Less a history of a specialty that scarcely existed before the '70s -- men habitually donned wigs and dresses to double for women -- than a portrait of two women, one beginning her career and the other in the twilight of hers.

It's a fascinating story teeming with pride, arrogance, greed and overweening hubris, and Gibney attempts to give it all an added dimension by finding the archetypes of Greek tragedy among the sleazy deals and Ponzi-scheme financing.

This otherwise amiable family film plods whenever the action returns to dry land.

It's too fundamentally light-hearted to wallow in grinding poverty and despair.

The film is slow and somber during the windup but pretty scary in the follow-through.

Were it not for Kumar's luminous charisma, the film would be unwatchable.

A goofball gore picture with aspirations to cult status.

Ferociously entertaining.

First-time feature director Andrew Douglas, whose advertising background is evident in every frame, brings lashings of style but no sense of real horror to the recycled script.

The war between highly specific coming-of-age angst and icky-sticky overcoming-adversity cliches eventually brings the whole thing down.

Negrin's film is a well-deserved tribute to a principled man who dared to act when principles no longer counted for anything.

Raunchy without ever devolving into flat-out prurience, Berger's oddly sweet comedy perfectly captures the naivete of the era and the unexpected wholesomeness of some of its adult entertainment.

Hartley's score is lovely and he makes excellent use of digital video, but the film's paucity of provocative ideas is its undoing.

Clever though the premise is, the film's real strength is the smooth banter between Sam and Devon; it's never less than smart, often startlingly perceptive and always thoroughly convincing.

Palindromes read the same way backward and forward, and Todd Solondz' sour tale ends where it begins.

Dash and screenwriter Adam "Blue" Moreno abandon the stone-faced seriousness of the first film for a more playful approach, goofing on gangsta' poses and colorful hood-speak.

It's not a pretty picture, but it's an important one.

The greatest hits of '70s bar-rock soundtrack - "We're an American Band," "Right Place, Wrong Time," "Sweet Home Alabama," "Magic Carpet Ride" etc. - has a certain rollicking, kick-ass energy that, unfortunately, never rubs off on the movie.

If you're rooting for Barrymore and Fallon, then why not their team? In the movies, there are enough happy endings for everyone.

A giant leap forward in Stephen Chow's ongoing assault on Jackie Chan's status as reigning balletic clown-master of martial-arts mayhem, this extravagantly nutty crime comedy is a work of some kind of genius. Not everybody's kind of genius, to be sure.

With its porno plot, Undressed production values and ersatz "Will & Grace" banter that manages to be crude without being the least bit funny, Q. Allan Brocka's debut is a tasteless comedy that nevertheless leaves a nasty flavor on the tongue.

Like most anthology films, this thematically linked trio of shorts is a mixed bag.

Sternfeld's script, developed at the Sundance screenwriters' lab, is spare to the point of stinginess; individual scenes play beautifully without adding up to anything, stranding the actors in an emotional vacuum that drains the life from their performances.

With scenes that must surely rank among the most revolting ever committed to film.

Attal's characters are one-note position statements, which forces the unsubtle soundtrack - mostly American pop songs that range from the Velvet Underground's "Sunday Morning" to Radiohead's "Creep" - to bear the brunt of clarifying their thoughts and feelings. Without it, you'd be entirely in the dark.

If his ambitious first feature isn't entirely successful, it nevertheless poses genuinely provocative questions and opens a window into the way the 9/11 disaster looks from outside the U.S.

Filled with some of the most powerful poetry and shattering images ever to come out of warfare.

An offbeat and sometimes jumbled western adventure film. (Review of Original Release)

The film's rather shallow treatment of his art only reinforces the long-held opinion that Hockney is more a brilliant visual stylist than an artist of any great depth.

Offers a rare glimpse into the hermetic world of the Satmars.

The atmosphere is once again black, creepy and unsettlingly elegant, lending this twisted tale of psychological dominance and submission a patina of anxiety and dread.

But once you're good and drunk on the look, details like the tin-eared tough-guy dialogue (which sounds especially stilted issuing from flesh-and-blood mouths) don't seem so important.

