By combining flamboyant suspense with a sunbaked slice of life and lots of good mean fun, Director Smight makes every clue a pleasure to follow.

For closeup conflict and emotional kick, the Frost/Nixon movie tops the play. But neither can match the tension and weird poignancy of the original interviews -- reality TV of the highest, queasiest order.

Disobedience, based on a novel by Naomi Alderman, cuts deeper than your standard forbidden-love story, largely because the actors are so attuned to their characters’ anguish.

Screenwriter Frederic Raphael has managed to preserve the book's broad vision while clarifying its bucolic speech. His most valuable ally is Director John Schlesinger (Darling), who displays the best sense of Victorian time and place since David Lean in Great Expectations, alternating his stars with a brilliant cast of minor players who serve as a Greek chorus in tragicomic peasant roles.

At its best moments, Thor weaves a spot of magic from the complex science of $150-million fantasy-film technology.

This complex, heartbreaking film recounts the brutal struggle of one couple to survive.

The film gives Jones (Oxford) a chance to take control of its emotional center, and she seizes it with spectacular subtlety. She proves that behind this Great Man movie is a woman – an actress – who’s every bit her man’s equal.

Pariah should be a special, important film for gay teens and their parents.

As a story about how New Yorkers get by, making marriages and family relationships work in one of the toughest cities of the world, it’s both smart and entertaining.

Franco Zeffirelli's film is plenty pretty. It almost works as a cloak-and-bodkin adventure

This anti romantic and anti-comic -- it's not as funny as Delpy seems to think it is -- movie may appeal to the dark side of your immune system.

If the people responsible for A League of Their Own had tried just a little harder to avoid easy laughs and easy sentiment, they might have made something like a great movie. As it is, they have made a good movie, amiable and ingratiating.

Wants to contain multitudes -- high ideals and high tech, the poignant and the silly. Doing so, it becomes a lexicon of modern filmmaking. It could be its own creature: Super-Generico. That's not the worst thing for a movie to be, but it's not quite Marvel-ous either.

A fairly standard exercise in claustrophobic menace. It is also an exercise in style.

Jason Patric is the chief sleaze; Ben Stiller adds to his gallery of wormy guys; and Aaron Eckhart is the doleful husband who, when asked who his best lay was, unabashedly answers, "Me." [24 August 1998, p. 85]

The Beaver is serious about portraying mental illness. And whatever your opinion about Gibson the man, so is Gibson the actor.

This is a messy movie, sometimes repetitive, sometimes too compressed and allusive. But that's like saying Ty Cobb was not a very good sport -- irrelevant in comparison to the horrific fascination of his story.

This is a modest, clear sighted film, and it profits considerably from a lack of the bravura landscape photography that most directors would have used to puff up a movie set in Australia.

Its high-bounding excesses of action simultaneously satisfy and satirize the passion for heedless viciousness that so profoundly moves the action film's prime audience, urban adolescent males.

When it sparkles, which is often, it’s perfectly enjoyable.

The Zero Theorem is a spectacle that demands to be cherished — as long as the society Gilliam portrays is a satire, not a prophesy.

The Iron Lady is a clever and oddly touching entertainment.

There may be no role Barrymore is better suited to than that of sanctimonious environmentalist.

Even if Gladiator II is essentially an unapologetic retread of its predecessor, all of these actors are fun to watch—though none stands taller, literally or figuratively, than Denzel Washington, as slave-turned-schemer Macrinus.

If the premise sounds tired, what’s surprising—or perhaps not—about The Contractor is how well Pine carries it.

Vivid, relevant and of elevating scariness.

All the components are there. No wonder In the Land of Blood and Honey is the most compelling, heartfelt movie Jolie has made in years. She isn't in it, but she's all over it.

In its purposeful accumulation of depravities, both individual and institutional, the director's non-style has an honorable payoff that's rare in modern Hollywood cinema: the story's weight could come close to burying you in despair.

The Beach Bum is barely a movie; it’s more of a joyous squiggle adorned with a paper cocktail umbrella, a “What did I just see?” dollar-store trinket. But in these dark times, it’s just the ticket.

