie to admire rather than enjoy.

The Way Back then takes its time, creeping through gorgeous locations in Bulgaria, Morocco and Pakistan, and basically feeling like a two-hour-plus version of the desert scene from "The Good, the Bad and the Ugly."

Never saccharine, My Dog Tulip does justice to the rare experience of heartfelt, mutual love in any form

How does one remain an unapologetic fan of Vaughn, abrasive though he is, even as his material fails him?

This tale of a rich brat (Jonet) is a banal, tone-deaf dud.

Every bit as unshakable as "An Inconvenient Truth," Werner Boote's documentary isolates the mysteries (and possible dangers) of that ubiquitous titular substance.

The question remains: Is Mugianis a shaman or sham?