The swooping helicopter shots, the POV camerawork from the front seat of a 800 hp trophy-truck and the propulsive soundtrack will have your heart racing towards the finishing line along with the drivers.

Too many musical montages break the momentum, but overall it's an engaging piece of work, regardless of which team you play for.

Antal's debut is a sharp, blackly comic hugely entertaining thriller.

The multitalented Jaoui and Bacri excel on every level; her direction is efficient and unobtrusive, their script dissects the nuances of corruption by celebrity with a razor-sharp scalpel, and they deliver a pair of subtly unsparing performances.

Queen Latifah's warmly formidable presence drives this amiable but poky comedy.

Hauntingly beautiful documentary.

Despite the sluggish opening, Kutcher and Bernie Mac ensure that this predictably plotted comedy of preposterous misunderstandings is occasionally quite funny.

By the time it reaches its fiery finale, the film feels less mythic than self-consciously portentous.

The terrific soundtrack, which includes the Only Ones' "Another Girl, Another Planet" and New Order's most excellent "Temptation," is heavily weighted towards the '80s, which is exactly as it should be.

Generous, slyly tough-minded documentary.

No amount of style or good acting can disguise the fact that this downbeat Israeli comedy is little more than a sudsy soap-opera with a distinctly unsavory aftertaste.

This is absolutely not a film for all tastes, but it's a masterpiece of pitiless power whose audacious, ambiguous climax strikes a note of insane romanticism as haunting as it is perverse.

Without Bullock, the film's frantic antics would be painful to watch; with her, they're just trivial.

A riveting account of one of the most extraordinary events in U.S. immigration history.

Hugely entertaining, globe-trotting documentary.

The film's utterly predictable dialogue and plot developments will leave most viewers cold. Ice-struck preteens are, of course, the exceptions.

One-scene guest star Sissy Spacek packs enough genuine madness into her brief screen time to make the surrounding film feel like so much listless play-acting.

It's all very well to say that laughter and tears are just a heartbeat apart, but both variations on Melinda's story bear the unmistakable mark of Allen's morose sensibilities.

Overall, it's a seriously flawed but impressive and promising debut.

It's a gripping, understated thriller with a solid emotional undercurrent that builds to an unexpectedly moving denouement.

The sci-fi wonders, including an army of shuddering robo-soldiers and one-man, steam-powered bombers with delicate wood-and-linen wings, are truly marvelous and go a long way toward making up for the film's erratic pacing.

Think of it as a dark, suspenseful scenario penned by Joseph Conrad and designed by Toulouse-Lautrec and Auguste Renoir, and jump right in.

The lives of three deeply unhappy New Yorkers crisscross in unexpected ways in writer-director Joe Maggio's uneven but strangely affecting film.

The amazing thing is how dull a movie crawling with gunfire, psycho tantrums and stuff blowing up can be when you just don't care what happens to anyone.

Though the script is best described as mechanical and it takes a while to get into gear, this computer-generated "reach for the stars" story is a well-calibrated piece of entertainment.

As contrived and pretentious as its title.

This cheeky fable rests on the slender shoulders of Etel and McGibbon, and the lovely, natural performances Boyle elicits from them are the film's real miracle.

It's essential viewing for anyone interested in the state of post-Apartheid South Africa.

The result, a dissection of the complicated dynamics of sexual and economic exploitation, is pitiless and occasionally inspired.

Grateful fans so enamored of traditional Irish folk music that they don't care how they come by it may enjoy John Irvin's folk-filled feature, but while there's lots of great Ceili music on tap, it's wrapped in a story so traditional that it's not especially interesting.

Cruz's willingness to allow her appearance to be so degraded for cinema's sake doesn't really help.

Its seductive stylishness is undermined by one narrative twist too many; by the time the last revelation has been unveiled with a "But wait!" flourish, the contrivances have entirely overwhelmed the characters.

The result is an unpleasant slog to an unrewarding conclusion that feels far longer than it is.