The differences between the two Assaults--the new one's pretty good, the old one near great--are of tone, style and perspective.

A gentle, charming movie and really a parent's dream: a kid's movie that doesn't involve action sequences or explosions. Yet you wish the filmmakers had adhered to Mr. Quimby's no-nonsense point of view and found a way to make this family slightly less squeaky-clean.

Declaration of War is about being under siege from illness, but there is light at the end of the tunnel. This modern-day Juliette and Romeo find their own tragedy, but are not poisoned by it.

Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again is terrible. And irresistible. How a movie that’s almost not even a movie can be both of those things at once is one of the mysteries of filmgoing, and one of its puckish pleasures.

My Old Ass is a bit crazy. It’s also winning, in the gentlest, sweetest way.

The picture is sometimes wayward and unwieldy, its dialogue creaky and awkward, like an amateur’s attempt at scrimshaw.... But in a movie climate rife with superhero reboots and rehashings of childhood favorites, it’s a small marvel that In the Heart of the Sea exists at all.

I don't want to oversell You Kill Me. It is not going to leave you breathless with laughter. But I don't want to undersell it either. For an hour and a half it exerts its own preposterous reality, making you believe it -- and like it.

Motion capture, which transforms actors into cartoon characters in a vividly animated landscape, is the technique Spielberg has been waiting for - the Christmas gift, or senior-citizen birthday present that he's dreamed of since his movie childhood.

The Boys in the Band is anything but a relic. This version, produced by Ryan Murphy and performed by the same cast that appeared in the play’s 2018 revival on Broadway, is like an unusually strong telescope, giving us a clear and vivid view into a not-so-distant past.

The full-bodied performances of Merad and Darroussin give everyone - everyone with an indulgence for old movies about old values - a reason to see this Well Digger's Daughter.

Fredric March, ably assisted by Miriam Hopkins and Rose Hobart, is magnificent as Hyde, and he gives Jekyll a stilted Victorian elegance which, being a little false, makes Hyde's existence seem more credible.

With a welcome mixture of juice and grit, the movie dramatizes the lingering conundrums of young people in the time of the Vietnam morass.

But the film is keyed to Posey's performance: perfectly brittle, faultlessly false. As the most toxic of this family of vipers, she creeps and stings, and no one dares look away.

The film may be manipulative in its construction, and cliché-ridden in some of the incidents it recounts, but it has a good, large heart.

Persona (the ancient Latin word for mask) is too deliberately difficult to rank with Bergman's best. But in an era when the director who dares to repeat himself is rare indeed—when the cinematic world is full of one-shot wonders, Bergman's consistency is itself refreshing.

This loose retelling of Carlo Collodi’s weird and often unsettling 1883 fantasy novel (the screenplay is by del Toro and Patrick McHale) is a little too long, and hammers away too eagerly at its central idea: that fathers who expect too much of their sons can do untold emotional damage. Even so, del Toro’s creation is clever and lively and just strange enough to keep you guessing what’s coming next.

A brisk and entertaining indictment of the Bush Administration’s middle East policies before and after September 11, 2001.

An agreeable time-waster for the onlookers and its star. The Rum Diary isn't a corrective to Johnny Depp's kid-centric career, more like a vacation from it, in a resort where the visitors are strange, the natives are restless and the flow of alcohol endless.

We should hail a movie that recalls creepy political thrillers of the mid-'70s, back when some films were made for grownups and the comfortable catharsis of a happy ending was not required -- think of the panoramically cryptic worldview of "The Parallax View" and "Three Days of the Condor," and of course, "Chinatown."

It all sounds absurd and simplistic, but I dare you to watch the joyful delirium of the big dance number, set to an old Fred Astaire tune called "Things Are Looking Up," and not to feel an unexpected sense of rosiness. This movie may contain endorphins.

The picture could use a little more dramatic tension; in places it goes a bit slack, losing its way on the path to its conclusion. Even so, its refusal to push the usual buttons is one of its finest qualities. Back-alley scare stories serve their purpose, but Call Jane has something else in mind. This is a story about women getting the job done when they have no one to rely on but one another.

The genius of Ghost in the Shell is that you don’t have to care about cyborg-anything to enjoy it. In fact, you’ll probably enjoy it more that way.

Bringing Gonzo to his senses gives the Muppets briskly economical opportunities to satirize government, media excesses and cult sci-fi's more tiresome tropes.

The slight but captivating indie-comedy The Kings of Summer has the ragtag look and feel of a movie made in some teenager’s basement

A slim but likeable little romantic comedy that feels like a sweeter cousin of HBO's Girls.

If it isn’t a great movie, it’s at least a fascinating and thoughtful one, an even-handed film that doesn’t need to resort to extremes to paint an accurate picture of what America and the world are up against right now, in terms of one particular past and possibly future president.

It’s one of those movies you watch not necessarily for its whodunnit complexities, but for the pleasure of watching a group of actors having fun, in a storybook English-countryside setting complete with happy, well-kept flower beds and cemeteries dotted with gravestones both ancient and new.

So a tip of the hat to A Good Old Fashioned Orgy, a frequently very funny movie about planning and executing exactly what the title describes.

This is a story about a seemingly unforgiving landscape that’s actually giving back every minute, once Rona reopens herself to its windswept language.

Mel Gibson, directing for the first time, presents this deeply wet material in a reasonably cool and dry manner. But his film is in desperate need of smarm busting -- something, anything that would relieve the familiarity of its characters, the predictability of its structure, the bland failure to challenge its perfect correctness of outlook. [30 August 1993, p.63]

What a concept! Mad Max meets The Cosby Show. What a surprise! It works better than a fastidious mind might imagine. One reason is that Mel Gibson himself has been recruited to play Lethal Weapon's lethal weapon, Los Angeles Police Detective Martin Riggs. [23 March 1987, p.86]

Two of Us keeps you guessing where it’s headed until the very end. But it’s not giving too much away to say that it’s about the unconscious dance steps a person takes as she moves toward the person she calls home.

I'd take any woman in my life, ages 10 to 100, to Letters to Juliet and my guess is we'd both leave with a little Italian glow.

It is good to see Connery's grave stylishness in this role again. It makes Bond's cynicism and opportunism seem the product of genuine worldliness (and world weariness) as opposed to Roger Moore's mere twirpishness.

The new Panda has a bright palette, an amiable vibe and enough vivacity to keep kids entertained and any accompanying moms from bolting for "Bridesmaids."

O.K., Ritchie mistakes flash for style. Perhaps that's the price you pay for storytelling exuberance. If he keeps making films as down and witty as Snatch, we may learn to forgive him.

Vengeance is a small but ambitious film, and the murder mystery is its weakest element: Novak has so many threads going that he doesn’t quite know how to tie them up. But he’s made a shrewd satire that’s a pleasure to watch.

The picture is worth catching for the delicate and toxic nuances of Rudd's performance. And one of its funniest corollaries is that it shows how hilarious and instructive a star this perennial supporting player can be.

Ordinarily such trespasses against truth would be enough to condemn such a movie, but Rhames' gravity and grace, Voight's pinched anguish as he wills himself to do right, the moving work of actors like Don Cheadle and Esther Rolle do much to redeem this film for human if not historical reality.

Refn's mix of grindhouse horror with sweetie-pie sentiment is a recipe mastered by Takeshi Kitano (and, in his own way, David Lynch), but this director's brew is simpler, more direct, less cerebral and less heartfelt. To invest oneself emotionally in the central relationship, or the movie itself, would be akin to investing oneself emotionally in one's car. But when the car looks this good and drives this fast, why not?

Zola’s comic absurdities are entwined with its horrors in a way that almost shouldn’t work. But Bravo—who co-wrote the script with actor and playwright Jeremy O. Harris—shows a lightness of touch in navigating the story’s quicksilver tone shifts, and the movie’s two leads bring their best.

It’s a love letter to the gorgeous, disorderly patchwork that is New York. It’s also a story about how we all need to reinvent ourselves as we age, and part of that is to be more forgiving of ourselves.

On its own, Captain America is a modestly engaging little-big movie in the median range: well below the first "Iron Man," somewhat above "X-Men: First Class."