Surprisingly, it works: The overwhelming natural expanse of the New Mexico desert is perfectly balanced by the psychic space Charley and Arlene create - the space where all the real action takes place.

This feverish drama examines issues of faith and redemption through the practice of prayer intercession.

Despite the exotic locale, this is a coming-of-age tale that should be familiar to anyone raised on the tales of Jack London or Robert Louis Stevenson.

There's no downside to a reminder that not every beefy, God-talking sheriff is a bigoted cracker, and Kraus' short, no-frills documentary is a model of fly-on-the-wall filmmaking.

The sweet nostalgia of Travolta and Thurman's reprise of their "Pulp FIiction" dance-floor flirtation cuts through a lot of rubbish, including the Black Eyed Peas' smutty "Sexy."

This kind of gloomy razzle-dazzle isn't everyone's cup of mind-altering tea, but strong performances make it worth the effort to keep the time-tripping shenanigans straight until the surprisingly satisfying payoff.

Most of the occasional chuckles are provided by the spunky York, who really gives Diesel a run for his money.

Mortimer is riveting as the sympathetic but flawed Lizzie.

Though the clash between old-world parents and their American-born children is familiar territory, New Jersey-born, Taiwan-raised director/cowriter Bay-Sa Pan gives the conflict a culturally particular spin and elicits strong performances from her appealing cast.

But good intentions aside, Tucker and codirector Petra Epperlein only further confuse the issue: Their rap-video stylings and use of non-source music create the impression that you're watching characters trapped in a Tom Clancy Xbox game.

Warm and frequently very funny, Argentine director Carlos Sorin's third feature weaves together three story lines into one road-tripping adventure that's a joy ride from beginning to end.

Fox falters a bit with the narrative, but offers a fascinating treatment of the issues facing the descendents of Jewish victims and their German persecutors, as well as one of the most chilling birthday parties ever filmed.

The film's measured pace may put off impatient viewers, but the brilliantly underplayed ending is worth the wait.

Rarely have six hours spent doing ANYTHING seemed so rewarding.

Slight, genial documentary portrait of a man and his dream.

Unfortunately, this earnest but short-sighted documentary by New York-based painter-turned-filmmaker Stefan Roloff touches only the tip of a very large iceberg.

The film vacillates between inanity and flat-out lameness, and the decision to recut from an R-rated version to a PG-13 sucked out whatever life might have been left.

The film is never dull.

And if you can't figure out who [the bad guy] is the minute he first appears, you've either seen too few movies with mind-numbingly predictable plots or you've seen far too many.

This poky and indifferently plotted film isn't much of mystery.

Hrebejk's film remains clear-eyed and satisfyingly complex right to the bitter end.

Its power lies in the intense, subtle performances of the ensemble cast and Bellott's ability to keep the tangled narrative threads from becoming a knotted mess.

A sweet film with no big action moments may be a hard sell to young male audiences, but it's nevertheless a quality story that the whole family can watch together.

Music video-trained director Francis Lawrence whips up a witch's brew of gray-on-gray atmosphere, but for all the end-of-the-world mumbo jumbo, nothing much ever seems to be at stake.

S-s-s-smokin'? Hardly, this sequel to the 1994 Jim Carrey flick "The Mask" should have been snuffed out in the drawing room.

Beautifully shot and lushly scored, this may be one of the least P.C. love stories ever filmed. But it's one of the most deeply felt.

Indeed, Hirschbiegel himself seems reluctant to single out a protagonist, and finally settles on Junge.

What makes the film more interesting than it might have been, however, is the warm relationship between Glenn and Peter.

Ghobadi has little use for sentimentality, and never flinches from the fate of these children.

Given the dearth of outlets for short, noncommercial animation, fans of the form shouldn't miss this collection.

A welcome introduction to yet another facet of an artist who continues to beguile well into her seventies.

The meat of the matter is fight sequences, and rather than being goosed with now-common digital effects and Hong Kong-style wirework, it's all real and all breathtaking.

Gloriously seductive musical sequences seem suddenly hokey and self-conscious when they're staged in Western settings, and the songs' English-language lyrics are painfully banal.