The screenplay, with credits shared by Gluck, Keith Merryman and David A. Newman, is predictable, plotwise. But it is elevated by energetic dialogue, the sexual chemistry between the leads and the fact that the miscommunication that keeps bliss at bay - there's always one in a rom-com, and usually it is annoyingly unbelievable - is plausible.

Concrete Cowboy—directed by Ricky Staub and adapted from a novel by Greg Neri, inspired by Philadelphia’s real-life Fletcher Street Urban Riding Club—is your classic story about an irritable young man redeemed by an animal, and the embrace of a community. But it’s satisfying even so, largely because watching Elba is such a pleasure.

Although 3 Faces is far from Panahi’s best work, it’s still a solid primer on how much a skilled filmmaker can achieve with very few resources.

But if you can see past the thicket of dollar signs surrounding Hudson Hawk, you may discern quite a funny movie -- sort of an "Indiana Jones" send-up with a hip undertone all its own. [10 June 1991]

Chow Yun-fat, the epitome of swaggering suavity in John Woo's Hong Kong crime films, wears his role as a good-bad cop dapperly in this good-middling drama set in Manhattan's Chinatown.

The picture is frisky and casual; it doesn’t try to be something it’s not.

The blend of digital animation and live action is first rate.

I don’t think you could tell this story properly or honestly without being forthright about the horrors of the Pacific Theater, and as Gibson dramatizes them, they put Doss’ actions in jaggedly sharp perspective.

Despite its novel milieu somehow remains trapped in genre conventions. It's still basically a boxing picture, not essentially different from dozens of other movies about life in and around what the old time sportswriters used to call "the squared circle." Mamet's circle is, alas, just a little too square.

Even after The Ice Road overcomplicates itself, there’s enough gas here to keep the thing going, including some nicely sustained bridge-crossing suspense and several fine demonstrations of stunt dangling.

A mini-showcase of smart, thoughtful contemporary horror.

There are a few longueurs, and moments when the plot trips, like Jeremy, over its own complications. But The Secret of NIMH is more important as Bon Bluth's declaration of dependence on a form of popular art that can infuse every corner of the imagination with its rainbow light.

So Twilight isn't a masterpiece -- no matter. It rekindles the warmth of great Hollywood romances, where foreplay was the climax and a kiss was never just a kiss.

Accepting Pawlikowski's mood of poetic seriousness may be a chore for some. Others will find this creepy little sonata a dream or nightmare worth succumbing to, and believing in.

The new film is more an embellishment than an improvement on the snazzy Raiders.

Sleepwalk is oddly soothing, like a cup of camomile tea before bedtime.

This is a big, often quite scary action movie, with tons of creepy computer-generated imagery that's right up there with Voldemort in terms of physical nastiness, although less powerful emotionally.

It has plenty of charm and is filled with astonishingly intimate footage worth seeing on the big screen but is sketchy on details and dumbed down by cutsy, anthropomorphizing narration.

It’s both intimate and almost comically egotistical—yet Branagh has clearly poured so much love into it that you can’t be too hard on him. It’s hard to resist the movie’s affectionate energy.

Cotton is that rarity in the horror genre: a genuinely intriguing character.

It's like a restaurant where you go for the food and go back for the atmosphere. Or for the waitress. [13 July 1995]

DiCaprio, here as in "The Departed," proves himself the most watchful and watchable actor of his age. Since his teens, he has known how to make moral dilemmas seem both profound and sexy, and at 32 he just keeps getting better.

With a two-fisted script by John Milius (who later wrote Apocalypse Now and Red Dawn), Huston and Newman created a raucous, Rabelaisian, revisionist western of the sort popular at the time.

The Mastermind is a sneaky, undulating movie; it’s perhaps even less direct than Reichardt’s usual brand of sly, behind-the-beat filmmaking. But O’Connor’s slippery charms hold the picture steady.

The lumpiness of The Good Lie’s progression – from infancy to adulthood, and from the horrors of war to gentle social comedy and back again – proclaims a respect for facts and truths that can’t be molded into a smooth narrative.

World War II was a historical event, but also a movie genre, and Fury occasionally prints the legend. The rest of it is plenty grim and grisly. Audience members may feel like prisoners of war forced to watch a training-torture film.